Wren
Thursday night
He came today.
Five years. Five years I've waited. Five years of replaying that lecture in my head—the way his hands moved when he talked, the sound of his voice, the moment I knew he was the one who would see me.
And today, he finally did.
I knew it would be him. When they told me a new doctor was coming, a forensic psychiatrist named Thorne, I felt it in my chest before I even saw the name. A flutter. A warmth. Like something waking up after a long sleep.
Then I saw the name on the assignment sheet, and I smiled so hard I scared the nurse.
Dr. Cassian Thorne.
My Cassian.
I don't know when I started thinking of him as mine. Maybe from that first moment in the lecture hall. Maybe from the thousands of times I've replayed it since. Maybe from the dreams—the ones I don't always remember but wake from with my heart pounding and his name on my lips.
He's more beautiful than I remembered.
Taller. Sharper. His eyes are gray-green, like the sea before a storm. He thinks they hide everything. They don't. They hide nothing. Not from me.
I saw the way he looked at me in the yard. Through that window, with all that glass between us, I felt it. The catch in his chest. The way his hand pressed against the glass without his permission. He didn't know me then. Didn't know my name or my file or my crimes. But he felt me.
That's what matters.
That's what I've been waiting for.
Someone who feels me.
He asked about the murders today. They always ask about the murders. I told him the truth: I don't remember. I never remember. The nights they say I did things—those nights are just... empty. Like someone erased the tape. Like I was never there at all.
But I remember him.
I remember every word of that lecture. I remember the way his hands moved when he talked. I remember thinking: That one. He's the one who will see me.
And today, he almost touched my face.
His hand came across the table. I felt the heat from his fingers before they got close. I stopped breathing. I thought—for one insane, perfect second—that he was going to wipe my tears away. That he was going to be gentle with me. That he was going to cross whatever line he's been drawing in his head and just... touch me.
Then he stopped himself. Pulled back. Grabbed his pen like it was a lifeline.
He's fighting it. I can tell.
Good.
Let him fight.
Fighting means he feels it too. Fighting means I'm already inside his head. Fighting means that every time he closes his eyes tonight, he'll see me. My tears. My voice. My silver eyes looking at him like he's the only person in the world.
Because he is.
He's the only person who's ever looked at me and seen something worth looking at.
I have to get it all down. Every word he said. Every look. Every micro-expression. I'm building a map of him in these pages. By the time I'm done, I'll know him better than he knows himself.
I already know things. Things I shouldn't know.
I know he's lonely. The kind of lonely that lives in your bones, that follows you into sleep and waits for you when you wake. I know because I have the same kind.
I know he's scared. Not of me—of himself. Of what he might feel if he lets himself feel it.
I know he lost someone. A long time ago. Someone who mattered. Someone whose absence is still a wound that hasn't healed.
I don't know the details yet. But I will.
I'll know everything.
Then he'll see me.
Then he'll understand.
We're the same, Cassian Thorne. You just don't know it yet.
But you will.
---
Later
I woke up on the floor.
I don't know what time it is. Late. The lights are dim, the kind they leave on so we don't wake up screaming in complete darkness. My head hurts. My hand hurts.
I looked down.
My knuckles are scraped. Three thin red lines across the bones, like I've been scratching at something. There's blood under my fingernails. Not much. Just a little. Dried and dark.
I don't remember doing this.
I don't remember getting out of bed.
My journal is open on the desk. I don't remember leaving it there. I always put it under my pillow. Always. It's the only thing I have that's mine, the only place I can say the things I can't say out loud. I protect it. I hide it.
But it's on the desk. Open. Like someone was reading it.
Or writing in it.
I walk over. Look at the page.
The handwriting is mine. I'd recognize it anywhere—the way my letters slant, the way I press hard on the downstrokes, the way I curl my g's and y's. It's mine.
But the words...
The words aren't mine.
"Don't touch him. He's not yours."
I stare at them for a long time. The words blur. Come back into focus. Blur again.
I don't remember writing this.
I don't remember thinking this.
I don't even know what it means.
He's not yours.
Who? Cassian?
Of course he's not mine. He's not anyone's. He's a doctor. He's evaluating me. He's doing a job. The fact that I've been waiting for him for five years, the fact that I think about him constantly, the fact that my heart races when he walks into the room—that's mine. That's my thing. That doesn't make him mine.
So who wrote this?
And why does it feel like a warning?
I tear the page out. Rip it into tiny pieces. Flush them down the toilet. Watch the water swirl and swallow them.
Gone.
It didn't happen.
I go back to bed. Lie on my back. Stare at the ceiling.
But I can't sleep.
Because somewhere, in the back of my mind, I feel it.
That presence.
That warmth.
That thing that's been with me since the closet, since the dark, since the worst nights of my life.
It's closer than it's ever been.
And it's watching.
---
Friday morning
I didn't sleep.
I lay there all night, feeling it. That presence. That someone. They didn't speak. Didn't move. Just... watched. From somewhere inside my own head.
I wanted to be scared. Maybe I should have been scared.
But I wasn't.
Because for the first time in my life, I wasn't alone.
Not really alone.
There's someone in here with me.
Has been since the beginning.
I just never wanted to admit it.
---
Friday afternoon
Nurse Marchek gave me a strange look today.
I was in the yard, sitting on my bench, thinking about Cassian. About the way he'd looked at me. About the way his hand had almost touched my face. About the promise he'd made—I'm not going anywhere—and whether he meant it.
I must have been whispering. I do that sometimes. Talk to myself without realizing.
But when I looked up, Nurse Marchek was staring at me. Not her usual careful watchfulness. Something else. Something almost like fear.
I smiled at her. "Hi, Nurse Marchek. Is it time for meds already?"
She blinked. The fear faded, replaced by her usual professional mask.
"No," she said. "Not yet. Another hour."
She walked away fast.
I wonder what she heard.
I wonder what I said.
---
Friday night
I'm writing this by the little light they leave on. My hand hurts. My knuckles are worse now—more scratches, deeper ones. I don't know how they got there.
I don't want to know.
I'm going to try to sleep.
But first:
Dear whoever's in here with me.
I don't know who you are. I don't know what you want. But you've been with me my whole life, through the closet and the homes and the running and the dark. You kept me alive when I didn't want to be alive. You kept me warm when I was cold. You kept me company when I was alone.
I don't know if you're real. I don't know if you're just me, some part of me I can't reach. But if you are real—if you're listening—I need to tell you something.
I love him.
I've loved him since the lecture. I'll love him until I die. And if you're in here with me, then some part of you must love him too. Because you've been feeling everything I've been feeling. You've been there for all of it.
So please.
Don't hurt him.
Don't scare him away.
Don't write things in my journal that make me afraid of my own hands.
If you're real, be real with me. Talk to me. Tell me who you are.
I'm not afraid anymore.
I just want to know.
I'm putting the journal under my pillow now.
I'm closing my eyes.
I'm waiting.
---
Saturday morning
I woke up in my bed. Not on the floor.
My hands are clean. No new scratches.
And on my desk, in handwriting that's mine but isn't, one word:
*Soon. *