Even If We Break

by Marieke Nijkamp

  The wind outside sighs. The wardrobe creaks. Then another shadow, and one of the curtains tumbles down from near the window, scattering coins all over the floor. They’re rolling toward me like they did when they fell out of my cloak, and it’s like a nightmare.

  Like being haunted by your worst decisions.

  I’ve had enough. I’m done.

  Maddy will have to do without her pills. We have to get out, now. I have to get out.

  In my room, the mattress bounces. The bed springs squeak as if someone sat down.

  And my feet remain frozen by panic and fear.

  All I can see is my overly big suitcase, which is nothing more than a silent shadow. The coins on the floor are still rolling and spinning happily.

  I’m convinced, I’m convinced, if I hold my breath I can still hear someone breathing.

  Fingers pass through my hair.

  My heart slams into my throat.

  I take a step back, in the direction of the stairs, pushing myself close to the wall. I reach out to steady myself, and I turn to bolt.

  “You’re making things up again,” I whisper to myself. “There’s no one here.”

  “Wrong.”

  Here’s what no one has told you, what no one will tell you. To you, this world is real. The game master weaves it around you. It’s the greatest gift they can give you. They build the game. They are the game. They tweak and push and tease and draw out, to let every person who is a part of it have their challenge, to let every player shine. They create sorrow and joy and heartbreak.

  But that world shivers and crumbles. Sometimes, when the game twists in unexpected ways, even the best game master can be caught off guard, and they keep the world together with well-placed words and imaginary duct tape. Sometimes, when you all lose focus, the rules fall by the wayside, and they’re like tears in the fabric of that reality.

  And some days, like today, the worst happens. And parts of the world crumble and break.

  And the game master does too.

  Sixteen

  Maddy

  “Maddy? C’mon, we need you to be here. For Carter. For us.” Ever’s soft voice helps me to get my breathing under control, but the restlessness inside me doesn’t dissipate. My heart beats too loud in my ears. My hands are shaking, and my whole body has tensed to the point of pain and exhaustion. As if I’ve run a marathon—or as if I’ve run for my life. And I’m still in flight mode.

  I need to understand. I just want to understand.

  “Maddy.” Ever keeps their voice low. Soothing. Like they’re talking to a cat. “Listen to me. Focus on my voice. What do you see?”

  Their hand, hovering above mine. There but not quite touching.

  “What do you feel?”

  The cold from the porch creep into my bones. The roughness of the wooden planks.

  “What do you hear?”

  The sound of crickets in the grove somewhere. The wind chimes. Finn and Ever, breathing and worrying.

  “What do you smell?”

  Pine. Night. My own sweat.

  I start to laugh at that, without meaning to, but it’s so blatantly absurd. The narrow tunnel in front of me widens, a little. Enough to see Ever sag in relief.

  “Are you there?” they ask.

  “Maybe.” I bring my shoulders up to my ears. Clench my fists and try to slowly relax again. My throat hurts, as if I screamed for hours, but it may be a side effect from forgetting how to breathe. The world around us feels distant, as though there’s a veil between us that I still need to push through. Or perhaps I can stay on this side.

  I was doing so well. I hadn’t had a panic attack in months, and this is my second time today. Maybe painkillers aren’t a great coping mechanism, but I need the world to quieten again. The dark helps, but the fear and the anger and the worry and the pain are all too much. They push at me from the inside out.

  I don’t know how to deal with it, and I’m bursting at the seams.

  Ever reaches out a hand to me and pulls me to my feet, Finn at their side. “We need to go find Carter,” Finn says.

  We do. He went back inside before I could stop him, though I can’t remember the exact details. I was freaking out and pacing, and there was so much blood on my hands.

  I just need the world to quiet. I rub my hands on my tunic and the dried blood feels uncomfortable and flaky.

  Carter should’ve been back already.

  “C’mon.” Ever and Finn form a united front, impossibly determined to go back in.

  I don’t want to. I don’t know what kind of shadows the cabin holds. I can’t imagine I used to feel at home here.

  But still. Of course I’ll go in. Liva’s already disappeared. I’m not about to lose Carter too. I’ll go in, even if I really, really, really don’t want to.

  It’s just one step, and then another.

  Through the door. (I prop it open by putting one of the Styrofoam swords between the door and the frame. Just in case. I’ve hated that door since Liva and I got trapped in here that time, and I don’t want that to happen again. I don’t want to be here to begin with.)

  Through the room, toward the staircase.

  Breathe. The world around me is empty here.

  We all stay within touching distance from one another, though none of us touch. Finn looks up at the stairs and yells Carter’s name.

  Then, nothing. No movement. No sound. No extra pair of footsteps. Just silence.

  Silence.

  More silence.

  I ball my fists and pound my leg and the stabs of pain force me act. “Carter? Carter! Are you okay?”

  No response.

  Ever turns to us. “Stay put and stay close together.”

  Briefly, they reach out so their fingers touch Finn’s. Then they square their shoulders, clench their jaw, and head into the dark hallway. I wish we would’ve stopped in the kitchen to grab a knife from one of the drawers. Something is wrong. Again. Everything is wrong. Constantly.

  Something is waiting for us out in the darkness.

  One step and then the next.

  It’s so cold in here. Maybe Carter found another way out, though I’m positive there’s only the one door to the porch.

  “I’m not sure it’s a good idea to go farther in,” I whisper.

  “We can’t leave Carter on his own,” Finn says, though there’s doubt in his voice too. And something else. Something I can’t place.

  Ever starts climbing. “We’re not leaving him behind. We’re not splitting the party again.”

  So we feel our way around because there’s nothing else to do. All the doors upstairs are closed, and without a window to the outside, we have no light source.

  It hits me again; all the doors upstairs are closed. Sickening unease unfurls in my stomach.

  “Did you close Liva’s door when you were in here?” I ask.

  Ever clears their throat. “No. But maybe Carter did?”

  I shake my head, though I doubt they can see it. “Let’s stick close. Carter went to my room, so let’s look there first.”

  “Do we all go in?” Finn asks. “Or do we need to keep watch while you look around the room?” He yelps quietly when Ever apparently punches him.

  “If something happened to Carter, we’re not sending you in alone,” Ever says, and there’s no arguing.

  I want to protest. I want to tell them both to stay safe, because I don’t know what to expect when I open the door. Because it’s my fault Carter went back in in the first place. But they both face me with staunch determination, and I know they won’t back down. It’s a little easier to stand straight with the two of them at my back.

  “Thank you.”

  Without further ado, I push the door to my room open. It creaks a little. It creates a dark, cloak-like shadow that passes over us and into
the hallway.

  Four candles burn in the room. They’re small enough to belong to a birthday cake. They circle the bed, a good ten feet away from the door. But their combined light is so bright and unexpected, it disorients me.

  They weren’t here before. They don’t belong.

  “Carter?” My voice cracks. I lick my lips and sway back and forth on the balls of my feet.

  Ever reaches out to squeeze my shoulder, and I nearly jump out of my skin.

  “I’m sorry,” they immediately apologize. “You looked so spooked. These weren’t there before, right?”

  I blink against the flickering flames. My eyes water. “No.” I take a step closer to the candles and one of the floorboards creaks, gives a bit. From nearer the bed, it’s obvious the candles are each stuck to a nail, to keep them steady. There are two others already snuffed out. They can’t have been burning long; they’re too small to last.

  “Carter? Say something.” My voice echoes.

  My cloak doesn’t hang on the wardrobe door anymore. It’s spread out over the bed. I pick it up to see if it’s covering anything. It’s not. So I slide it on for warmth and protection.

  That’s when the music box starts chiming again. It’s such a familiar melody. A lullaby that parents play for their children when they go to sleep. The kind of music box that grandparents keep as a souvenir from that time they went on a tour of Europe. Achingly familiar.

  But it grows loud.

  Louder.

  Louder still.

  Like someone has put a radio on blast, but all it plays are children’s tunes. Wordless, melodic. Impossible to escape or ignore.

  Then something crashes in the room next to mine—Carter’s room—and the music abruptly dies on an off-key tone.

  I run. Exactly like how I used to run, back when I still could. I push myself past Ever and Finn, and I run to get to Carter’s room, to make sure he’s there, he’s okay, he’s—

  I slam into Carter’s room. In it, I spot the broken music box before I see anything else. It’s one of the small ones that Ever brought to the cabin to mimic the ones in the game, and it’s been smashed to countless pieces against the door. It’s impossible to enter the room without crunching the splinters of wood. I kick it all away as hard as I can and I try to orient myself.

  There are candles here too. Also around the bed.

  The covers of the bed are rumpled, and Carter’s suitcase lies propped open against one of the walls. I still can’t believe his parents made him drag a suitcase up a mountain, even if it doesn’t necessarily surprise me.

  “Carter? Come on, C, answer me.”

  “Maddy, I don’t think—” Ever stands in the doorway and their voice trails off. “I don’t think—”

  I turn to see what they’re staring at. I follow their gaze.

  Oh no. Oh no, no, no, no, no.

  I take a step closer to the bed. It’s not that it hasn’t been made.

  There’s someone inside it.

  I whimper and reach out to someone, anyone for support. Finn steps in and his shoulder bumps against mine.

  In the darkness I can’t see if the bed is moving. If someone’s breathing.

  “We’ll have to pull back the covers,” Finn says quietly, and all the fear and anger that laced his voice earlier is gone. There’s just defeat, because we can all imagine what we’ll find inside—nothing good.

  I nod. “Together?”

  “Yeah.”

  Ever walks around the bed and makes to uncover the bed from that side. They catch my eyes and nod. No point in delaying the inevitable, right? I nod too. Keep moving. Stop thinking. We pull the cover back and—

  I scream.

  Carter’s body lies in the middle of the bed. His eyes are wide and empty. His mouth is set in a silent scream, and the mattress is red with blood. He’s splayed out like Councilwoman Yester, like someone took a scene from our game and recreated it, arcane circle around him and all.

  I’m going to be sick. On the other side of the bed, Ever has turned away too, and their body language is a chaos of horror. They sway. They keep themself standing only because they can lean on the bedside table.

  And Finn keeps repeating the same word over and over again: “No. No. Nonononononono.”

  Unlike the victims in the game, Carter is real. He is our friend. He was our friend? He should still be here. He shouldn’t have come inside. If only I’d been less of a mess, if only I’d kept my wits about me, if only…if only…if only.

  On the other side of the bed, Ever sinks to the floor, and Finn immediately rushes to them, still muttering the same word.

  I can’t keep staring at Carter. I should close his eyes? But I don’t want to reach out to him. I don’t want my memory of him to be…this. I want to remember his gentle hands and the way he supported me. I don’t want to touch him. For the first time in my life, I don’t want to touch him.

  I want to kill the person who did this. Who did this to him, and to the memory of our game. This weekend was supposed to honor it, and our friendship, and now…

  Carter’s left hand rests on his chest. Four of the fingers are curled around a small wooden carving of a rat, almost as though he’s cradling it.

  His ring finger is gone.

  Unlike the victims in our game, the circle around Carter isn’t drawn with magic. It’s drawn with coins all around him. A piece of paper is quite literally pinned to his chest, sunk into his flesh, and I won’t touch that either. I can’t.

  “What does it say?” Ever’s voice sounds strangled. They have their arms wrapped tight around their chest.

  It’s only one word:

  Thief.

  “Just like Liva—just like Liva’s room.” Finn produces a piece of paper in the same handwriting, the same bloodred words. Liar.

  It takes everything I have not to scream again or toss all the coins from the mattress onto the floor.

  “We have to get out.” My voice sounds different, hollow, cold. It sounds like it doesn’t belong to me. It feels like it doesn’t belong to me. When no one moves immediately, I all but snarl at them, “Go. Now.”

  Someone—or something—is playing a twisted game with us. And they’re inside this cabin. “We’ve got to run.”

  But a dull thud comes from living room down below.

  And the all-too-clear sound of a lock.

  Seventeen

  Finn

  “We have to move.” I reach out a hand to Ever and nearly tip my crutch over.

  Ever reacts almost instantly, grabbing it and steadying me without hesitation. It’s the simplest movement, and it’s a low bar, but outside of this group, most people don’t meet it. Here, when my crutches fall out of reach, everyone will immediately stoop to pick them up. They grab whatever needs holding. They make sure to walk alongside me in such a way that they don’t kick my crutches out from under me—and no one else gets the chance to do so either.

  We’ve changed and grown, and I’ve pushed them away, and they’re still here.

  We’re all scared and frustrated, but they all still have my back.

  Now, I feel emptier. As angry as I’ve been, I never would’ve wanted this for Carter and Liva.

  * * *

  I pulled Liva into the game. And by extension, Zac.

  Ever, Carter. And Maddy.

  But our adventuring party started with the two of us. Ever and me, at lunch one day. Ever was a lowly freshman, and I a lowly sophomore, and we found each other because I sat in the cafeteria reading an RPG rule book, and they sat next to me. Zac passed us and scoffed, but I don’t think Ever noticed it. They told me they had an idea for a role-playing game they wanted to test; I told them I wanted to be a game dev, and it was as simple as that.

  Well, there was more to it, of course. They made me laugh. They stared straight through me w
ith those piercing green eyes. They weren’t awkward about my crutches. And they listened to me when I told them about my dreams for the future.

  Even then, Ever was the type of person who listens so intently, they make you believe in yourself. And I wanted to believe in them.

  The first time we met to play with the others, we all fell head over heels in friendship.

  It was raining outside. It was a couple of weeks before winter break.

  I hesitated in the doorway to the basement, where Ever was already setting up shop, but the others quickly followed. We stood around awkwardly. Two freshmen—Ever and Maddy—and four sophomores. Hands in pockets. Messing with our bags. In various stages of doubt and excitement. Not quite looking at one another, at least until Ever spoke up first.

  “Welcome, adventurers.” They smiled. “I always wanted to say that. Welcome to our Rune and Lore club, or as Finn wants to call it, the Gnomic Utterances Tabletop Society, a.k.a. NUTS. I’m thrilled you’re all here, and I’m going to try my best not to mess this up too much. Over the next hour or so, we’ll figure out how to play this game together and if you’re all comfortable playing together. The system is loosely based on magic, mystery, and murder, and in my experience the best way to learn is to start playing.” They motioned to the table that was set up along one of the walls. “Please, take a seat. Grab one of the dice and a character sheet, and I’ll set the scene.”

  We all hesitated for a second longer, but there was something magnetic about the way Ever took charge. We all wanted to be here, after all. And what they said made sense; the only way to get started was to dive right in. In that way, it wasn’t much different from any other game. Sure, there are rules to learn and techniques to master. But both of those things are pointless if you don’t first have a feel for the ball.

  Or the dice, in this case.

  Ever perched on the edge of the table. “It always starts with murder.” They started the story like they came to do every game. They had some note cards in their hand, but they mostly stared at us, as if they were weaving the story out of thin air.

  “Welcome to Gonfalon. Welcome to the case of the deadly class.”