Page 15 of The Ache That Stayed

I groaned and dropped back onto the pillow, squeezing my eyes shut. Whoever was there could leave or freeze to death. I wasn’t moving today.

Survival rule: if you don’t move, nothing can demand anything from you.

“Roxy, are you there?” A familiar voice yelled.

“Open up, bitch—it’s freezing out here.”

I pulled myself upright, sitting on the bed for a moment, elbows braced on my knees, waiting for the world to settle back into something resembling stability. When it didn’t, I stumbled to the door anyway. I dragged my feet across the floor, every step heavy, every muscle protesting, head thick with alcohol and regret.

My thighs ached faintly with the dull pull of overused muscles. I ignored it, shuffling to the door and yanking it open.

Ritu—of course, standing there, bright-eyed, irritatingly alive with cheeks flushed from the cold, hair pulled back too neatly for someone who’d been bar-hopping the night before. It felt like an insult, proof that the night hadn’t touched her the way it had me.

“Why are you here so early?” I croaked.

My voice was sandpaper.

“And why do you look so chirpy?”

“Firstly, it’s two in the afternoon, and secondly, I digest alcohol like water,” she said breezily, shoving a cup into my hand.

“Now drink up.”

Great. I’d slept half the day and it still wasn’t enough.

The liquid inside was green and ominous. I sniffed it and gagged.

“Why does it look like swamp water and smell like death?”

“Drink,” she said, already moving toward my couch. “It’ll bring you back to reality.”

I took a cautious sip and gagged. “This tastes like shit.”

“I honestly don’t want to know how you know the taste of shit,” she said, settling on the couch. “Trust the process.”

I forced myself to finish it, grimacing the entire time. The bitterness hit first, then a sharper taste, almost electric, spreading through my bloodstream like it meant business.

As the minutes passed, the fog in my head didn’t clear so much as… thin. Sounds sharpened first. Then light. Then the shape of my own living room.

Something felt… off. Too neat.

Not curated neat. Maintained neat.

Like someone had already been here, rearranging it while I slept.

Ritu pretended to pick dust off the neatly arranged cushions.

Did I arrange them?

It felt wrong.

My stomach dipped, the sensation sharp and familiar—like missing a step on stairs.

“So,” she said. “Where did you disappear to last night? And with whom?”

I frowned. “What are you talking about? One of you probably dropped me home.”

Her expression shifted subtly, concern threading through the humour.