Page 66 of Stay Scared

Recorded versions of him continue talking through the darkness.

“You check every lock twice.”

“You watch reflections when you think someone is behind you.”

The voices overlap until the words blur together.

The wall presses into Owen’s back and drives his body tighter against mine. His forearm locks across my upper back while the hand at my ribs digs in hard enough that I feel each gloved finger through my clothes.

“Are you hurt?”

“My shoulder.”

“Can you move it?”

“Enough to keep going.”

The mechanism pushes again. Owen widens his stance and takes the pressure across his back, forcing one of my legs between his.

“Listen to me.”

“I’m listening.”

“Stay with my voice.”

His chest moves beneath my hands, and I follow that instead of the speakers.

The first breath comes shallow. The next reaches deeper.

His arm tightens around me once.

The speakers stop, but machinery continues somewhere inside the walls. Owen is close enough that I feel his breath hit my mouth through the openings in the mask.

My hand rises between us. My fingertips touch the smooth mouth of the mask.

He stops breathing for a beat.

I trace upward until I reach one narrow eye opening.

“You found me,” he says.

“I could tell which voice was yours.”

His hand stays locked at my waist. “When the wall opened, you took my hand.”

“I chose it.”

His fingers tighten once.

I find the strap behind his head, and Owen tips his chin.

I pull the mask away.

There is nowhere to put it, so I let it hang from one hand while the other finds his face in the dark. My fingers pass over the cut on his cheek and trace the line of his jaw.

Owen turns into my palm.

“Salem, what are you doing?”