The Friend Who Joins
358 Words
Marisol didn’t plan to tell anyone.
But secrets have weight, and hers felt like a stone pressing against her ribs.
At school the next day, she sat alone under the covered walkway again, the wind cold against her cheeks. She picked at her lunch, her mind replaying the bracelet, the symbols, the warnings.
“Hey.”
She looked up.
It was Ana.
They weren’t best friends, not exactly. But Ana was the kind of person who noticed things—quiet things, subtle things. The kind of person who didn’t look away when someone was hurting.
“You look like you haven’t slept in a week,” Ana said, sitting beside her. “What’s going on?”
Marisol hesitated.
She could lie.
She could say she was tired.
She could say she had homework.
She could say anything.
But Ana’s eyes were steady, warm, patient.
And Marisol was tired of holding everything alone.
“There’s something I need to show you,” she whispered.
Ana raised an eyebrow. “Okay…?”
“Not here.”
After school, they walked to Marisol’s house. The air felt heavy, the sky low and gray. When they reached the porch, Marisol paused, staring at the spot where the bracelet had appeared.
Ana noticed. “What happened?”
Marisol swallowed hard. “You’ll see.”
She led Ana to the locked room.
The eucalyptus scent hit them both.
Ana wrinkled her nose. “It smells like your mom.”
Marisol nodded.
She opened the wooden box.
Ana’s eyes widened. “Whoa. These are beautiful.”
“They’re dangerous,” Marisol whispered.
She handed Ana the red notebook.
Ana flipped through it, her expression shifting from curiosity to confusion to fear.
“Marisol… this is…”
“I know.”
Ana looked up. “Your mom wrote this?”
“Yes.”
“And you think it’s real?”
Marisol didn’t answer.
She didn’t have to.
Ana closed the notebook gently, as if it might break.
“Okay,” she said softly. “Then we figure it out together.”
Marisol’s chest tightened.
For the first time since opening the box, she didn’t feel alone.
- Writer
