Rise of Ember Quin

8

Ember wakes to the sound of a spoon clinking glass. For a moment, there’s no context, only the immediate: a stabbing ache in her right foot, the grit in her eyes, the taste of blood where she must have bitten her cheek in the night. The room isn’t hers; it smells like coconut conditioner and the gummy tang of energy drink, sunlight pouring in through bedsheet curtains. Rae’s room, which means she didn’t make it home last night. Or maybe she did, and home is a moving target.

She tries to sit up. Her body refuses, so she flops sideways, sheet sticking to her damp skin, hands finding her own thighs through borrowed pajama pants. The pain is real—her feet are wrapped, not with medical tape but with the white athletic stuff Rae uses for gymnastics. Her toes are exposed, swollen and dotted with angry red where the blisters popped. The memory of the party is a fresh punch to the diaphragm: the spill, the laughter, the way Jackson wouldn’t even meet her eyes.

She considers just shutting down again, going back under, but the clatter comes closer, then a gentle knock. Rae nudges the door open with her elbow, balancing a mug and a bottle of Tylenol. She’s already dressed, hair in a bun, face set to full morning mode: brows sharp, mouth flattened in concentration.

“Oh good. You’re not dead.” Rae sets the mug on the side table, then folds herself onto the edge of the bed. “For a second, I thought you might have straight-up ghosted into the afterlife. Here.” She shakes two gel capsules from the bottle and offers them, palm open, no arguments allowed.

Ember takes the pills, washes them down with a mouthful of tea. It’s sweet and milky, not how she likes it, but the warmth is grounding. She holds the mug in both hands, cradling it like something alive.

“I look like hell, right?” Ember’s voice comes out raw.

Rae barks a laugh. “You look like the crypt keeper’s hotter sister. But seriously, Em. When I found you on my doorstep last night—Jesus. I thought you’d been hit by a truck.”

Ember stares at her feet, flexes the toes. The left one throbs. “You bandaged me up?”

“Uh, yeah. You were leaking all over my welcome mat. Couldn’t let you bleed out and ruin my tile.”

A silence. Rae’s sarcasm is familiar, a life raft, but there’s tension in her shoulders, a brittleness Ember’s never seen before. She wonders if Rae cried last night, too.

The phone sits on the nightstand, screen-down, as if in disgrace. Ember reaches for it and flips it over. Thirty-seven missed calls. All from Jackson, except for two from her mom.

She feels the air go out of the room. “He called,” Ember says.

Rae leans in, her hand squeezing Ember’s thigh just above the knee. “Yeah. He texted me, too, looking for you. I didn’t answer.”

Ember wants to smile, but the muscles in her face don’t cooperate. “You think he’s sorry?”

Rae snorts, shoves her own feelings through a sieve of protective anger. “No, I think he’s damage-controlling. Word got around. Half the school saw you bail, and the other half watched the TikTok.” She looks away, then back. “It’s everywhere, Em.”

Ember’s vision blurs. She blinks, quick and surgical. No tears. Not yet.

“What happened after I left?” Ember asks. The words are tiny, her voice shrunken to a whisper.

Rae’s jaw works. She looks like she wants to throw something. “He went full Jackson. Twenty minutes after you left, he was making out with Brittany McClain in the kitchen. Like, tongue in her throat, on display for the entire world. Molly caught it on Snap. He told people you were ‘too much drama’ and ‘not his type anymore.’”

Ember sets the mug down. Her hands are shaking so hard she has to interlace the fingers to make it stop. “He said that?”

Rae softens. “Not to your face, obviously. Coward. He’s been telling everyone you were obsessed with him, that you came to the party just to stalk him. Like you’re some psycho ex.”

“That’s not even true,” Ember says, but the words have no weight.

Rae’s voice goes hard. “Of course it’s not true. But he’s trying to own the story before you can. He’s a manipulative little s**t, Em. You know this.”

Ember wants to argue, but her mind cycles through every moment of the last six months—how Jackson would say things in private, then deny them in public. How he’d make plans with her and then bail last minute, always a better offer. How she twisted herself to be less loud, less weird, more whatever he liked. The reality lands heavy, impossible to budge.

“He was embarrassed,” Ember says, quiet. “Because of the fall. Because everyone saw.”

Rae leans forward, her forehead almost touching Ember’s. “No. He was embarrassed because you existed outside of his control for one second. Because you had a real moment and didn’t pretend it was fine. He can’t handle that.” Rae’s eyes narrow, full of predator energy. “He doesn’t get to break you, Em. He doesn’t get to rewrite you.”

Ember feels a tremor pass through her. The urge to cry is sharp, but she fights it, jaw clamped. “I think he already did.”

Rae squeezes her leg harder, just shy of pain. “Bullshit. Look at me. You survived him. And you did it in front of everyone.”

Ember does look, and Rae is there, unwavering. She wishes she could climb inside that certainty, use it as a shell.

“Come on,” Rae says, “let’s get you upright. I’ll make pancakes. Or, you know, heat up some Pop-Tarts. Let’s start with eating, then we can deal with the Jackson problem.”

Ember allows Rae to pull her to sitting. The room spins, but steadies with the touch. She clings to the mug, watching the steam curl off the top in gentle, animal shapes.

“I’m so tired,” Ember says.

Rae nods. “Then we rest. We eat. Then we plot revenge. That’s what girls do, right?”

Ember manages a laugh, tiny and unexpected. “You’re the worst.”

Rae’s grin returns, teeth and all. “Damn straight.”

The moment sits, fragile but real. Ember still hurts, but there’s a layer of insulation now, a barrier of Rae’s outrage and care. She thinks, for the first time in hours, that maybe the world won’t end. Not today.

She sips her tea, lets the warmth bleed into her hands. There’s no going back, she knows that, but maybe, with Rae beside her, she can figure out what forward looks like.