The hole we walked through blackened, anthropomorphizing into a vicious beast, eager to swallow us whole. Somewhere along the walk, a genuine connection formed in the poignant hush between us. We were disappearing into this hungry void, covered in vomit and blood and tears and who knows what else. The darkness became so complete that I no longer remembered how to be anything other than afraid. In the absence of other feelings, that fear became soothing.

A wall shattered our tragic mutual resignation. An actual wall. My free hand could not fathom its wholeness after infinitely reaching for nothing. The cold concrete startled me so much that I screamed out, my shrill voice bouncing around me, offending my own ears. We’d walked into the space between another crossroads. Once backed away a bit, subtle differences in our surroundings manifested. Two circular shapes blotted out of the void: one on the left, one on the right.

Come on, Ollie. Make the right choices, my letter had said.

On impulse, I sprinted down the right side, possessed by the promise of freedom and the belief that this was a way out of the mess we’d made.

I expected Harrison to be behind me. Instead, cries of “Ollie! Ollie!” echoed off the walls.

The wrong name for the wrong girl. I wasn’t her anymore.

Turning back, even a little, would’ve disoriented me, so I remained steadfast, my insides thick and syrupy, swirling like a washing machine. No stops, I repeated to myself. Harrison should’ve known how this went. Follow or defy. And he didn’t follow.

With arms stretched out in anticipation, I hit another wall. This one was fixed with metal bars that seemed to be for climbing. Each bar led to another, to another, and so on, until my head bumped into a ceiling. I pushed up, meeting resistance. Pushing again, sunlight shoved its way in like an unwelcome guest, nearly knocking me back down.

My eyes could not adjust to the change. Squeezing my lids tight enough to make my cheeks almost touch my eyebrows, I shoved the cover to the side and flopped stomach-first onto the sand in front of me. For a while I lay like that, easing up my squint in concentrated bursts, trying to train myself to see daylight again. The surface of the sand was hot, but the farther I burrowed into it, the cooler it became.

I tried to open my eyes all the way. I was not ready for the pierce of the sun, but I forced myself to keep looking, fighting so hard against my body’s reflexes that my eyes furiously watered. I was in the desert, which I should’ve known from the sand and shrubs, but had not registered.