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“You feel fine,” she murmurs. “You’re not feverish. So what’s going on?”

Her gaze flicks around the living room, over the discarded contents from my stupid ritual, then she goes completely stock-still.

The knife. The bloodied parchment.

Shit.

“Eden... what the fuck did you do?” she says cautiously. “Have you self-harmed? I knew it. I knew you were spiraling.”

She’s already reaching into her pocket, pulling out her phone. “I’m calling Mom. We’re getting you to the hospital.”

“No!” The word rips out of me and I lunge forward, my fingers catching the casing of her phone just as it begins to ring.

I disconnect it and we scramble in a brief, desperate wrestling match in the middle of the tea-and-salt-stained rug. I manage to wrench it from her grip, stumbling back, chest heaving.

“No,” I gasp, holding it away from her. “Piper, listen to me. It’s not—it isn’t what it looks like. Do not call her.”

“If you didn’t cut yourself,” she says, her hand held out, “then why is there blood on your table, Eden?”

I look at the dried crimson staining the parchment. “Okay! Okay, I did cut myself, but⁠—”

“Fucking knew it!” She snatches the phone back with a snarl of triumph and terror.

“No! Fuck! Piper, just listen to me, it isn’t like that, alright?”

My mind is a frantic, whirring machine. If I let her think it’s self-harm, the sirens start. The whole family machine grinds into gear. Dad will have another heart attack from the stress, Mom will start that haunting, quiet crying again, and I’ll be watched every second of every day. I’ll be smothered.

I need a middle ground. Something weird, but ‘grief-weird.’ Not ‘danger-to-myself-weird.’

“It’s a ritual!” I blurt out, the words tripping over each other.

“A what?”

“It’s... it’s a grief thing. From a forum.” The lie rushes out as my hands flail, gesturing at the mess. “Like a... a spiritual cleansing? You’re supposed to—to release the pain. The salt is for protection, the candles are for focus, and the blood is a symbolic thing. To bleed out the sadness. It’s a trend, Pipes. It’s supposed to be symbolic, and act as a grounding exercise.”

I hate how pathetic I sound, but I’m clutching at damn straws here.

“I’m not trying to die. I’m trying to feel better,” I clarify shakily. “It just... got a little out of hand. I felt dizzy and spilled the salt. Please. If you tell Mom, she’ll think I’m suicidal, and I’m not. I’m just trying to get through things.”

She looks at the salt, then the knife, then me. The skepticism is written in the hard line of her jaw, but the anger in her eyes is softening into pity.

Down the hall, my bedroom door might as well be glowing.

Please stay quiet. Please don’t move. Please don’t exist just for a bit longer.

“Eden, this looks like a crime scene, not a yoga class,” she says, completely flat. “Show me what you did to yourself.”

My face is burning. It’s one thing to feel the edge of a breakdown in the dark; it’s another to show the receipt to the person who’s been trying to keep your head above water for months. The shame is a thick, hot lump in my throat.

Slowly, I peel back the sleeve of my oversized cardigan.

The wound is still fresh. Red at the edges, tacky in the center, a slightly thin, crusting seam where the skin has barely begun knitting back together.

A sharp hiss escapes through her teeth as if she can feel the sting herself. She doesn’t lecture me—not yet—but her hand is firm and delicate as she grips my wrist and guides me toward the kitchen.

“We’re cleaning this. Now.”

We step into the kitchen, and she stops dead.