Chapter 1
**Let me know if this flow correctly. I write a lot. It's hard to remember what all I write and sometimes I don't make sense...**
Lux
The fluorescent lights in the school hallway buzz like dying insects, and I keep my eyes on the scuffed linoleum as I navigate the current of bodies flowing between classes. It’s easier this way; head down, earbuds in (even though nothing’s playing), red-gold hair falling forward like a curtain. The universal signal for don’t talk to me. Not that anyone would.
I’m a ghost here at Leeward High, which is ironic considering I’m probably the most solid, corporeal thing in this building. But that’s how it works when you’re the weird girl. The one who reads during lunch, who wears too much black, who never quite learned how to laugh at the right jokes or care about the right things. I’ve been invisible for so long that I’ve almost perfected it. Almost.
Because there are still moments when someone’s eyes will catch on me; usually with that flicker of confusion, like they’re trying to remember if they know me or if I’m just a stranger who’s been haunting their periphery for four years. I am, of course. Both, really.
“Lux! Wait up!” I turn to see Maria weaving through the crowd, her dark curls bouncing, her smile bright enough to make the fluorescents seem dim. Behind her, Riley follows at a more leisurely pace, tall and willowy, her nose already buried in her phone. These are my people. My only people, really. And I’m grateful for them in a way I can never quite articulate.
“You coming to Riley’s tonight?” Maria asks, falling into step beside me. “Movie marathon. Her parents are out of town, and I’m bringing enough junk food to sustain a small army.”
“I can’t,” I say with a sigh as I adjust my backpack. “I work until eleven.”
“The theater again?” Riley glances up from her phone; one perfectly shaped eyebrow raised. “Don’t you basically live there?”
“It pays,” I say with a shrug. “And watch movies for free,” I add with a shrug.
“In an empty theater. Alone. In the dark.” Maria shakes her head, but she’s smiling. “You know that’s literally the setup for every horror movie ever, right?” If only she knew.
“I like the dark,” I say, which is possibly the understatement of the century.
Riley snorts. “We’ve noticed.” They have. They’ve noticed a lot of things about me; my preference for shadows over sunlight, my tendency to drift toward the edges of rooms, or the way I sometimes go still and quiet like I’m listening to something they can’t hear. But they’ve never asked me to explain it, never pushed me to be something I’m not. That’s why they’re my friends. That’s why I’ve never told them about Draven.
How could I? How do you explain a boy who appeared from nowhere when you were five years old, who visited you four times over the span of nine years, who kissed you once under a canopy of stars and shadows and then vanished like he’d never existed at all? You don’t! You keep that information locked away in the quiet spaces of your heart, and you learn to live with the ache of it.
“Earth to Lux.” Maria waves a hand in front of my face. “You’re doing it again...”
“Doing what,” I ask in confusion.
“Like you’ve gone somewhere else in your head.” She studies me with concern. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, just tired,” I say giving my automatic response to being asked that question. The bell rings, saving me from further interrogation. We split off toward our respective classes, and I slip into AP Literature with thirty seconds to spare. Mrs. Jensen is already writing on the board; Magical Realism: The Intersection of the Mundane and the Impossible, and I feel something twist in my chest. The mundane and the impossible. That’s my whole life, isn’t it?
I slide into my usual seat by the window and let my gaze drift to the trees beyond the parking lot. They’re bare now, November having stripped them down to skeletal branches, but I can still see the shadows pooling beneath them. Even in daylight, even in the cold, the darkness finds a way to gather. And sometimes I swear I feel like it’s looking back at me.
The memory comes to me unbidden as Mrs. Jensen drones on about Gabriel García Márquez. I was eight years old the second time Draven appeared. Three years had passed since that first meeting, and I’d started to wonder if I’d imagined him. If he’d been nothing more than an imaginary friend conjured by a lonely little girl who spent way too much time in the woods. But then one autumn evening, when the sun was setting and the shadows were growing, I felt it; that same pull, that whisper in the darkness that said come, come to me... I’d run to the edge of the yard, to the place where the forest met the grass, and there he was.
Taller and older but still him. “You came back,” I’d breathed, and he’d smiled; this small, shy smile that made my heart do strange things in my chest.
“I promised I would,” he said simply. We sat together until my mother called me in for dinner, talking about everything and nothing. He’d told me about his world; a place of shadows and whispers, where darkness wasn’t something to fear but something to embrace. And I’d told him about mine; about school and books, and the way other kids looked at me like I was something strange. “You’re not strange,” he said. “You’re just different. Like me...” And for those few precious hours, I’d felt less alone.
The next time he came when I was twelve. That time, he’d stayed longer; almost a whole day, hidden in the shadows of the forest while I brought him sandwiches and lemonade and told him about starting middle school. He’d listened with those dark, fathomless eyes, and when I’d complained about feeling like I didn’t belong anywhere, he’d taken my hand. “You belong here,” he said. “With me. In the spaces between.” I hadn’t understood what he meant then. I’m not sure I understand now. But I’d believed him.
The last time I saw Draven, I was fourteen years old. It was summer; late July. It was the kind of night where the heat lingers even after the sun goes down, and the air feels thick enough to swim through. I’d been sitting on the back porch, reading by the light of the bug zapper, when I’d felt it. That familiar pull, stronger than it had ever been before.
I’d gone to the forest edge without hesitation. He’d been waiting for me, leaning against the old oak tree, and my breath had caught because he wasn’t a little boy anymore. He was beautiful; all sharp angles and dark eyes and shadows that clung to him like a second skin. He looked like he was fifteen or sixteen, maybe. Old enough that when he’d looked at me, I’d felt something shift in the air between us.
“Lux,” he’d said, and my name coming from his mouth sounded like a prayer. We’d talked for hours, the way we always did. But that night had been different. There’d been tension, an awareness that hadn’t existed before. When he’d reached for my hand, his fingers had trembled slightly. When I’d leaned closer, he’d gone very still.
“I shouldn’t be here,” he’d whispered. “It’s getting harder to cross. Harder to stay.”
“Then don’t go,” I’d said, even though I’d known it was impossible. He’d cupped my face in his hands; hands that were cool and solid and real, and he’d kissed me. It had been soft and sweet and achingly brief, tasting of shadows and smoke and goodbye.
“I’ll come back,” he’d promised against my lips. “I’ll always come back.” But he hadn’t. Three years. It’s been three years of waiting and watching the shadows, of feeling that pull in my chest that never quite faded. Three years of wondering if I’d done something wrong, if I’d scared him away, if he’d forgotten about me entirely. Three years of being alone again.
My shift at the Starlight Cinema starts at six. It’s a small, old-fashioned theater; the kind with velvet seats and art deco fixtures and a popcorn machine that’s probably older than I am. Most people go to the multiplex across town, which means we’re usually dead on the weeknights. Which is exactly how I like it.
“Hey, Lux.” Danny, the manager, looks up from his phone as I clock in. “Pretty quiet tonight. You good to handle the floor solo?”
“Always am,” I say with a small smile as I tie my apron.
He grins. “That’s why you’re my favorite.” I’m his only employee who actually shows up on time, but I’ll take the compliment.
The evening passes in its usual rhythm; a handful of customers for the seven o’clock showing, a couple of stragglers for the nine. I sell popcorn and candy, tear tickets, and sweep up any small messes that may have been made. Mundane tasks that require just enough attention to keep my hands busy but leave my mind free to wander. And it wanders, inevitably, to Draven.
Where is he right now? Is he in that shadow realm he told me about, the place where darkness is home? Does he think about me the way I think about him? Does he remember that kiss, or has it faded into nothing, just another moment lost to time? Does he know that I’m still waiting for him to return?
By ten-thirty, the theater is empty except for me and Danny, who’s in the office doing paperwork. I’m supposed to be cleaning the lobby, but instead I find myself standing by the front doors, staring out at the parking lot. The streetlights cast pools of amber light across the asphalt, but between them, the shadows gather thick and deep. And as I watch, I feel it; that familiar sensation of being seen. Of eyes in the darkness, watching, waiting... My heart kicks up a notch.
“Draven?” I whisper, even though I know it’s foolish. Even though he’s been gone for three years and probably never coming back. But the shadows seem to shift, just slightly. Just enough to make me wonder.
I find myself pushing through the doors and stepping outside. The air is cold against my skin, but I barely feel it as I’m too focused on the darkness at the edge of the parking lot, where the trees begin, and the streetlights can’t quite reach.
There’s something there. I’m sure of it! I take a step forward, and then another, drawn by that invisible thread that’s been pulling at me since I was five years old. The shadows seem to deepen as I approach, growing thicker, more substantial. And for just a moment; just a heartbeat, I think I see a figure standing among the trees. Tall. Dark and familiar. “Draven,” I breathe.
But then headlights sweep across the parking lot as a car pulls in, and the shadows scatter like startled birds. When I look again, there’s nothing there. Just trees and darkness and the cold November wind. I stand there for a long moment, my heart pounding, my breath misting in the air.
Maybe I’m going crazy. Maybe I’ve been alone for so long that I’m starting to see things that aren’t there. Maybe Draven was never real at all, just a figment of a lonely girl’s imagination. But deep down, in the part of me that’s always belonged to the shadows, I know better. He’s out there somewhere. Watching. Waiting.
And someday; somehow, he’s going to come back to me. I just have to be patient. I just have to keep believing. Behind me, Danny calls my name, and I turn away from the darkness, heading back toward the light. But even as I step inside, even as I return to the mundane world of popcorn and ticket stubs and fluorescent lights, I can feel it. The shadows, following me. Always following me. Waiting for the moment when the boy made of darkness finally comes home.
