I barely slept.
Every time I shut my eyes, the image of the note burned against the inside of my skull. My brain kept looping back to the photograph—the one with the lake house. The one with all of us in it.
Me. Lily. Noah. Chase. And others I couldn't place.
It was old, worn at the edges, the kind of photo that looked like it had been stuffed into the back of a drawer and forgotten for years. But the second I saw it, something deep inside me twisted, like my body recognized what my mind didn't. A memory on the tip of my tongue, hovering just out of reach.
I flipped the note over in my hands again. The words were scrawled in frantic, uneven handwriting:
Don't forget, no matter what happens.
The ink was smudged in places, like it had been gripped too tightly, the edges of the paper creased and soft from being handled too much. My stomach churned every time I read it, but I couldn't stop. The message felt urgent, desperate—like a plea rather than a simple reminder.
Why had I written this? Or had someone else written it for me?
I traced my fingers over the letters, searching deep into my memory for any recollection of writing this, but it remained just as elusive as the memories clawing at the edges of my mind. The more I stared, the more I felt like the answer was just out of reach, dangling in front of me but slipping away the moment I got too close.
I was being reminded of something important. Of something I had once known but had somehow lost.
A warning.
I stared at the ceiling for what felt like hours before exhaustion finally took me under.
The dream came in pieces.
I was standing at the edge of a lake, the water unnaturally still, like glass stretched over something waiting beneath. A reflection stared back at me—but it wasn't my own.
It was his.
The boy. The one from the fragments. Chase.
I wanted to move, to step away, but my feet were rooted to the ground, as if the earth itself had claimed me. The lake stretched endlessly around me, swallowing up the horizon, the sky, everything. There was no wind, no sound, only the steady pulse of my own heartbeat pounding in my ears.
Then, a voice whispered through the air, slithering through the silence.
Do not forget why I gave you a second life.
A shudder ran through me. The reflection's lips moved, but I wasn't sure if the words had come from me or him. His eyes—my eyes—were hollow, endless, filled with something I couldn't name. Something I didn't want to name.
A ripple disturbed the surface of the water, distorting his face, fracturing it into something unrecognizable. The world around me lurched, as if the ground had disappeared beneath my feet.
I woke up gasping, fingers tangled in my sheets, lungs burning like I'd been drowning instead of dreaming. The early morning light slipped through the blinds, too soft, too normal for the way my entire body was buzzing with unease.
I needed answers. Now.
School was a blur.
Lily and I sat in the cafeteria, trays untouched. I pushed a fork through my food absentmindedly, stomach too twisted to eat.
"I need to see the diary," I said.
Lily blinked, then frowned. "What?"
"The one from that summer. The one you found. I need to see it."
Lily shifted in her seat, suddenly uncomfortable. "It's just dumb childhood stuff, Chloe. It's not—"
"Near the end," I interrupted, my fingers tightening around the fork. "Did you write about someone named Chase?"
At his name, something flickered across Lily's face. It was brief—so brief I almost missed it—but it was there. The hesitation. The instinct to pull away.
"I don't really remember him," she admitted. "But… I wrote about him like he was my best friend."
My stomach curled in on itself. "And that doesn't seem weird to you?"
She shrugged, but there was something off about it. Forced. "People forget things."
Not like this. Not like an entire person being wiped clean.
I exhaled, rubbing at my temple. "Lily, please. Let me see it."
She shook her head immediately. "No."
It wasn't just reluctance. It was fear. The kind that ran deep, settling into the bones. And it told me everything I needed to know.
Something about that diary terrified her.
I studied her more closely. Lily had been my best friend since we were kids, but suddenly, she felt like a stranger. The easy way she used to talk to me, the way she used to trust me with everything—it was gone. Like a switch had flipped, like something fundamental had shifted between us without me realizing it.
And I didn't know if it was because of me… or because of what she was hiding.
"I don't get it," I said slowly. "You used to be curious about all of this. About the past. About what happened that summer. But now you don't want to talk about it at all."
Lily wouldn't meet my eyes. She pushed her tray away, shaking her head like she was trying to shake me off, too. "Because it doesn't matter, Chloe. We were kids. Whatever happened—whatever we thought happened—it's over."
Her words were final. Too final.
I stared at her, the discomfort growing into something darker, something heavier.
She was acting as if I was the one making it up.
But I knew what I had seen. I knew what I had felt.
And the fear in her eyes told me that she knew it, too.
Noah found me after school.
I was leaning against my locker, still picking at the edges of the conversation with Lily, trying to fit the pieces together. But they refused to snap into place.
Noah's posture was stiff, his hands buried deep in his hoodie pockets. His gaze darted around, like he was making sure we were alone.
"Stop asking about the past," he said.
The words were quiet, but firm. A command, not a suggestion.
I glanced up, caught off guard by the tension in his voice. His expression was unreadable, but the strain in his jaw told me he was holding something back.
Something sharp twisted in my chest.
"How do you—" I started, but he cut me off.
"I just do."
Not an answer.
I studied him, searching for something—anything—that would make this make sense. His shoulders were tense, his body coiled like he was ready to run. Like he was afraid of what I might find.
"Noah," I said carefully, "do you remember that summer?"
He hesitated. Just for a second. But it was enough.
"Not really." He exhaled sharply, looking away. "But sometimes… I get these feelings. Like I was somewhere I wasn't supposed to be. Like something was wrong."
A chill settled in my bones.
"Chase," I said.
Noah's head snapped toward me. His throat bobbed as he swallowed.
"I don't…know who that is," he murmured, looking away from me before walking away.
His words sent a shiver down my spine.
I didn't know what happened that summer. I didn't know why everything about it felt fractured, rewritten, erased. But I knew one thing for certain—
It all led back to the lake house.
And I was done waiting for answers.
That night, I made the decision.
I stood at my desk, staring at the note, at the photograph. At the faces I should have remembered but didn't. My pulse throbbed in my ears, a steady rhythm of certainty.
The lake house held the answers. It always had.
I turned away from my desk and caught my reflection in the mirror. For a moment, I barely recognized myself. The girl staring back had my features, my uniform, my expression of restless determination. And yet—
A flicker. A shift.
For a split second, I wasn't looking at Chloe.
I was looking at Chase.
The face in the mirror was his. The sharp lines of his jaw, the intensity in his eyes, the way his mouth parted slightly, mirroring my own shock. My breath hitched, the image wavering like a ripple in a pond, and then—
Gone.
I stumbled back, gripping the desk for support, my pulse hammering in my ears. The room felt too small, the walls pressing in. My own reflection stared back at me again, unchanged. But the weight in my chest remained, heavier than before.
Noah's warning rang in my head, his words circling like vultures, but they weren't enough to stop me. If anything, they only made me more certain. Something had been taken from me. From all of us.
I needed to know why.
The past was waiting.
And I was going to find it.