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Jade's bracelet snaps in half and she buries her mother on a rainy Saturday morning. She has an outburst and makes scene during the funeral, and she scribbles furiously in her notebook, jotting down all the vicious things she's afraid to say out loud. Days later, she's still pulling pieces of shattered glass from the windshield out of her hair. She can't tell if everything is falling apart or slipping into place. She wears red lipstick to reflect her hair, but she paints her nails to match the shining razor blades that sit in the cabinet in the bathroom. Jade is a burning torch and a blunt blade. She uses the kitchen scissors to cut her hair, and keeps everything choppy and messy and hopes that someone will care enough to help put everything back in place. The walls start to close in on her once the funeral is over, and with nowhere left to hide, she decides to run. She meets a boy who wears a scarf to cover up the hickeys on his neck, at least, that why she thinks he keeps it wrapped around him like its a cloak of armor. He smells like whiskey and thick cologne, and she can't shake the feeling of disgust that she gets whenever she speaks to him. He is a walking exclamation point and a perfectly tuned instrument. He stares at her for a beat entirely too long, and she is the one to finally look away.
He doesn't believe in God, but that's ok, because she can believe enough for the both of them.
Faith is something that has always come easily to her, even when she let her seat grow cold at church and burned the palm crosses her mom collected from the mass every spring. Jade wonders if the shadows dancing along the edge of the cave wall are trying to tell her something.
He doesn't want to hold her hand, but he also doesn't want to let go. He never bothered to say prayers growing up because they always sounded like blasphemy on his tongue, but they sound sort of poetic on hers.
Maybe the freckles on her face are like constellations spattered across the sky, and she's the whole galaxy wrapped up in an infuriating depressed ginger teenager. Ike has always found a reassuring comfort in the the sky. No matter where he was in the world, passed out in some downtown club, or hiding from his mother and her latest fling on the balcony, the stars shining overhead were always the same. He hoped his father, wherever he was, looked up at the sky too, so they could both admire the same stars. Abraham never bothered to look up to the heavens because he found slices of divinity in the desert, in the children in his camp. Ike quickly outgrows the telescope he desperately wanted, and turns his attention to the liquor cabinet in the oak lined office.
She only kisses him because she doesn't want to die, and they're sitting in the cell with a dozen armed guards waiting for the order to kill them. It's fleeting and she tastes like cinnamon, and it's over before Ike even has time to register how soft her lips are. He doesn't think Jade is naturally attractive, but in that moment when she grabbed his face and pulled him closer, he would almost swear she looked beautiful.
He's always been good at putting on an act. Everything about Ike is a perfectly crafted illusion to let people see him as he wants to be perceived. He can talk them out of trouble. He just needs to buy some time, to get some answers. Visions come to him, slithering snakes, and Jade's pale hands trying to hold her spilling guts in place in her stomach. He thinks he remembers what it felt like to cut her open. He wakes up screaming, and his father is looking up at him with the same disapprovingly glare Ike received as a child.
Jade is chapel and Ike is a wrecking ball. They can't withstand each other but they also can't figure out how to stay away either. His lips still taste like a hint of cinnamon when the guards drag them both out of the room, and he decides to stop trying to outrun his nightmares.
The gun slides across her freckled forehead and she keeps looking back at him like she's waiting for him to drop the act. He's pretty sure Jade would come right back if he did pull the trigger, because she can't seem to do anything right, even dying. He wants her to realize that he's exactly the kind of monster everyone thinks he is, but even when the Ukrainian girl is bent on killing him, Jade refuses to give up on him. She's the first person to really believe in him. Ike is lost. He's always been lost, but she is this guiding light that just may be able to pull him out of the darkness.
Ike knows what happens when he plays with fire. He ends up with blistered fingers and some swear words on his lips, and he flinches and shrugs. He never learns his lesson.
Jade is fire in the truest sense, and he follows her around after the Woodrun because she refuses to look at him. He doesn't think she's really all that mad at him, but what would it say about her if she forgave him for holding a gun to her head?
Fire licks at Ike's skin every time he speaks to her. It hurts. He doesn't really mind though.
They walk through the winding path of the school campus, and he feels the dull ache of a sunburn. Ike imagines that they're really on an island somewhere, and this hellhole is just some nasty dream brought on by one too many cocktails.
He looks directly into the sun and the face of God, and never falters, but when she stares him down with mascara running down her face, Ike has to look away.
And then she's gone.
The school starts to feel like a nightmare again, but he can't go talking to anyone about it. If he started noticing things, like when a certain redhead goes missing, then he wouldn't be Ike anymore. His reputation is all he has left, and he knows how this place operates. Jade is probably dead. Better now than later, before he got too attached. Casey knows the rules of the game, but she doesn't see what's right in front of her. The blonde probably knows her roommate is dead, but she won't admit it.
There's an hourglass somewhere, and they are all running out of time. Ike knows it's just a matter of time before they're all dead and buried.
Speaking of things that people won't admit: Casey was right. About Ike. About Jade being the only real friend he's ever had. About him needing a friend.
But he's never needed anyone before, and he doesn't want to start now.
Ike has always been the kind of guy who pretends he loves to be in the center of the party, when he actually prefers quiet rooftops. It's just another fact about him. He's also classical trained to play piano. He wears too much purple. He hasn't slept in so long that he's pretty sure sleep is just a notion made up by adults to make kids think they're missing out on something.
The party goes perfectly.
He's Ike. It's his party. Of course everything goes swimmingly, because underneath his facade of impulsiveness and casual disinterest, he's a control freak who can think two hundred steps ahead. Underneath the flashing disco lights, he looks out over the crowd of cringe worthy dancers. Ike's not sure who he's looking for, but he definitely doesn't find them.
They say a friend is person who jumps into your mind when you're sharing a special moment. They're the person you want to share your experiences with.
Well, when he propels the glass bottle at Gribbs's head as hard as his lanky arm will allow, he really wishes Jade was standing next to him. She would find it funny in a twisted sort of way, and maybe she'd grab his hand and pull him through the chaos of the crowd like she did that day in the woods.
Their whole relationship is flooded with "maybes," and "almosts."
Maybe they've known each other for a thousand years in one hundred different lifetimes.
Maybe she should have died that day they flooded the classroom when she sank to bottom like a sinking ship, or when she went flying through the windshield of the car like a bird that was finally free.
Maybe they're meant to be together.
Maybe they were with each other when they were expelled from garden, and they floated away hand in hand during the flood.
Maybe they're meant to kill each other.
Maybe they'll have to die for each other.
Jade almost kissed Ike again, even after the cell and the gun, because she doesn't mind the sting of whiskey on her lips, and there are parts of him that aren't so terrible. He almost told her how he felt. They almost found each other.
Ike's bruised face hurts for days after the memories of the party fade, but he doesn't mind the pain. It's distracts him from the dull ache in his chest that keeps resounding inside of him like a heartbeat.
Casey doesn't come back. The librarian drags her off to meet the Headmaster, and the rest of them barely get a few minutes of celebration.
Ike doesn't think she's dead. The blonde has always been the Academy's favorite in a twisted sort of way, and they wouldn't kill her now. Not after all they've done. Casey. Casey who is resilient, loyal, and fearless. She's a hero. She's everything Ike isn't.
He hears whispers around the school about Casey, and her mysterious disappearance. The blonde chick who won the election was tossed through the green house window and broke her neck. She vanished from the rows of flowers. She was secretly in love with Hodge and they ran away together.
Whenever Ike thinks about Casey, he senses it again: the ache of a sunburn, the sea washed scent of salt hanging in the air, and the scratchiness of sand under his feet.
He hopes Casey is lounging on an island somewhere, and maybe Jade is with her. They were always at their best when they were together.
Hunter is the first to lose it. In the beginning, he was fine. Too fine. The freckled boy was in such denial that he refused to even admit Casey was missing. He went to class, bought the blonde's favorite snacks and left them on her desk, and kept himself busy with the AV club.
When desperation set in, Ike found his roommate trying to pry open the door to a janitor's closet with his bare hand a because he thought there was a chance Casey was inside. Hunter was tearing the entire school apart looking for their leader. The blonde was his anchor, and without her, he's sinking down and drifting away. Hunter is the enteral optimist, he's the beacon of hope that fading away.
Someone has to step up. Ike begrudgingly realizes this when he walks by the girls' dorm room next to his own. All the bunk's were empty, a thin layer of dust has settled over the floor. Casey's homework is sitting on the desk and her post-it notes are filled with reminders that she'll never get to finish. Pamela moved out ages ago, and Zoe is six feet under and her skin has grown cold. The room is uninhabited. It should have been an obvious fact by process of elimination, but Ike gets shell shocked to find the room so cold and deserted. It never registered to him that they are all gone.
Jade's bed is still messy and unmade, she always lived in a perpetual state of chaos. Ike thinks she just needs someone to help her clean up her mess, and he makes the bed so it'll be tidy when she gets back.
Everyone is falling apart. They're stray sheep without a leader.
Without Casey around, Ike never really had to do much of anything. He could observe and snipe remarks at the gang, and she thoughtfully carried out the execution.
It doesn't take much convincing to get everyone involved. Everyone breathes a sigh of relief, like they were waiting for someone to decide that things could go back to normal. With Casey, there was detailed plans, synched watches, and contingency after contingency plans laid out.
Ike manages to scramble together three flashlights, a pocket knife, and a new pair of sunglasses. The shades are more for his own personal aesthetic, not really essential to the operation, but hey, if he's going to be a leader he needs to look the part.
Ike and Jade are like magnets. Nothing can keep them apart for too long: not a brainwashing academic establishment, not death, not some evil Asian twin. No "maybes," or "almosts," about that fact. They always find each other, it's the staying together part that gives them trouble.
He can find her. Whenever she is.
The entire world around Jade trembles. She slips through the thin fingers of death again, except this time it isn't her mother bleeding out in her place, it's the truant with sandy hair and a kind heart. She wants to go looking for Casey, but somehow she knows she wouldn't find her roommate even if she searched the entire grounds of the Academy.
There's someone else she wants to find too, but Jade is sure that the next time she sees Ike will be the time they both die. Her body is weak and shaking, and Jade leans against the wall to steady herself.
Somewhere, the cylinder is swirling, the countdown hits eight thirteen, and flowers in the green house are blooming again.
For the second time in her life, Jade isn't sure if everything is falling apart or slipping into place.
Parts of the ceiling are crumbling, and the walls shake around her. She barely registers two arms slipping under her legs and neck, and then she's being carried down the corridor.
She's burning up. Jade can feel the fire pulsing through her veins, like she's shedding her skin to reveal whatever true form lies underneath. No mortal can cast their eyes upon a god, Ike needs to leave. He knows it.
Jade is barely conscious, but she knows he's there. She can still smell whiskey and cologne in the air, and his fingers slip and tangle themselves between hers. Ike will only ever truly love one person, and he will watch her die more times than he can count.
This is the death of a star. Another tally for the list. Jade has always been a supernova, she's meant to take out everything in her path, she's meant to lose it all. She's burning up, and collapsing in on herself like a black hole. She's a star falling out of the sky. Jade is literally glowing in his arms.
This is it. She'll go down in flames and an explosion of light. That's why she didn't die all the other times, because she's meant to go out like this. One last glorious act to close the show.
Ike holds on even though her skin is searing, and her handprint is burned on to his. His father warned him not to play with matches. They're about to take their last breathes together, and in the next life, they'll take their first ones together too. He never even considers letting go, because Jade has always been fire.
And Ike has never really minded getting burned.