Chapter Text
The TV had been on since before Spider came downstairs, the same low stream of voices filling the house like it belonged there more than he did, like it had settled into the walls and wasn’t planning on leaving. It mixed with the faint sound of dishes from the kitchen and the hum of something running that probably didn’t need to be on, and for a second he just stood at the bottom of the stairs, not fully in the room yet, one hand brushing along the railing like he hadn’t decided where he was going.
He was already thinking about grabbing something quick and heading back up, or maybe just leaving entirely, but then something in the reporter’s voice cut through the rest, not louder, just sharper in a way that made it harder to ignore. “…the body was discovered early this morning by a passerby,” she said, calm and steady, the kind of voice that didn’t change much no matter what she was talking about, and that was enough to make him look over at the screen properly, his attention catching before he could stop it.
The image showed a narrow street blocked off with yellow tape, police cars angled across the road like they’d been dropped there in a hurry and never moved again, and a small cluster of people standing just far enough back to pretend they weren’t involved. There was a blur on the ground where the body had been, not completely hidden, just softened enough that you had to fill in the rest yourself. Spider stepped a little further into the living room without realizing it, his shoulders tightening slightly as he tried to take in the scene, his eyes moving from one detail to another like he was checking something, even though he didn’t know what he was looking for yet. It felt familiar in a way that wasn’t good. Not the place, not the people, just the setup of it.
“Turn it up,” Nash said from the couch, not even looking at Spider, just holding his arm out in his direction like that counted as asking. Spider didn’t move for a second, then reached over to grab it off the armrest instead, pressing the button himself. The volume jumped a little too high before he adjusted it back down, the reporter’s voice snapping into focus again.
“…authorities have not ruled out suicide, though the investigation is ongoing,” she continued, and they cut to another angle, this one wider, showing more of the sidewalk, more officers, more space that felt too controlled for what they were saying it was.
Nash let out a quiet, annoyed breath, leaning back deeper into the couch like the whole thing personally bothered him. “Another one,” he muttered, dragging a hand over his face before reaching for the beer sitting beside him. “That’s what, the fourth now? Fifth?” He didn’t wait for an answer, taking a sip like he’d already decided it didn’t matter. “City’s going to hell.”
Spider stayed where he was, arms hanging loose at his sides, his attention still locked on the screen even as Nash kept talking over it. Fourth. That’s what the reporter was saying too. Fourth incident in the past three months. The words repeated in that same controlled tone, like they were supposed to settle things, like putting a number on it made it less messy than it actually was. They showed a picture of the victim next, some normal photo pulled from somewhere, the girl smiling at the camera like people always did, like that was the version of her that mattered now. Spider stared at it for a second, then back at the street, then back again, his brow tightening just a little without him noticing.
“It’s always the same thing,” Nash went on, louder now, like he was arguing with the TV. “They don’t know anything, they don’t say anything, and then a week later it’s another one. Nobody wants to admit what’s actually going on.” He shook his head, setting the bottle down a little harder than necessary. “Call it suicide, close the file, move on. Easier that way.”
From the kitchen, a cabinet door shut a bit too sharply. “Nash,” Mary’s voice followed, not raised, just firm enough to carry, “you don’t know that.”
He turned his head slightly, not fully looking at her. “Oh, come on. You really think all these people are just deciding to off themselves in the same way, same kind of places, over and over?” he shot back, gesturing vaguely toward the TV. “That doesn’t strike you as weird?”
Mary stepped into the doorway then, drying her hands on a dish towel, her expression already tight in that controlled way she had when she didn’t want to turn something into a full argument but wasn’t going to ignore it either. She glanced at the screen for a second, then at Nash, then briefly at Spider, like she was checking if he was paying attention, which he was, even if he didn’t look like it. “What strikes me as weird,” she said, measured and careful, “is you jumping to conclusions based on a two-minute news segment.”
Nash let out a short laugh, not amused. “Yeah, because the news always tells the full story, right?”
Spider shifted his weight slightly, the movement small but enough to ground him again, pulling him out of just watching and back into the room with them. He crossed his arms loosely, his eyes still flicking back to the screen where they were replaying the same shot of the street, the same tape, the same blurred shape on the pavement. Suicide. That word again. It sat wrong, in a way that wasn’t exactly obvious, just enough to make it stick in his head longer than it should. They’d said it last time too. And the time before that.
Nash snorted, leaning back again. “They're leaving something out. They have to be."
Mary gave him a look but didn’t respond to that, turning slightly as if she might go back into the kitchen, then hesitating for a second instead. The TV kept talking in the background, repeating details they already knew, cycling through the same footage again like there was more to say when there really wasn’t. Spider barely heard it now. His focus had narrowed without him meaning it to, his mind catching on small things instead of the bigger picture they were trying to show. The number of officers. The way they were standing. One of them near the edge of the frame had his head tilted slightly, like he was listening to something important, his posture stiff in a way that didn’t match a simple call. If it was a suicide, it would’ve been simpler than that.
“People are just losing it,” Nash added after a moment, like he wasn’t done yet, like a minute ago he hadn’t been the one saying there was no possible way for all of those deaths to be suicides. “Pressure, money, whatever. Doesn’t take much anymore.”
Spider didn’t answer. He didn’t really hear that part. His eyes stayed on the screen a few seconds longer, even as the reporter started repeating herself again, even as the footage looped back to the beginning like nothing had changed. Fourth incident. Possible suicide. Investigation ongoing. The same words, over and over, like if they said them enough times they’d start to sound right. They didn’t.
It was mid July, deep into summer. School was out, the days ran long, and most people in town kept to the same simple routines. Nothing major changed from one day to the next. That was part of why it stood out so much once things started happening. There wasn’t anything else to distract from it.
The first death happened maybe two, three months ago. A man was found behind a storage unit complex just after sunrise. One of the employees had opened up for the day and noticed him immediately. The police came, blocked off the area, asked a few questions, then wrapped it up fast. No witnesses. No reported noise. No clear reason for anyone else to be there. The report called it a suicide before most people even heard about it. It showed up on the local news as a short segment, nothing detailed, just enough to say it happened. People talked about it for a day or two. Some said it was sad. Some said they knew him, or knew someone who did. Then it stopped coming up. It didn’t stay in people’s minds.
The second happened a couple of weeks later. Different part of town, but not far. The body was found behind a small strip of closed shops, in a space that wasn’t exactly hidden but wasn’t in direct view either. Again, early in the day. Again, found by someone who wasn’t expecting to see anything. The report followed the same structure as the first. No witnesses. No signs of a struggle. Suicide. This time, more people noticed. Not enough to panic, but enough to comment on it. Two in a short time felt unusual, but not impossible. People explained it away. Bad luck. Personal issues. Things no one else could see.
The third happened before two full months had passed. That was when it stopped feeling normal. Three deaths in that amount of time, all ruled the same way, all found in similar conditions. It didn’t match how things usually worked in a town this size. People started talking more openly. Not just passing comments, actual conversations. Some stuck to the explanation given. Others started questioning it. A few pushed it further and said something was wrong with the town itself, that something had shifted. It didn’t take long for words like cursed to start showing up, half-joking at first, then less so. No one had better answers, and the lack of information left space for anything to fill it.
That’s when Spider started paying attention to it. At first it was just noticing the repetition. The same phrases used in every report. The same kind of locations. The same conclusion every time, delivered quickly and without much detail. It didn’t sit right. There were no witnesses in any of the cases. Not one person who saw something happen, or even heard anything unusual. That’s usually how most suicides went, but something about the patterns made Spider think those were not suicides. And it wasn’t just Spider thinking that. Everybody had their own suspicions.
The locations didn’t make sense either. They weren’t personal spaces. Not homes, not anywhere connected to the victims in an obvious way. They were all places someone could reach, but not places someone would choose without a reason. Public enough to be found, but out of the way enough to delay it. That pattern repeated every time. It didn’t add up as suicide. Not three times in a row, not in the same way, not in the same kind of places. It required too many coincidences stacked on top of each other. It required everything to go perfectly, every time, with no variation. That didn’t just happen.
Then the fourth body was found, today.
Late afternoon this time, not morning. Behind a laundromat near a busier street. Not hidden the way the others were. Someone walking through the back lot would see it without trying. The position stood out immediately. It wasn’t random. It looked arranged. There were still no witnesses. No one reported seeing anything unusual until it was already too late. No one came forward with information that helped. Police arrived, secured the area, and kept people and medias back. The same process. The same structure.
And already, before anything else had time to develop, the same word started forming around it again. Suicide. Spider knew it wasn’t. Someone was repeating the same action, over and over, and getting the same result. He just had to find out who.
Spider didn’t leave the living room right away, but he didn’t stay in it either, not really. The TV kept going, the same footage replaying, the same voice repeating details that didn’t explain anything, and Nash had gone quiet again, the conversation dropping off without resolution. Mary moved back into the kitchen, the sound of dishes picking up like nothing had shifted. It all continued around him in a way that felt disconnected from what he was thinking. After a few seconds, he pushed himself off the wall and walked down the hallway without saying anything.
His room was exactly the same as he’d left it. Window cracked open, air barely moving, the faint noise of the highway drifting in. It should have felt normal. It didn’t. He stepped inside and let the door fall shut behind him, not slamming it, just closing it enough to cut off the rest of the house. The quiet settled in immediately, heavier than before. Without the TV, without Nash talking over everything like some angry dog barking, the thoughts didn’t have anything to compete with. They came back sharper. Clearer. The pattern didn’t fade just because he wasn’t looking at it.
He didn’t sit. He didn’t move much at all. Just stood there for a moment, staring at nothing in particular while his mind kept going over it, lining everything up again. The timing, the locations, the lack of witnesses. That part stayed the same in every report. No one saw anything. No one heard anything. No one came forward with details that mattered. That didn’t happen by chance, not repeatedly, not this cleanly. People noticed things. Someone always did. There were always gaps, mistakes, something out of place.
There weren’t any here.
His jaw tightened slightly, his arms crossing without him really thinking about it. The word suicide came back again, the way it had been used each time, quick and final, as if saying it was enough to close everything behind it. It didn’t match what he was seeing. Not anymore. Maybe the first one, on its own, could have passed. Even the second, if no one looked too closely. But three, and now four, all following the same pattern, all ending the same way? That required everything to line up perfectly, over and over again, with no variation. That wasn’t how things worked, as he'd said.
His thoughts shifted again, not away from it, just outward. If he could see it, then someone else had to see it too. Someone who actually knew what they were doing, someone who had access to more than a short report or a news segment. His mind landed on Kiri without much effort. She wasn’t the kind of person to ignore something once it felt off, and she wouldn’t shut him down just because it sounded unlikely. She paid attention. She noticed things other people missed. And more than that, there was her dad.
Jake Sully wasn’t just another officer in town. Even people who didn’t know him knew who he was. He had a background that made people take him seriously without needing to explain it. Former Marine, years of experience, the kind of person who had dealt with real situations, not just routine calls and speeding tickets. If something like this was happening—multiple deaths, real corpses—then it was already at a level where he would be involved. It wasn’t small anymore. Which meant either he already knew or he didn’t see it the same way.
Spider exhaled slowly, his hand coming up to the side of his face, fingers pressing there without much awareness. If Jake had all the information, more than what was being shown publicly, then maybe there was something Spider was missing. Something that made it make sense in a way he couldn’t see yet. Something that maybe he could get Jake to tell him.
His gaze shifted toward the door, not moving yet, just looking at it. Staying in his room wasn’t helping. It wasn’t changing anything. The thoughts kept circling back to the same place, the same conclusion, and sitting there just gave them more time to settle in deeper. He needed to talk to someone who wouldn’t dismiss it. Kiri would listen. And if Jake was already involved, then she might already know something.
He sat down on his bed to put his shoes on, then afterward, Spider made his way downstairs. The living room came into view as he passed, the flickering light from the screen stretching across the walls in uneven pulses. Nash was still there, sunk deep into the couch like he hadn’t moved in hours, one arm slung over the back, the other hanging loose with the bottle tilted in his grip. His eyes tracked Spider immediately, narrowing just slightly as he straightened a bit, attention snapping into place with irritation already built in.
“Where are you going?” Nash asked, voice rough, impatient.
Spider didn’t turn. “Out.”
That was enough to set him off. Nash let out a sharp, humorless breath, sitting forward, elbows braced on his knees now. “Yeah, no surprise there,” he said, louder, the edge in his voice cutting through the room. “Anything to not be here, right?” His hand lifted, gesturing vaguely toward the TV without even looking at it. “You hear what’s going on or you just don’t care? People turning up dead every other week and you’re just gonna go ride around like it’s nothing.”
Spider’s fingers tightened slightly around the door handle. He didn’t answer, didn’t slow, didn’t give him anything to push against. “Unbelievable,” Nash muttered, leaning back again with a shake of his head, but his voice carried. “No sense at all. Boy’s got nothing in that head."
From the kitchen, Mary said nothing. Not even a glance. Just the quiet, steady sound of a plate set down, a drawer closing, the normal rhythm of someone who had already decided not to get involved. She wasn’t much better than her husband by staying out of this and letting Nash talk to Spider like that. But how was that new exactly, Spider didn’t know. The McCoskers had always been like that, for as long as they’d fostered him.
Spider opened the door and stepped outside, pulling it shut behind him with a firm, final click that cut Nash off mid-breath. The heat hadn’t gone anywhere. It sat heavy in the air, pressing in without movement, the kind that stuck to skin even this late in the day. For a second, everything felt still. Then he moved again.
His bike lay off to the side of the house where he’d left it earlier, tipped onto the grass like it had been dropped and forgotten. One handlebar dug slightly into the dirt, the front wheel turned at an awkward angle. He walked over, grabbed it by the frame, and pulled it upright in one motion, the metal warm under his hand from sitting out in the sun. The chain gave a small, familiar click when he rolled it forward, the tires crunching lightly over gravel before hitting pavement.
He swung on without hesitation and pushed off hard, the first few pedals quick and forceful, the bike catching speed almost immediately. The street stretched ahead, quiet in that empty way it got when people stayed inside, lights on behind windows but no one out. The sky had started to dim, the brightness draining slowly, leaving everything softer but not darker yet.
He rode fast, not reckless, just direct. The route to the Sullys’ place was something his body knew without thinking, turns taken automatically, corners cut clean. The further he went, the more the town opened up, houses spreading farther apart with bigger properties instead of just rows of apartments pressed tight together, the noise dropping until it was mostly just the sound of his tires against the road and the faint rush of air past his ears.
The Sully house sat just off the corner, painted a soft, worn blue that caught the last of the evening light and held onto it, the whole place washed in that deep golden glow that made everything look warmer than it really was. A wide porch wrapped around the front, its white railings clean but not perfect, steps leading up where the wood creaked if you hit the wrong spot, and an old flag hung near the door, barely moving in the still air. Tall trees leaned over the house, their branches stretching across the roof and tangling with the overhead wires, leaves filtering the light so it came down uneven, shifting across the windows and siding.
The yard was kept but not obsessively, grass a little too long in places, bushes grown out just enough to show no one cared about trimming them back every week. The windows were lit from inside, steady and warm, silhouettes passing now and then, the kind of house that felt full without needing noise to prove it, solid and lived-in in a way that didn’t try to impress anyone.
Neteyam’s car was parked in the driveway, slightly off-center, like he hadn’t bothered correcting it after pulling in. It stood out immediately. During the year, it wasn’t there—he was away most of the time, off at college, only showing up on holidays or short breaks. But summer changed that. He came back, stayed longer, slipped back into the house like he’d never left, and the whole place shifted with it. More voices, more movement, more presence. It made the house feel fuller, heavier in a way that wasn’t overwhelming, just steady.
The sound of Spider’s bike carried ahead of him before he even reached the driveway, the chain clicking unevenly with each turn, the faint rattle of something loose near the back wheel that he’d never bothered to fix. It wasn’t loud, but in the quiet of the street it stood out. He eased off the pedals as he got closer, the speed dropping gradually, tires humming softer against the pavement before rolling onto the edge of the driveway.
One foot dragged slightly to slow the rest of the way, the bike tilting just enough before he brought it to a stop. He swung his leg over and hopped off in one quick motion, barely pausing as he let the bike fall to the ground beside him, the metal frame hitting with a dull, careless thud. He didn’t even look at it after. It wasn’t worth anything, not really—old, worn down, the kind of thing no one would bother taking even if they had the chance. And this part of town wasn’t the kind where you worried about that anyway. If his bike was ever going to get stolen, it would’ve been back near his place, not here, where everything was quieter, cleaner, and people had actual money to pay their rent and still buy a bike ten times better than his.
He knocked, the sound landing solid against the door, and before it could even fade there were footsteps coming fast from inside, uneven and rushing, the kind that didn’t bother slowing down at the last second. The handle jerked, and the door swung open wide enough to let the light spill out across the porch.
Tuk stood there, still catching her breath a little, like she’d run the whole way just to get it first. Her hand stayed on the handle, fingers curled tight around it, her eyes already locked on him with that immediate recognition she always had. There was nothing hesitant about her, never was. Her hair was slightly out of place, a few braids falling in her face, and there was something smudged on the side of her sleeve that looked like she’d wiped her hands on it instead of bothering with an actual towel.
“Spider,” she said, quick and certain, her voice carrying that constant energy she never seemed to run out of. “You just got here? I didn’t even hear your bike until you were like right there.”
“Yeah,” he answered, already stepping closer, his gaze shifting past her into the house without really meaning to. “Is Kiri here?”
Tuk nodded immediately, like the question didn’t even need thinking about. “Yeah, she’s upstairs. She’s been in her room for a while, I think she was reading or something, or maybe just sitting there, I don’t know, she told me not to go in earlier but I was gonna anyway and then Mom said to leave her alone so I did.” She paused just enough to look back at him again. “You’re going to see her?” He nodded.
“Okay,” she said, stepping back to give him space, pulling the door open wider with a small shift of her weight. “She’s in the same room. Second door on the left. Well, you know that, but still.” He gave a quick nod as he stepped inside, the cold of the house settling around him immediately, different from the still heat outside. The door stayed open behind him for a second before Tuk pushed it shut, the click soft but clear.
“Are you staying for dinner?” she added, already trailing a step after him, not quite ready to let the interaction end. “Mom made something, I don’t know what it is yet but it smells good. Or you can just come anyway even if you don’t stay, she won’t care.”
“I’ll see,” he said, already walking away. Tuk hummed, then went back to the living room. Spider didn’t slow down. He reached the stairs and took them quickly, two at a time, his hand brushing the railing just enough to keep his balance as he turned at the top. The hallway stretched out ahead, familiar in a way that didn’t require looking closely, doors slightly open, light spilling out from some of them.
Kiri’s door was closed. He slowed just a fraction as he reached it, the movement finally breaking its rhythm. Spider knocked on the door and waited. His hand rested briefly against the frame before pressing again. The door moved slightly when it opened, and Kiri appeared, white milkmaid top, shorts ending above her knees, necklace stone held in green-and-brown cords swinging lightly against her chest. She didn’t hesitate, didn’t pause to speak. She reached out, pressing one hand against his shoulder, and pulled him into the room. The door clicked closed behind them, the lock turning with a quiet, deliberate twist.
She pressed against him immediately, lips meeting his. One hand cupped his jaw, the other rested along the back of his neck, tilting his head subtly. He mirrored her movements with his hands on her shoulders and waist, adjusting to the way her body shifted with each press of her lips. The necklace brushed his chest each time she leaned or tilted, swinging slightly with the motion. They pressed together in the center of the room, stepping around the bed and past the desk without breaking contact. The sunlight slanted through the window, brushing across the floor, the curtains moving slightly with the breeze, dust motes catching on the stone of her necklace.
She pulled back for a moment, forehead resting against his. Spider’s eyes tracked the details of the room: the neatly made bed, papers stacked on the desk, books aligned along the shelves, worn carpet in the center where steps were repeated. They moved together again, lips pressing, bodies shifting around each other. Her hands adjusted his hair, cupped his face again, sliding down to hold his shoulders. He followed the motions with subtle shifts of his own hands along her back, guiding without forcing, each movement smooth, familiar.
Spider and Kiri had known each other for as long as either of them could actually remember. It wasn’t something that started at school or through mutual friends later on, it went all the way back to daycare, back when everything was small and loud and structured around nap times and plastic toys. They had ended up sitting next to each other on the first day by accident, two kids who didn’t really talk much at first, just existing in the same space, sharing crayons, sitting through the same routines. They just stayed near each other. Day after day, week after week, it became normal that if one of them was somewhere, the other wasn’t far. The adults noticed it, called it cute, paired them together without thinking too much about it, and it stuck.
As they got older, nothing really broke that pattern. Elementary school, then middle school, they were still there, still close, still defaulting to each other without needing to plan it. They sat together, worked together, walked home together when they could. They knew each other’s habits, moods, routines, the small things most people didn’t notice. If one of them was quiet, the other picked up on it immediately. If something changed, even slightly, it didn’t go unnoticed. It built slowly, over years, into something solid enough that neither of them questioned it. They didn’t need to define it. It was just there.
At some point, though, it stopped being just friendship. There wasn’t a clear moment where everything shifted, no single event either of them could point to later, but the change was obvious once it had settled in. It showed up in small things first. The way they looked at each other a little longer than before. The way touches started to linger instead of being quick and absent-minded. Sitting closer without realizing it. Noticing details they hadn’t paid attention to before. Neither of them said anything about it at first, but it built quietly, steadily, until it was impossible to ignore.
By the time winter came around, it wasn’t confusing anymore. They both knew. They just hadn’t said it out loud yet. That changed around Christmas. It wasn’t a big planned moment, not something staged or perfect. It happened the same way everything else between them had—naturally, almost casually, like it had been heading there the entire time and finally caught up. One day they were just close like always, and the next, they were closer in a way that didn’t leave room for pretending it was still just friendship. They didn’t make a big deal out of it. They didn’t need to. They both understood what it meant. That’s when they really started dating.
Since then, they kept their relationship to themselves. Completely. It wasn’t even really a discussion, more of an immediate, mutual understanding that this wasn’t something they could just let everyone know about. The way they acted around other people didn’t change much. They still sat together, still talked the same way, still moved through their routines like nothing had shifted. All the real differences stayed behind closed doors, in quiet spaces like her room, in small gestures no one else was around to see. It wasn’t about hiding because they were ashamed. It was about avoiding what would come with people knowing.
Lo’ak had figured it out first. Not because they told him, but because he paid attention just enough to notice the difference. The way Spider stayed a little longer, the way Kiri looked at him when she thought no one was watching, the small, almost invisible changes. He didn’t push it, didn’t make a big deal out of it, just acknowledged it in that quiet way he had. Honestly, he had known it was heading that way for years. Neteyam found out not long after, more directly, but handled it the same way—no drama, no unnecessary questions, just an understanding that it wasn’t something to spread around. The four of them operated with that shared knowledge, keeping it contained without needing to constantly talk about it.
Tuk didn’t know. That part had been intentional. It wasn’t about not trusting her, because they did. It was the opposite, really. She was too open, too honest, the kind of person who would mention something casually without realizing the weight it carried. She would say it in passing, or bring it up at the wrong time, not out of carelessness but because she didn’t see why it needed to be hidden. And that was exactly the problem. If Tuk knew, it wouldn’t stay quiet.
And if it didn’t stay quiet, Jake and Neytiri would find out.
That was the real reason behind all of it. Not just avoiding questions, but avoiding the kind of reaction they both knew would come, especially from Neytiri. It wasn’t hard to predict. The looks, the disapproval, the immediate assumptions. The idea of Spider—of all people—being that close, being involved in that way with their daughter, it wouldn’t sit right. Not with everything tied to his past, not with his blood, not with the history that followed him whether he wanted it or not. Even if Jake might handle it differently, more controlled, more politely, Neytiri wouldn’t. And once she reacted, it would spread through everything else. So they kept it contained. Simple as that.
Kiri pulled back slightly, hands still resting along his shoulders, thumbs brushing lightly against the line of his collarbone as she tilted her head, eyes scanning his face with that quiet certainty she’d always had. “Why’d you come?” she asked, voice steady but curious, a little edge of amusement hiding underneath, the kind of question that wasn’t just about words. Spider’s hands stayed on her waist, holding lightly, shifting just enough to adjust to her movements.
“...I wanted to see you,” he said after a pause, voice low, almost embarassed, but she caught the tension in his jaw, the flicker of hesitation in his eyes. She smiled briefly, brushing her lips along his temple before letting them rest against his cheek.
“That’s not it,” she said. Her fingers pressed gently into his shoulders, tilting his head toward hers. “I can see it in you. It’s something else. Always is.”
He swallowed, glancing toward the edge of the bed, fingers tracing along her sides, hands adjusting slightly as if that small movement could anchor him better. “I… I wanted to know if your dad’s around,” he said finally, careful, measured, and almost like a question phrased as an observation. His eyes flicked briefly to the door, then back to her, tracking her reactions. She didn’t answer immediately, just held his gaze and let the moment stretch. She knew why he asked without him needing to say it, the weight pressing behind the words, the underlying concern that had been growing ever since the news reports started piling up. She knew what he was thinking even before he fully formed it.
“He’s at work,” she said after a beat, tone precise and factual, but her eyes softened slightly. She moved her hand along his forearm, guiding him closer, leaning into the motion just enough to keep him pressed gently against her. Grace’s necklace swung against her chest as she shifted slightly, tilting her head to look at him again.
Kiri leaned in again, brushing her lips lightly along his, just enough to anchor him without breaking the space between them. He responded, pressing forward slightly, hands moving along her back and waist, following her rhythm. No words were needed to confirm the understanding between them, but each subtle gesture, each tilt of the head, each press of lips against skin, layered meaning over action: he had come for more than comfort, she knew it, and she accepted it without question.
Kiri’s hand slid from his shoulder to his chest, palm flat, pressing lightly as she leaned back just enough to catch his gaze. Her expression softened, eyes narrowing slightly, clear and certain. “It’s not him,” she said, voice low but steady. Her thumb brushed the edge of his collarbone as she held him still, guiding him to focus on her rather than the dark thought circling his mind. She didn’t need to elaborate. She knew exactly what he was thinking—the pattern of the deaths, the way his brain had latched onto it, the way he had tracked the news for weeks, the way his chest tightened at the thought of a killer moving unseen in the town. She could feel the tension in his hands, the small tremor in his fingers as they rested against her sides, the subtle flicker in his eyes.
He thought of his dad. Of what had happened when he was eight. It hadn’t been just some news story or a headline in a paper he barely read. It had been a full, public ordeal that no one in the house could protect him from completely. He remembered waking up to shouting, the sound of heavy boots in the hall, and the flashing red and blue lights from the front door. They told him it was nothing, that it was safe, that he should stay in bed, but he had seen enough to understand something terrible had happened.
He remembered the officers moving through the house, the way one of the paramedic had tried to cover him with a blanket, pressing him into the mattress, telling him to close his eyes, telling him it would all be okay. But the voices, the orders, the sound of his father being restrained, the way people were speaking in hurried, clipped sentences, it had all sunk in. He remembered catching a glimpse of someone lying on the floor, something dark spreading across the carpet, the smell he couldn’t identify at the time but would remember forever. He had not been able to look away completely, and he couldn’t forget what he saw.
The media arrived before the night was over. Cameras, reporters, flashes of lights, people asking questions he didn’t know how to answer. His father’s name was on every screen, every newspaper: Miles Quaritch, convicted of murder, sentenced to life. And his own name was part of it because he had been there, because he existed. People wanted to know what the son of a killer thought, what the child had seen, what he felt. He didn’t have words then. He had only fear, and that fear had carved itself into memory with sharp edges.
He remembered the interviews Jake refused to let him watch, the whispers from neighbors and strangers, the way some people looked at him in school differently, the way adults in public tried to avoid mentioning it but couldn’t help the tension in their voices. He remembered going to court, once, maybe twice, though he had been shielded as much as possible, but even the brief glimpses—the long hallways, the security guards, the heavy doors, the sound of his father’s voice behind them—were enough. Enough to know that his father had done something that couldn’t be erased, something permanent.
He had nightmares for years after that. Dreams where the lights flashed under his door, where he could hear the yelling and the sirens, where the world outside his bed was unsafe and filled with sudden, violent endings. He had tried to convince himself that his father was locked away, that nothing could reach him, that it was over, but every sound at night, every argument in the street, every headline about violence anywhere, triggered the same fear. The knowledge that his father was behind bars for life didn’t make the memories softer. It didn’t erase the shape of the fear, the way it lived in his chest, the way it settled across his shoulders, pressing him down even years later.
Even now, seventeen, with Kiri beside him, safe and present, the images and sounds returned whenever he thought about real danger, about the news, about people dying under strange circumstances. He knew logically that his father couldn’t reach him. And he knew that Kiri was right, that there was no possible way those called suicides were his father’s doing. He knew it with a kind of cold certainty that should have been comforting. But his body remembered anyway. His hands tensed, his chest rose unevenly, his stomach rolled with the remembered panic. He had been a child, powerless, and that powerlessness had lodged in him, a permanent residue he couldn’t scrub away.
Eventually both of them sat down on the bed. Kiri adjusted the pillow behind her back and settled into it properly, her legs folding into a cross-legged position without thinking about it, one knee angled toward Spider. He mirrored her on the other side of the bed, close enough that the space between them felt intentional, his hands resting on the blanket, fingers relaxed but not completely loose. For a few seconds, neither of them said anything. It wasn’t uncomfortable, just a pause where both of them were aware of the same thing without deciding who was going to bring it up first. Kiri ended up doing it, her gaze already on him when she spoke.
“My dad’s probably going to be late tonight,” she said, her tone even, stating it the way she had already processed it. “He got called in again this morning, same as the other times.” She shifted slightly against the pillow, one hand flattening the blanket near her knee before resting there. “He’s been on two of those scenes already, and he doesn’t talk about them after. Not at supper, not later, nothing. It’s like he just skips over it completely.
Spider stayed quiet, but his attention sharpened in a way that showed he was taking that in properly. That part mattered more than the call itself. Jake usually said something. Not details, not anything that crossed a line, but enough that it didn’t feel like he was actively avoiding it. If he was choosing not to say anything at all, especially more than once, that wasn’t random. That was a decision. Or maybe it was simply professional secrecy. Go figure.
Kiri leaned forward a bit, resting her forearms on her knees, her fingers loosely linked together as she looked at him. “It’s not even that he’s trying to hide something,” she added. “It’s just… not there. Like it didn’t happen. He changes the subject before it even starts.” She let out a small breath, more thoughtful than frustrated. “I don’t know. It’s just weird.”
Spider nodded once, slow, his eyes still on her. His mind was already lining that up with everything else he had been noticing. The reports that all followed the same structure. The way each case got closed fast. The locations that didn’t make sense if you looked at them together instead of separately. And now Jake being there more than once and choosing not to talk about it at all afterward. That didn’t fit with something simple.
He looked at her properly then, holding her gaze instead of letting it drift. “You don’t think those are suicides, do you?”
Kiri exhaled through her nose, her shoulders dropping slightly as she leaned back against the pillow again. The reaction wasn’t sharp, but it was immediate, like she had expected him to go there eventually. “Spider,” she said, her voice steady, a little tired at the edges, “I get why you’re thinking that. I do. But that doesn’t automatically mean there’s someone out there killing people.” She shook her head once, small but firm. “It’s a lot happening close together, yeah. That’s going to look wrong. But that’s not the same as…” She stopped herself before finishing the sentence, then tried again, a little more grounded. “It’s not enough to jump to that. A serial killer on the loose, here, of all places, that’d be a bit ridiculous, you see?”
He didn’t interrupt her, didn’t argue back right away. He just kept looking at her, the same way he had been when he was trying to work something out in his head. Kiri held his gaze for a second longer, then her expression changed slightly, the resistance in it easing as something else clicked into place. It wasn’t a big reaction, just a quiet recognition of where his head had actually gone with it, like she suddenly realized something she had not before but should have been obvious.
“Oh,” she said, softer now. She adjusted her position slightly, one hand pressing flat against the blanket beside her, her voice lower when she spoke again. “That’s not the same thing,” she said. “You know that.” Spider’s jaw tightened just a little, his hands pressing briefly into the mattress before relaxing again. He knew exactly what she meant. One person. One night. Something that had already happened and ended.
“I know you didn’t mean it like that,” he said after a moment, quieter than before.
Kiri watched him for a second, not pushing it further, not trying to argue him out of it now. The earlier frustration was gone, replaced with something more careful, like she was choosing her next words instead of reacting. Spider stayed where he was, his posture unchanged, but the thought didn’t go anywhere. It stayed there, steady, running under everything else, lining up the same details again in a way that still didn’t match what everyone else was calling it.
“It’s not him. It’s not your dad.” She said again. To her, it was simple. The timeline didn’t match. The situation didn’t match. There wasn’t anything real connecting his dad to what had been happening in town, and she wasn’t going to pretend there was just because it felt off. She watched him after, like she expected him to argue, or at least question it, but he didn’t.
Spider stayed where he was, hands resting on the bed, his gaze dropping slightly instead of holding hers. He didn’t answer right away. There wasn’t anything he could say that would change what she meant, and part of him already agreed with her. In his head, the response came quickly. She was right. His dad had been in prison for eight years. That had never changed. Life sentence. No gaps, no confusion, no chance of him being anywhere else. It had been clear from the start and it had stayed that way.
He went over it again anyway, the same way he always did when the thought came up. The dates lined up. The facts lined up. Everything pointed to the same conclusion. His dad was still there. That part wasn’t up for debate. And the deaths everyone kept talking about were ruled as suicides. That was what the reports said every time. Nothing that would suggest someone else was involved. That should have been enough to end it. Spider knew what she was saying was true, he wasn’t arguing with her. He wasn’t trying to prove anything.
The deaths were suicides. And his dad was in prison. Right?