Between the Dimensions✔️

Chapter 24

"Checkmate." I grin as I stare at the chess board.

Gabe frowns. "Neither of us has made a move yet."

I shrug. "Checkmate."

Gabe looks deeply perplexed. "That's not what checkmate means."

"I'm just warning you that you're going to lose," I laugh.

Gabe's face scrunches up as he looks at the board. "I've never lost a game of chess."

"This will be a humbling experience for you then," I tease.

Gabe focuses on the board, picking up a pawn and is about to set it down when he mutters to himself under his breath and puts it back in place, his eyebrows pulled tightly together.

He stares at the board a few minutes longer, and I see his mouth moving, like he's talking through every possible outcome. He probably knew all of them, but my Sight is too strong now, he doesn't stand a chance.

I sigh. "I'd like to finish this game sometime today, Gabe."

Gabe scowls and moves a pawn.

I shake my head sadly. "You really shouldn't have done that."

"I just moved one piece! There's no way you could possibly already know how this ends!" He yells in frustration, and I laugh harder.

We continue playing, and he gets more and more unraveled as the game goes on.

"This sucks," He groans when I take a rook.

"I warned you," I laugh. "Don't worry, you don't have to count this against your winning streak."

He sighs, sweeping his hand over the board and knocking the pieces over. "I forfeit," He grumbles.

"Wise decision," I nod.

"Someday, I'll beat you," He warns, but he's chuckling. "Even if it takes decades to figure out how."

I laugh with him. I don't mean it.

****

Blood, blood, and more blood.

It's in my lungs, and I'm drowning in myself.

I'm calm when I wake up, despite the gruesome dream. I felt at more at peace with my death now. There's a certain kind of serenity around it, of knowing it's coming regardless of anything else.

I didn't feel scared anymore.

If anything, I was just patiently waiting for it to happen.

At least with inevitable events, there's no choices, no decisions to be made. It just is.

I start coughing up blood, and the fits last longer every time they happen. If Gabe was here, he would have been able to tell me exactly how long I hacked up blood into my handkerchief.

I reach for my glass of water, but frown when I realize that I already drank all of it before going to bed.

Sighing, I get out of bed, wrapping a blanket around me. Even blankets aren't enough to warm the deep chill I feel in my body with my impending death.

It's not bad, or even sad. It just is.

And I'm okay with that. Happy, even. Relieved it'll be all over soon.

I've been dying since the day I was born. My life was always an hourglass, sand slipping through too fast to stop.

I quietly go downstairs to the kitchen, and see Killian sitting on a stool, a steaming mug and a book in front of him.