Jackson woke up at around nine o'clock in the morning, immediately reaching for his glasses—only to realize they were already on his face.
They sat perfectly straight on the bridge of his nose.
Which meant he hadn't put them there.
He stared at the ceiling for a long moment, unmoving, as the realization sank in.
Holt's doing.
He groaned, dragging a hand slowly down his face before pressing his palms into his eyes. The world felt thick and cottony around the edges, like someone had stuffed insulation inside his skull. He could feel last night in layers—smoke clinging to his sweater, the faint ache in his neck from sleeping wrong, the dull throb behind his eyes that felt suspiciously like dehydration mixed with social regret.
Fragments of memory filtered back in, disjointed and unreliable.
Heath's "gourmet" marshmallows that had tasted like someone set sugar on fire and then insulted it.
The bonfire roaring too high because Holt had insisted "bigger flame equals better vibe."
The way the sparks had spiraled up into the night sky like they were trying to outshine the stars.
And Frankie.
Frankie laughing—bright and electric—at something Holt said. Jackson couldn't remember the joke. He just remembered the sound. The way it cut through the crackle of firewood and the low murmur of monsters swapping stories. He remembered the warmth in his chest that wasn't from the flames.
Then blank.
Not gradual fade-to-black blank.
Hard cut.
Jackson winced as he rolled onto his side and grabbed his iPhone from the nightstand. The screen lit up with aggressive brightness, forcing him to squint. A barrage of unread messages stacked across his lock screen like an accusation. Most of them were from Heath.
Naturally.
He unlocked it.
The group chat name—Bonfire Buddies (But Make It Spooky)—was already a red flag.
He scrolled.
Heath: "WHO LET HOLT NEAR THE FIRE PIT"
Heath: "BRO TRIED TO JUGGLE EMBERS"
Heath: "FRANKIE STOP ENCOURAGING HIM"
Heath: "JACKIE MY DUDE U ALIVE????" 💀💀💀
Jackson sighed, rubbing sleep from his eyes with one hand while typing with the other.
"Yeah, just woke up"
He stared at the message for a second, debating whether to add punctuation. He didn't. He hit send and tossed the phone onto his bed like it had personally offended him.
It bounced once and landed face-up.
Crossfade, perched on his desk like a vaguely judgmental gargoyle, shifted from its default moss green to a concerned shade of bruised purple as Jackson stared at nothing in particular. The tiny creature—if "creature" was even the right word—tilted its head, its surface rippling faintly like liquid glass catching light.
The phone buzzed again.
Jackson didn't look at it.
It buzzed a second time.
He groaned and reached for it.
Frankie.
Of course it was Frankie.
"Hey Jackie! You missed a shocking good time last night ;)" ⚡⚡⚡
He pressed his palms into his eyes again.
Holt's terrible puns were contagious now.
This was how it started. First lightning emojis. Next thing you knew, everyone was making combustion metaphors like it was a personality trait.
He rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling. The faint smell of smoke lingered in the room. Not enough to set off alarms, but enough to remind him that Holt had been in control long enough to leave a signature.
Jackson dragged himself upright and shuffled toward the mirror.
The reflection that met him looked like a Victorian ghost who'd recently discovered caffeine and regretted it.
His bowtie was crooked—tilted just enough to suggest effort had been made and then abandoned. His sweater vest was inside out. The tag stuck up near his collarbone like it was trying to escape. His hair—
His hair looked like someone had attempted to sculpt it using a lighter and blind optimism.
He leaned closer.
There were faint, uneven sections near his temple that definitely hadn't been there yesterday.
"Real subtle, Holt," Jackson half muttered, half yawned.
His voice sounded scratchy. Used.
He reached up and tried to finger-comb his hair into something vaguely human-shaped, angling it carefully to cover the shared piercing on his ear. The metal glinted in the light, small but impossible to ignore if someone looked too closely.
He remembered Holt standing in front of this same mirror, squinting at their reflection like it was a competitive sport.
"Trust me, Jackie, asymmetry is personality."
Jackson groaned at the memory.
He glanced down at his phone again.
Another message from Frankie had popped up.
"Also, do you know who Holt's parents are? Or where they live, Jackie?"
Jackson's stomach did a backflip that would've impressed a zombie gymnast.
The room seemed to tilt slightly.
He stared at the message.
Read it again.
Then again.
His thumbs hovered over the keyboard.
He typed:
"No."
Deleted.
Typed again:
"Can't say I do."
Paused.
Added:
"Why?"
He stared at the blinking cursor like it might offer advice.
He deleted the whole thing.
He leaned forward and gently—very gently—tapped his forehead against the mirror.
Then again.
Then once more for emphasis.
Of course Frankie would ask about Holt's parents.
Because why wouldn't she?
Holt was loud. Charismatic. Impossible to ignore. People wanted to know where that kind of confidence came from. It had to have an origin story. A lineage. A dramatic ancestral flame passed down through generations.
Holt had probably spun something ridiculous last night.
Phoenix adoption.
Spontaneous combustion in infancy.
Raised by fire sprites in a volcano.
He could practically hear Holt saying it.
"Nah, my mom's a wildfire and my dad's a lightning strike. They met during a climate event."
Jackson exhaled sharply.
He resisted the urge to text something equally absurd.
"Holt spontaneously generates from campfire smoke, actually."
Tempting.
So tempting.
Instead, he settled for something safer.
"No. Can't say I do, why?"
He hit send.
Immediately regretted it.
The three dots appeared almost instantly.
Then disappeared.
Then—
A voice message.
Of course it was a voice message.
Jackson stared at it like it was a bomb with a visible timer.
Crossfade shifted from purple to a slow, pulsing red.
He tapped it.
Frankie's voice crackled softly through the speaker—bright, curious, threaded with that gentle hum she always seemed to carry.
"Because, Holt always seems so open and confident, but he also feels so closed off, you know? Like a locked journal with a really catchy title."
Jackson froze.
His reflection stared back at him, pale and wide-eyed.
That was exactly how he felt.
Except Holt wasn't the journal.
Holt was the title.
Big. Bold. Impossible to ignore.
And Jackson was the messy scrawl inside. Crossed-out lines. Margins full of overthinking. Words too small to read unless you leaned in.
Crossfade's red deepened, then flickered erratically.
Jackson's grip on his phone tightened.
The irony was suffocating.
Here he was. Literally two people in one body. Sharing memories like mismatched puzzle pieces. And somehow Holt was the one who got to be the cover everyone wanted to read.
He swallowed.
His thumbs hovered again.
"Really, I never noticed that?"
He sent it before thinking.
Too sharp.
Too defensive.
He winced and quickly followed up with:
"I mean, yeah, Holt's kinda… extra."
Which was like calling a werewolf slightly hairy.
Crossfade swirled into a clash of blue and red—Jackson's anxiety mixing with Holt's lingering bravado.
The phone buzzed again.
Frankie.
"Extra is one way to put it. But you're both kinda mysterious in your own ways, Jackie."
Oh no.
Okay.
This might be really bad.
His heart started beating harder, faster, not from fear exactly—but from exposure.
Everyone was soon going to know that he and Holt weren't normal.
Even by monster standards.
Monster High was built on strange. Vampires who fainted at the sight of blood. Zombies obsessed with skincare. Werewolves who scheduled full-moon calendars like they were academic planners.
But this?
This wasn't aesthetic weird.
This was structural weird.
He typed:
"Really? How am I mysterious?"
His fingers trembled slightly as he hit send.
Instant regret.
What if she pointed something out?
What if she'd noticed the gaps? The shifts in tone? The way sometimes "he" remembered conversations he hadn't been present for?
What if she'd already connected dots he was desperately trying to keep scattered?
Crossfade pulsed a nervous yellow-green.
Jackson stared at the typing bubble as if it were a live wire.
Three dots.
Three dots.
Three—
A sharp knock on his bedroom door shattered the tension.
He jumped so hard he nearly dropped his phone.
Oh yeah.
His mother was off today.
The realization hit him like cold water.
The smell of smoke.
The state of his hair.
The inside-out vest.
The unexplained mood-creature glowing on his desk.
And Frankie asking about Holt's parents.
His pulse spiked.
Another knock.
Closer this time. Firmer.
Reality intruding.
Hard.
Jackson stared at the door.
Then at his phone.
Then back at the door.
His brain ran through scenarios at lightning speed.
If his mom came in and saw—
If she asked about last night—
If she mentioned anything about calls from school—
If Frankie kept digging—
The knock came again.
His stomach dropped straight through the floor.
"Jackson?"
Fuck.