I don't know how long I stayed on the floor like that, my back pressed against the side of the bed, legs stretched out in front of me, hands resting uselessly in my lap. The red gloves were still on, stiff now, the blood drying into dark flakes along the creases of my fingers. In the dim light of my room, it had already turned from bright red to a dull brownish black.
John hadn't moved. Of course he hadn't. He lay exactly where he fell, one arm twisted awkwardly under his body, neck angled in a way that made my stomach turn if I looked too long. His eyes were open, staring at nothing. They had been open the whole time. I hadn't closed them. I couldn't bring myself to touch him again.
The thought came slowly, almost politely, as if it were asking permission to enter my head.
I killed someone.
It didn't feel like my thought. It felt like something spoken from far away, drifting into the room.
I killed someone with my bare hands.
I looked down at them, at the dried blood clinging to the gloves. I could still feel the pressure in my arms, the memory of it lodged in my muscles. I had wrapped my arm around his throat and squeezed. I had felt him struggle, felt the jerking panic in his body, heard the choking sounds turn thin and weak. I had counted under my breath without even knowing why.
At twenty-five he had stopped fighting.
At thirty I was still squeezing.
A strange sound escaped me then, something caught between a laugh and a sob. My stomach twisted violently and for a second I thought I was going to throw up right there beside him. I swallowed it back down with effort.
Holding back tears I started thinking burying my emotions.
I needed to get control.
I couldn't just go to prison, I didn't wish so.
The body couldn't stay here. It was still light outside, the city loud and alive beyond my window. I would have to wait until night. Moving him now would be suicide. Cameras were everywhere in Manhattan. Public transportation was out of the question. Ride shares were worse. Drivers remembered faces.
I didn't have a car.
Carrying him through the streets in broad daylight was impossible. The absurdity of the thought almost made me smile. Three weeks ago my biggest problem had been hallway humiliation and stupid nicknames. Now I was planning how to transport a corpse without getting caught.
I forced myself to stand, and my legs shook so badly I had to steady myself on the bed frame. My face still throbbed from earlier, from the beating I'd nearly forgotten in the middle of everything else. The door caught my attention next. The frame was splintered, the lock destroyed. Anyone in the hallway could push it open if they tried hard enough. I didn't have tools or time to fix it, so I closed it as tightly as it would go and wedged my desk chair under the handle. It wasn't secure, not really, but it might hold against a casual push. I told myself that would be enough for a few hours.
Visenya's borrowed hoodie from yesterday lay crumpled near the bed. I picked it up without thinking.
I removed the gloves carefully and set them aside, stripped off my stained shirt, shoved it into a plastic bag under the sink, and pulled the hoodie over my head.
I slipped a clean pair of cheap household gloves into my pocket instead of putting them on. Wearing them outside would look strange. I grabbed my wallet, my phone, my keys, then paused at the door and looked back.
John was still there, eyes open, blood dark against the floor.
Biting my trembling lips hard, I turned.
I stepped out and closed the door behind me, adjusting the chair wedge as best I could before heading toward the elevator.
The ride down felt suffocating despite lasting less than a minute. The fluorescent lights hummed overhead and my reflection in the scratched metal doors looked pale and distant, like someone I vaguely recognized but didn't fully know. My body trembled beneath the hoodie, though I hoped it wasn't visible. Inside, everything felt unstable, like I was vibrating from the inside out.
The lobby was empty when the doors opened, and I exhaled for what felt like the first time in minutes. Outside, the city moved normally, uncaring. Cars passed. People talked. Someone laughed too loudly near the corner. The world had not paused just because I had ended someone's life.
I walked toward the convenience store two blocks away, the same place I'd bought snacks and energy drinks from a hundred times before. The traffic light at the intersection seemed to take forever to change, and when it didn't switch fast enough, I stepped off the curb without thinking.
Headlights flooded my vision and tires screeched as an SUV stopped inches from me.
"WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU? YOU TRYING TO DIE? LOOK WHERE YOU'RE GOING, YOU STUPID FUCKING KID—"
The driver leaned out the window, furious, shouting about whether I was trying to get myself killed. I should have apologized. Instead, I just looked at him.
Something in my expression must have unsettled him. His anger faltered mid-sentence. His eyes searched my face and whatever he found there made him hesitate. He rolled up his window without finishing his rant. When the light changed, I crossed the street without looking back.
Inside the store, the bright lights felt harsh against my bruised face. I grabbed a basket and moved automatically through the aisles, selecting heavy-duty trash bags, multiple bottles of bleach, disinfectant wipes, paper towels, extra gloves, a small bottle of alcohol. Each item landed in the basket with barely any hesitation.
I added a few bottled waters and energy bars without really thinking about it.
At the counter, the owner watched me unload everything. His gaze lingered briefly on the swelling around my eye, then on the pile of cleaning supplies. He didn't ask questions. He simply scanned the items and told me the total. I paid, keeping my voice steady and my eyes down.
The walk back felt heavier, the bags digging into my hands. Every passing siren made my pulse spike. Every pair of eyes on the sidewalk felt like they could see straight through me, past the hoodie, past the calm exterior, into the apartment upstairs where John lay on my floor.
When I reached my building, the door to my apartment was still closed, still held in place by the chair. I pushed inside and shut it quickly behind me.
He was still there.
Of course he was.
I set the bags down slowly and stood there for a long moment, staring at him.
I forced myself to move then.
I crouched beside John's body, the smell of blood already thickening in the room, metallic and faintly sweet. My hands hovered over him for a second before I steeled myself and began checking his pockets. It felt invasive in a way that almost made me flinch. He was dead, and I was still treating him like a threat.
His jacket yielded a phone. I slid it out carefully and set it on my desk without looking at the screen yet. Back pocket—wallet. Inside: cash, cards, ID. I took the entire wallet. Keys followed, heavy and cold in my palm.
Everything that could identify him. Everything that could trace him back here.
I stepped away and slipped on a fresh pair of gloves, snapping the latex tight around my wrists. My stomach churned as I reached for the first box of heavy-duty trash bags. The plastic crackled loudly in the quiet room.
"Just do it," I muttered trembling under my breath.
I started with his legs.
Lifting him was worse than I expected. Dead weight wasn't just an expression. His body resisted in a way that felt unnatural, slack and uncooperative. I had to swallow hard to keep from gagging as I maneuvered the first bag up and around him. The smell intensified when I shifted him, and for a second bile burned at the back of my throat.
I stopped. Breathed through my mouth.
Then kept going.
Layer after layer. I used more bags than I thought I would, double-wrapping everything, pulling the plastic tight and taping the seams closed. My hands shook the entire time, not from emotion exactly, but from the sheer effort of forcing myself to continue.
When I finally stepped back, he was no longer John.
Just a long, black shape on my floor.
I didn't let myself think about that too hard.
Dragging him was another pain. The plastic scraped against the floor as I pulled, inch by inch, toward the small shower room connected to my bedroom. My arms burned. My palms slipped even through the gloves. Every small thud against the floor sounded deafening in my ears, as if the entire building could hear it.
The shower stall was narrow, barely enough space for a person to stand comfortably. It would have to do.
I maneuvered the wrapped body inside, adjusting it until the door could close most of the way. Not perfect, but hidden enough for now. Out of sight.
I stood there for a second, chest rising and falling fast, staring at the black shape through the fogged glass panel.
Then I turned away.
The blood.
I grabbed the bleach and poured it directly onto the darkest stains first. The sharp chemical smell immediately overpowered everything else, stinging my nose and eyes. I scrubbed with paper towels, with sponges, with anything that would absorb and erase. The floor. The baseboards. The edge of the bed frame. Even spots that might have been nothing—I cleaned them anyway.
Over and over.
Bleach. Wipe. Scrub.
The reddish brown smears faded into faint discolorations, then into nothing at all. I moved methodically around the room, checking from different angles, crouching low to inspect the floor under the desk, under the bed, near the closet. I wiped the doorknob. The desk surface. The chair I'd used to wedge the door. The sink. The faucet handles.
If there was a trace left, I couldn't see it.
When I finished, every used paper towel, every sponge, every empty bottle went into another trash bag along with my bloodied shirt and the original gloves. I tied it tight, double-knotted, then double-bagged it for good measure.
The room smelled like a swimming pool and cheap plastic.
But it no longer smelled like death.
I looked around one last time.
No visible stains. No obvious signs of struggle.
Just a slightly crooked door frame and the faint hum of the city outside.
My legs finally gave out.
I slid down against the wall and sat on the floor, head tipping back until it hit the drywall. For the first time since it happened, I let myself breathe without doing anything.
My hands felt numb.
I reached into my pocket and pulled out my phone. The screen flickered on, and that's when I noticed the crack running diagonally across the corner. It must've happened earlier during the fight. I hadn't even realized.
I opened Google Maps.
My fingers trembled as I zoomed out from Manhattan, scanning for green spaces, empty areas, anything that looked remotely isolated. Parks, wooded patches, industrial zones near the river. Each option looked smaller the more I zoomed in. Surrounded by buildings. By people. By cameras.
I swallowed hard.
This wasn't some rural town where you could disappear into trees for miles.
This was Manhattan.
Every inch of it watched.
Even if I found somewhere, how was I supposed to get him there? I didn't have a car. I couldn't rent one without leaving a trail. I couldn't drag a human-sized bundle down the street without someone noticing.
That left one option.
Walking.
But not like that.
My eyes drifted around my room until they landed on my closet.
I stood slowly and opened it. At the bottom, shoved behind a stack of old boxes, was a large wheeled suitcase.