A line of light split through the clouds, jagged and unnatural, and the world around her shuddered. The grass beneath her feet trembled. Glass cracked in windows that hadn’t yet been built.
Time wasn’t rewinding. It wasn’t even slowing. It was collapsing.
Ava reached for Jace, her fingers locking around his wrist, her voice caught somewhere between a gasp and a cry.
“Something’s wrong,” she said. “It’s all wrong. I’m not supposed to be here.”
“What’s happening?” he shouted, eyes scanning the sky. Ava looked around wildly. The football field rippled like water. The trees twisted, their leaves suspended mid-air like broken pixels.
She saw students flicker between versions—child, teen, adult—then disappear altogether. Voices echoed down the halls behind them. Laughter, sobbing, arguments, all blending into a chorus of ghosts.
“It’s me,” she whispered. “It’s because I don’t belong here.”
Her knees buckled, and Jace caught her, holding her steady.
“No,” he said. “This can’t be about you.”
“It is,” she sobbed. “I came from somewhere else. Another version. Another time. This isn’t just memory—it’s a fracture. And I’m breaking it.”
He stared at her like he wanted to argue—but couldn’t. He saw it too. The way the sky cracked wider. The way his hand glitched when he reached for her face.
The ground rumbled again, and a loud, metallic groan split the silence. Ava pressed her hands to her ears as the bleachers twisted like liquid, folding in on themselves, their metal seats bending and screeching.
She turned to Jace, eyes wide with panic. “I need to go.”
He stepped forward. “Then take me with you.”
“I can’t!” she cried. “You’re part of this time.”
“So?”
“So if I pull you out, I don’t know what it’ll do.” Her hands trembled. “You might disappear. You might forget. I might forget.”
Jace’s jaw clenched. “None of this is real unless you’re in it.”
“You’re not mine to take,” she said, voice breaking. “This place—this version of you—it doesn’t belong to the future. It belongs to now.”
“But I’m choosing you,” he said. “Doesn’t that count for something?” Ava turned away, unable to hold his gaze.
“It’s not enough. Not this time.”
Time warped again. A crack split across the pavement behind them. A tree vanished. Reappeared. Then vanished again. The field broke into squares like a shattered mirror.
Ava clutched her watch—it sparked in her hand, the light dimming.
“It’s closing,” she whispered. “The passage. It’s trying to fix what I broke.”
“You didn’t break anything,” Jace said. “You made something real.”
“And now it’s costing everything,” she said, eyes burning. “All this… it’s tearing apart.” She looked up at him, her breath ragged. “And I don’t know if I’ll ever find you again.”
He stepped forward, grabbed her face in his hands. “Then let me choose to follow you.”
“You can’t,” she cried. “You’re tied here. To this place. To this time. I don’t even know how I got back to you.”
“I don’t care,” he said. “I just know I can’t lose you again.”
The ground began to split beneath them. A jagged crack tore through the grass, cutting inches from where they stood. Ava stumbled back, and Jace pulled her into his arms.
“We don’t have time,” he said. “You have to go.”
“Not without you,” she sobbed. “You brought me back. You remembered.”
“Then remember me,” he said. “Even if I disappear. Even if this all fades.”
She shook her head. “You deserve more than memory.”
“I don’t,” he whispered. “But I want it.” Ava gripped his shirt like it would anchor her to the present. “I came here to find you, not to leave you.”
“And I came here,” he said, voice shaking, “to finally say it.” The light around them surged. Another crack split the sky.
“Say what?” she asked.
Jace’s hands were still on her face. “That loving you… it’s the only thing that’s ever made sense.”
Reality folded inward like paper burning from the edges. The school flickered. The trees bent. The air collapsed around them in a roar of wind and sound and light.
Ava felt herself being pulled—backward, forward, everywhere at once.
“It’s happening,” she cried. “I can’t stop it.”
Jace pulled her into his chest, wrapping his arms around her. “Then don’t stop it,” he said. “Just hold on.”
“I don’t know if you’ll be there on the other side,” she whispered. “I don’t know if I will.”
“Then remember me,” he whispered into her hair. “That’s all I ask.”
“Jace—”
“Even if this breaks us apart,” he said. “Even if I’m gone—remember I loved you.”
Her vision blurred. Light poured in from every direction.
“Even when I couldn’t love myself,” he finished.