I scrambled on top of him, pinning his axe arm with my knee. I punched him in the face—or where his face should be.
My fist connected with hot, sticky sludge.
The "Snowman" mask was dissolving. The white texture was bubbling away, revealing the hard black shell underneath. The black tears from the eyes were boiling now, sizzling as they ran down the distorted plastic.
Marcus roared and bucked, throwing me off like I was a ragdoll. I slammed into the base of the easel, the wind knocked out of me.
He sat up, dropping the axe. He didn't need it anymore. He reached for me with two massive, gloved hands.
"Look at me!" he screamed. He clawed at his own face, ripping the melting mask away in wet, tearing chunks.
Underneath the sludge and the latex was a tactical helmet and a balaclava, both soaked in the fake black blood. He ripped the balaclava off.
There was no monster. No ghost. Just a man.
Marcus looked terrible. His face was red, veins bulging in his neck, sweat and soot streaking his skin. His eyes were wide, bloodshot, manic. He looked exactly like I felt on my worst days—trapped in a loop of misery he couldn't break.
"She called you," Marcus spat, crawling toward me. The fire was climbing the walls now, eating the old canvases. The smoke was getting thicker, banking down from the ceiling like a grey blanket. "That night. She called you three times."
He lunged, his hands closing around my throat.
His gloves were hot, sticky with the melting costume. He squeezed.
My airway collapsed. The room started to spin. All I could see were his eyes and the flames reflected in them.
"I... didn't... hear," I choked out, clawing at his wrists. It was like trying to bend steel bars.
"You never listen!" he screamed, spraying saliva in my face. "You were in here! Painting your little nightmares! You loved the darkness more than you loved her!"
Black spots danced in my vision. The roar of the fire faded into a high-pitched whine. He was killing me. He was actually going to squeeze the life out of me right here in the ashes of my own work.
My hand scrabbled blindly across the floor, searching for anything. A brush. A rock. A shard of glass.
My fingers brushed against something cold and metallic.
The drafting compass.
It was an old-school Rotring divider, solid steel with two needle-sharp points. I used it for measuring proportions.
I gripped it.
"Daddy!"
Lily’s scream cut through the haze. It wasn't a scream of fear anymore. It was a command.
Marcus flinched. For a microsecond, his grip loosened. He looked toward the corner where the tarp was smoking.
That was my window.
I didn't hesitate. I didn't think about the morality of stabbing my brother-in-law. I just thought about air.
I drove the compass upward with every ounce of strength I had left.
I didn't aim for the eyes—I wasn't a killer. I aimed for the shoulder, for the gap between the Kevlar vest and the neck protection.
Chunk.
The steel points sank deep into his trapezius muscle.
Marcus howled—a sound of pure animal shock—and let go of my throat. He reeled back, clutching at the metal spike sticking out of his shoulder.
I gasped, sucking in a lungful of hot smoke, coughing violently. But I was up. I was moving.
"Get up!" I yelled at myself.
I kicked him in the chest. He fell backward, tripping over his own melting boots. He landed hard near the window.
The fire had cut off the door. The stairwell was a chimney of smoke. There was no way out that way.
I looked at the skylight. Too high.
I looked at the dormer window behind Marcus. The glass was already cracked from the heat.
"Lily!" I shouted, coughing. "The blanket! Keep the blanket on!"
I grabbed the heavy iron easel—a cast-iron beast I’d bought at an estate sale—and lifted it. My muscles screamed.
Marcus was trying to stand up, pulling the compass out of his shoulder. Blood—real, red blood—was soaking his shirt, mixing with the fake black ink.
"It's over, Marcus!" I yelled. "The narrative is over!"
"No!" he shrieked, lurching toward me. "I write the ending!"
"Not this time."
I swung the easel legs like a battering ram.
I didn't hit him. I hit the window behind him.
SMASH.
The glass exploded outward into the blizzard. The wind roared in, feeding the fire with a fresh blast of oxygen. The flames leaped up, swirling in a vortex.
The sudden draft caught Marcus off guard. He stumbled back, his boots slipping on the slick mixture of melted snow-suit and turpentine.
He flailed, his arms windmill-ing. He grabbed the window frame, jagged glass cutting into his gloves.
He looked at me one last time. The rage evaporated, leaving only a hollow, crushing sadness.
"I miss her," he whispered. The wind almost stole the words.
"I know," I said. "Me too."
And then, his grip slipped.
He didn't scream as he fell. He just vanished into the white swirl of the storm.
ns216.73.216.10da2
and then Add to home screen.