The stepbrother I shouldn't want

Chapter 3: Chapter 3: Haunted Days

"Eliora. Eliora."

Priya waved a hand in front of my face, and I blinked back into focus, my scalpel hovering uselessly over the dissection tray.

"Sorry," I said. "What?"

"I said, pass me the forceps." She raised an eyebrow. "You’ve been out of it all week."

"I’m fine," I said, handing them over.

"You keep saying that." She examined the specimen without looking at me. "You’ve said, ’I’m fine,’ more this week than in the entire time I’ve known you, which, statistically, means you are extremely not fine."

I forced a laugh.

"It’s just been a long week."

"Uh-huh." She glanced sideways at me. "Long week... or long thoughts?"

I set my scalpel down.

"Okay. Fine. Something happened."

Priya’s whole face lit up.

"I knew it. Is it a boy?"

"Just... let me talk."

"Sorry, sorry. Go."

I lowered my voice, glancing around the empty lab as though the walls themselves might report me.

"Last week, during my late shift... Cadaver Seven. I pulled the sheet back and he..."

I stopped, hearing how it sounded before I even finished the sentence.

"He wasn’t dead."

Priya blinked.

"What do you mean, he wasn’t dead?"

"I mean he opened his eyes and grabbed my wrist, and I nearly had a heart attack."

She stared at me for a long beat before letting out a short laugh.

"Okay... that’s a really vivid dream, Eliora, but I think the sleep deprivation is finally..."

"It wasn’t a dream."

"You’d been on shift for, like, fourteen hours..."

"Priya, I’m serious."

My voice came out sharper than I intended.

"He was alive. He grabbed my wrist. He talked to me. There were men... armed men... who stormed into the lab looking for him, and I lied to their faces to protect him. Then he got dressed and walked out like none of it had happened."

Priya’s smile faltered.

"Eliora, come on. A living man doesn’t just end up on a cadaver trolley. That’s not... that doesn’t happen."

"I know how it sounds."

"You do realize how it sounds, right? Exhausted med student hallucinates a hot dead guy who turns out to be alive, says mysterious things, and vanishes into the night. That’s basically a fever dream."

"I’m not imagining this," I said.

Something in my voice must have finally reached her because Priya’s expression shifted.

"You’re really not joking."

"I’m really not joking."

I rubbed my temple.

"Dr. Simon even found a mismatched log entry that same night. A third body that shouldn’t have been there. It disappeared from the records completely by the next day. I checked."

Priya was quiet for a moment, studying me the way she always did whenever she was trying to make sense of something.

"Okay," she said slowly. "Okay... I believe you."

She paused.

"That’s... actually, now I’m freaked out."

"What did he look like? What did he say?"

"That’s the thing I can’t stop thinking about," I admitted.

"He knew my name."

"I never told him."

"Not once."

"That’s not creepy at all," Priya said dryly.

"Thank you. Very helpful."

"So..."

She leaned forward, abandoning all pretense of studying.

"Was he hot?"

"Priya."

"That’s not a no."

Heat crept up my neck despite myself.

"That is entirely beside the point."

"It is extremely the point."

She grinned.

"So there is a boy."

"There is a bleeding, cryptic stranger who may or may not be involved with dangerous people, which is the complete opposite of a boy."

"Sounds like a boy to me."

I threw a glove at her.

She caught it easily, laughing.

For a moment, the tight knot of anxiety in my chest loosened, just a little, simply because I’d finally said everything out loud.

"Anyway," I said, eager to change the subject before she asked another question I couldn’t answer, "my mom’s getting married in a few weeks."

Priya’s eyebrows shot up.

"Wait... seriously? To who?"

"Some guy named James."

"She seems happy."

"Genuinely happy, which... honestly, I don’t remember the last time I heard her sound like that."

"That’s good, right?"

"I think so."

I hesitated.

"Apparently, I’m getting a stepbrother out of the deal too."

"He’s twenty-five."

"I’ve never met him."

"Ooh... mysterious older stepbrother energy."

Priya wiggled her eyebrows.

"This story keeps getting better."

"Don’t."

"I’m just saying... between the mystery man and the stepbrother, your life has suddenly gotten very interesting."

"You should come to the wedding," I said.

"I could use a friendly face in a room full of strangers."

Priya’s smile softened with apology.

"I actually can’t."

"I’m so sorry."

"My aunt is flying in that same week, and my mom already has the whole house on lockdown getting ready for her. There’s no way I can get out of it."

"If it were any other weekend, I’d be there in a heartbeat."

"It’s fine," I said, disappointed but not surprised.

"I’ll survive."

"You’d better call me the second it’s over," she said.

"I want a full report."

"Every detail."

"Especially about this stepbrother situation."

"There won’t be a stepbrother situation," I said.

"He’s basically a stranger."

"We’ll shake hands, eat cake, and probably never speak again."

Priya smirked as though she knew something I didn’t.

"Sure."

"That’s exactly how these things always go."

I rolled my eyes and returned to my dissection tray, telling myself she was wrong.

I had no idea yet...

Just how wrong she was.

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