Mike reached out to him despite a fresh trickle of blood down his neck. “How can you still ask? Help me! I’ve been here for years, and I’m freezing. Always freezing. Whenever I hope to finally disperse into nothingness, there I am again. And you never came to help me! We’re twins. How did you not wake up when I called for you? How is it that you didn’t feel me dying?”
Someone pulled on the back of Gray’s jacket, but it was beyond Gray’s comprehension, and he swatted the hand away, locked in a bubble with his brother. He’d been dreaming of a moment like this since Mike’s death. A chance to say sorry, to console him, to say things he’d told Mike too rarely. Yet now that he was facing the broken body of his twin, his mind was empty.
“I’m sorry, Mike. I was tired. And I knew you were such a good rider. I’d never imagined anything happening to you. We looked for you, but we didn’t know where. I—”
“Excuses,” hissed Mike, shaking his head so violently blood from his head wound sprayed Gray’s face. “You’re probably happy I’m gone. Nobody can compare us anymore. Nobody will suggest you should be more like me.”
The words speared straight through Gray, and he stumbled against the wall, clutching at the painful spot over his beating heart. He used to be jealous of the ease with which Mike filled the shoes of what Rev considered a perfect young man, but he’d never wanted Mike gone from his life. “No… I… I love you, Mike. You always understood me like no one else in the world. With you I didn’t feel alone.”
The pull on his arm was insistent, but when he looked back and shoved, there was no one there, just blurry air that made the world appear out of focus, so he quickly turned back to what really mattered.
Mike leaned on the rim of the tub, a mocking smile passing over his features. “I bet you were sorry I was cold and dead before you got me drunk enough to fuck you.”
Gray stiffened with horror. “What? What the fuck, Mike?”
“No?” Mike asked, clutching at the tub and pulling himself up, his body blue from cold and blood loss. “Didn’t you think you could never meet a man who’d be closer to you than me? Just admit it,” he gasped, suddenly tipping over and sliding to the floor in a tangle of crooked limbs.
The cold water splashed Gray’s clothes, but before he could back away, Mike grabbed his ankle and crawled closer, rubbing his stiff body against the tiles. His flesh was somewhat puffy and wrinkled from being in the water for so long. When Mike pulled his front up, and the skin on his torso ripped like soggy cardboard, Gray at first didn’t believe what he was seeing, but once uncovered muscle came into view, Gray let out a choked scream. He frantically tried to pull the flap of skin back in its place, but Mike’s body was as cold as meat straight out of the fridge.
“No… I’m sorry. I’m sorry I couldn’t be there for you.”
“It was your fault. You should have stopped me. You should have been there with me, on the same bike,” Mike shouted, sending bloody spit through gaps left behind by knocked-out teeth. “We are one, and you deserted me. You deserted me!” he shouted into Gray’s face.
Gray broke down. Tears that had earlier been only a sting around his eyes, finally spilled, and he let out a choked sob, pulling Mike’s freezing body against his own. “You were the most important person in my life. I’m so sorry.”
“‘Were’? Already forgotten, am I?” Mike let out a bitter laugh. “You’ve moved on, instead of doing the right thing. You should have walked into that creek next to where I died and laid in the icy water until we were joined again.”
The cold where Mike touched Gray was so intense he could sense it all the way to the bone, so the heat at his back startled him so much he wasn’t sure anymore what was happening to him.
Mike’s frosty lips brushed his cheek, and his hands wiped away Gray’s tears. “But you can make amends. You can still join me, little brother. We can be one again. I miss you so, so much,” he whispered, pulling on Gray’s hand as he crawled toward the window.
Gray choked on air, but when he leaned forward, trying to follow Mike’s guidance, something hot grounded him in place. His brain was a chaotic mess, thudding with sounds made by his heart pumping and playing the image of Mike’s dead body on repeat.
When Mike stood and pulled away the curtain, his gaze returned to Gray. “If you go through with this, suffer like I did, I will forgive you.”