on the lip of his mattress gave out. Gonzalo fell. He plummeted
across the room, or down—he couldn’t tell anymore—spin-
ning and tumbling through the air. His scream was silenced
when he plunged headfirst into the blood.
Down into the thick red plasma he sank. Deeper and deeper,
into the dark and cold, until all he could see was black, until
the blood seeped into his mask and filled his mouth with a
cold syrup that tasted like copper and chalk. He couldn’t feel
anything but the cold, and he was left alone with the knowl-
edge that he’d come within a hair of getting the only thing
he’d ever wanted, and failed.
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