Page 27 of Ghoul Me, Maybe

ELIAS

T he first thing I feel when I wake up is pain.

The kind that thuds through bone and muscle like it’s trying to carve its name into my ribs. Every breath tastes metallic—like blood and something else. Something sharp. Something real.

I stretch my fingers. My knuckles ache, skin split and bruised. There's dried blood on my shirt, a smear on the inside of my forearm. I don’t remember how it got there.

Sienna’s beside me, still asleep, her face turned toward the window. The morning light catches the edge of her jaw, and for a moment, I forget the fight. The fear. The feeling of fists connecting with flesh.

But the memory hits quick.

It started at Rusty’s , a dive tucked two miles inland. Low ceiling, sticky floor, dartboards that look like they’ve seen wars. The kind of place where the jukebox only plays Springsteen and fights break out if you ask for water without lemon.

We were trying to be normal. Whatever that means now.

Sienna was laughing. God, I could listen to that sound forever. She was leaning over the bar, chatting with the barkeep—some dude with tattoos on his knuckles and a beard that could start its own folk band. I stayed close, keeping an eye on the exits, the shadows, the way everyone looked at her.

Then he showed up.

Broad shoulders. Sunburned neck. The kind of guy who drinks light beer and thinks a woman’s smile is an invitation. I caught his scent before I saw him—cheap cologne and old sweat.

He zeroed in on her like a shark on blood.

I watched his hand slide across the bar, fingers brushing her elbow.

And that was it.

I was already moving before my brain caught up.

“Hey,” I said, stepping between them. “Back the hell off.”

He turned. Smirked. “Didn’t realize she had a handler.”

“She’s got a partner. ”

Sienna touched my arm. “Elias, don’t.”

But the guy made a mistake. He grabbed her wrist.

And something ancient inside me snapped.

I punched him in the face. Not a warning tap. A full-body swing with every ounce of fury I’ve bottled since I crawled out of that wreck. He went down hard, crashing into a table, beer and glass exploding around him.

Silence.

For one beautiful second, silence.

Then his buddy charged me.

I ducked his first swing, caught his second with my jaw. Pain exploded behind my eyes, white-hot and immediate. But I didn’t stop. Couldn’t. My instincts screamed louder than the crowd.

I slammed him into a jukebox, felt something crack.

Another came at me from the left—I blocked with my forearm and drove my knee into his gut. He dropped with a gasp, and I turned just in time to catch a barstool across my back.

I staggered. My vision blurred.

Someone tackled me from behind, driving me into a table. I heard Sienna shout my name.

I threw an elbow. Felt it connect.

Blood. Yelling. My ribs burned. My fists ached. I didn’t care.

He touched her.

That was all it took.

The fight didn’t end so much as fall apart.

The bartender screamed he was calling the cops. Chairs were overturned. Someone was bleeding onto a pool table. I was panting, heart racing like it wanted out of my chest. Every part of me felt bruised or broken.

And then—Sienna.

Her hands on my face, grounding me.

“Elias,” she said, her voice firm. “We have to go.”

I nodded.

Didn’t speak.

Couldn’t.

We sat on the tailgate of her truck in a half-lit parking lot, my knuckles throbbing, her knee bouncing in quiet frustration.

“You want to tell me what the hell that was?” she asked.

I stared at the ground. “He grabbed you.”

“That’s not a reason to take on the entire bar. ”

I looked up. “It is to me.”

She ran a hand through her hair. “You’ve been human for what—three weeks? You’re gonna get yourself killed before we even get a mortgage.”

I winced. “You want a mortgage?”

“I want to not be banned from every bar in a ten-mile radius.”

I laughed. Winced again.

“You’re not invincible anymore, Elias. I can’t lose you again.”

The weight of her words landed heavy.

She didn’t say it lightly.

She meant it.

I reached for her hand, bloody and bruised as mine was.

“I’m still figuring this out,” I said. “The pain. The fear. Time. Hunger. It all hits different now.”

She squeezed my fingers. “Then figure it out with me. Don’t go full beast-mode every time someone’s a jackass.”

I nodded. Swallowed the pain. Both kinds.

“I’ll try.”

She leaned her head against my shoulder.

We sat like that until the moon rose above the bar roof, casting long shadows and soft silver light.

I never thought mortality would be the hardest part of life.

Turns out, being human isn’t about surviving the wreck.

It’s about surviving after.

And that’s where the real trial begins.

We’re on the porch later that night. The stars are dim—hiding, maybe—but the wind’s soft, carrying the smell of salt and smoke from someone’s chimney down the road.

Sienna’s curled beside me on the old swing, legs pulled up, a blanket around her shoulders. She hasn’t said much since the fight. She doesn’t need to. She’s always been better at silence than me.

“I scared you,” I say eventually.

She doesn’t deny it.

But she doesn’t pull away either.

“No,” she says. “You scared yourself. ”

I nod. Let that truth settle.

Then she shifts, presses her forehead to my shoulder.

“When I was a kid,” she murmurs, “I used to think love was some kind of spell. Like, once it happened, that was it. You were done. Marked. Unbreakable.”

I wrap my arm around her.

“And now?”

She laughs, soft and dry. “Now I know it’s messier. Harder. You don’t just fall. You choose. Every day. Through blood and fights and bar brawls and haunted relics.”

Her voice catches, just a little.

“You choose it, even when it hurts.”

I close my eyes.

“I choose you,” I whisper.

She leans in and kisses me. Gentle. Real.

“I know,” she says. “I choose you, too.”

And that’s the magic.

Not the relic. Not the curse.

Just us—still here.

Still choosing.