Trial

Note: contains graphic depiction of hanging self (though not technically suicide)

——

Ky’sy’ana hadn’t been happy about it, but she’d gotten me a rope.

“It’s your life,” she told me. “Think before you take it.”

I wasn’t planning on dying here. If I did, the plan wouldn’t work.

Years ago, when Sai-ee had fallen off that cliff, his magic powers had instinctually activated to stop him from dying. Ten days ago, I’d been able to reproduce that when Jayla and I jumped out the window.

And three months ago, when I’d been hit by that car, I’d been sent here instead of dying.

Moments of crisis. If a magician was going to die, the universe stepped in to stop them. And one of those times when I’d been about to die…I’d been sent to another world.

This prison cell wasn’t built to make hanging myself easy. I’d actually asked Ky’sy’ana for a knife at first, but she said there was no way she could take a weapon down into the prison and give it to a prisoner. So now I was here, clinging onto the bars of the door at the point where they met the ceiling, trying to prop myself up against a lower part of the bars with my feet but feeling my sweat-slicked sandals slowly slide down.

A small barred grate was set into the other side of the wall. With some effort, I tied the rope to the high bars of the door; then to the grate, where a stone sill would stop the knot moving downward from my weight; and with my teeth, cut off the remainder of the rope and tied the noose in the middle of the room, where there would be nothing for me to hold on to.

By this point, I was exhausted, but I had to do this fast before a guard came down with a meal or something like that. I was also scared, but scared was good. If I wanted to die, I didn’t think this would work.

There was a thin cot in the cell I was supposed to sleep on. I brought it over so, standing on the very edge, I could tie the noose around my neck. Then I kicked it away.

The rope cut harsh lines against my neck and pressed against my windpipe. I gasped for air. My vision blacked out, then blurred. Lurid blue and purple dots covered the cell, my hands, everything I could see. This was a shitty idea. I needed to breathe. I grabbed for the rope above me, but I couldn’t keep a grip. I kicked wildly, trying to touch the ground.

This was stupid this was stupid—

I stood on the sidewalk across from a convenience store. The 7-11 logo glowed neon. Morning birds chirped.

A car zoomed by.

I sank down to my knees. My neck still hurt, and there was still blood on me. I was wearing the Genatyi robe, and my hair was long; I’d aged. No one else was outside, and probably no one else was awake.

I stumbled up and into my house. My leg still hurt. If I hadn’t left the door unlocked all those months ago I probably would have just curled up outside and given up on life but luckily I had. I was crashing hard, trying to cling onto my sparks of motivation.

My plan had succeeded, but I just wanted to cry.

A big part of that was because of my leg. That tingling magic had vanished when I’d crossed over, and blood was pouring out of my thigh again. Some was trickling out of my nose too. Rough crossing.

I got my cell phone off its charger and dialed 911.

*

I woke up in a hospital bed and drew a shaky breath. My clothes had been swapped for a hospital gown, pushed up above my right thigh to expose raw, new skin. My arm was bandaged, and I fuzzily remembered talk of taking a skin graft from there.

What time was it?

My phone read 3:02 pm, May 25th. I hadn’t known what day it was when I’d been hit by that truck, so knowing that time wasn’t actually helpful. It could have been anything from ten hours to days, a week, two weeks.

Probably not two weeks. I hadn’t been in a coma, just sick, sleeping, and then unconscious for surgery.

A new email had come in from my editor. The first line was, I think this ending is too bleak.

What an annoying message. I knew about bleakness, I’d lived it.

Someone walked in, carrying a vase of flowers. When she saw I was awake, she hurried over. It was Priya.

“Naomi! How do you feel?”

“I’m okay,” I said. “My leg hurts, but not more than when I got…”

“Right. How the fuck did you get shot?”

“Hunting accident.”

“Who’s going hunting in suburban Vancouver?”

“You know I can leave my house,” I said.

“To go into the woods?”

“Nature is fine. Everyone should go into the woods sometime. Like Walden.”

“So someone shot you, then, and it wasn’t on purpose? Did you get their information?”

“Nope.”

Priya sighed, massaging her forehead. “Jeez, Naomi, you disappear off the map for a year, and then this? Well, I called your parents. They’ve booked a flight over, but they couldn’t get one for the last couple days.”

“That’s fine. They don’t have to come.”

“Well, they are coming, so don’t try to self-isolate yourself again.”

“Can I have my computer?” I asked. I needed to get going on my Ana and the Emperor rewrite sooner rather than later.

“Your…sure, to watch TV or something, right?”

I made a vague sound that conveyed no information.

“Right?”

“Sure.”

“Don’t try and work, okay?”

“I don’t wanna work,” I said. “I got shot in the leg, I’m only going to relax.”

“Okay, good. I’ll go to your house to get it.”

Priya had my spare key, had had it for years.

“If you need anything, call the nurse, okay?”

“Mhm.”

For now, I started typing on my phone. I decided immediately to cut out all the old stuff. Otherwise, the changes might not take.