Chapter 11: The Hollow Return

The oil screamed as soon as the eggs hit the pan. Sizzzzzzzzzzzz.

Two yolks side by side, quivering in the heat, held together only by the thinnest membrane. Elisabeth stared down at them as they hardened, the hiss and spit deafening in the silence. Two halves of a whole, burning alive together.

Her stomach cramped. She could not wait. She tore into the food with the desperation of someone returned from famine, chewing too fast, swallowing before she had finished. Each bite seemed to restore a fraction of her strength, though her body still felt heavy, wrapped in damp cotton.

The apartment around her was still and dark. Only the low hum of the refrigerator kept her company. From the end of the long hallway, the bathroom door stood ajar. Elisabeth didn't look straight at it, but she knew. She could see, even in shadow, the pale outline of Sue's body lying where she had fallen, lifeless against the tiles. A presence that filled the silence more than any sound.

Elisabeth kept eating. Faster. As if by devouring enough, she could drown out the silence, silence that pressed in like a fog. Everything felt slowed now, muted, compared to the sharp light and air she had known in Sue's body. Even her own chewing sounded muffled, like she was underwater.

At last she dropped the fork, exhausted, her hunger momentarily subdued. The refrigerator buzzed on. The house breathed nothing.

The pile of envelopes was dull and ordinary: bills, circulars, anonymous white rectangles stacked like blank faces. Elisabeth shuffled through them with the apathy of someone expecting nothing.

Until her fingers stopped.

One envelope was different. Smooth and heavy. Sealed without a return address.

She slit it open with the edge of a fingernail. Inside, a card the color of fresh snow slid into her palm. The message was short, printed in crisp block letters:

We hope you are enjoying your experience with THE SUBSTANCE Your two-week refill kit has been delivered to your deposit box.

The words looked harmless. Neutral but they sounded corporate. But Elisabeth felt them like a shiver running down her scar.

Her hand trembled. Then she set it carefully on the table in front of her, as though it were dangerous to touch too long.

A refill kit. Waiting. Just for her.

Her stomach tightened. Hunger again—but of a different kind.

She stared at the card for a long time, until the printed letters seemed to pulse against the white like something alive.

Later on,

Elisabeth twisted in front of the mirror, her bathrobe slipping from her shoulders. The scar split her reflection in two, a long pink seam that ran from the base of her neck down her spine, neat but obscene.

She lifted the pliers. Her hand hesitated.

The first stitch resisted, tugging her flesh into a small painful peak before it finally gave way with a faint snap. A tiny thread dangled free.

She exhaled through her teeth and kept going. One by one, the sutures came loose, each tug sharper than the last, each drop of discomfort threading into something deeper. By the time she was done, the sink was littered with black strands. They looked like spider legs, abandoned husks of something that had been nesting inside her.

Her fingers trembled as she gathered the threads into her palm and tossed them into the trash.

The cream was cold when she spread it across the scar. She rubbed it in slowly, as though soothing a child, until the angry pink line shone under the bathroom light.

Behind her, sudden and shrill, a phone began to ring.

The phone buzzed against the nightstand, its glow flashing across the room. Elisabeth leaned over, and for an instant her chest tightened — HARVEY.

She hesitated, smoothing her robe against her knees before answering.

"Hel—"

"I need you to come back," his voice cut in, warm and commanding all at once, like a leash disguised as a caress.

Elisabeth sat straighter, shoulders drawn back, the ghost of poise sliding over her body. For the first time in days, a flicker of light caught in her eyes.

"To empty your office. Whenever you want, no rush. This afternoon? Great, see you then!"

The line clicked dead before she could breathe a reply.

She stayed there, the phone heavy in her hand. The scar down her back pulsed in the silence. She set the receiver down slowly, her reflection in the black screen catching her, small and pale as it haloed in daylight.

---

Clack. Clack. Clack.

The echo of her heels should have sounded decisive, confident, like punctuation marks striking through the day. But now, every step felt fragile, swallowed too quickly by the growl of engines and the shrill horns that carved through the street.

Elisabeth kept her head down, tugging the collar of her mustard-yellow coat higher, the fabric rough against her neck. Each time her hand brushed the scar beneath, a shiver of self-consciousness rippled through her. She imagined it glowing like a neon wound, visible to everyone, branding her as broken.

No one looked. No curious stares, no lingering glances trailing after her as there once had been when Sue walked in her skin. The world streamed past with merciless efficiency — people brushing by without recognition, their faces tightened by errands and deadlines.

She moved forward through the crowd, each clack of her heel underscoring the strange truth: the city hadn't changed at all. She had.

The air itself felt different, harsher and less forgiving. Even the wind seemed to sting. Once, the city had pulsed for her, each sound sharper, colors richer, like a song only she could hear. Now, the music was gone. Everything was just noise.

Her eyes dropped to the pavement as her thoughts spiraled inward, deeper into the silence of her own body.

---

She stood there, frozen, the cardboard box heavy in her arms. Its weight was out of proportion, awkward, pulling her shoulders forward as though forcing her into a hunch.

The long corridor stretched endlessly in front of her, fluorescent lights buzzing faintly overhead. Every poster, every smiling portrait of her younger self that once radiated power and perfection — gone. Only faint rectangles of lighter paint remain on the walls, ghostly frames of her erasure.

She lowered her gaze to the wrapped package sitting on top of the pile. A neat bow. The glossy paper glimmered under the cold light. A little something to keep you busy. The words echoed, poisonous in their cheerfulness.

The fountain behind her coughed again. Glug. Glug. Glug. It was the only sound in the corridor now. The sound of something cheap and automatic, filling itself while she stood emptied.

Her throat tightened and then she shifted the box against her hip, the edge of the cardboard biting into her forearm. She forced herself to move, her heels muffled by the grey rug that swallowed every trace of her passage.

For a fleeting second, she dared to imagine Sue walking this hallway instead — heads turning, smiles blooming, Harvey trailing after like a puppy. The contrast was unbearable.

At the end of the corridor, a door loomed and Elisabeth exhaled slowly, steadying her arms around the box as if she were holding on to the last pieces of herself. Then she pushed forward, engulfed by the silence.