A Message From My Future Self

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1: 1

The year I was sixteen, our house caught fire, and it was my best friend, Serena Quinn, who ran into the flames to save me.

The day I found out Samuel Simmons was cheating, I was ready to kill myself.

It was Serena who snatched up the ashtray and forced him to his knees to beg my forgiveness.

Under her watch, Samuel got himself in line.

He handed over his paycheck card. He even had to check in before going downstairs for a pack of cigarettes.

I thought our marriage had been given a fresh start.

Until a video call came in from my own self, eight years in the future.

Looking at the gaunt woman on the screen, I asked,

"Do Samuel and I have a child?"

She tugged at the corner of her mouth and sent a photo.

In it, Samuel had Serena pinned against the vanity.

Both their eyes were glazed, their skin flushed red.

"That mistress is Serena."

"Eight years. Samuel has come to hate you."

"Because of you, the two of them can't be together in the open."

Cold spread through my whole body.

The mistress I could never track down turned out to be the best friend who once risked her life for me.

The me from eight years ahead leaned close to the screen and smiled in pure despair.

"As long as you're alive, you're keeping two lovers apart."

"Let them have each other, and let yourself go too."

...

I watched the phone screen slowly go dark.

I gripped the pill bottle, my hand shaking hard.

I shook out a fistful of pills and was about to swallow them when the bedroom door slammed open.

Samuel rushed in and knocked the bottle clean out of my hand.

Pills scattered across the floor.

"Have you lost your mind? Why would you do something so stupid?"

His eyes were rimmed red as he pulled me into his arms.

Before all this, I would have collapsed against him in tears, grateful that my husband still cared.

But now, I felt it clearly.

The instant he held me, there was a sigh, one he was trying to smother, thin with impatience.

"Why would you want to die? Are you giving up on me?"

Quick footsteps came from the top of the stairs.

Serena rushed into the bedroom, out of breath.

She saw the pills all over the floor, her eyes red, and lunged forward.

Seeing the pills, she raised her hand and slapped Samuel across the face.

Crack!

"Is this how you kept your promise? You said you'd stay by her side every second!"

"Samuel, if anything happens to Bren, I will make you pay with your life!"

Samuel's head snapped to the side from the blow.

He lowered his head, his voice hoarse.

"I'm sorry. I didn't watch her closely enough."

Serena shoved him away and pulled me into her arms.

"Don't be scared, Bren. Rena's here. Rena will protect you."

She wept, tears streaming down her face.

At sixteen, this was exactly how she'd held me right after I escaped the fire.

I used to think it was the warmest embrace in the world.

Now it only made me sick.

I lowered my eyes and saw the red mark below the collar of her nightgown.

The kind of kiss mark Samuel most loved to leave.

"I'm fine."

I pressed down the trembling and spoke calmly.

"It was just the medication taking effect. I hallucinated."

Serena let out a long breath and stroked my cheek.

"No. I can't leave you like this."

"From today on, I'm moving in to stay with you."

Samuel nodded at once.

"Good. With you here, I can go handle some things without worrying."

I watched the two of them play off each other.

It felt like something had been torn open in my chest.

Pain, then numbness.

I gave a dull nod.

Late that night, Serena came into the bedroom carrying a glass of warm water.

"Bren, time for your medicine."

She opened her palm, showing a few pills.

"These are the special ones Sam had someone bring back from overseas. They really help with your depression."

I took the pills and tipped my head back to swallow them.

"Good girl."

She ruffled my hair, tucked the blanket around me, and turned off the light as she left.

The lock clicked softly.

I rushed straight into the bathroom and jammed my fingers down my throat, gagging.

The pills, still whole, came up into the sink.

The me from the future had said Samuel's secrets were all on the backup phone in the study.

Barefoot, avoiding the cameras in the living room, I felt my way into the study and dug the phone out of the very bottom of the drawer.

I typed in Serena's birthday.

Wrong password.

I paused, then typed the date they first met.

The screen unlocked.

I opened the photos.

The first image was a downtown riverfront penthouse.

Below it, a piece of surveillance footage.

I tapped the video.

In front of the floor-to-ceiling windows, Samuel had Serena pinned to the glass, kissing her neck without a shred of restraint.

His usually neat hair was a mess.

This man, who disinfected even a cup after I'd used it, looked like someone else entirely.

The time stamp in the top corner was from last night, right after I'd taken the medicine and fallen unconscious.

"Sam... Bren's still in the house..."

Serena's voice came through the footage, breathy and soft.

"Don't bring up that lunatic."

"If I weren't afraid she'd pull some suicide stunt and tank the company's stock price, I'd have been done with her long ago."

I watched it all the way through, calm, without a single tear.

I backed out of the footage and kept scrolling.

At the very end of the album was a yellowed receipt.

The payee was Starbright Talent Agency.

The note in the memo field read:

County clerk's office set dressing and hired extras, fifty thousand dollars.

The date signed was the day we got our marriage certificate.

I stared at the photo, and something in me wanted to laugh.

So from beginning to end.

I had never even been his wife in name.

2: 2

The next morning I pulled on my coat and slid the marriage certificate into my bag.

"Where are you going?"

Samuel came out of the kitchen carrying two plates of fried eggs.

He was in his house clothes, that faint smell of disinfectant clinging to him.

"To pick up some pan-fried buns from that place I like."

My voice was calm, my eyes empty.

Serena wandered out of the guest room with a yawn and pulled out a chair, settling in like she owned it.

"Sam, I want some warm milk."

Samuel turned at once to pour it.

"Careful, it's hot."

Serena looked over at me, her face full of concern.

"Send the driver. You're not well. You shouldn't be running around."

"I want to walk a little."

I didn't wait for her answer. I changed my shoes and left.

As the door shut behind me, I caught Samuel's voice.

"Why do you even bother with her? When she's having an episode she's just a lunatic."

The county clerk's office.

I slid the marriage certificate and my ID through the window.

"Could you check these for me, please."

The clerk tapped at her keyboard a few times, then frowned.

"Ma'am, there's no marriage registration on file for you in the system."

She opened the certificate and studied it carefully.

"The embossed seal and the security markings are both wrong. This is a forgery."

"Ma'am, you need to call the police."

I took the documents back. My fingertips were cold, but my heart beat steadily.

"Thank you. I understand now."

I walked out of the lobby into blinding sun.

Eight years ago, he'd gone down on one knee and said he'd love me for the rest of his life.

To soothe the sense of security my depression had stripped away, he'd booked out the entire clerk's office and staged a grand ceremony just for the signing of our papers.

So it turned out that vow had been a line in the script too.

I went back to the house.

The moment I stepped inside, Samuel came to meet me.

He held a cup of warm water, a few pills resting in his palm.

"Empty-handed? They were out of buns?"

He took my bag from me on the way past.

"The line was too long."

I lowered my head to avoid his eyes.

"It's fine. Take your pills first."

He stroked my hair.

"Good girl, Bren. Take them on schedule and you'll get better."

Those eyes were full of tenderness.

If not for last night, he might have fooled me for the rest of my life.

I took the pills and swallowed them down with the warm water.

"Such a good girl."

Satisfied, he turned away.

I rushed straight into the bathroom, locked the door, and hooked a finger down my throat, bringing the pills up along with a mouthful of sour bile.

Once I'd rinsed my mouth, I sealed the pills into the bag I'd prepared in advance.

That afternoon, I said I was going to the hospital for a follow-up and dropped the pills off at a private testing lab.

At eight that evening, the results came through on my phone.

I sat in the bathtub and opened the file.

Component analysis: levonorgestrel, sedatives in excessive doses, and several hormonal compounds of unknown origin.

Conclusion: not antidepressants.

Taken together over a long period, they could cause endocrine disruption and nerve damage, worsening both the depression and the hallucinations.

I clapped a hand over my mouth, tears striking the screen.

A wave of pure terror and revulsion swept through me.

For eight years, my depression had only deepened, spiraling out of control again and again, until I was even seeing things.

So all along Samuel had been feeding me these, turning me into a madwoman they could handle however they liked.

The screen flickered.

Another video call from the future came through.

The woman on the screen was thinner now, her eyes sunk deep into their sockets.

"Don't cry. Tears are the most useless thing there is."

She coughed hard, blood threading at the corner of her mouth.

"Next, he'll send you to a sanatorium in Switzerland, in the name of treating you."

"There, you'll become a husk who can't even speak."

The words had barely left her when nausea hit me and I doubled over the toilet, retching until the room spun.

The future me watched, and pulled her mouth into a bleak smile.

"Go take a test."

Hands shaking, I dug out a pregnancy test.

Five minutes later, two red lines appeared on it.

3: 3

I stared at those two red lines, cold to my fingers and toes.

There was no joy. Only a crawling, bone-deep dread.

If Samuel knew this child existed, he would never let it live.

I wrapped the test up tight, layer over layer.

I carried it out to the balcony, dug into the soil around the money tree, and buried it there.

After washing my hands, I stood at the mirror, rubbed my face, and pulled the blank, hollow look back on.

When I pushed the bathroom door open, Serena was standing right outside, holding a bowl of soup.

"Bren, all done?"

Her face was full of concern.

"Drink it while it's hot. I simmered it for three hours."

I looked at the film of grease floating on top and my stomach turned.

There were probably those drugs in this bowl too, the ones eating away at my nerves.

I took the bowl, dull and slow.

"Thank you."

I drank two mouthfuls in front of her.

"Rena."

I set the bowl down and stared at the floor, unfocused.

"I want to go back home for a while."

"I keep feeling like my mother is calling me."

Serena's expression shifted. She snatched the bowl away and set it on the table.

"Go home for what? In your condition, how could you be out of our sight?"

Samuel happened to come out of the study just then, his eyes going cold.

"Bren, don't be difficult."

He looked down at me, his tone leaving no room for argument.

"You're getting worse and worse. The medical care back home would only put you in more danger."

"I'll arrange the best sanatorium for you."

I kept my head down and didn't argue.

"Okay."

My meek answer made them both breathe easier at the same time.

Late that night, I lay in bed pretending to sleep.

The study door next door hadn't shut all the way, leaking out a thread of light and low fragments of conversation.

Barefoot, I pressed myself against the wall.

"Is everything set with Switzerland?"

Serena's voice was urgent.

"Early next month. We take her over there under the pretense of seeing the snow mountains."

Samuel's voice was cold.

"That place is completely locked down. Once you're in, you don't come out."

"Isn't that too cruel?"

Serena pouted the words, and inside the room came the rustle of clothing.

"She's still a person, after all."

Samuel gave a cold laugh.

"Only when she's completely mad, locked away for good, can the two of us be together clean and free."

"Or would you rather stay in the dark your whole life?"

"Stop it..."

Then came the sickening sound of their breathing from the other side of the wall.

I slid down the wall to the floor, both hands over my belly, nails digging into my palms.

The phone screen lit up in the dark.

The future me had sent another video.

The woman on the screen was already terribly frail, lying in a bed, her right leg bent at a grotesque angle.

"After they sent me to the madhouse..."

Every single word cost her a long, dragging breath.

"They aborted the baby..."

"I fought back, so they broke my legs..."

I clamped a hand over my mouth so no sound could escape.

"Don't cling to anything."

The future me fixed her eyes on the lens, the last of the light flaring in them.

"Stage the most brutal death you can."

"It's your only way out."

"Use it well..."

The video cut to black.

A few seconds later, a sealed black suitcase dropped beside the bed.

I stayed frozen for a long time before I pulled the zipper open.

Inside lay a body, already stiff.

It was me, eight years from now.

I sat in the dark, and the tears slowly dried.

I laid my palm over my belly, and my eyes settled, little by little, into calm.

I would never cry again.

4: 4

Over the next few days, I played it crazier.

I sat up in the middle of the night and talked to the empty air. At dinner I pushed grains of rice up my nose.

Every time, Samuel soothed me gently, then turned away and let the disgust show.

Tomorrow was the day they planned to ship me abroad.

While they were out, I cleared away every trace that belonged to me.

Passport, ID, bank cardsall mailed to a private box overseas.

That afternoon, Samuel came home early to get some papers from the study.

I stumbled in after him, holding a cup of red ink.

"Sam, look, blood"

My hand jerked, and the whole cup splashed across the original contract.

"Brenda Henson!"

His face went livid, veins bulging at his temple.

He whipped his hand up, like he wanted to slap me dead on the spot.

I tilted my head and grinned at him, blank and dazed.

His hand froze in the air, and in the end he clenched his teeth and pulled it back.

"It's fine. Bren didn't mean it, did you?"

He forced a stiff smile and wiped at the contract with a tissue.

Watching him want to kill me and still have to fake devotion, I felt nothing but satisfaction.

That evening, Serena came home.

I made a point of acting wired, clutching her hand and refusing to let go.

"Rena, let's cook together, okay? I want to eat something you made."

She paused, then managed to squeeze out a smile.

"Sure. Rena will keep you company."

When she turned to grab the seasoning, I tilted the blade and cut open my left palm.

Blood welled up at once.

I grabbed at her skirt in terror.

"Blood! So much blood!"

The blood smeared onto her couture skirt.

"What are you doing!"

Serena shrieked and shoved me away.

Samuel came rushing into the kitchen at the sound.

He saw the blood on Serena's skirt, his eyes went hard, and he shoved me down hard.

"Have you gone crazy enough yet!"

"Rena's been helping you this whole time, and you hurt her?"

I hit the tile, and pain tore through my belly.

Warm blood ran down my thigh.

I clutched my stomach, my face drained white.

But Samuel didn't look at me.

He took a wet wipe and dabbed tenderly at Serena's skirt.

"Are you hurt?"

Serena shook her head, her eyes red.

That one shove broke the last of what I still clung to.

I dragged myself up, one hand pressed to my belly, and edged into the master bedroom, locking the door behind me.

Outside, Samuel lost all patience and kicked the door hard.

"You unreasonable lunatic!"

Then, in the next breath, he was comforting Serena.

"Forget it. Let her calm down on her own."

"Let's go spend the weekend at the riverfront place. We'll take her tomorrow."

The footsteps faded, and the front door locked.

Once I was sure they were gone, I dragged the suitcase out from under the bed.

I moved the body to the middle of the living room and changed her into the nightgown I wore most often.

Then I scattered the shreds of the fake marriage certificate around the body.

Last, I left a note on the coffee table.

You two are filthy enough to make me sick.

Let you go, and let myself go.

I twisted open the gas valve and poured strong liquor across the carpet.

The match dropped, and the flames swallowed the carpet fast.

In the riverfront penthouse.

Samuel had just pinned Serena to the sofa when a violent jolt slammed through his chest.

His breath caught, and the image flashed through his mindthe blood beneath me, that glaring red, when he shoved me down.

"Sam, what's wrong?"

Serena pressed close.

"Something's wrong"

Samuel pushed her off, grabbed the car keys, and bolted out the door.

"Something's wrong with Bren!"

He tore back to the estate the whole way, and kicked in the sagging security door.

In the rolling black smoke, he froze where he stood.