The First to Die at the End (Death-Cast #0)(28)

“Looking for you. You pulled some low-key magic act and vanished.”

“I’m sorry,” he says, getting up and helping me to the seats, which makes me feel so damn ancient, but I guess this is how he cares for someone fresh out of the ER. “I just needed to think some things over.”

“It’s okay, I get it. I just didn’t know if you left to go . . . to go do whatever comes next.”

“I definitely thought about it, but I think my place is here.”

“Really?” I ask, wondering if it’s got anything to do with me, which is so stupid because what am I trying to make happen with someone whose future is about to be cut real short? Scratch that, it’s not stupid, he’s still alive and his life is worth living until the end, I proved that when I didn’t just let him get shot in the streets. But I’ve got to recognize that I’ve got storyteller bones in my body and I can build, build, build a narrative out of nothing. I bet Valentino is only still here because a hospital is a pretty solid place to be if you’re about to die for some mysterious reason.

“Do you have your phone?” Valentino asks.

I wrestle my phone out of the pocket of my skinny jeans.

“Nothing from Death-Cast?”

I click the side button, the screen lighting up with texts from Team Young but no missed calls. “No, but it’s not too late,” I say, seeing we’re one minute away from the End Day calls stopping at 2:00 a.m.

Suddenly, it feels like the last minute before midnight all over again, except this time we’re not surrounded by countless strangers. It’s just the two of us, watching the phone’s clock and waiting to see if he’ll be dying alone or if we’ll be going out in a blaze together.

The clock hits two, and no one’s calling.





Valentino


2:00 a.m.

Death-Cast isn’t calling Orion because he’s not going to die today, and I think I know why.

This night is unfolding like a photo shoot coming together. For once, I’m not the subject. I’m the photographer, and everything is zooming into focus, like I’m switching out lenses until I land on the best one. The background is still a bit blurry, but if I adjust the aperture just enough, light enters and exposes the true model of this photo shoot. The boy with the constellation name. I’ve only seen some of his stars at work, but I understand the beauty. Orion is the focal point, so I stare at him and the sharpness of his hazel eyes and the hunched framing of his body, and once everything is aligned, just like stars in a constellation, everything becomes clear.

“You’re going to live,” I say.

“Until tomorrow, I guess.”

“You’re going to have much longer than you think.”

“So you got some psychic Death-Cast powers or something?”

“No, but I think destiny brought us together so I can change your future.”

“I don’t get it.”

“You don’t need the waitlist anymore, Orion. I’ll give you my heart.”





Orion


2:02 a.m.

Once upon a time, I wrote a fairy tale.

Since fairy tales are on the shorter side, it was an easier commitment than a novel. It’s wild what those stories get away with. You got pigs building houses and wolves impersonating grandmothers and a lost glass slipper helping you find your one true insta-love.

Then there’s mine. Stop me if you’ve heard this one.

It’s about a young man whose heart is dying.

Everyone always says to write what you know, right?

I named the protagonist Orionis, aka my name in Latin because I’m original as shit. When you’re constantly running against the clock, you don’t take forever choosing names.

Anyway, Orionis was always out and about doing his thing in this New York–esque kingdom when Death appeared out of the shadows and pressed his skeletal finger to Orionis’s heart, turning it from red and healthy to gray and crumbling.

“Am I going to die?” Orionis asked, not at all questioning Death’s physical existence or anything like that because when you’re in a fairy tale you just roll with shit like that.

“You may live if you dance with me,” Death said.

“Hell no,” Orionis replied, not about that life.

Until a piece of his heart disintegrated.

Orionis didn’t want to die, so he embraced Death, dancing nonstop from dusk to dawn. Orionis was exhausted, stopping to breathe at the cost of his heart chipping away some more. As he resumed the dance, Orionis grilled Death, trying to find out why he was targeted since he was perfectly healthy and didn’t engage in any risky behavior, but Death never answered. The two danced all day, all night, all week, all month, all year. Anytime Orionis broke away to do anything that would’ve made him happy, he lost more of his heart. Eventually, he was left with one last piece the size of a pebble.

If Orionis stopped dancing with Death one more time, he’d be his forever.

One day, right when Orionis was ready to hang up his cloak, aka throw in the towel, he crossed paths with an elder whose heart was so golden it shone through his chest like rays of sunshine. He was so carefree as he lived his life—fishing, performing, cooking, even dancing alone so dizzyingly fast that he fell to the ground, laughing at himself until his face was red. But he lost all color when he saw how miserable Orionis was with Death.