Faking It

Julian’s hands were shaking as he smoothed the business card onto the island. The bold, embossed letters of a criminal defense firm felt like an indictment on my own kitchen counter.

"They're coming for you, Eleanor," Julian whispered, his eyes darting toward the foyer as if the walls themselves had ears. "And they're coming for me if I help you. My boss is ready to pull me off this job by five o'clock."

"Give me forty-eight hours," I said, my voice low and steady, belying the frantic pounding in my chest. "I just need to finish the 3D rendering. I need to prove the space exists before they lock me out."

Julian hesitated, his professional integrity warring with the very real threat to his livelihood. "Forty-eight hours. Then I’m done. I can’t lose my firm over a walk-in closet."

He left through the side door, his truck tires spitting gravel as he sped away. I stared at the business card for a long second before sweeping it into a junk drawer. I didn't have time for lawyers yet. I had a part to play.

I took the stairs to the second floor, my legs feeling like lead. I entered the master suite, the air still tasting of cedar and old dust. I didn't go to the closet. Instead, I went to the vanity and stared at the amber prescription bottle Harrison had left on the kitchen counter earlier.

The new dosage. The one meant to seal the cracks in my memory.

I popped the cap, the sound echoing in the silent room. I took a single white capsule, went to the bathroom, and made a show of running the tap. I dropped the pill into my pocket instead of my mouth.

I needed to be 'compliant' when Harrison called. I needed to be the docile, slightly foggy sister they expected.

I spent the next hour performing a domestic pantomime. I folded Leo's laundry with deliberate slowness. I moved a stack of architectural journals from the nightstand to the bookshelf. I hummed a low, tuneless song, making enough noise to satisfy the house’s acoustics.

When my phone rang at noon, I answered on the third ring, pitching my voice into a soft, hazy register.

"Hello?"

"Eleanor. How are you feeling?" Harrison’s voice was the embodiment of clinical concern.

"A little... heavy," I said, leaning my head against the cool glass of the bedroom window. "The new pills are quite strong, Harry."

"That's the therapeutic effect, El. It’s calming the overactive pathways. You sound much more grounded."

"I think I’m going to nap," I murmured. "The construction noise was giving me a headache anyway."

"Excellent. Sleep is exactly what your neurology needs right now. I'll check your biometric feed in an hour."

I hung up and checked the watch on my wrist. The heart rate display showed a steady, suppressed sixty-two beats per minute. I had forced my body into a state of artificial calm, mimicking the drug’s effects through sheer, terrified will.

I walked to the closet and sat on the floor, leaning my back against the false wall. I didn't use the laser measure. I didn't use the stud finder. I just closed my eyes and listened to the house.

Behind me, the void felt like a living thing. A dark, airless lung that hadn't breathed in twenty-eight years.

I thought of Harrison sitting in his pristine clinic, watching the green line of my pulse on his monitor, believing he had successfully walled off my mind.

I pulled my laptop from under the bed and began the final render of the attic access point. The red block of the hidden room glowed on the screen, a target in a field of blue.

I looked at the closed bedroom door, then at my reflection in the full-length mirror. The 'fragile' baby sister was gone.

She smiled at her brother, knowing she would destroy him.