The Ink Won't Listen

The Ink Won’t Listen

Rice. Her name is Rice. She is 17. She is always covered in paint or Sharpie. She is never far from a book. The pages display her with a laugh of corrosive copper and rustling raven feathers.

I’m writing this carefully. With slow, methodical intent.

Last month, I decided it should be October. The little town of Crooksbane, I wrote her in needed that belligerent mix of weather that begins in late autumn. Lending itself to the tenor of the story.

I gave her a best friend. Margo. I gave her a mother who feels guilty for working nights, so we - her mother and I - gave her a dog named Birk. A standard Schnauzer, abnormally large and incredibly perceptive. I gave her an old bicycle. The whimsical sort with the big yellow banana seat and oversized chrome handlebars.

I did not give her Him…

He first appeared in Chapter 3

I did not write Him. I never do. Yet here He is. I’m sitting at my desk with my scribbled outlines and notes, drowning in ink and loose-leaf. I’m working on fleshing out the cafeteria. Sneakers squeaking, the smells of disinfectant, and teen angst permeate the air. Along with a heavy smog of body odor. And there He is.

A boy leaning against the bay of lockers like He’s been there for years. As if the building were constructed around Him.

I crumple the page. Write it again. Trying to get back to what Rice was telling Margo about-

“His name is something old,” the sentence says before I can stop it. “Something that sounds like a place you’ve never been, but somehow recognize.”

I name him Warrick Ravenbridge because I have no choice.

By Chapter 5, Rice has noticed Him.

I write, “Rice has not looked up from her book…”

The page writes back, “but she had already looked. She looked before she knew she was looking.”

I shove the papers across the room and slam my cursed pen on the desk. I make coffee. I let the cat out. I return… He is still there.

Here is what I know about Warrick. Mind you, I did not decide these things:

1. He has no photographs on his phone. Not one. Sometime last night, Rice was up to her old tricks. Her and Margo stole Warrick’s phone and checked.

2. He always knows when Rice is about to say something sad.

3. He is tall, dark, and handsome - according to the 17 year old. My observations are far more sinister in nature. I do not trust Him, and neither does her mother or best friend.

4. He does not like Birk. The feeling is mutual.

5. I DID NOT WRITE ANYTHING ABOUT HIM.

I’m telling you now, I did not write these things about Him. I do not know Him the way I know Rice. I know Him the way you know your little sister’s new crush.

By Chapter 11, I am becoming more desperate. All too aware of my approaching deadline, I decide to be ruthless.

I write a truck. A very large, very heavy truck. Speeding. Wreckless. Something frightening enough to put Rice in a reset. To remind her the world is dangerous, and she should go home, lock the door, call her mother, and never think of Warri —

The truck swerves.

The son of a bitch is fine.

She’s shaken. He’s pissed. The words I didn’t write continue to bleed their betrayal across the pages of that dusty gravel road: with her heart rapidly firing out of her—

Wrong. WRONG. WRONG!

I didn’t even put her there. She wasn’t even in the scene!

Warrick. Truck. Road. That’s it.

Person. Thing. Place.

Warrick. TRUCK. ROAD!

But there she is racing across the pages down that gravel road. Rice. My Rice. Whom I made. Whose laugh I designed like a gift… leans into Him on the tips of her toes. Wearing the yellow sneakers I gave her, by the way!

“How did you know?” They ask as one.

Great.

He says, “I always know where you are.”

She thinks it's romantic.

I am left screaming at ink that has not yet dried.

Literally screaming.

Margo disappears in Chapter 14.

Not dramatically. She just stops appearing. I try to write her in - I put her at Rice’s door. I gave her a note to pass Rice in class. Nothing sticks.

I write her finding Birk and trying to return him to Rice. Still nothing.

Rice is always with Him. Rice is always with Warrick. I haven’t seen Birk since the last time I tried to write about Rice playing with him. He growled at Warrick—who, of course, showed up—ruining everything.

The last time I tried to write in Margo on Rice’s front porch in the October cold - will be her last.

I didn’t write that last detail. The little threat there at the end. It just… came.

By Chapter 19, I try a different tactic.

I begin with the ending.

I write Rice as safe. Older. In a new city, away from Him. Birk’s collar is collecting dust on her shelf. A tangible reminder of the love she shared with Birk, her “soul dog.” The one who saved her.

Complete. Sealed. Done.

I go back to Chapter 15.

She is with Warrick in the cemetery. I’ve erased this scene dozens of times now.

He is showing her something this time - carved into the headstone. I’ve read Him written next to the headstones a few times. Her fingers run along the face of the stone where she finds her name. Her full name. Beneath it, a date that hasn’t happened yet.

“Did you do this?” She asks.

He says, “No, I only found it.”

He is smiling as He says it. That placid smile with nothing behind it. I hate that smile. I’ve seen it too many times before.

“It’s been here a long time,” he continues.

Rice reaches out and traces the letters of her name on the cold stone. Her name looks… perfect. As if this were the only future allotted her. That’s the worst part, the belonging. Like this, fate was inevitable.

The finality of it creeps me out.

I check the ending I wrote. It’s gone.

Chapter 19 is blank, even the title. Gone.

I rifle through the pages, reading as fast as my eyes will carry me. The story. My work. Replaced. Her yellow sneakers scuffed raw, haunting the pages of scenes I never wrote. It keeps going now. Longer than I intended. New pages I’ve not read, and certainly haven’t written-

On the very last page, a chill freezes my spine. Unnaturally rigid.

At the bottom, not in my handwriting. Not by my pen, but in a thick, inky red, almost granular material.

A single line:

“She’s mine now. You can stop writing.”

But I haven’t stopped. I can’t. I can’t abandon her. My hands are still moving. My fingers are desperate, scraping the pen across the pages like it's hooked into my nerves. I don’t know why, I don’t know what’s happening, I just know I can’t leave her. I can’t.

The ink floods the pages, swallowing the margins, swallowing me. My breath snaps in half. Too shallow. I can’t get out.

The story is everywhere—buzzing in my teeth, burrowing under my skin, cinching my ribcage like a corset of flesh and bone. I’m falling through it, choking, and she’s there. Walking through the cemetery like she doesn’t know she’s not supposed to be alive. The October air is too sharp. Too bright. Too wrong. I can feel it slice through her lungs. I can feel her heartbeat stutter. I can feel—

— and I can feel him reading over my shoulder now.

"Put the pen down. Come to bed, Rice."