Holt exhaled through his teeth—a sharp, quiet sound—as he pressed his forehead against the cool glass of the window. Outside, Draculaura and Ghoulia's retreating figures blurred into the twilight, their silhouettes shrinking with each step. The faint hum of distant music from Heath's bonfire still prickled at the edges of his hearing, a leftover trigger clinging like static.
*"Relax, Jackie,"* he muttered under his breath, fingers twitching against the sill. *"We've done this before."*
Except they hadn't.
Not like this anyways.
Holt's fingers twitched toward the stereo's volume knob so as to turn it off—an instinctive motion, like flipping a breaker before the house burns down. The music had been pulsing through the room like a second heartbeat, but now it was just noise. Bad noise. The kind that made Jackson's thoughts scramble like spiders under a flashlight. Holt exhaled through his nose, a sharp, controlled sound, and killed the track mid-beat. Silence crashed over them, sudden and absolute.
"Okay, Sparky," he muttered to the empty room, rolling his shoulders like he was shaking off stage lights. "Your turn."
The transformation wasn't instantaneous—it never was. First came the tingling in Holt's fingertips, like static clinging to skin after dragging socks across carpet. Then the heat, pooling low in his gut before spreading outward in slow, deliberate waves. His reflection warped first at the edges, the way candlelight bends around a hand passing too close.
-----
Jackson's fingers trembled against the hardwood floor where he'd collapsed—no, where *Holt* had landed—the lingering ghost of panic still clawing at their shared ribcage.
The door creaked open exactly four minutes and thirty-seven seconds later—Holt had counted for some reason—with Jackson peering out like a startled bat caught in lamplight. His hair was mussed from where Holt had raked fingers through it, his borrowed shirt slightly singed at the cuff from an aborted flame flicker, but his smile was steady. Mostly.
"Ghoul, Jackie," Draculaura breathed, pink nails digging into Ghoulia's arm. "You scared us worse than a surprise pop quiz!"
Jackson's fingers twitched toward Holt's headphones before he caught himself. "I'm so s-sorry," he stammered, left hand fumbling with the hem of his singed sleeve—a nervous habit Holt *never* had. "Tripped over my own tail. You know how it goes." His forced chuckle sounded more like a hiccup.
Ghoulia's yellow eyes narrowed. "Rrrgh." The groan vibrated with suspicion as she tapped her notebook pointedly—right on the page comparing Jackson's messy scrawl to Holt's crisp signatures.
Draculaura squeezed Jackson's shoulder, her cold fingers lingering just a beat too long. "Your shirt's smoking, mansterfriend." She sniffed the air delicately. "Literally."
Jackson's pulse jackhammered against his ribs.
"O-oh, this?" Jackson's laugh came out high-pitched as he pinched the singed fabric between shaky fingers—too quick, too left-handed. "Just a, uh, failed chemistry experiment for Mad Science. Mom's gonna kill me even more than she already did." The lie tasted like battery acid, but he shoved it forward with a nervous grin that didn't reach his eyes. "Tried making—what was it—" His gaze darted to Ghoulia's notebook like he could steal an answer from her equations. "Fog-in-a-flask? Yeah. More like fire-in-a-beaker."
Draculaura's eyebrow arched so high it nearly disappeared under her bangs. "You really need to be more careful Jackie, we care about you you know?" Her voice softened, fingers tightening briefly on his sleeve—not enough to hurt, just enough to ground.
"O-of course I know that Draculaura," Jackson stammered, his hand tightening around the burned cuff—too tight, Holt would've never gripped fabric that desperately. The scent of ozone clung to him like cheap cologne, leftover from their abrupt switch. Ghoulia's notebook snapped shut with a decisive *thwack* that made Jackson flinch.
Draculaura's fangs worried her lower lip. "You've just been acting... different lately," she said slowly, pink eyes flicking between Jackson's face and the singed sleeve.
Jackson could have sworn that he somehow swallowed his Adam's Apple—it had lodged itself somewhere in his ribcage, pulsing uncomfortably with each heartbeat. He watched Draculaura's pink eyes flick between his singed cuff and Ghoulia's increasingly incriminating notebook, the weight of their combined scrutiny pressing down like storm clouds before lightning strikes.
His fingers twitched instinctively toward his pocket where Holt's mixtape always lived—except it wasn't there. He'd left it in his bag after last period, a rookie mistake Holt would've mocked him for. The silence stretched, thick as fog, until Ghoulia's notebook flipped open again with an accusing *snap*.
Draculaura leaned in, her perfume—something like crushed roses and old books—making Jackson's nose itch. "You're acting weirder than a werewolf during a solar eclipse," she whispered, pink eyes narrowing. "And I *know* weird."
Jackson's left hand fluttered to his collar, fingers catching on Holt's silver chain. Wrong hand. Wrong gesture. Wrong *everything*. Ghoulia's pencil hovered over her notebook, circling their shared height (5'10"), shared shoe size (9), shared everything except the things that mattered.
The streetlamp outside Jackson's window flickered—once, twice—before sputtering out completely, plunging the sidewalk into uneven shadows. Jackson watched Draculaura and Ghoulia's retreating backs dissolve into the patchy darkness, their footsteps fading unevenly against the cobblestones. His breath fogged the glass in uneven bursts as he counted their steps under his breath, a nervous habit Holt would've teased him for.
*Eighteen. Nineteen. Twenty—*
The mixtape in his back pocket pulsed like a second heartbeat, its bassline thumping against Jackson's thigh through the denim. He pressed his forehead harder against the windowpane, letting the cold glass seep into his skin as Draculaura's distant laughter floated up from the street—bright and unburdened, so unlike the choked sound he'd made imitating it five minutes ago.
*"You're a terrible actor, Jackie,"* Holt's voice drawled in their shared mindspace, lazy as smoke. *"Like, community-theatre-after-three-energy-drinks bad."*
Jackson's fingers twitched toward the volume knob on his ancient stereo. The urge to drown Holt out was visceral, but he knew better—music was gasoline to Holt's flickering lighter, and right now, they couldn't risk another uncontrolled switch. Not when Ghoulia's notebook had practically screamed *TWO?* in neon ink.
A floorboard creaked behind him. Jackson spun, left hand flying up defensively—only to freeze at the sight of his own reflection in the hallway mirror. His right sleeve was still singed from Holt's aborted flame flicker, the blackened threads curling like dead spider legs.
Jackson's reflection in the hallway mirror was actually Holt's now—same body, different posture, different smirk. The singed cuff on his sleeve still smoldered faintly, but Holt didn't bother patting it out. Instead, he leaned closer to the glass, tilting his head just so, watching the way the dim light caught their shared piercing.
"You know, Holt," he murmured to the empty house, tracing the silver hoop with his right thumb—*his* thumb now—"this whole lie has been tearing us apart, we might actually end up as two separate people at this rate."
The mirror offered no response, but Jackson didn't need one. He could feel Holt coiled tight beneath his skin like a struck match waiting for friction—an itch between his shoulder blades, a heat behind his teeth.
-----
That was then.
This was now.
And things had gone about as smooth as they could have for both Holt and Jackson.
Their mom had ungrounded him.
People just accepted that Holt Hyde and Jackson Jekyll were cousins now—even if their "coincidental" absence patterns defied logic. The rumor mill had chewed up Holt's theatrics and Jackson's awkwardness, spitting out a fractured narrative that somehow held.
For now.
Jackson exhaled sharply through his nose as he woke up for Monday.
This was it.
Friday would be Halloween.
The same day as Holt's Blood Moon Dance.
Jackson's alarm blared—some unholy mix of distorted guitar and synthesized drums Holt had programmed last week—and he fumbled for the snooze button with his hand, knocking over a half-empty energy drink in the process.
The neon-green liquid pooled across his nightstand like toxic sludge, the energy drink's sugary stench mingling with the burnt-plastic tang of Holt's abandoned mixtape. Jackson groaned and swiped at the spill with his already-stained sleeve.
The fabric of Jackson's sleeve clung to his wrist like a second skin, stiff from dried energy drink.
"I'm going to find some way to kill you one of these days Holt, I swear to God." He groaned as he finally fully got out of bed.
*Good luck with that one Jackie,* Holt's voice hummed in the back of Jackson's skull—half-taunt, half-song—as Jackson stumbled into the bathroom and promptly tripped over Holt's abandoned sneakers. The left one was singed at the toe. Again. Jackson groaned, rubbing his shin while the neon toothpaste Holt insisted on buying bled mint-green foam into the sink.
The mirror showed him bleary-eyed, hair sticking up in three different time zones, with the faintest shadow of Holt's smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. Jackson splashed water on his face, but the heat under his skin wasn't from the tap. It never was.
"Five days," Jackson muttered to his reflection, pressing a palm flat against the glass. The mixtape in his pocket pulsed once—a warning—as the bathroom light flickered overhead. "Just hold it together for five more days."
*We can hope so right?*
Jackson's reflection blinked back at him—same green eyes, same sharp cheekbones, same stupid silver hoop Holt had insisted on—but the exhaustion clinging to his skin like static was all his own. The neon toothpaste foam spiraled down the drain, taking his morning resolve with it. Five days until Halloween. Five days until Holt's big debut at the Blood Moon Dance. Five days until—
"Jackie!" His mom's voice cut through the bathroom door, sharp as shattered glass. "If you're late—"
"I know, I know!" Jackson fumbled for his backpack, knocking over Holt's abandoned energy drink *again*. The sticky green liquid oozed across the floor like radioactive slime. He groaned, pressing his forehead against the cool tile. "Ghoul, help me."
The mixtape in his pocket pulsed once—Holt's equivalent of an eye roll.