I Can't Sleep

The first time Elio heard the voice, it was 3:12 a.m.

A buzz.

Then a hum—low, like someone breathing through static.

And then:

“I can’t sleep.”

He blinked at the sound, half-asleep, disoriented. The voice hadn’t come from outside his window or from the hall.

It came from his phone.

He picked it up. No calls. No apps open. Just the black screen, glowing faintly with nothing at all.

The words hung in the air, brittle and cold.

“I can’t sleep.”

Elio stared at the phone for a long time. Then set it back on the nightstand, face-down, like it could still see him.

Silence returned.

So did the grief.

He hadn’t slept in months. Not really. Not since the funeral. Not since the casket sank into the dirt like an anchor pulling him with it.

Not since Vynn.

Vynn had been wildfire in a glass bottle—fierce and beautiful and impossible to hold without bleeding. They wore chaos like cologne. Every part of them hummed with a kind of unrepentant life, the kind Elio had only ever seen in lightning storms and certain types of strangers on subway platforms. They used to read poetry like confessions, like warnings—delivered soft and slow, like the truth might sting if said too fast. Their tattoos were inked starlight and teeth, little fragments of myth and memory, constellations mapped across their shoulders. Their smile was soft but never safe. It always looked like it knew something Elio didn’t.

He fell in love the way you fall asleep in class: slowly, then all at once, with no way to explain why your heart raced when you were supposed to be calm. Vynn had that effect on him. They’d brush a hand over his arm in passing and Elio’s stomach would do the kind of somersaults that made him feel fourteen again. Sometimes, when they laughed—really laughed—Elio would stare too long and forget what it felt like not to ache.

He still dreamed in Vynn’s voice. The cadence of their laugh. The way their hand found his knee under diner tables. The quiet reverence in the way they tucked a curl behind his ear when he was trying to read, like even his distractions were worth treasuring.

The way they said, “You make the world feel less loud,” and actually meant it.

Their first kiss had tasted like chai and rain and cracked knuckles. It had happened under the orange glow of a streetlamp, the night Elio finally worked up the nerve to walk Vynn home. They’d paused at the curb, music from someone’s upstairs window floating down, and Vynn had leaned in like they were asking a question.

Elio had answered with his mouth.

It was soft, at first—uncertain and trembling—but then Vynn sighed into it, and something inside Elio split open, blooming like bruises under skin. They kissed until the streetlamp flickered out.

The first time they had sex, it had been in the back of Vynn’s cluttered apartment, surrounded by books and incense and unfinished paintings. It wasn’t perfect—too many limbs and not enough breath—but it was sacred. Elio had cried, just a little, not from sadness but from the weight of it. From the intimacy. The trust. Vynn had pressed a kiss to his ribs and whispered, “You’re safe.”

Elio had never felt that before. Not really.

They fought, sometimes. It was never loud, never cruel. Just sharp edges meeting where softness had worn thin. Elio wanted to be held too tightly, too often. Vynn needed space to breathe. They would drift apart for hours, sometimes days, but always found their way back like tide to shore. One time, Elio had screamed, “Why do you always have one foot out the door?” and Vynn had whispered, “Because I’ve never known what it’s like to stay.”

After that, they stayed longer.

Their first apology wasn’t just words—it was a song on cassette, a half-finished poem left on the fridge, a new toothbrush next to Elio’s in the bathroom. It was quiet groceries bought with no ask. A second key on the windowsill. A blanket folded the way Elio liked it. It was how they learned each other’s scars without ever asking for backstory.

The last time Elio saw them was supposed to be temporary.

They were coming over.

He had sent that text—Take the express. I miss you too much.

They’d replied with a heart and a little ghost emoji. Be there in ten.

Ten minutes stretched into forever.

And now the silence was louder than Vynn ever was.

Now every poem felt like a body he couldn’t hold.

Now every sound his phone made sounded like a promise breaking in half.

Now, all he had was memory.

Memory, and a voice through the static, saying:

“I can’t sleep.”

The next night, the voice came again.

“I can’t sleep.”

Then softer, slower, like the words had traveled a long way to reach him:

“It’s cold here.”

Elio’s body curled into itself. His hands trembled as he reached for the phone. But there was no message. No call. Just the voice fading into static, like waves pulling back from shore.

He whispered, “Where are you?”

No answer.

But the static thickened like fog, and buried inside it:

“I’m trying to come back.”

He began to wait for it. Every night. 3:12 a.m. exactly. Like clockwork. Like a haunting.

The voice grew stronger. Fuller. Like Vynn was remembering how to be human.

“I can see you,” they said one night. “You look tired.”

Another:

“Play the poem again. The one about the orchard.”

He did.

He played everything he had—videos, voicemails, even the voicemail where Vynn had said “I’ll be there in ten.” It had once shattered him to hear it.

Now he clung to it like a rope.

He stopped answering calls. Quit work without telling anyone. His world narrowed into candlelight and headphone static and sleepless obsession. Grief made people sick. Love made them worse.

Then, finally:

“Elio,” Vynn said. “You have to come find me.”

The abandoned subway at 43rd had been shuttered before he was born. But the rusted gate gave way under his crowbar like it was waiting.

The tunnel swallowed sound. The deeper he walked, the less he could hear his own heartbeat.

The air shifted the way breath does in a body that's just died.

He kept walking.

The walls pulsed. The concrete softened. Everything smelled like wet stone and burnt pages. Vynn’s voice echoed up from the tracks, calling him deeper, softer.

And then—he saw them.

Standing still. Pale and barefoot. Wrapped in the jacket they died in, its hem soaked with something dark.

“Elio,” they breathed.

Their eyes were the same.

Nothing else was.

“Don’t look at me,” Vynn said. “Just turn. Walk. I’ll follow.”

Their voice cracked.

“Please.”

He didn’t ask why. He just obeyed.

The walk was endless. The tunnel grew stranger with every step. The air hissed with voices, none of them kind.

But Elio kept going.

He whispered over his shoulder, “You’re still there?”

“Yes,” Vynn answered. “Keep going. We’re almost out.”

Then silence.

Then—

“Elio?”

He turned before he could stop himself.

And Vynn—his Vynn—was gone.

What stood there wore their skin like wet clothing.

Its smile broke the shape of their face.

“Elio,” it hissed, “you always look too soon.”

He stumbled back, heart in his throat—and fell.

He woke in his bed.

Morning spilled across the sheets like gold leaking from a wound. The room was quiet. Too quiet. The kind of quiet that holds its breath.

Elio sat up, slow and hollow. The edges of the world felt soft, like they’d been touched too many times and were wearing thin.

His phone buzzed once.

One voicemail.

Vynn’s number.

3:12 a.m.

He didn’t even blink.

He pressed play.

“I can’t sleep,” they whispered.

A pause.

Then:

“It’s warmer now. I think you’re getting close.”

Elio exhaled.

Or maybe he sighed.

Or maybe he let something go.

He stood, though he didn’t remember moving. His legs felt light, like hollow reeds filled with wind. He walked barefoot through the apartment, each step soundless, disconnected.

The window was open.

He didn’t remember opening it.

The wind outside had stilled.

The city below rippled in the light, impossibly slow, like a reflection in water.

He stepped onto the ledge.

It didn’t feel dangerous.

It felt inevitable.

Above him, the sky widened. Waiting.

Behind him, the voicemail continued, even though the phone was no longer in his hand.

“Come find me,” Vynn whispered, just as Elio leaned into the light—

—not falling, not flying—

but finally

finally

sleeping.