Jerina and Jara if you squint, I suppose. STRONG T.
Jerome hears Mara snort. He swallows the vomit rising in his throat.
"I hear it though, don't you," her voice is a whisper, scared and guileless. Mara is a good actress.
"No, Mara, I don't, and neither do you," Jerome is tired, and he knows that Mara realises this. The thought makes him want to panic, but he is Jerome Clarke. Cool, collected, manipulative. Most definitely not the one manipulated, hyperventilating and sweaty. Mara knows he is tired and scared, and Mara is also not real.
That doesn't make the knife she puts in his chest hurt any less, though.
(Days later, the death of Jerome Clarke is stated to have been a suicide by a young man with mental illnesses that had gone undiagnosed during life. Naturally, the reporter also states that no one is sure what was wrong with him. Friends and family could only say he was a trickster.)
Blood on the walls. Warnings of the flaws of humanity ("No one understands, they don't care to see past the outside. This is by design, but I must make you promise not to forgive.") and blue tinted shadows.
A knife to her chest.
"What's your name," Nina asks, and she isn't scared, not really. This boy knows she sees things, he is likely one of the things she sees. She has been well aware of these truths for a long while.
"Jerome."