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Charlie woke to the sensation of falling. There was no ground beneath him—only darkness and the distant echo of something screaming. Then his eyes opened. A small room surrounded him. Padded walls. A door without a handle on the inside. For several seconds, he couldn't remember where he was or how he got there.
His head felt heavy, drugged. He tried putting his hand to his forehead but couldn't. It appeared that he was trapped inside a straitjacket. Charlie began to panic. As his breathing started to increase, he couldn't tell what this sudden fear he felt was from. Could it be the cocktail of drugs he was forced to consume or something far worse, a guilty conscience?
A woman was standing over him. She was slender and middle-aged, although her youthful face made it difficult to guess her exact age. Her medical scrubs, at the very least, were able to reduce some of the anxiety Charlie was feeling.
"Where am I?"
"Oxleas House." Charlie stared at her. "That's a funny farm, isn't it?" "We prefer the term mental health unit." Charlie wiggles himself around, using all the strength he could muster to prop his back onto the padded wall. "Let me help you". "I can do it myself. Lord knows what you might do to me next".
"We are here to help you, Charlie". "I shouldn't be here." "I need to get out of here." The woman remained composed as she methodically walked over to him. "Don't get yourself all worked up. After all, that's how you ended up in this room". "No. You don't understand." His voice cracked. "I need to check on my sister..."
The nurse bends down to his level. He catches the outline of her snatch. In any other situation, this would have excited his carnal desires. There was a numbness that he couldn't quite shake. These must have been some pretty heavy drugs, much stronger than any that he might partake in on the weekends with his friends.
"You experienced an episode last night. Can you remember what happened?" A piercing sound tore through his memory. This sound was like the kind you would find if a television couldn't find a signal. It was harsh on the ears. Whilst it was unpleasant, at least it stopped the ringing in Charlie's ears. He had tinnitus and had had it for much of his life.
He could never quite figure out whether this was hereditary or due to the loud metal music he would consume after another long shift at the warehouse. At least he thought he wasn't like Abi, who was born deaf. Charlie nevertheless winced. Then he remembered. "My sister?"
The woman paused. "Where is she?" "I guess you don't remember what happened to her." Charlie stared at her, waiting for the penny to drop. "Abi was murdered in Cator Park a few nights ago."
For a moment, the words meant nothing. Then the room seemed to tilt. "What?" He pulled violently against the restraints. "Let me out of this thing! I need to see her." "I'm afraid you can't leave."
"You have no right to keep me here." "You've been sectioned here for your safety. The shock of losing your sister like that... It's understandable why your mind broke."
"Don't try to psychoanalyze me."
The woman sighed. "Charlie, if you don't calm down, one of my staff will have to sedate you again." "If you don't let me out of this thing, I swear to god I will bite your fucking nose or ear off." The door then opened. Two heavyset male nurses entered. One carried a syringe.
Charlie glared at them. "Yeah. That's it. Come on, then. Give me your best shot." "That's where you are wrong, Charlie. You voluntarily checked yourself in," the doctor said. Charlie went through confusion and anger but couldn't pick what to feel. "You were responsible enough to realize you needed help."
"Bullshit. You did this to me." The nurses seized him. "Get off me, you cunts! I need to see Abi!" The needle entered his skin.
Darkness swallowed him.
Several nights earlier, Abi had walked through Cator Park beneath the autumn sky. She was young, dressed for an evening out, ear warmers covering her ears. The tattoo across her bare back—a Jorōgumo, a legendary folklore spider-woman from the land of the rising sun. It could be partially seen in her black dress, which exposed the alluring woman who carried eight legs.
As she walked with purpose to a house party of Kat's, who recently moved from Brighton to the big smoke, she appeared oblivious to the footsteps behind her. The man followed at a distance. He watched her as he waited for the perfect moment to strike. A broken bottle scraped beneath his shoe. Abi stopped. She glanced at her phone as she noticed her brother was calling. She let out an audible sigh as she forwarded his calls to voicemail.
As she looks up from her device, a sheet of clear plastic wraps around her face. Abi is thrown face first onto the ground. Her phone struck the ground with some force. Its display shattered into thousands of pieces.
The man held her down. Abi fought desperately, but he was so much stronger that she was unable to stop his savage onslaught. Her breathing became frantic. She tried to let out cries for her, but they were masked by the passing cars outside the park. Then came the blows. At first they were his fists. Then he pulled out a rusty hammer. It connected with her skull with some force that it cracked.
When the man finally walked away, he did so without looking back. The cars on the outside of the park had dissipated as an eerie quiet went over the park. Abi lay motionless on the cold pavement. Her phone began to vibrate beside her.
At her parents' house, Charlie held his phone to his ear. Nothing. He lowered it. "Still nothing." Sally was Abi's and Charlie's mother. As she watched him, Charlie continued to get no answer. Sally found herself increasingly irritated by this development. "Why must you always upset her before she goes out?"
"I only offered to give her a lift." "But you should know how she is. She likes her independence." Charlie looked away for a second. Out of guilt or as a means to collect his racing thoughts.
"Yeah. Don't I know it." Sally frowned. "What's that supposed to mean?" "I've had it all my life. I could hear the murmurs from people as we walked past. I've had to hear all kinds of abhorrent shit because of the way she is"
He hesitated for a sec. Then the rage came. "Why couldn't I have had a normal sister instead of a spastic that can't fucking talk? I don't know what's worse, having a mute for a sister or a mother with a broken vagina?" The slap came before he finished speaking.
Sally stared at him in disbelief. "How can you say that?" "I'm just saying, it doesn't make sense. I came out completely fine." "Is that so? I think you need to have a look in the mirror at who the problem is in this family". She looked as though she no longer recognized her son. "If she is such a burden to you, once you find her, you can find somewhere new to live."
She turned away and walked towards the front door of the house. "Where are you going?" "Out to find her, something you should have done ten minutes ago." "I'll take you." "I want nothing from you. After tonight, we are done"
"I'm sorry me and Abi are such a burden to your existence." Sally slammed the door. "Come on. You know I didn't mean anything by it." Silence settled over the house. Charlie stood alone. Then he heard something. A soft, almost imperceptible movement behind him. He turned. A tiny spider was crawling across a photograph of him and Abbey graduating from university.
Charlie stared at it. The spider crawled across the glass. His fist smashed through the photograph. The spider disappeared beneath his knuckles. "Fuck". The blood started to appear almost immediately from his knuckles. Charlie felt anger coursing through him. He chose to forgo a plaster or bandage for his hand. He reached for his car keys instead and hurried out of the home that was no longer his.

Writing The Elvis I Wish I Knew With Both Truth and Imagination
One of the most fascinating challenges in writing about Elvis Presley is deciding where the line sits between what happened and what might have happened. Anyone who has spent time with Elvis’s story knows how much of his life is already wrapped in myth, memory, and interpretation. Even the most rigorous biographies rely on recollections, interviews, and fragments of truth filtered through the people who loved him, worked with him, or simply watched him from afar.
When I began shaping The Elvis I Wish I Knew, I found myself returning to a simple question: how do you honour the real man while exploring the life he never had the chance to live?

The pull of biography

There is a deep satisfaction in working with real events - the Sun Studio days, the early friendships, the moments that shaped him long before fame became a burden. Books like Jerry Schilling’s Me and a Guy Named Elvis show how powerful those personal memories can be. They offer glimpses of Elvis not as an icon, but as a young man navigating sudden success, loyalty, and expectation.
Those truths matter. They anchor the story.

The freedom of fiction

But fiction allows something biography cannot: the ability to ask “What if?” without needing permission from history.
What if someone close enough, trusted enough, had been able to say “No” at the right moment? What if Elvis had taken a different path - not away from music, but away from the pressures that ultimately consumed him? What if the friendships that shaped his early life had included one more voice, one more influence, one more steady presence?
Fiction lets us explore the emotional truth behind those questions, even when the factual truth is fixed.

Walking the boundary

Writing this book meant walking a tightrope between authenticity and imagination. The events you’ll recognise — the football game in 1954, the early recordings, the whirlwind years — are treated with respect. But the story also steps deliberately into the unknown, into the version of Elvis who could have existed if life had bent just slightly in his favour.
It isn’t a biography. It isn’t pure fiction. It’s a conversation between the two - a tribute to the man he was, and a hope for the man he might have become.

If you’re curious…

If you enjoy stories that blend real history with alternative possibility, or if you’ve ever wondered how Elvis’s life might have unfolded with one different influence at the right moment, you may find something meaningful in The Elvis I Wish I Knew.
You can explore the book here on Written - and perhaps join me in imagining the version of Elvis who finally found peace.

Megan and Deshawn started dating, and they were being praised as being one of the first interracial couples that the school had seen in awhile. They were praised by students and teachers alike. Of course, some people weren't happy, and among them was Aniyah. She severely disapproved of it, partly because she not-so-secretly liked Deshawn herself, and partly because she felt that the relationship pushed the colorism agenda: a Black guy (Deshawn) was dating a light-skinned/white girl (Megan), leaving dark-skinned girls like Aniyah in the dust and making them feel less than their light-skinned and white counterparts. So, Aniyah rallied Maria, Roselyn, Natalie, and Emma to conduct a plan to destroy the relationship. She kicked off the plan by flirting with Deshawn. He obviously tells her that he's not interested, but she persists. Rather than simply walking away, he actually shoves her in the lockers before walking away. Aniyah merely scoffs. This wouldn't be the last time, either.

After school, following a flirtatious voicemail from Connor Davidson, the most popular guy in their grade (Natalie and Emma in disguise), Megan and Deshawn have a huge fight. The latter angrily slaps her, but before she could run out, he embraces her, and she forgives him. I didn't like the fact that that act of domestic violence was undermined, but I digress. Megan says that they're being plotted against (it was then revealed that Roselyn was the one who told her about it earlier that day).

Later that night, Roselyn joins a four-way FaceTime call between Aniyah, Maria, Natalie, and Emma. The girls tell her more details about the plan while Megan and Deshawn silently listen to it on the other line. As the tea is being spilled, there is an obvious sense of hurt and betrayal in Megan's eyes. She unmutes the call and speaks. "Thanks, Roselyn. I've heard enough." She hangs up and cries in Deshawn's arms.

Varying degrees of shock and dismay are seen in the four girls' faces. Emma's face in particular says, "Roselyn ruined the plan," rather than, "Oh, man. I messed up."

Maria turns the call to Roselyn. "Just a tip, Roselyn," she says heated. "No one likes a snitch. I'd be scared if I were you. Just watch your back." She then hangs up.

The next day, Deshawn confronts Aniyah about the incident. Aniyah shows no remorse and tries to hone in on him. Already angered, he begins to assault her. Starting at her head, he slowly works his way lower. Aniyah is too weak to defend herself and falls to the ground. She is unable to get back up.

At the hospital, Doctor Russell and Nurse Lawson discuss the situation, and the former reveals that Aniyah is now paralyzed (Deshawn called the paramedics with an alibi, so he was cleared as a suspect). Aniyah is seen laying in her hospital bed in anguish.

The next day, Deshawn goes to visit Aniyah. Aniyah is now wheelchair-bound and unable to leave her own bedroom by herself (her parents weren't home). Aniyah threatens to call the police, but before she could, Deshawn grabs her wheelchair and throws her down the stairs. He immediately calls the cops.

The next day, a celebration of life service is held in the gym after lunch. Roselyn is more or less confused over what happened, while Maria is grief-stricken, having been closer to Aniyah than anyone else. Emma takes advantage of Maria's broken state to try and campaign for Halloween princess, much to the anger of Megan. She savagely berates the two, which gets little-to-no reaction from Emma but causes Maria to become even more upset. Roselyn lets it slide, understanding the pain and betrayal that Megan had to endure. She offers to hang out with her after school, but Megan politely declines.

Over the course of the school day, Megan does her best to avoid Natalie and Emma. I applauded her for this, as most people would just beat the living heck out of their so-called friends. At the end of the day, Natalie and Emma unsuccessfully talk to Megan as Megan gets on the bus. After she sits, she looks out the window, and the bus starts to drive away. As the bus leaves, it fades to black and stays black for awhile. Then, it fades out.

It goes to Maria, who is lying on her bed listening to some music. I could barely make it out, but it sounded like "Time After Time" by Cyndi Lauper, which makes sense, as the lyrics are about losing a loved one. Maria is depressed, appropriately so due to the death of Aniyah. She never changed out of her outfit for the day (a pink sweater and black denim jeans); she just looks defeated.

Suddenly, the doorbell rings. Maria gets up and goes downstairs to open the door, revealing to be Megan. She has her hands behind her back and doesn't say anything.

"What?" Maria says in a rude and annoyed tone.

Megan looks into her eyes for a minute or two as the camera zooms in. Then she speaks in a chilling whisper.

"Say hi to Aniyah for me."

Realizing what she meant, Maria takes off, but Megan grabs the back of her sweater. Maria manages to break free with the sweater ripping a bit. She advances up the stairs with Megan right behind her. Maria runs into the bathroom and locks the door. She frantically looks around and realizes that she can't escape. Megan breaks down the door with a lump hammer. She kicks the door down and jumped in. Maria tries to run through the exit, but Megan grabs her hair and throws her down to the ground and immediately beats her to death with the hammer. After seeing her accomplishment, she sits on the floor to catch her breath for a few minutes. She then discards all evidence and calls the police.

After Maria's murder, one thing crossed my mind: Emma is so next. Sure, Megan (or Deshawn if he was willing to kill again) could go after Natalie, but Natalie was more or less along for the ride. She was too insecure to have anything openly against her. Emma, on the other hand, was a whole other person.

Like I predicted, it goes to Emma. It's at night, and Emma is doing some homework. Given that Aniyah and Maria's parents weren't present when their daughters were killed, it was safe to say that Emma was home alone as well. As the camera zooms in, it transitions from in front of her to behind her. Each transition increases with intensity and speed. When the camera is right in front of her, it goes to black. I assume this to be her demise, but it doesn't happen. Emma just gets the power back on and resumes working. Then, boom! The hammer goes down, and Emma falls to the ground with a thud. Megan comes into view, showing no remorse for her action.

"Sorry, Emma, but you left me no choice."