Charlie Lewis

Charlie shouldn't be alive. None of them should be. That was what haunted him most: not the death, but the knowing. His grandmother should have died fifty years ago. Something—luck, chance, or some unspoken cosmic glitch—allowed her to escape Death's grasp. And because of that, she had lived a life she never should have had. She had children. She raised a family. She created a lineage of people who shouldn't exist.

Now, Death was correcting its mistake. One by one, people were dying.

Charlie sat in the basement, his legs drawn up to his chest, his arms wrapped tightly around them as if he could hold everything together if he squeezed hard enough. The lightbulb above him flickered with a lazy hum, casting long shadows across the room. Boxes of old photos, Christmas decorations, and broken furniture surrounded him like relics of a family history that might soon be erased.

Upstairs, Stefanie was trying to explain it all, her voice high-pitched with panic. She had a theory, a logic to the madness: it was happening by age. From oldest to youngest. A slow unraveling, moving down through the generations like a descending countdown. That made Erik next. Not that he seemed very worried about it.

Charlie was fifteen years old. The youngest in the family. According to Stefanie's theory, that made him the last. The last to die. The last to see it all happen. The final name on the list. Having time should have been comforting. But instead, it emptied him inside, leaving him suspended in fear. What was the point of having extra time if it only meant watching everyone else disappear first? He lowered his head, resting his chin on his knees.

"So, eventually I'll be the last one standing, huh?... great..."

I don't know, girls, I never put any indication.