Something clawed its way from the bottom of my stomach to my throat, and it brought the threat to drag up breakfast with it.
Up until my last class around 3 pm, there still wasn't any Bolton, any of the boys, or even breakfast regurgitated.
The game wasn't until 7, so I had time to hide out in my room with Henry Jon’s pages.
I dragged myself up the stairs forcefully, lacking even the energy to take the next step. I was burned out, and I didn't understand why. I had stayed clear of any adventure, not for a lack of trying. Just being at Arcadia was exhausting.
I let my bag fall off my shoulder in the middle of our empty room before I crawled into bed, completely clothed in my uniform that wasn't wrinkle free before this decision, so I determined it didn't matter.
Yanking the covers up to my chin finally, a yawn forced my jaw into a stretch. I was forcing my eyes open and the wheels to turn in my mind enough to prepare for whatever Kate had up her sleeve. My eyelids, at half-mast, closed anyways, while I begged my mind to keep trying until a deep sleep snatched all of my efforts.
It was a kind of sleep I hadn't had in years. I had been functioning on four hours a night since I could remember.
I was probably an insomniac at this point. Not even coffee elicited the slightest buzz. Nothing but an entire bottle of NyQuil really put me on my ass.
The severity of four hours a night only hit my bones once in a while.
Bolton’s voice tumbled against my ear drums, and fear seeped into my soul. “Run.”
Wherever I was, it was too dark to even see my own hand in front of my face. I looked down, trying to listen to the ground against my Doc Martens carefully for clues, but I came up empty. Everything was put on mute, except Bolton’s voice, echoing for me to run.
I felt a sharp pain in my lower back, and it made my breath hitch and freeze. I tensed around a foreign object lodged into my back that my hands couldn't reach, and my vision was robbed by the heavy black of night.
His hot breath caressed my ear without feeling him touch me anywhere else, expertly touching everyone he came into contact with while keeping a distance I envied. Nothing touched him, not me sitting on his throne, not me wearing an invisible crown, not our moments my mind constantly replayed.
Bolton was untouchable.
“I told you to run. Still not listening.”
I still couldn't find my breath, as a painful groan escaped my lips, hoping if something came out that the pain would ease.
“Do you want me to hurt you, Arianna? Hurting you isn't some trophy. It will end us both.”
The sarcasm that ran through my veins wanted to smirk through the pain and taunt him with how strong I could be, but the pain brought me to my knees. I heard the dead leaves crunch under my bones. I was left speechless by the pain, something so rare it shocked even me.
“I will burn the world down, the end of us, if you make me hurt you.”
Slowly I felt myself bleed in and out of consciousness. It was hard to tell when my eyes were closed or not, both dark, but one held Bolton’s voice.
I woke up choking on my breath and the dream being the last thing on my mind. A cold sweat covered the back of my neck, chest, and back, like a fingerprint of my dream, all the affected areas.
I sat up in our empty and dark room, trying to regain composure. I touched everything around me, trying to convince myself that this was reality, tangible, while that dream was a version of Bolton’s betrayal that didn't exist.
Turning over, I saw that my phone read 5:30 p.m., and it was hard to be mad. I wanted to casually sleep through Kate’s plans.
She hijacked my adventure and now my revenge too.
I leaned over, tugging the drawer open that kept Henry Jon’s pages safely hidden in the pages between the old binding.
I opened where I had left off last night. After the half serpent/half bull appeared for Rosalia, and Henry Jon was made a believer in something beyond good and evil.
Something, or someone, like Bolton, playing both sides and making it look easy.
When Bolton was good, he almost glowed, and the hard edges seemed personable.
When Bolton was bad, he made me question what real torture was when he had your body aching, but begging for more.
He was an enigma wrapped up in beauty and pain.
By the time I dragged my still heavy body out of bed, it was almost time for her “plan” to kick off amateur hour. Everything about Kate was meant to irritate your patience.
She was a typical mean girl, without the two-faced jabs. If she had a jab, she didn't pretend to be anything but herself—one face, one girl (typically in pink), and no filter for her attitude.
My phone kept buzzing against the wood of the bedside table, while I threw on whatever my greedy hands pulled out of my drawer. It didn’t really matter what I chose, as long as it wasn't this stiff uniform, which got me nothing, except for detention for the unique spin I constantly put on it. I wore thigh highs instead of tights, Doc Martens instead of loafers, and none of my uniform was ever as pristine as the other girls.
Tonight, some leggings, a crop top, and flannel tied around my waist would have to do. Nothing designer or ironed, just all me.
The field was starting to become flooded with people ready to cheer on the players, for both sides.
Exeter was a rival of Arcadia in every sport, and picking a side was half the fun. Their rival had everyone in the stands involved, invested, and intrigued.
After seeing the game myself last time they played, I was in shock at the push and pull. All my other schools were firmly either the loser or winner. There was no push or pull.
Arcadia wasn’t anything like my other schools. The prestige practically assaulted you with just a glance, never mind attending here.
I got to the girls’ locker room to change, since I went against my better judgment and tried out for the team. That wasn't even the shocking part. That part was that my name sat comfortably on the short list of girls who made the team.
My earbuds blared PVRIS’s angsty ballads, which really sounded like poetry to my ears, when I walked in and went straight to my locker. So far, I was unscathed by Kate’s watchful eye.
I spoke too soon. I opened my locker to yank my cheer uniform off the hanger, closed my locker, and was scared shitless by her standing there.
“You're late. Get ready quick. We have boys to make drool.”
I let my head hang as I plucked my earbuds out of my ears and cursed myself for changing. I shouldn't have bothered. What a waste of being awake. I didn't bother giving her shit. I got changed and pulled my purple hair into a half up ponytail—the best I could manage with my medium length hair.
I smoothed out the crimson red and navy blue uniform in the mirror before I shifted my eyes up to see myself looking more polished than I had since my mom died.
It was an easy marker to my life: before my mom died or after. Two very different versions of myself, the same person, but a hell of a lot more tricks up my sleeves now.
She wouldn't approve of my love for vengeance, adventure, and danger. She wouldn't even approve of my words becoming arrows and piercing all the fragile skin I had.
I smiled big in the mirror, pretending to be someone I didn't know for a second—someone who didn't have so many defense mechanisms and so many people that she had fallen in love with just to vanish into a new town.
The smile faded quickly into my content straight lip. I gripped the porcelain sink so hard my hands flared up with red in every crease. I wasn't going to let myself be another person who judged me.