“I’m tired.” I turned away from him to lie on my opposite side. Maybe I was unfriendly—cold, even—but it was the only way to stop while he was ahead.
“No,”—he puffed before a doubtful laugh followed—”you’re not tired, you’re impossible.” The sound of the curtain against the rod was the only proof of him leaving, and suddenly the room felt empty.
This was my fault. I’d let him chase me, but I’d been fucked up, and there was no possible way he could understand the truth. No one ever did. They believed it was a front, a charade, like I was doing this to myself.
I pulled the white sheet over my head to block out the fluorescent light. This was precisely the reason why I never kissed anyone. In the end, it was the boy who would develop feelings and get hurt in the end.
That evening, I was discharged after going twenty-four hours without a fever which ultimately screwed me on Oscar-Tuesday. I needed Oscar to smother this fire Ollie built inside me.
To avoid Jake’s pity glare, and Ollie’s assumptions, I skipped dinner as a precaution and showered instead.
Choosing comfort, I wore a pair of cotton shorts, a tank top, and a camo sweatshirt. My hair stayed up in a messy bun, and I glanced over my desk at the pile of homework and the blank pad of paper Dr. Conway had given me.
The decision was simple.
The blank space stared back at me as I tapped ink dots over the paper. Dr. Conway’s words replayed in my head. “Free your mind and write.” And so I did. With a clear mind and pen to paper, my fingers took off as if they had a mind of their own.
A knock at my door pulled me from a trance, and I looked up at the clock to see a full hour had passed. My chair squeaked as I pushed away from my desk to answer it.
“She’s alive!” Jake exclaimed as soon as I opened the door. He took a step forward with arms extended, but I withdrew behind the door out of habit. “Sorry. I know I can be a bit much and sometimes forget boundaries exist,” he said after dropping his hands to his sides.
“It’s fine.” I forced a smile, waiting for the purpose of this visit.
Jake looked down the hall and back at me. “I would love it if you made it tonight.” He held his palm in the air. “No mandy tonight. Promise. Only a good time with mates and booze. What do you say?” The force behind the flutter of Jake’s lashes almost had me flown across the room and pinned to the cement wall.
“I don’t get it, what it is it about me that makes you all so persistent to be my friend? I’m an asshole.”
“You may be right, but it’s exactly the reason why I’m so fond of you. You’re an asshole, but not in the Bria way. More like in a cool, I-don’t-give-a-shit way. I find it refreshing. The only thing Bria ever cares about is making sure all eyes are on her. You prevent anyone from seeing you. It’s quite intriguing.”
My hand found my hip as I leaned into the door. “I’m a cool asshole?”
A crooked smile appeared across his thin lips. “A very cool asshole.”
“Alright, fine … but don’t mistake this as an agreement to go every night, and I’m not sitting at your table in the mess hall, either. I can only handle you all in small doses.”
Jake shrugged a shoulder as his head slanted into it. “I’ll take what I can get.”
After Jake left, I returned to my desk to rip off the page-long written paper, folded it, and put it away so I couldn’t read what I wrote. I didn’t want to be confronted with whatever was truly occupying my mind. It was between my subconscious and my subconscious.
After the security guard checked the corridor, and a few assignments were completed, I built my mountain an hour after midnight. I’d changed my mind a few times during the last hour but decided I may as well keep everyone on my good side to have access to the only semi-fun here at Dolor.
Chatter echoed through the walls of the vent as I crawled closer to Ollie’s. Everyone was already there, and Ollie was lying on his mattress with his hands clasped behind his head with his eyes closed. Taking in the moment, I appreciated his beauty. Telling him off the way I had was bitter, but I had done worse in the past.
Though there was something about Ollie I couldn’t quite swallow.
“Ollie?” He opened his eyes and saw me over him with my head poked through the vent. He parted his mouth as his face drew a blank. He blinked a few times, but no words came from him. “Should I not have come?”
He quickly got to his feet and held up his arms. “No, of course. You’re just the last person I expected to see on top of me …” He let out a laugh as he waved me down. “I meant, you’re the last person I expected to see. Period. Not on top of me.”
Ollie pulled me down, and everyone greeted me as I immediately took a seat against the wall beside Jake. Jake gripped my shoulder and passed over a bottle of whiskey. “Thank you, Crap-bag,”—Jake smiled—”for coming.”
Alicia cleared her throat, and I glanced over as she held a finger in the air. “Okay, Mia. Since you dropped in, it’s your turn. Strip or dare?”
I downed as much of the whiskey my throat could stand, and Ollie fell back over his mattress without his eyes leaving mine. “Strip,” I said once the burn subsided. I passed the bottle to Alicia and pulled off my hoodie, revealing a white tank top underneath. With the heat in the room, it had been bound to come off sooner than later, and I wasn’t in the mood to play childish games.
“If she keeps avoiding dares, we’ll have her naked by the end of the night.” Isaac snickered, looking over at Ollie. Ollie clenched his jaw, and the tension turned up a few more notches. “Relax, Masters. I’m kidding. Mia, go ahead and choose someone.”
I glanced around the room. “How far can we go with this?”
“There are no rules; you either strip or complete the dare,” Bria said.
“Okay, looks like Ollie could use some fun while he’s over there by himself. Strip or dare?” I asked, looking over at Ollie, who sat by himself on the mattress against the wall.
He gritted his teeth before saying, “Dare.”
A devious smile grew across my lips. “Touch yourself, Ollie. I want to see you make yourself come.” There was no way he would go through with it.
Jake threw himself into a full-body laugh, almost falling over while everyone turned to look at Ollie. His brows snapped together. “You can’t be serious.”
“Yeah, like Ollie would ever do that.” Jake giggled.
Flashing him a challenging smile, I said, “There are two types of people in this world, Ollie. Those who don’t complete their dares, and those who do. Just slip those fingers underneath those boxers of yours so I can see you lose yourself.”