“Ollie provides the fun, but he doesn’t participate. He never gets in on it,” Alicia whispered. “The only time Bria can try to have a chance, is when he’s tore up.”
“Bloody hell, she’s right.” Jake chuckled. “You’re the only one Ollie has willingly kissed, let alone jerked off in front of.”
“So, none of you ever hooked up with him? Not even a kiss?” I asked, and I wasn’t sure why I cared so much in the first place. All I wanted to do was get Bria off him, her hands off him, her lips off him. Ice frosted over my skin in a cold sweat as my eyes burned a hole to the back of her head. Ice and fire. This was different, though. Rage.
A blue and red twisted rage.
Alicia and Jake both shook their heads. “He refuses every time.”
My brows snapped together. “Not even Bria?”
“Not that I’m aware of,” she said. “She’s way more into Ollie than he will ever be into her.”
Jake interjected, “Yeah, Bria normally goes for Isaac by the end of the night. She’ll screw him in front of everyone, but I suppose since he’s passed out first, Ollie was next on her list.”
“This is sick in so many ways, even for me.” My attention stayed on Bria, watching her like a hawk. Suddenly, Bria stood and shimmied off her shorts and panties in one swoop, and my rage turned into a silent mania, slithering through the fire in my veins.
“What do you mean even for you?’” Alicia asked, utterly oblivious to what was happening in front of us, or completely discarding it altogether like it was normal.
“I’m all about sex and a good time, but this is rape! You can’t tell me Ollie knows what he’s doing right now,” I shouted, pointing in Ollie’s direction. Bria sat back down over Ollie’s lap.
Alicia looked over to Jake. “Yeah, but is it our place?”
“Hell yeah, it’s our place.” The mania influenced my legs as I stood to my feet. A few strides later, I peered over Bria as she gripped his length. Like glass, the frost shattered and all was left was the painful fire inside me.
“Mia, I don’t think that’s such a good idea,” Jake called out, but I didn’t listen.
Gripping Bria by her dumb short hair, I dragged her off and away from Ollie. “What’s wrong with you?” I shouted as she clawed at my hand.
Bria struggled to her feet as her words slurred together. “Get the fuck off me!”
As I threw Bria against the wall, Jake and Alicia stumbled to their own feet. My fist clenched at my sides and I looked back at Ollie who remained oblivious to what was going on around him. He slumped over against the wall to his side before I turned my attention to Bria.
“He’s not a toy you can play with whenever the hell you want …” My eyes darted around the room, and everyone glared at me in a shocking silence, except for Isaac.
Isaac was still passed out in the bed.
Bria’s face turned red as she slid down the wall until her bottom hit the floor. She wouldn’t dare come after me. Shaking my head, I returned to Ollie’s side and fixed the waistband of his boxers and sweatpants, then lifted his head off the wall. “Ollie, you got to wake up,” I said, holding his head in my hands. Ollie struggled to open his eyes. “Why did you do this? Why did you put yourself in this situation?” It broke something inside me to see him so fragile and defenseless. “Ollie, open your eyes for me.”
Ollie’s lashes fluttered open, and his beautiful green eyes were bloodshot and broken.
“Mia.” He exhaled. “I’m sorry.”
And his eyes closed again.
As I guided his head over the pillow, everyone exited the dorm through the vent. Staying by his side, I wasn’t going to leave the room until Bria was far away from him.
I understood sex. Hell, I understood drunken sex. I could accept messing around, experimenting with genders, and living in the moment, but nothing about this was okay. No one should be allowed to violate someone who didn’t have the right mind to say “no.”
I wondered how many times this had happened. How many times Bria, or anyone else here, had touched him in ways he didn’t want to be touched. How many times he had he gotten so drunk, where he was oblivious to whose hands were on him and whose lips were on his. If I hadn’t been here, how far would this have gone?
My adrenaline soared through the roof as I paced the dorm room cleaning because I couldn’t sit still, and I had lost my chance of leaving already. Isaac was still passed out, hanging off the end of the mattress. Maybe when, or if, he woke, we could help each other out of here.
Eventually, my nerves calmed, and I took a seat on the floor beside the mattress. My eyes grew heavy as I fought to keep them open. Even though my fingers ached to scratch Ollie’s back and swipe my hand through his hair, I was afraid to touch him. He lay on his side as he rested his hand under his head beneath the pillow. I admired his slightly parted lips, soft pink and perfectly made, and the small freckle off to the side of his mouth. What was it about him that made me do these crazy things?
Chapter Eight
“Leaving her breathless in my aftertaste
was the worst way to leave. The best was
to stay, but she isn’t ready for me yet.”
—Oliver Masters
I MADE IT IN time to my first group therapy session on Thursday and found an empty seat in the circle. Unfortunately, the whole crew was present, amongst other students I’d seen in passing. Everyone greeted me with a small smile but stayed quiet for the most part. Group therapy had to be the place where Isaac, Jake, Alicia, Bria, and Ollie had been brought together.
Chairs faced each other in a circle in the dark room, and in a corner lay a dusty piano under a lit floor lamp. The piano stared back at me, taunting me. My fingers itched to feel the cold keys, and my ears ringed, begging to hear the music my fingers could produce with each stroke.
“A musical genius,” my mother used to call me, but I hadn’t played since before she passed. It was bizarre, of all the places, a piano was in this room. My gaze touched over the black and white details, and I wondered if the F-chord still caused my pulse to skip.
“Mia Jett?” a dark-skinned man announced from the circle, breaking my attention away from the piano. I didn’t know he was the counselor. He could have easily passed as one of the students with his young features. Not a single wrinkle or imperfection marked his dark and creamy face.
I nodded, and he continued, “Please, introduce yourself.”
“It sounds like you just did. Why don’t you tell me your name?” There was movement throughout the circle as if I had stepped over an invisible line.