Page 77 of The Pawn

So this is it. He's there, standing outside her door. And I might not like what I see.

Suddenly I find myself wishing that I'd taken a few of those Solo cups filled with contraband alcohol and snuck them with me to my room. I'm not sure what it's like to be fall down drunk, but it seems preferable to the pulse-pounding, dread-filled cycle of indecision I'm going through right now.

But I can't look away from this. So, with a deep breath and the knowledge that Mariana said her attacker was still on campus, I press play.

A boy comes out of the room towards Silas. His face isn't on camera because of the angle, but his hair is light and he's tall, with a lean frame. He reaches out a hand with a set of bills and hands it to Silas.

Confused, I watch as my brother looks around, checking for any observers, and pulls something from his jacket, then palms it and hands it to the other boy. The boys takes whatever it is and puts it into his back pocket, then tugs on his jeans and scratches an itch on the side of his leg.

Silas leaves the hallway. I pause the video again, closing my eyes and breathing through my nose. Whatever just happened, I don't exactly understand, but it seemed like a trade.

I tell myself it wasn't drugs. Because if itwasdrugs... and if this is the boy who assaulted Mariana... there's only one thing it could be. Well, two things really, neither of them good.

GHB or Rohybnol.Roofies.The kind of drugs you only buy from a dealer when you have ill intent in mind. Drugs that only shitty people sell.

I tell myself that's not what it is. But then Mariana appears on the screen, walking in from the opposite side of the hallway that my brother left through. She has a bottle in her hand, which she holds up with a grin on her face. The tall boy turns around, but now Mariana is between him and the camera; I can't see his face.

They put the drinks into cups. Sip them, leaning against the wall of the hallway. I manage to see a sliver of what he looks like: tall cheekbones, light hair. He disappears again in an instant, crossing his legs, one ankle showing.

Then my attention is taken by Mariana. She slumps over. He helps her into her room.

I don't need to see the rest. Especially since his face isn't on it. I watch for a little while, though, feeling sick, clicking on the fast forward button.

He doesn't even close the bedroom door.

I guess he wanted to hear anyone coming.

The tall boy leaves, and the video ends without showing his face. But I have to watch it again; I need to see what my brother did. Were those really drugs in his hand? Could it actually be true?

Was he responsible for the rape of Mariana Marks, not because he was the attacker, but because he supplied him drugs?

I want to believe otherwise, but the video doesn't give me answers.

The second time around, though, I notice more things. Including the tattoo that's flashed on the attacker's ankle more than once. It seems familiar, so I pause the video, take a screenshot, and zoom in, sharpening the details.

My mind skips away from the truth that the tattoo tells, so it takes a while for me to place it.

But I've seen it before, and in the exact same place, too.

This is the dragon tattoo I saw on Lukas's Dupont's ankle.

The one he said he's getting lasered off. The very same tattoo that he hid from me quickly, pulling the cuff of his pants down to cover it up, a frown on his face.

It couldn't be. Lukas doesn't seem like the type.

Then again, they never do.

It makes a certain kind of poetic, terrible sense. I've wondered since I first came here why Cole pointed the finger at my brother. If Silas really was the drug dealer who gave the attacker his drugs, then maybe he thought it was justice to name him responsible without saying why. The mob took what he said and ran with it, twisting the truth into an assumption he never corrected, until the drug dealer he blamed for what happened to Mariana left Coleridge forever. That's what he deserved, I'm sure Cole thinks, for selling drugs.

But if his best friend was the one who bought them...

My mind flashes back to something Lukas said to me."Reggie was a low-life drug dealer. He offered to sell roofies to a friend of ours who was only looking for a little Molly. He's bad news."

For all I know, that friend was Lukas.

And I made out with him.

Gave him the benefit of the doubt.

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