Page 44 of Through the Flames
“Ugh. Gross,” I muttered under my breath.
“Don’t be salty, sis,” Dom crowed, nearly colliding with the couch but saving them from face-planting with a twirl that would’ve impressed even the cheerleaders.
It was infuriating how smooth he was, while I was running around like a bumbling klutz.
My chest suddenly felt tight watching them, like a rubber band was snapping taut around my ribcage. For the first time, I felt like a guest in my own apartment.
I trailed behind them, holding Sierra’s bag, and felt oddly like a sidekick in someone else’s rom-com. My own fucking brother’s sidekick, nonetheless.
The plot line straight out of hell.
They disappeared into Sierra’s room with a “Good night” over their shoulders, and I felt like the last person left on stage after the curtain had already fallen and all the people had gone home.
Shuffling into my room, the door closing with a soft click, the silence was suffocating me.
I hated silence. It felt all wrong, like something inside my brain was scratching on the inside of my skull, desperately trying to claw its way out.
Pulling out my phone, it took me less than a minute to get one of my audiobooks playing. I closed my eyes, breathing in deeply through my nose. That was better.
Peeling my clothes off my body before carelessly kicking them into a random corner of the room, I flopped onto my bed.
My head was spinning, but I wasn’t sure if it was because of the alcohol or the insane overthinking I’d exhibited.
The walls were thin here. Too thin.
Even with the dulcet sounds of the narrator describing someone getting railed six ways from Sunday, I heard a muffled laugh, followed by a groan.
Then the kind of whisper you most certainlyweren’tsupposed to hear through drywall.
Still only wearing my underwear but too exhausted to get up to actually pull on my sleep shirt or wash off my makeup, I rolled over and shoved a pillow over my face.
Not to drown out the noise, but for the ache that’d been growing all night.
Everything was changing.
The dread crept in, quiet and cold.
My only close friend here was leaving, and I was going to lose my home. My normal.
I’d need to find a new roommate. Or a new place. Neither had ever really worked out well for me, and at this point, I wasn’t sure which would be worse.
The unmistakable sound of the headboard banging against the wall reverberated around the room. That was my cue. I didnotneed to hear that shit.
I was genuinely happy for Sierra. But the truth was, while my friend just got everything she ever wanted, I just got a countdown.
Before I knew it, I was on my feet, pulling a random oversized hoodie over my head and socks up over my frozen toes before shoving my feet into sneakers.
I didn’t give a second thought to where I was going; my legs just carried me there.
The air outside slapped me instantly. Winter in Tennessee didn’t bring blizzards or ice storms, but the damp chill clawed through my hoodie like it wanted to make itself at home in my bones.
My breath puffed white in the air, each exhale proof of how stupid I was for being out here half-dressed.
The campus was deserted and quiet. Streetlights cast long shadows of pale yellow across the sidewalks, and the oaks on the edge of campus reached their bare branches toward the sky.
Their branches clicked together when the wind cut through in a dry rattle, which raised the hairs on my arms, even through the sleeves of my hoodie.
I shoved my hands deep into the kangaroo pocket of my hoodie and walked faster, my sneakers crunching against the frosted grass as I veered towards the grove.
