Page 24 of Riot Rules
Boom.
Boom.
Boom.
Boom.
BOOM.
My heart is steady when I unfasten my bra. It doesn’t trip or skip when I lower my panties down over my hips and slide them down my legs, stepping out of them on wobbly legs once the cotton material bunches at my feet. I stand in front of him, naked and shaking, folding my arms over my chest to hide my flat chest, and Kevin huffs down his nose.
“Well. I can see why Jason wanted to keep you all to himself.” The needle is ready, the near-black liquid visible in the chamber. He sets it down on the coffee table, and then he pats his thigh. “Come on. Come sit here. We oughta get acquainted, don’t ya think?” When I sit down, screaming internally and gripped by fear, he asks me, “You ever been kissed by a boy before, Hannah?”
“No, Sir.”
Kevin’s pleased by this. Beaming. “And…” His fingers, rough and nicotine-stained, run up the inside of my leg, wavering mid-thigh. “…what about touched? You ever let a boy touch you…here?” His hand moves higher. Much higher still, up my side, over my ribcage. I bite back a startled, animal yelp when he pinches my nipple between his fingers.
“N—no, sir.”
“That’s good. That’s very good. And what about…” He begins to slip his other hand down, between my legs, and for a distorted moment, everything feels calm. Then his fingers are probing, wriggling, exploring parts of my body that he should never, never touch, and I snap.
Everything blurs and stretches. The room becomes nothing more than color, and light, and a high-pitched buzzing sound. I move quickly, and my thoughts can’t keep up with my body. I am outside of myself as I lean sideways, and my hand closes around the fully loaded syringe on the coffee table…
…and I sink it into Kevin’s eye.
I press down, press, press, press, and the plunger has nowhere left to go, the barrel empty, and Kevin is screaming, screaming, SCREAMING…
Then heisn’tscreaming. His head kicks back, his body shaking, seizing, his hands curving into locked claws, and white foam starts to spew out of his mouth.
His jerky movements throw me off his knee and onto the floor. I scrape my side on the coffee table. More of the white foam oozes out of Kevin’s mouth. Wide-eyed and choking, he reaches for me, like he’d grab hold of me if he could, or maybe he’s reaching for my help, but either way, I’m too far away and his contorted fingers swipe from left to right, singing through thin air. The guy coughs, chokes, splutters, the white foam spraying out of his mouth now tinged pink, flecked with blood.
“Fucking bitch. I’m gonna…fucking…killyou!” Like a scene out of a horror movie, Kevin’s spine arches away from the back of the couch, and he slides on the floor. He tugs the needle from his eye, jittering like a nightmare monster, and the whole scene is just too much, too grotesque, too disturbing.
I puke. A stream of hot orange bile rockets out of my mouth and hits the carpet, splattering all over my bare feet. Again, my stomach muscles tighten, sending another wave of burning bile up and out of my mouth, this time spraying all over my legs.
When I catch my breath, Kevin isn’t shaking anymore. He’s very still, legs splayed, eyes fixed, staring up at the ceiling, and the front of hisJohn DeereEquipmentt-shirt is covered in spit and blood. Is…is hedead?
I think he must be. I race across the living room, I grab Jason’s reeking hoody from where it’s hanging on the hook, I yank the front door open, and I run.
It’s raining. My feet are bare. I’m naked save for the disgusting hoody I’ve wrapped around my shoulders. The cold and the dark don’t matter. All that matters now is my escape.
I hurl myself into the night, and I do not stop.
12
DASH
Okay.So what? I’m a liar. Big fucking deal.
I’ve taken my fair share of pills. I drink, and when I’ve drunk enough, I’ve been known to smoke. Mary Jane and I are best friends. I’ve tripped my face off on acid and mushrooms, and I even hit a crack pipe once, just for the hell of it (zero stars, would NOT recommend). But have I done heroin? Of course I haven’t done heroin. I’m notthatfucking stupid.
Iamcapable of making my own decisions, though, and I sure as hell don’t need some jumped up do-gooder telling me what a mess I’m making of my life. I’ve been stressed. The heel of my father’s size eleven Italian leather shoes on the back of my neck is a constant source of pressure, and a hit from a hip flask just before lunch is a perfect way to ease back the tension. I won’t be letting Carina Mendoza chide me like an incompetent little kid, just because she has her shit locked down tight and everything’s roses forher.
If I’d had any Molly on me, I would have done that. Xanax would have been acceptable. A Valium or two. But I didn’t have access to any of those drugs, did I? So, I had a nip of vodka, which is fucking child’s play in comparison, and yet she stood there, looking at me like I was the biggest loser on the face of the planet? Yeah, I don’t think so, love.
Why does she even care, anyway? It’s none of her concern if I want to cultivate a mild buzz between periods. I mean, who the fuck does she think she is? She’s a no-one, sticking her nose in where it doesn’t belong. If she’s not careful, she’ll wind up trying to get involved in something that falls strictly under Riot House dominion, something thatreallyisn’t her business. Heaven help her then.
I make my way around the back of the main building, ranting angrily to myself under my breath as I draw closer to the entrance to the maze behind Wolf Hall. The maze was designed and built by a mathematic savant back in 1903. It’s notoriously difficult to solve, with its exceedingly high hedge walls and its infuriating switchbacks, but we Riot House boys made it our business to solve it during our first month at the academy. Back in 1957, the dismembered head of one of the academy’s custodians was discovered at the very center of the maze. Wolf Hall students love to tell stories about that unfortunate janitor, claiming that the ghost of his body roams the narrow, overgrown walkways, searching for his head. The stories are bullshit. Everyone knows they are, but even so, no one willingly enters the maze these days. No one except myself, Wren and Pax.
