Page 196 of Drown Like Heaven
Or maybe I was just a terrible person, twisting things in my brain to transform my infidelity into something less evil than it was. But then…I remembered what Micah had done to me in my bedroom, and I hated him all over again. I’d begun to wonder how many of my emotions he’d taken away before I knew he could do that. Could I actually trust him at all?
What if he took everything from me again? Could I survive that? What if he kept me in that nothingness forever? I had no idea how strong his powers were, or what limitations he had.
It seemed the more I learned, the less I knew.
The noises of everyone packing up had my attention snapping back to the front—to where the TAs were walking down the aisles, passing out stacks of papers.Holy shit.I swallowed through the sudden lump in my throat, feeling my cheeks flush hot. Somehow I’d completely forgot we had a test today. We were allowed to use a one-page reference sheet, but I hadn’t even created one. Too preoccupied with other nightmares.
With my heart beating too fast and heat crawling up my throat, I put all my materials away, trying to breathe as my test was passed down the line to me. It was face-down when it reached me, so I waited for the professor to tell us to begin before flipping it up.
Upon reading the first question, I wanted to break down in tears and leave the classroom entirely.
Panic wrapped around my ribs and my palms started to sweat. It was like my brain had completely stopped working. I didn’t remember a thing from this class. I had no clue how to even start the first question. I reread it again and again, desperately searching my brain for any thread of knowledge, something to refresh my memory, but everything was blurry, formless.
Skipping to the second question, and then the third, I found the same issue. I didn’t know how to do any of this.
The sound of pencils scratching on paper had me looking around the room, staring at everyone with their heads bent and pencils scribbling down answers.Everyone is writing except me. Am I the only one unprepared?
Warmth pulsed in my face, sheer embarrassment and regret churning in my stomach as I turned my head down. I should’ve studied. How did this entirely slip my mind?
The pencil noises around me magnified to an unbearable volume in my head; too fast, too confident. My pencil hovered over the page, shook, tapped once, then froze again. I considered getting up and just walking out; it wouldn’t make a difference in my grade, anyway. But the thought of everyone’s eyes following my abrupt departure kept me glued to my seat.
I gritted my teeth and started writing, then got rid of it all one second later, digging my eraser so hard into the page it wrinkled.I’m already failing. Why am I here?
My eyes flicked to the clock. There wasn’t much time left, but the words and numbers on my quiz still meant nothing to me.
I forced myself to scribble down some bullshit, just so the quiz wasn’t blank when I turned it in. There was a pit in my stomach as I realized how much this was probably going to affect my grade.
By the time I turned my exam in, I was barely holding myself together, anxiety crushing me from every direction. I ignored all of it, shoving my earbuds in my ears with shaky fingers.I’ll deal with it later.
?????
Mason’s text made me phone buzz on my pillow, but I didn’t have to unlock it and read the message to know what he’d said.Faintly, I’d seen his headlights through the front blinds a second ago.
I tumbled out of my unmade bed, padding across the carpet, past the giant pile of dirty laundry spilling off my chair, then went to my front door. I opened it, flipped Mason off from behind the screen door, then went to pack a bag.
He came inside a moment later, surveying all the half-empty water bottles and cups littering my nightstand, my unwashed jeans strewn across the floor. I grabbed random shit from around my bedroom, stuffing it all into my tote bag, then went to the bathroom. My mascara was almost completely rubbed off, and darkness lined my lower lids. I snatched a makeup wipe from the package, scrubbing the rest off before pushing past Mason back into my bedroom.
“Why are you inside?” I huffed.
“To make sure you’re doing what I want,” he answered. “And I’ll carry your bags.” He motioned to my bulging tote bag and school backpack, which I was dragging across the floor. The panic of forgetting about the quiz today was weighing on me, making me even more stressed about my grades.
“I have homework,” I informed Mason, then dropped everything at his feet.
“Got it.”
Without further instruction, I got my shoes on and headed outside, bypassing all the unopened mail piling up on my laminate countertop. Mason carried my bags to his car idling next to the steps while I locked the front door, then he tugged me around to the passenger side and opened my door.
I tried to ask him questions on the drive to his apartment, but he refused to answer anything, so I just stared silently out the window. It was clear he didn’t like talking about his aspect, or about anything relating to him being an angel. My hopes of emotional intimacy had been misguided.
Inside his place, surrounded by black and the smell of the ocean, I felt miles away from the rest of the world. Time stopped here, the same way it did underwater. Mason led me into his bedroom.
“Do you smell like the ocean because you’re an angel?” I questioned, my eyes roaming his tall frame.
“Yes,” he answered me, shocking me with his candidness. “You shouldn’t be able to smell it as a human, but somehow you fucking can.” He dragged a hand through his hair, muttering something else I couldn’t make out under his breath. “Kapnos. Supposed to make female angels aroused.”
“And it gets stronger when you’re turned on,” I inferred.
“Yeah.”
