I am seriously at my wit’s end. Something has got to give, soon, or I think my head will explode. I turn the corner and catch sight of Ketchup closing his locker door. A burst of pain shoots through me when he slams the door and walks away.
My already dragging feet seem impossible to move as I make my way down the hallway to English class. The bell rings a good minute before I get there, but I keep trudging. By the time I reach the door and pull it open, Mr. Littleton is already at the front of the classroom, getting ready to say something. He glances over at me and freezes.
“Van, are you feeling okay?”
I open my lips to answer, but I can’t say anything, because if I do, I know I’ll start crying. I close my lips and shake my head slowly.
My. Littleton motions for me to stay put. Turning back to the class, he hands a stack of worksheets to the nearest student. “After grading your last writing assignment, it’s clear you all need to brush up on your parts of speech and the definition of a run-on sentence. Get to work. I’ll be back in just a moment.”
Having said that, Mr. Littleton turns back to me and all but pushes me out the door and into the hallway. A strange sense of vertigo hits me, and I stumble over my own feet a little. Luckily, Mr. Littleton has a good hold on my arm and keeps me from toppling over. I try to steady myself, but the mild tightness of my teacher’s grip is suddenly all I can focus on. He isn’t squeezing tight enough to hurt me, but just the mild tightness, the hint of the possibility of pain, seizes my attention in a stranglehold.
“Vanessa,” Mr. Littleton almost shouts, “I asked if you’re okay.”
“What?” I manage to say through the fog.
His face crinkles in concern. “What’s going on? Are you feeling ill?”
Pressing a hand to my face, I try to gauge whether or not I’m getting sick. My forehead feels clammy, but not hot. “I… I don’t know. I just feel… weird.”
“Weird how?” he asks.
Only when I trip over my foot again do I realize that we’re walking. “Where are we going?”
“To the nurse.” He turns me around the corner. “What do you mean, you feel weird?”
We walk by a classroom, and I suddenly feel like I’ve been punched in the gut. The air in my lungs blasts out of me as I double over in agony. Mr. Littleton curses. My head spins as I try to figure out what just happened. I barely even realize that Mr. Littleton is now carrying me, running through the halls. I want to tell him I’m okay, but a blinding wave of nausea slams into me and I curl against his chest, sobbing.
Something bangs into my feet, and I hear Mr. Littleton yell, “Call an ambulance!”
“Is that Vanessa?” the nurse asks as she scrambles for the phone.
I don’t know if he answers her, because when Mr. Littleton tries to lie me down on a cot, the cloying, gagging taste of pain rolls over me, setting my entire body rigid with the desire to feed. I try to bite it back, but a scream rips out of me as my hunger erupts violently. Everything turns red as I struggle to get up. Tears pour down my face as I fight against whoever is holding me down.
“Get that kid out of here!” I hear a voice yell. It sounds familiar, but all I can think about is the pain. My arms flail as I try to get out from under the weight sprawled across me. I lash out, trying to push my way free, but someone grabs my hands and pins them above my head.
Something changes so suddenly that it makes me reel. I stop fighting and gasp in a ragged breath. “He’s gone,” the voice says again. “It’s okay. The sick kid is out of the room. Just breathe, Van. Just breathe. It’s okay.”
“Ketchup,” I wail, sobbing again as I realize it was his voice. The weight lifts off my middle as Ketchup reaches in and pulls me into his arms. I crave his touch more than I can say, but every inch of my skin feels like it’s on fire. The miniscule weight of my clothes feels like knives stabbing me. I can hardly bare it, but I huddle against Ketchup like a scared kitten as I cry.
“Shh, it’s okay, Van. David and your grandma are on their way.” He shifts, just slightly, but it sends a bolt of agony through my back, and I scream into his chest.
“Ketchup, I’m scared,” I cry. “It hurts so much.”
“I know you are, Van, I know,” he croons. “It’s going to be okay.”
The door crashes open, startling Ketchup, and making me cry out in pain as my hunger bursts through me in a flash of heat and agony. A hand reaches in and grabs at me. The pain is so great that it blurs my vision, and I blindly fight off whoever is trying to pull me out of Ketchup’s arms. The sting of a needle sinking into my arm feels like a blade straight to my heart. I scream as my hunger rages.
Without warning, my connection to my rampaging hunger grows fuzzy and strange. I can still feel it running amok through my body, lapping up every spec of imagined pain, questing out for more as it tears me apart. Agony continues to pulse through my entire body, as if I were swimming through an ocean of nails. I can still feel everything, but some part of me is trying to hide it away.
A strange feeling of fear wraps itself around me at the thought of losing my hunger, but I feel myself slipping away too quickly to do anything about it. The only other lucid thought I can hold onto is Ketchup. My hands reach out blindly. “Ketchup,” I beg, “don’t leave me. Please, don’t leave.”
Someone has me in their arms, but it isn’t Ketchup. I feel him the second he crowds in close, like a burst of sun in an otherwise black and empty hole. “I’m not going anywhere,” he promises.
His lips touch gently against my cheek, and even though it feels like a hot brand on my skin, I whisper, “Thank you,” before losing myself to the blackness.
***
Blinking hurts. I can’t figure out why at first. My finger twitches, sending a spasm of pain through my hand. My foggy brain struggles to comprehend why it can’t get my arm to move properly. It’s stuck. Panic starts building in my chest as I try to open my eyes and move my body. My breathing escalates as I start to yank and pull against my restraints.
“Van, calm down,” a soothing voice demands.
My eyes snap open painfully as I recognize the speaker. “Chris?” I ask when I can finally see semi-clearly. “What are you doing here?” My eyes scan the room filled with medical equipment. “Where am I?”
“You’re in the hospital,” Chris says. He grimaces. “Not the ideal place to deal with your erupting hunger, but your school called an ambulance before David got to you and there was no way they were going to let him take you home after what they witnessed. I think your teacher honestly thought you were dying. Luckily, though, all of your teachers had been made aware that something like this might happen, and he got you to a safe place.”
“Where’s Ketchup?” I demand.
“He’s at your house. You won’t be allowed to see anyone until we get through this initial chaotic phase,” Chris explains.
I close my eyes again, because keeping them open hurts too much. Thinking about Ketchup hurts almost as much. I force my thoughts away from him and onto what I can remember. Over the last few months, I’ve had a love-hate relationship with Mr. Littleton over pairing me with Noah. I sigh as I realize I’ll have to abandon the hate part. Tears well behind my closed eyelids as I consider what might have happened if he had ordered me to my seat like some of my other teachers would have, instead of taking the time to make sure I was okay.
“To answer your other question,” Chris says, “I’m here to help you deal with your new hunger. Those isolation training exercises we did weren’t just for future roles in the Godling ranks. They’re going to keep you from tearing yourself or anyone else apart over the next few months.”
“Months?” I whine. “I’m going to be like this for months?”
Chris chuckles. “It’ll get better as time goes by, but it’s going to take time. You saw what your brothers went through, so that shouldn’t be a big surprise.”
I scowl, knowing he’s right. Somehow, I just thought it would be easier, faster for me,
just because I wanted it to be.
“It’s not so bad right now.” I say. “Why? In a hospital, I would think I’d be going nuts. There’s got to be tons of pain hanging around here.”
The clear displeasure over my location settles on Chris’s face again. “For one, you’re pretty heavily sedated right now, not only with painkillers to dull your pain, but with a unique cocktail the Godlings have developed over the centuries to keep your hunger under control. Not to mention, David had you moved to a quarantine room in order to keep you as far away from the other patients as possible.”
“So, if you can manage my new hunger with drugs while I’m in here, why can’t you do that until it quiets down?” I demand.
Could they have helped both my brothers deal with their hunger and kept them from losing control? They knew about us long before Oscar lost it. They could have helped, and I know my parents would have agreed to it if it meant keeping their children safe.
No doubt Chris can feel my hunger rising as my anger stirs it up. He looks at me sternly as he carefully unbuckles one of the restraints on my wrist. “Try to pick up your hand,” he orders.
I scowl at him, but do as he says. Or, I try to, anyway. Not only does the pain of moving make me want to vomit and agitate my hunger, I can’t lift any part of my hand more than a centimeter.
“Unless you want to experience the life of a paraplegic for the next few months, I suggest you listen to me and learn how to deal with your hunger on your own. Without the drugs,” Chris says.
Still scowling, I say, “Fine.”
Satisfied, Chris sits back in his chair. “Now, I’m sure you have other questions.”
“Why does this hurt so much?” I ask. “I don’t remember Zander or Oscar feeling like their skin was on fire.”
“You know it’s different for everyone,” Chris says, “but this is a new one even for me. When I first got here and realized they were giving you pain meds, I didn’t understand why. You seemed to have the expected reaction of being hypersensitive to everyone around you. You had a close call when your teacher took you to the nurse’s office, and there was already a sick student in the room.”
“Ketchup made them get that kid away from me,” I say quietly.
“He probably saved his life,” Chris says. “Aside from that, though, your hypersensitivity seems to extend to your own body. If anyone touched you, you started screaming. I talked to both of your brothers, and neither one of them experienced anything similar.”
“You talked to Oscar?” I ask, surprised Oscar would even allow it.
Chris shifts in his seat. “Yes, your friend Ketchup took me.”
“Ketchup, why Ketchup?”
Again, Chris seems uncomfortable with the conversation. “It was the only way Oscar would agree to see me. David tried to take me himself, but Oscar refused.”
“And David backed down?”
“Uh, yes.” Chris scratches his arm nervously.
“Why?” I demand.
Shaking his head, Chris says, “I have no idea. It’s beside the point. All I’m concerned with is helping you get through your hunger erupting safely.”
“How do you plan to do that?” I ask.
For some reason, Chris grins. “You remember the black room, don’t you?” When I groan, he laughs. “Yes, I thought you did. I know it wasn’t your favorite, but it’s about to become your best friend.”
Chapter Twenty-Four: Body, Heart, and Soul
(Vanessa)
I watch nervously as the nurse’s fingers extract the needle from my arm. Chris is holding my other hand, and I squeeze as the combination of my overly sensitive body and raw hunger bash around inside of me.
“Are you sure this is safe?” I gasp. The nurse glances over at me, looking rather offended. I’m too anxious to explain I wasn’t talking about her.
“It’s going to be fine,” Chris reassures.
The nurse presses a sticky bandage over the tiny hole in my arm. My fingernails dig into Chris’s skin. After cleaning up the pieces of the IV, she tells me I can go ahead and get dressed. I release his hand slowly. I feel like a huge baby having to hold his hand just to get through having an IV removed from my arm. Dealing with my chaotic hunger has gotten a little easier over the last week, but I’m nowhere near the point that I can handle it on my own.
Moving like a ninety-year-old woman, I slowly slide my legs over the side of the hospital bed. It’s amazing how much I have come to cherish being able to do things on my own. They’re so far and few between these days that I can count them on one hand. Unfortunately, getting down to the floor without help isn’t one of them. Chris steps forward calmly and gently lifts me to the floor. I have to bite my lip to keep from crying out at the pain simply putting my feet down causes, but I manage to hold it back.
“Now for the embarrassing part,” I grumble.
Chris shakes his head at me. “You think you’d be used to it by now. I won’t look. You’re a little young for me, and I’m married, remember?”
“Still, not being able to dress myself is mortifying!”
“Yeah, yeah. Let’s get a move on, or you’ll never get home to see everyone.”
As much as I hate having to rely on Chris to help me get dressed—and yes, I know he isn’t interested in peeking at me—I am so grateful for him. He’s been the only one allowed to see me while I’ve been here. Not even Grandma or Zander were allowed in. Certainly not David. Given my unstable state, I may have tried to tear his throat out. I would have blamed it on my new hunger, but it wouldn’t have been completely true.
The worst has been not being able to see Ketchup. He came to my rescue when he saw Mr. Littleton running down the hall with me in his arms, and he promised he wouldn’t leave me, but I have no idea how things stand between us right now. I’m terrified to find out, but I don’t think I can take one more day being stuck in here.
As Chris helps me struggle into clean clothes without setting off my hunger, I say, “You know I’m forever in your debt for keeping me alive and sane this last week, but I’m kinda tired of looking at you.”
“Ditto,” he says with a laugh.
“At least you get to talk to your family every night,” I grouch. “I didn’t even get to do that.”
Chris ignores my whining as he guides me into the wheelchair. I try to sit down carefully, but I’m still blinking back tears when I’m finally seated. I work on composing myself as Chris gathers up my meager belongings. A few minutes later, we are heading for the elevator. Whatever usual checkout process there is, Chris has somehow circumvented it. He’s done his best to limit my contact with any of the hospital staff.
Not to mention patients.
I feel like a criminal as he wheels me through empty halls to a freight elevator. Somehow we make it out to Chris’s car without me having either a meltdown from pain or an attack of my hunger. Getting me loaded into his SUV isn’t nearly as easy. Chris is as careful as he can possibly be, but I’m still crying by the time he buckles my seatbelt.
“It’s okay,” he says softly. “Just remember, it’s getting better.”
“It’s getting better,” I mumble through my sniffles.
He walks around to the driver’s side and climbs in. Normally, a guy setting a syringe filled with clear liquid in one of the cup holders before starting the engine would make me concerned. I breathe out a sigh of relief at the sight of it. I’m going to do my best to suffer through the trip home and practice putting to use all the training Chris has been having me do this past week, but if I can’t, we have a backup plan.
“Ready?” Chris asks.
I nod, mentally, if not physically prepared.
We make it out of the parking lot before things start getting difficult. My hands grip the armrests tightly, matching the set of my jaw. Chris doesn’t say anything. He knows I’ll tell him if it becomes too much. He pulls onto the main road, and I send my mind back to the black room—well, it turned out to be the black tube known as a deprivati
on chamber at the hospital. Shutting each of my senses down, I focus on clearing my mind completely and disassociating myself from my hunger and the pain racing through me. It is the longest twenty minutes of my life.
By the time we pull into my driveway, my breathing is so labored I sound like a freight train, and I fear I have permanently damaged Chris’s seats. He doesn’t say a word, though. What he does do is give me a few minutes to calm down and compose myself. When he sees I’m ready, he gets out and comes over to my door.
“Do you want to try walking?” he asks.
We’re only a few steps from the porch, but I shake my head. I hate admitting to such weakness, but I know there’s no way I can handle moving that far on my own. Chris nods and gently scoops me into his arms. I can feel blood in my mouth as I bite down to fight against the pain and hunger, but after the initial transition, Chris gets me into the house and sets me down on the couch with as little discomfort as possible.
It takes me a moment to notice how quiet the house is. “Where is everyone?”
“They’re here,” he says, “but I asked them not to rush you. I wanted to make sure you were settled before we started pushing your limits. Normally, we would keep a newbie like yourself in seclusion for quite a bit longer, but this situation called for a readjustment.”
“I’m okay. I’d like to see everyone.”
Chris takes a deep breath. “Let’s start with one at a time, okay?”
He walks into the kitchen and comes back with my grandma. She walks slowly, no doubt hesitant. It’s not just that she’s been through this twice before with less-than-happy memories to show for it. Things have been tense between us since David showed up and we realized how much she had lied to us about everything.
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