Level Up: Violent Circle: Book Five

by Shade, S. M.

  Trey especially, with that damn tongue of his.

  No, not the thought I need right now. As a matter of fact, I need to avoid any and all thoughts of Trey’s wonderful appendages while I’m staying here.

  The clank of metal on metal with the occasional grunt thrown in spills into the hallway from the weight room, just before a heavy metal song blares to life. I guess I know what they’re doing. Glad I have noise cancelling headphones.

  My stomach growls, and I head to the kitchen. After rummaging through the fridge and cabinets, I decide to make everyone dinner as a thank you for letting me stay. A new album by one of my favorite artists has just released. Cranking up the music, I get to work.

  By the time the pot of chili is bubbling on the stove, I’m in my own little world, just humming along to the music and waiting on the cornbread to bake, when I look up at three grinning faces.

  My headphones get jerked out just in time for me to hear Denton. “Oh my god. I’ve never seen Sasha all happy and not insulting someone. I’m a little disturbed.”

  “I had to block out that dying cat screech you call music.” I’m not really embarrassed. It takes a lot to embarrass me. It’s a gift.

  “That’s more like it,” he says, leaning against the counter.

  Trey takes the lid off the pot and dips a spoon in. “Hey! Get out of that!” I chastise.

  Becca rolls her eyes as he makes a weird hash hash sound trying to cool off the food he’s stupidly shoved into his mouth. “That’s what you get,” I laugh. “Turn the burner off. The cornbread is almost done too.”

  Becca pulls bowls and silverware out of the cabinet, and everyone fills up their bowl, grabs a drink, and heads for the living room. A few minutes of good natured arguing ensues over what’s on T.V. but they finally settle on a sitcom.

  “This is good,” Trey says between bites. “You should make me dinner every night.”

  “I didn’t make you dinner. I made everyone dinner. Because I appreciate being able to crash here.”

  “Stay as long as you want,” Denton says, shoveling it in.

  The evening is relaxed and fun. After the last few days of broken sleep, I’m exhausted, and end up excusing myself early to go to bed. The bed isn’t bad, the mattress is better than mine, that’s for sure. It only takes me a few minutes to fall asleep.

  A strange noise wakes me, and I roll over to check my phone in the pitch dark room. Four a.m. Did I hear something or was it part of my dream? Maybe it’s just because I’m sleeping in an unfamiliar place.

  My heart leaps in my chest as I hear it again. It’s a weird, rustling sound. Like someone rifling through a stack of papers. I’m aware there are three other people in this apartment, but it sounds like it’s coming from the corner of the room.

  My mind goes to the terrifying possibilities. A rat? Could a rat make that much noise? Serial killer? Yeah, Sasha, a serial killer is just shuffling around the room. Fuck, that thought should be ridiculous, but once it’s in my head, all I can picture is some ax wielding maniac wandering around the room, dragging his feet, searching for a victim.

  The flashlight on my phone has never seemed so deficient when I turn it on. Dread fills me at the thought of what I might see, but I turn it to face away from me, and breathe a sigh of relief when the room comes into view without revealing the axman.

  Until the rustling sound fills the room again and I realize it’s coming from the closet. Of course it is. Isn’t that how it always goes? The disemboweling slasher hides in the closet and the stupid girl goes to see what the noise is and ends up dead or chained in a dungeon.

  The sound of a toilet flushing down the hall nearly makes me wet myself until I realize that means someone else is awake. As quietly as possible, I creep across the room and open the door, stepping into the hall.

  Moonlight floods through the windows and the hallway brightens even more as the kitchen light flips on. Turning off my phone light, I step into the kitchen where Trey stands at the sink, his back to me, chugging a glass of water.

  My words suddenly fail me because what am I supposed to say? I heard a scary noise, check my closet? Seriously? I don’t get a chance to say anything before Trey turns and lets out a noise I can only describe as a cross between a squawk and shout.

  He chokes on the water, coughing the last of it into the sink before regarding me. “Fuck’s sake! Are you trying to kill me creeping up like that?”

  “Sorry! I…”

  His concern changes with my hesitation. “Are you okay? You sick or something?”

  “No…there’s something in my closet.”

  “What?”

  “I can hear something in my closet, and if it’s a serial killer, I don’t want to open it alone.”

  He studies me for a moment before breaking into laughter.

  Damn it.

  “Fine. You’re going to be sorry when I’m splattered across the room,” I announce, turning to leave. I’ll open the damn door.

  “Wait.” He follows me out. “Don’t get splattered alone. Becca would never forgive me.”

  A stray chuckle still escapes him as we step into my room and throw the light switch. We approach the closet, and my mouth goes dry. “Hang on and listen. You’ll hear it.”

  Doubt is etched on his face, and he’s clearly humoring me when he asks, “What does it sound like?”

  “I don’t know. Like a rustling sound.”

  His lips tilt up. “Like a mummy dragging its wrappings?”

  “Fuck off.”

  “Just let me show you there’s no monster in the closet so we can go back to bed.”

  “I know there’s no monster, you asshole! Serial killers are real!”

  “And you think he’d just stand in there listening to us have this conversation?”

  Sighing, I step back. He’s got a point. I feel stupid. But I heard something before. Of course, it won’t do it again with him standing there.

  He grabs the handle, opens the door, and…nothing. Well, not nothing. A few boxes sit on the floor, and empty hangers rest on the clothes rod. Turning back to me, he raises his eyebrow.

  “I swear I heard it. I wasn’t imagining things!”

  “It was probably a mouse or something.” He gives the closet a last look before closing it. A grin leaps to his face. “You can sleep in my bed.”

  Tempting, but I know damn well we won’t get any sleep if I do. And we managed to get away with it once without our friends finding out and making a big deal over it. There’s no way we’ll be able to pull that off again.

  I also know there’s no way I can fall back to sleep in here either, so I grab my pillow and march past him. “I’ll just get a couple more hours on the couch.”

  “The girl sleeping in the living room usually dies first in horror movies, you know,” he calls out, laughing as I give him the middle finger. Since I went to bed early, I only need a few more hours, and I’ve stayed on their couch before.

  I hear his door shut as I close my eyes.

  I’m never going to hear the end of this once everyone is awake.

  * * *

  All day at work my mind keeps drifting back to what I heard in that closet. Chances are it was a mouse, but I know I won’t sleep well there without knowing for sure. When I get there this evening, I’m going to search that closet from top to bottom. If it’s a mouse, there should be some sign. Mouse droppings, shredded paper, something. I’m not afraid of mice. If I see proof that’s the source of the sound, I’ll have no trouble sleeping through it.

  Becca has the day off, and she grins at me from the couch when I enter the apartment. “Tough day?”

  “Nah, a few walk-ins. Then I had two hours with Paul. You remember, the guy who is getting the full backpiece of Smurfette?”

  “Dude, seriously?” Denton laughs, taking a seat beside her. “Smurfette?”

  Trey snorts from the recliner. “Says the guy with an inch of ink.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry, did I insult your cartoon c
rush?”

  Trey blanches. “Having a blue cock is not a dream of mine, so no.”

  Denton looks at him like he’s crazy. “Why would fucking Smurfette turn your cock blue? You think the blue rubs off?”

  “The way I fuck, it would.”

  Becca holds up her hand. “Enough! God, isn’t it a little early for you two to be high?”

  Denton grins at Trey, and Trey mumbles, “Knock that little white hat right off.”

  Becca follows me out of the room, leaving their laughter behind us. I hear the front door open, then Noble’s voice joins in as I toss my bag on the guest room floor.

  She perches on the edge of the bed while I open the closet and shift one of the boxes out into the room.

  “What are you doing?”

  “A noise woke me up in the middle of the night. Trey said it’s probably a mouse—though I don’t think he believed me at all—so I’m checking to see if there are signs of mice.”

  “We haven’t seen any, but I wouldn’t be surprised with it getting so cold out. There are some traps under the sink if you want to be sure.”

  A shadow shifts, just catching the corner of my eye. By the time I look at it, a frantic flapping sound echoes around me and something brushes my ear as it passes by my head.

  I’m confident in the ability of my bladder. And my bowels, for that matter. Because if there was ever a time I was going to piss my pants or shit myself, that was it. “What the hell?” I shout, jumping back.

  Becca jumps to her feet and points to a dark lump in a back corner of the ceiling. “A bat! Oh my god! Did it bite you?”

  “No.” My heart is beating a hundred miles per hour, and the door pops open to reveal Trey, Denton, and Noble, all staring at us.

  “What are you screaming about?”

  “Shut the door!” we both yell in unison.

  Noble swings the bedroom door shut, and Becca points to the corner. “There’s a bat in the house. It was in the closet.”

  Trey’s gaze meets mine the same time I exclaim. “I told you there was something in there!” The last three words are punctuated by my palm slapping his chest.

  “Okay,” he laughs, grabbing my wrist. “I’m sorry I didn’t believe you.”

  We all stare at it, until Denton says, “So, uh…how do we catch it?”

  Becca grins at me and grabs my hand, pulling me toward the door. “We’ll just let you guys figure that out.”

  Trey waves his hand at us. “Go on. Let the men handle this.”

  “Don’t be volunteering me for this shit. I’ve already had rabies shots once after that damn raccoon attacked me,” Noble argues.

  Becca and I step out of the room, careful to shut the door behind us quickly. “How do you think they’ll catch it?” I ask.

  Grinning, she shakes her head. “I don’t know. Three stoned Frat Hell guys versus a tiny bat. It should be interesting.” Laughing, we return to the living room.

  There’s some murmuring coming from the bedroom and Trey comes out, grabs a broom and a pillowcase, and heads back inside.

  A loud bang is followed by laughter, and I look at Becca. Both of us jump up and head down the hallway, loitering right outside the door to listen. Their voices are a bit muffled and it’s hard to tell who is talking with the way they’re yelling over each other.

  “No! Don’t do that, it’ll just take off again!”

  “Great! You pissed it off!”

  “If I get bitten, I swear to fuck…”

  “Just poke it into the sack. Harder! Are you trying to catch it or seduce it?”

  “Trey, hold it higher. It’s not gonna…”

  A high pitched shriek fills the air, and it doesn’t come from the bat. Becca turns to me. “I have no idea which one of them is capable of making that noise.”

  Becca opens the door a tiny crack so we can hear better.

  “It got me!” Noble yells.

  And a few seconds later, Trey says, “It didn’t bite you.”

  “It…touched me!”

  “Stop being a pussy.”

  “Says the guy who just about broke my eardrums screaming like a bitch!”

  “Stupid sky rat,” Denton adds.

  Becca and I nearly burst trying not to laugh aloud. Grabbing my phone, I do a quick Google search to find the best way to get a bat out of the house. As the banging, cursing, and screaming continues, I slip through the door, closing it behind me. The guys don’t pay any attention when I head over to the window and open it wide. It’s clearly the way it got in the first time and according to multiple sources online, it’s likely to fly right back out if given the chance, especially because it’s dusk. The room just needs to be dark. I also learned that bats rarely carry rabies and they won’t just attack and bite you for no reason.

  “You’re scaring it. Just stand still and give it a minute!” I order.

  Noble takes the opportunity to inch toward the door, and the others hover around it. All of them are sweating, and Trey holds a pillowcase while Denton carries a broom. Three big college guys. All of whom scramble to get out the door as soon as I flick off the light switch, leaving the room illuminated by only the thin evening light. It’s hilarious because the door opens inward, and I swear, you’d think the room was on fire when they can’t get out of each other’s way enough to escape.

  Especially when the bat takes off and flies to the opposite corner before swooping through the open window.

  “Let the men handle this,” I mock in a deep tone of voice, closing the window. “My heroes.”

  Chapter Two

  Trey

  A glance at my clock makes me groan. Waking up minutes before my alarm goes off is infuriating. It’s not enough time to make going back to sleep worth it, but I still feel robbed of those all important last ten minutes.

  I can hear Becca and Denton talking in the kitchen and a chuckle rattles through me remembering our run in with the bat last night. My alarm blares, and I silence it, dragging myself out of bed. There’s no school today, but I have to work.

  Denton and Becca sit across from each other at the table, having lunch when I enter the kitchen. “Good morning,” Becca chirps. “There’s plenty of pizza if you want some.”

  “You mean good afternoon,” Denton scoffs.

  Grabbing a slice, I lean against the counter and shovel some in my mouth. “I need my beauty sleep.”

  “Then you need to hibernate.”

  Becca throws a wadded up napkin at him. “Ignore him. He’s just grouchy because he sent an embarrassing text to his new boss.”

  Denton’s mouth falls open and his face is pure betrayal. “Rebecca!”

  “What? I didn’t know it was a secret! You guys talk about everything! I had to hear about Noble’s gross twisted toenail last night.”

  “Ah, Qausimotoe. Yeah, it’s a mess,” I laugh, and Denton grins at me. “What was the text you sent?”

  Grumbling, he shakes his head. “What I meant to text was that I was looking for a PDF file, but autocorrect hates me.”

  I raise my eyebrows and wait for him to continue. When he doesn’t, Becca speaks up. “It autocorrected to pedophile.”

  A pepperoni nearly gets stuck in my throat. “You told your boss you were looking for a pedophile? Tell me you didn’t realize what you sent.”

  He glares at me. “Not until he texted me back that he didn’t think we had that close of a relationship yet.”

  Becca laughs with me. “At least it sounds like you have a cool boss.”

  “I’ll never live it down at work tomorrow, though.” He wipes his mouth and starts to clear the table of their paper plates, then shoves the pizza box into the fridge.

  Speaking of work, I’m running late.

  I’ve worked at Tasty Tacos for almost three years. I’ve heard about the horrors of fast food work, and a lot of it is true, but since I work in the kitchen, far away from irate customers screaming about missing sour cream or too much guacamole, it’s not bad.

  W
es, the guy I work with most of the time, is a lot like me. We don’t sweat the small stuff, just do our jobs and crack jokes all shift. When I tie on my black apron and join him at the prep table, he barely looks up.

  “Wes, are you stoned?” It’s a fair question. It wouldn’t be the first time he showed up high.

  “No, I’m good.”

  He’s clearly not. “Everything okay?”

  He glances up at me as he slides me a head of lettuce to chop. “Just had a fight with Natasha. I think I need to break up with her.”

  “Dude, I’m sorry. What happened?”

  “She’s getting way too jealous. Doing crazy shit. I woke up with her trying to open my phone while I was asleep by scanning my finger. I’ve never cheated on her, and she suddenly has it in her head I’m screwing around. It’s pissing me off.”

  “It’d piss me off too. You guys haven’t been together long, have you?”

  “Nah, a few months.” He scoops a bunch of chopped tomatoes into a container. “She’s just starting to show her crazy.”

  “You realize Natasha spelled backward is ah satan.”

  He pauses then cracks up laughing. “Holy hell, it is! I can’t wait to point that out.”

  His mood seems to pass after that, and we spend the next few hours joking and laughing as we slap together tacos and burritos.

  I won’t be working here much longer since graduation isn’t far away. When it came to picking a major, I had no idea what I wanted to do, but since I’ve always loved video games and computers, game design seemed like a solid choice. It turns out that it’s a cut throat business where most game developers end up working sixty plus hours a week. Screw that.

  I want to work enough to live, not live to work. I’m not really sure what I’ll do, but I’m not stressing it. I have a place to live and a way to support myself. I’m sure I’ll figure it out eventually. It seems a little unfair, that I’m supposed to know how I want to spend the rest of my life already.