by Eden O'Neill
Shit.
I had said that, and when we both realized the bullshit we gave each other, trying to play the other, we both had a laugh at our own expenses. Ramses shrugged broad shoulders. “We skip all the time. I’d rather be making money than going to sleep in class. We go to an academy over in Crestfire Hills.”
Aware of the city a town over, I nodded, and Ramses’ more burly friend, the one the size of a mini monster truck, threw a fist into Ramses’ shoulder.
“He skips to work. We skip for froyo!” Backing up, the mini-monster-truck friend bumped chests with the literal monster-truck-sized friend to Ramses’ right, the two completely bros and the opposite of Ramses. Dare I say, I thought he was a little bit of a nerd, but seeing him with his friends, I might have been wrong with the assumption.
Ramses knocked the two on their heads for being idiots, making me genuinely laugh in what felt like had been a while. A good belly laugh I think I needed, but all that stopped at least for Ramses when his friend directed a froyo cup my way and asked a question.
“You should hang out with us,” the mini-monster-truck friend said, puffing up. “We’re going to a college party—”
“I’m sure she’s busy.” Ramses cut that off quick, so quick my head nearly spun. He faced me. “You’re busy, right? Tell them you’re busy.”
I wasn’t, and I really didn’t like he thought he could speak for me. Actually, him not wanting me to go out with him and his friends made me want to hang out with them more. Call that me being cheeky.
I smiled. “I’m totally free actually,” I said, genuinely happy for the invite. It’d be nice to do something besides basically stalk my ex all day. I started to go with the guys, but Ramses held me back a little.
He gazed over my shoulder. “You forgot your bag,” he said, lowering his hand and calling attention to my stuff. “Wouldn’t want to forgot that.”
I didn’t know what he meant by that, but I held back and grabbed it. I was sure knowing Ramses I’d find out. He was always one to speak his mind after all, at least when it came to me.
Thirteen
December
The guys de-academied themselves in Ramses’ Mercedes Benz, removing jackets and pushing up shirt sleeves to “blend in” once we got to the party. Crestfire Hills turned out to be more than an hour away, and since I had worked with Ramses, I trusted these guys not to murder me—for the most part. Ramses was definitely aware of me in the passenger seat, but I think mostly because of his friends. They were complete jocks. Seriously, the way they talked about sports, video games, and girls… needless to say, I heard it all and laughed through most of it. Being with them all reminded me of better and normal times, though I hated to admit that. The car trip reminded me of homecoming night, the moments before things got shitty and my life had been kinda all right. In actuality, the strange comfort of the feeling triggered something that had me putting distance between them and myself the moment we did get to the party. It was in some kind of frat house on campus, the “welcome” sign making the event out to be some kind of open house. Bodies mingled and drank, drank and mingled like a typical college social gathering. I attempted to move away from the party I arrived with in the influx of it, but I noticed Ramses stayed close. He looked out for me, even going first so I could walk and stuff through the crowd, and I didn’t know if it was because he felt he had to (maybe since he took his sole, female coworker more than an hour away), but whatever compelled the boy in half an academy uniform to take care of me tonight. He actually looked kind of in his element here, his tie and academy jacket gone and his dress shirt untucked. He left all that and who he was in the car, standing before me kinda thicc with the surprising amount of muscular definition he usually kept stashed away behind chunky sweaters of various designs. He definitely wasn’t a nerd. At least a weak one. He looked at me. “So this is a college party.”
Laughing, I nodded. “Apparently.”
His eyes smiled more than his mouth, but not in a bad way. He’d never been one to be flagrant about being happy. I could tell he wanted to sometimes, but was obviously very cautious about me and what to make of me. At least, that’s what I assumed. Again, I’d given him a reason to be hesitant about me so I didn’t blame him for all that. Through the party people, we made our way to the kitchen, and when Ramses grabbed some red Solo cups off the platter of many for us, I eyed it. “You really trust that?”
Obviously thinking better of it, he cringed before tossing them both and filling us fresh cups from a nearby keg. He gave me one, and by the time he filled another, I’d already drunk mine. I handed him back the cup, awesome at drinking. I shook for another, and his eyes bugged the hell out.
“Whoa there, tiger. Save some for the fishes,” he said, though he poured me mine. He handed it to me.
“Fishes don’t drink,” I told him, getting a big ole gulp. I waved it for him to top me off, and raising his thick, dark eyebrows, he did.
“True. Though you should probably take it a little easy,” he said.
He wasn’t in charge of me, but since I’d gotten myself into trouble the last time I heavily drank, I didn’t fill my cup any more after taking another sip. I gestured toward his cup. “You just going to nurse that or let me make a fool of you?”
His pride clearly at stake, Ramses lifted his cup but made a point to shake his head first before taking a swallow. Joining him, we did so together, but I didn’t guzzle down what I had this time. We ended up taking our drinks as we walked through the house and came across one of his friends, the mini-monster-truck-sized one who looked a little like Chris Pratt if I squinted. I mean, I had to squint really hard but I could see it. Anyway, the dude was totally under another keg, sucking down booze while a couple of shirtless guys with spirit paint on their chests chanted him on.
Ramses tucked a hand under his armpit, shaking his head. “Can’t take him anywhere.”
“Obviously,” I said, smiling a little before taking a drink. I noticed Ramses’ more than familiar eye on me, and I lowered my arm. “What?”
His doe-colored eyes narrowed a little, his look curious when he tilted his head. “What’s your deal anyway?”
“Deal?”
“Yeah. You weren’t in school today.”
“You weren’t either.”
“I had a reason. School and all that’s basically bullshit for me. I get ahead super fast and really just spend the time sleeping. Senior year has especially been a joke. I’m ahead like three credits but I have to go to graduate.”
Jesus. He was smart, a nerd albeit an unconventional one.
I wished my reasons for skipping class had been the same as his, but because they weren’t I either had to lie again or come up with some fraction of the truth to give him.
“I was in school, but I’m not now,” I said, choosing the truth. I shrugged. “Don’t need it in the place I’m at in my life right now.”
“Which is?” he asked, then pointed toward my arm. “And what’s with the bag? You carrying your life in there or something?”
Damn, I knew I should have left this thing in the car.
It was instinctual not to, someone could take it from me. All I had. I adjusted it. “I’m not in school because I don’t want to be. Happy?”
“Not really,” he confessed, taking another sip of booze. “Just more curious.”
I had my own curiosity when it came to him. I pointed at him now. “What about you?”
“What about me?”
“It’s one thing for you to leave a town… that one you said you came from because of college, but it’s entirely another to just up and leave in high school—which you obviously were in.” I tried to sound passive about it, shrugging. “What really happened there? Why did you leave?”
I wondered if he’d actually tell me. I wondered if I overstepped and that may direct more questions at me, which I didn’t need. Ramses’ frown wasn’t small, and when he threw an arm against the wall, he didn’t look at me.
“There was a clique there.”
My heart squeezed.
“Had a run-in with them,” he stated, deadpan. The drink he took had him sucking his teeth after. “Anyway, after I voiced my opinions about it, my dad gratefully shipped me off to boarding school so he wouldn’t have to deal with my objections about it. That worked out just fine with me. I flipped that place and that school the bird. Never looked back since.”
So his dad was into the Court and he wasn’t. That’s assuming we went to the same school…
What were the odds?
It all made sense, though. Ramses clearly had some kind of money and being able to be shipped off to boarding school in the first place made that pretty much a given. We came from the same place, had similar “run-ins,” and his dad got rid of him.
I chewed my lip. “My dad can be kind of a jerk too.”
His gaze slid over, his arm dropping from the wall. “He’s okay with you just not being in school?”
“Hardly.” I laughed, staring off. “He basically disowned me.”
“So you’re on your own?”
My eyes flashed, this guy way too intuitive.
He smiled a little. “Just a theory.”
Well, he’d be too right and enough for me not to want to continue this conversation.
“Maybe where I was in life happens to be just as shit as where you were in yours,” I gave him, the two of us more in sync than he could possibly imagine. I mean, we were literally from the same town, those odds truly astronomical, but they happened.
He stared down at me. “I hope you’re wrong about that.”
“Why?”
“Because no one deserves that.” A lengthy finger tapped his cup before he smiled a little. “Not even a dirty little thief like yourself.”
My jaw dropped, the guy completely busting out in laughter. I smacked his arm. “What the fuck?”
“Relax. I know you didn’t steal anything from Myron or the library,” he said, easing away when I tried to hit him again. “I’ve been watching you.”
My lips closed, but before I could say anything about that, the pair of us noticed a shuffle up front. It all surrounded two officers, two police officers, making their way through the crowd, and when they started questioning people, Ramses took my drink from me.
He put his and mine on an end table. “That’s our cue. Come on. We need to find the guys. Wouldn’t want to add to that rap sheet of yours.”
His comment was only left on the floor due to the strict fear I didn’t want to get arrested for underage drinking tonight. Ramses obviously felt the same because he had us bolting in quick time amongst more than a few people flooding out the house with us. We weren’t the only ones probably drinking when we shouldn’t be. Ramses and I sprinted outside, but we didn’t see his friends. We ended up down the street and in his car by ourselves, but after a couple quick texts, Ramses started his car.
“The guys are headed to another party with some others,” he said, turning in his leather seats. “Want to go?”
With it getting even later, I probably shouldn’t. Heading back was quite a drive, and I didn’t want to be put out of the shelter again tonight by getting back too late. I was also kind of buzzed and probably shouldn’t be drinking any more anyway. I asked Ramses if he could take me home, and after confirming with his friends they’d take ride shares back, he said he would. He asked for my address and the one I made up before was on my lips before I could think better of it.
I hoped to God no one actually lives there.
That was my only thought as Ramses drove me more than an hour it took to get back to town. It was dark then, deeply dark, and my anxiety only skyrocketed the closer he got to my made-up address. We ended up pulling into a cul-de-sac that barely had streetlamps working, Google Maps definitely accurate. The neighborhood looked completely abandoned and the house Ramses pulled us to a stop in front of the same. There were boards on the windows and everything, no lights on and the gate at the front broken.
“Are you sure this is the right place?” he asked, leaning over the steering wheel. He sat back. “The whole neighborhood looks kinda… sketchy.”
Probably because it was, but I said nothing. I started to go, but stopped when he unbuckled himself. “What are you doing?”
He stopped too. “Was going to walk you up? Seriously, this place looks rough. I mean, I don’t mean to insult where you live—”
“Then don’t,” I shot, making his eyes widen. I was just tired of his fucking chivalry and shit, his meddling. I opened the door. “I’m fine.”
“December…”
His hand on my arm, I ripped it away.
He put his up. “I just don’t think this feels right.”
“I told you. I’m fine—”
“You don’t live here,” he rushed, immediately making my lips clamp tight. He wrestled with curls. “At least I don’t think you do. It seems like you don’t. Like you don’t live anywhere really.”
I said nothing, my heart racing, and he lowered his hand.
“You carry a shit-ton of stuff with you everywhere.” He tossed a hand to the bag at my feet, sighing. “Then there’s that conversation you were having in the bathroom…”
“You were spying on me?” Heated now, livid. “That was private.”
“I know. I know and I’m sorry, but I’m concerned. You’re obviously on your own and Myron… Myron caught you sleeping at the library the other day.”
My body shook, my lips quivering open. “I left. I didn’t stay.”
“No. Yes. I know, but that’s not the point—”
“The point, Ramses, is that you need to mind your own goddamn business and stay the hell out of mine.”
“December.”
Getting my bag, I opened the door, basically shutting it in his face. I pointed at him through glass. “Go. Go and get the fuck out of here. I don’t need you or your help.”
I pushed off the door and when he started to follow me down the street with his car I turned, flipping him off.
He stopped then, his hands on the wheel. He didn’t move, just… stared at me, judging me like he did that first day. “I want to help,” he mouthed through the windshield, but I didn’t want his help.
I pointed again. “Then go.”
He sat there with that, stark still, but eventually, he raised his hands. He put the car in gear with what appeared to be a sigh, pulling off from the side of the road and making a U-turn. His sleek Mercedes cruised down the street, and I closed my eyes.
Could you be nastier to him?
Knowing that he had just wanted to help, I put palms to my forehead and walked away. I had no idea how at all I’d deal with that at work or even if I had a job anymore.
Myron knows I slept there…
I kept messing up, doing stupid things, and I fought tears, trying to figure out how the fuck I was going to get to the shelter from wherever I was at. Pulling out my cell phone, I decided to figure that latter part out, and my heart sank to the depths even more. I was far enough away that I wouldn’t be able to walk there before the shelter’s doors closed for the night. They had a strict “no-entrance” policy after a certain hour, and I definitely wasn’t going to make it.
Stopping in the middle of the sidewalk, I decided to pony up the money for a ride share, thinking it’d be worth it when I started walking down the street.
Especially when a car came out of nowhere.
It went slow down the street, the lights off and in my periphery. Rather than stare at it and the driver, I cut through the alley, probably not the best idea, but when I pushed into the shadows the car kept driving on, a dark SUV.
You’re frickin’ paranoid, girl.
And a little buzzed. Not to mention emotional. My head woozy, I decided to continue down the alley to the other street, almost crashing into someone the moment I found sidewalk.
The man’s eyes widened, a couple men drinking beneath a streetlamp, but the one to the right I recognized.
He recognized me too, coming forward with a bottle poking out of a brown bag, and the moment he realized where from, he pointed at me. “You’re the bitch who stole from my store.”
Fuck.
I backed up, then ran the moment he grabbed for me. He missed.
His friend hadn’t.
He grabbed me, strong-arming me as I heard something horrible fall from the shop guy’s lips.
“Hold her down,” he said, throwing his beer bottle to the street. It crashed into a million tiny pieces under the streetlight, the shop guy messing with his pants. “We’ll show her not to steal from me.”
I screamed, my voice stifled when a hand came over my mouth. Shop guy did that while he messed with his pants, trying to get his junk out, but a car screeching to a stop not only made him hesitate but run when a force the size of a young gorilla came charging out of the car like a beast out of a cave. That force grabbed the shop guy, throwing him down, and the beast sent a blow into his face.
The blows didn’t stop. They came hit after charging hit, as this huge guy literally pummeled the shop dude’s face in. His hand came away bloody, the guy looking back at me and shouting for me to get into his car.
I got a good look at his face then, his voice chilling and dragging me right back into my past. Knight Reed was beating a dude’s face in.
Knight Reed was killing a guy for me.
Fourteen
December
“Knight… stop!” I physically had to pull him off the guy, no easy feat with his size and strength. In the end, I think he submitted only because he didn’t want to swing back and accidentally hit me, my tiny hands on his arm as I dragged him away. He caught a look at the shop guy’s friend on the way and when he went for him next I had to pull harder.
The friend ran like the chickenshit he was, the guy not knowing how close to death he was if I let go of this boy.
What the hell?
“Knight, what are you doing here—”
“Get in the damn car, December,” he grunted, physically tossing another man’s blood into the street when he flicked his hand. His next venture apparently consisted of getting my bag because he spun, picking it, then grabbed me by the arm on the way back. He opened the SUV’s door, tossed the bag in the back, and after forcing my stunned body inside, got into the car himself.