Sacred

Barriers

The sun began to peek into the window at my weary form still balled up in fetal position. I let go of my head and my fingers came away sticky with dry blood. At least my mud colored hair covered the gauge marks my fingers left. Ella would be alarmed if she saw my wounds. I groaned and stretched my protesting body.

“Master Seether, I hope you are well. Your bus will be here in half an hour so you better come out here and eat this instant!” Ella pounded on the door and made her usual morning demands. I sighed, picking myself up off the floor and opened the door. I can never get her to stop calling me master. I don’t even know why she does. Unless she knows about the horde of cash I’ve secreted all over the house. Or something about me that I don’t even know...

“Eat! I thought you liked pancakes!” I looked up from moving my food around with my fork and sighed.

“I do Ella, but I don’t feel hungry.”

“Nonsense! You need your strength, especially since you didn’t get any sleep all night.” The tall no nonsense dark haired woman argued. I looked at her sharply. How did she know?

“I would know. You kept me up all night with your moaning and screaming.” She answered my thoughts automatically. I’m not implying that she can read my mind, because she can’t. I’m just saying she’s known me since I was ten when I hired her to take care of me and the house. That’s as far back as I can remember.

“Hurry up. I’ll not let you go stinking as you are.” She waved a hand at me, shooing me to take a shower when I had finished eating. I grabbed something random from my closet and locked myself in the bathroom. I moaned with pleasure at the feel of the warm water massaging my aching muscles. My head jerked up and I laughed when I realized I was nodding off. I turned the knob to ice cold and gasped at the sudden change in temperature. My hand knocked the white bottle of Lever 2000 off the shelf. I jumped out of the way to avoid smashing my toes. Yeah, I have sensitive skin, so I can’t use any of the cool colored gel stuff like Axe or I’ll probably break out or get hives.

“You got five minutes!” Ella yelled from somewhere in the house. Damn she’s got a loud voice! I quickly picked up the bottle and began lathering my body. When I slipped out of the shower I dragged a green towel over me and threw on my random choice of clothes. At least it all matched; black cargo jeans and a black and green striped tight sweater.

Ella was stalling the bus driver when I got outside, lugging my backpack onto my back and shaking my wet hair. I slumped in a seat towards the back of the bus and slid my back pack next to me so no one could sit with me. The bus drove on with a low lying babble of conversation and 95.7 the vibe playing softly from the white round speakers on the ceiling. It stopped again, down a couple of streets.

“Hey, mind if I sit here.” I looked up at the speaker and felt my mouth drop wide open. It was him from last night. Fai. I blushed, remembering the kisses. He grinned.

“I’ll take that as a yes.” He moved my bag and sunk down beside me, resting my back pack in his lap. “I like it.” I turned to him about to ask him “what”, but he reached out and fingered my dripping hair. Awkward. For me. He stared into my eyes and then looked away biting his kissable lips. I looked down at my hands palm up, resting on my thighs. I hadn’t expected to see him again. Now I was regretting ever kissing him. It was supposed to be a one time thing. This was going to be complicated over the top. What if I lost control of my thirst? I could end up killing him.

I couldn’t bring myself to take my bag back or even ask for it, so it stayed in his lap. I leaned my head against the rattling window and closed my eyes, hoping it would block any conversation. I was afraid of what I might say. Of what I might give away.

Something moved along my jaw line, making my skin tingle pleasantly. I yelped in surprise. My eyelids fluttered open to Fai tracing his nose along my neck. My heart pumped faster and my eyes shut tight. I suppressed the urge to moan.

“Mmm... What are you doing?” I whispered roughly.

“Waking you up. It’s payback for last night.” He murmured against my skin, making me shudder. I let my head fall back against the seat.

“You started it. Maybe I don’t even like you. Maybe I have a-”

“Regardless. If you didn’t like me, you’d stop me from doing this.” He pushed my backpack off his lap.

“Wh-” He leaned over, almost on top of me, grabbing my arms, and kissed me, but this time it was different. His longs slender fingers slid up my arm to stroke the sides of my face, urging me to open my mouth and grabbing my hair. I felt his tongue slip into my mouth, rolling against mine; branding his taste on my tongue.

Then I realized I was moving with him, against him, kissing him back and it felt so good. At first I thought it was his cologne, so intoxicating. An image of me curled up in a ball, shaking and moaning, flashed in my head. I could smell his blood. I jerked away from him, balling my hands into fists. Fai flopped back against the bus seat, panting.

“Hey, are you alright? I’m sorry, that was dumb. I don’t even know you and I’ve already kissed you three times.” He closed his eyes and grimaced. I turned to face him, feeling my blood trickle through my fingers and pool in my shaking palms. A tight smile forced its way onto my face. He just seemed to climb over the barriers no one else could breach. I thought I could keep everyone away...

“Yeah, I’m fine.” I lied quietly. My eyes flickered to the girl sitting across the aisle from us, staring at us like we were still making out. She blushed when she met my gaze and whipped her head around, her brunette ponytail slapping the back of the seat in front of her, to talk to her friend. There went my reputation.

“Did I hurt you?” Fai studied my blank face. My eyes automatically glanced down at my hands. Idiot! His smoldering hazel eyes followed. “Oh my fucking god!” His eyes went wide. “I’m such a dickhead. I’m sorry.” How sweet. No questions, no thoughts about my sanity or the possibilities of previous abuse. He thought it was all his fault somehow. Fai shrugged off his black jacket and pried open my hands, wiping away the blood with it. I gritted my teeth at his touch and looked away.

“You’ll mess up your jacket.” I whispered. I felt him shrug his shoulders.

“I don’t care. It’ll make it more interesting anyways.” My teeth broke through the soft skin of my lip and blood dribbled down my chin.

“It’s not your fault. I’m just messed up.” I pulled my hands out of his grasp and wiped a sleeve across my face. I can do this. I can control myself. I have or people will die.

“It is my fault. If I had just left you alone, you wouldn’t be hurting yourself. Look at me, Ren.” I turned around slowly. “I want to start over. Hi, my name is Fai. Want to be friends?” The corners of my mouth lifted up into a slight smile.

“Yeah.” My voice rasped against my throat. I felt a headache coming on. He raised his hand to touch my face. No. If he touched me again right then, I knew I would’ve lost it. The touch never came and he dropped his hand.

“You know what? It’s all your fault for looking so goddamn innocent and beautiful.” He licked his lips nervously and turned forward, careful no to touch me as if he knew it would be bad. He thinks I’m beautiful?

The bus turned into a scenic circle drive decorated with an old iron and stone gate, the entrance to a mostly square two-story sandstone and rose building with several separate buildings circling around it. There were plenty of trees, but not enough to hide the school, just to decorate the always well kept lawn. Charles Harnem High School. My school. Everyone got up and started filing off the bus with a few groans and “hurry up’s”. I grabbed my bag and squeezed into the aisle. Fai chuckled as he got off the bus. He was looking up at the school’s name on the front of the building. The letter “N” was missing making the sign read CHARLES HAR EM. The letter had gone missing last year and had never been recovered. I laughed weakly. My foot missed a step and I stumbled into his arms.

“Hey, you look a little pale. You okay?”

“Ugh, I feel like I’m going to throw up.”

“Let go of him, you fag! Can’t you take a hint? He doesn’t even like you.” It was that brunette I saw on the bus. Still holding me up, Fai leaned in uncomfortably close to hear.

“Frankly, I don’t care what he or you think, because right now he’s sick.” He brushed past her with amazing dignity, almost carrying me to the nearest bathroom. “We’ll call you when we need someone to cleanup the puke.” He threw over his shoulder.

“Please, go. They’ll be expecting you to show up at least your first day.” I couldn’t think of anything better to say, except: If you don’t leave I might drink your blood and accidently kill you.

“Okay.” Fai said softly, his face so sad I wanted to run to him and hug him except... I looked at the empty space where he longer stood and felt my heart rise into my mouth. Was it really that easy? I turned back to the clouding old mirror above the white sink I held in a death grip. My face was pale and drawn with a sheen of sweat, my hair was beginning to dry, framing my face and barely falling to my shoulders in thick layers. My stomach heaved and I gagged to hold it down, bolting to the closest stall. When I finally stopped, I leaned over the toilet, shaking with weakness, breathing through my nose, and waiting. My body jerked and my stomach shoved its contents up my throat. I gasped for air and waited a little long but no more came. Empty. I can’t do this every time I’m with Fai. One day I won’t be strong enough to hold back and I-I-I... I don’t know what could happen. What if after the first one, I couldn’t stop? Tears stung at my eyes. I shuddered and laid down on the icy cold tile floor of the bathroom. I had to stay away from Fai. When the time comes I’ll figure out how. Right then, though, I slipped into unconsciousness with a broken heart.