No Time To Bleed

Kevin ended up interrupting Cece and mine’s dinner with a toss of orange juice at us.

“You little leech!” Cece flung a knife at Kevin who ran away giggling with another little blonde haired boy.

“Oh my God…” I croaked.

The orange liquid had soaked into my hair and clothes. They’d practically thrown an entire jug of it at us.

The area around us was gawking and even some of Kyle’s friends were laughing.

Cece’s cheeks burned as her eyes scanned over all the people.

“He’s laughing at me.” Cece whispered.

I sort of gawked at her.

Kyle wasn’t technically laughing at us, but he wasn’t helping either.

“Hey, you guys okay? Those kids seemed pretty evil.” Antoinette came storming over. “Do you want me to disembowel them for you?”

That got a good chuckle out of me; Cece just rolled her eyes, and went shoving past Antoinette.

“Hey, I just tried to help you! Watch where you’re walking!” Antoinette shouted before looking back to me. “Are you okay?”

I nodded. “I guess. I could use some new clothes anyway. And I’ll punch that little boy’s teeth in eventually.”

Antoinette smiled and I could see Kyle stretching his neck to see us.

“Are you interested in a little trade off deal?” Antoinette smirked, hand on her hip.

My eyebrows rose. “So, we’re gonna be doing some black market stuff now? Sweet.”

Antoinette walked away from the late night dinner arm in arm.

Footsteps came clambering after us.

Kyle was rushing over; dirty blonde and strong black hair flopping above his head and jade green eyes darting around nervously.

“Hey, is Cece okay?”

We both turned.

“Um, why do you care?” his sister snapped back. “You didn’t even help her.”

His hand reached for the back of his neck. He was in an army green goodie and cargo pants.

“Look I’m sorry my friends laughed at her, it’s just-“

“Just what?” I cut him off. “You’re a coward? Is that it?”

His head sort of fell then and I almost felt guilty for not letting off the hook, but then again Cece and I were close to being like family after everything that has happened.

“Look I just want to see if you’re okay. You guys are my friends now.” His eyebrows were quivering now and I was wondering what emotion was coursing through him.

My voice was softer, more caring. “Look. If you wanna be a good friend, you have to look after yourself and people you care about. You can’t let the people around you ruin that stuff. If you do, the people you want to like you won’t.”

Kyle nodded and slugged away from us, shoulders sunken lower that its usual confidence.

“That’s my brother for ya?”

We both turned around and started walking.

“Does he do that a lot?”

“What? Disappoint people? Give in to peer pressure?”

I nodded.

“Yeah. Since we’ve been to school, he’s been on the whole Be The Cool People crowd and since I usually hang out with him, I want to gouge my eyes out with toothpicks.”

I chuckled. “I feel the same way. The prep school I went to, there was this girl, Jessica. Total bitch. I punched her out in the hallway.”

“I did that once in the 5th grade. This boy tried to crack on me for being in foster care. He was a total meathead. After I knocked his teeth in, he tried to have a crush on me.”

“A crush? That’s disgusting. I hate when people switch like that.”

But, my mind immediately went to Jesse and Alex and Cece.

They’d all changed for the positive or negative in some sort of way.

“So, where’s this whole black market clothing trade going down?”

“In this backroom by the wash area at the hotel.” She answered. We jogged down a short area of steps and walked a large hall.

Big and expensive looking doors lay at the end and I knew that the hotel was close.

“And since you’re the cool new kid, I’ll give you the special treatment. I’ll let you have one of my band tee shirts, one of my babies.”

My eyes flew wide open and I on Cloud Nine. “You freaking serious?! What bands do you have?”

“The good ones: Suicide Silence, Eyes Set To Kill, 30 Seconds To Mars, and a lot of metal.”

I ruffled her hair and surprisingly, she didn’t grumble. Antoinette just did her own nervous smile as we walked through those doors

The hotel for South Western Airport was grand. Golden moldings rescinded the ceilings. Angels aimed for the sun oil washes of lavish colors. The eyes held irises so clear and the floor was solid marble. All of its lush richness was still intact with the world completely in shambles on the outside.

“Wow. How many floors is this place?”

She shrugged. “About 20 floors. Holds about 10,000 people which is ridiculous to think about. It’s build like a rock and it’s been up as long as the airport. Everyone keeps saying it’s a total gem.”

We passed by a hallway section elevators. There had to be at least 10 of those things churning at all points.

I wondered how they’d managed to suck so much power into this place when the town was running dry on power.

Down a dark hallway and past a clear glass showing the washers and dryers, a utility closet showed itself ahead of us and inside I was amazed.

Racks crated the walls. Hangers sprouted from all places.

“This is heaven.” The door closed behind me.

Antoinette nodded, her head shaking. “This is my secret stash.”

“How’d you get all this?”

She shrugged. “I raided a Hot Topic after the outbreak happened. Bags and bags of stuff, Kyle was pissed.”

“So, I get one shirt?”

She shook her head, pulling the string on another light bulb. “You can get three.”

I ended up choosing a Suicide Silence tee shirt for No Pity For A Coward, a Paramore one for Playing God, and Jared Leto (sex demon).

“Good choices. I wish I had my iPod, we could listen to some tunes.” She praised.

“Ugh, don’t even get me started on mp3. That thing was like my child.”

We left the closet laughing and Antoinette gave me a bag to shove my shirts in.

“We don’t want anyone knowing I gave you special treatment.” She checked her watch. “Oh, 4:53 am. Time to hit the sack.”

The grogginess of the impossibly long day hadn’t hit me yet and I wasn’t even sure if the time matched moment.

She took me to the hotel’s massive reception desk and a guard with a gun typed on the computer.

“Jasmine Rushman. You’ll be in Room 218.”

He handed me the key with a perverted stare of the eyes and Antoinette walked with me to the elevators.

“Is he always that creepy?”

She snorted. “Are you kidding? All 800 guards here are creepy. By the way, they put all us teenagers on Floor 2, quicker evacuations for us I guess.”

Antoinette dropped me off at my room and I gave a thank you.

Inside the room was more lavish than I had expected. The television rest inside, but the wires had been cut.

Why didn’t they want us watching TV?

The room held two beds and I took the one to the left of the room near the curtained window. The room has red carpet, heavy and thick wallpaper all over the walls in leafy scrawls, and the furniture was gold as well.

I took my bag and dropped it in the corner.

The sound of running water ended and I froze. The door knob to the bathroom shifted and moved.

“Girl, you are quite the handful, you know that?”

I turned to see a heavier set woman leaving the bathroom as steam pooled out with her hands wrapped around a girl’s wrists.

“Um, excuse me?”

The woman popped her head around. “Oh! I’m sorry. I’m Patricia! I’m your roommate’s aid! She can’t quite shower on her own like some people here, so she needs the help once in a while.”

Then, when the girl came out, my jaw dropped.

Her hair was in the same bleached tone, but now was strings upon strings that passed her shoulder. Her green eyes darted around as her tongue danced in her mouth like an animal waiting for food and the sloppiest grin went to her face with every second.

She was the same girl I’d known before, but never the same.

“What happened to her?”

Patricia breathed in. “No one knows. Her male friend brought her in, said she woke up like this one morning. She was beaten pretty badly. Blunt force trauma to the head did some real brain damage. She’ll mentally incapable for the rest of her life.”

Patricia patted the girl’s face and set her down to the bed. Next she handed her a bottle of chocolate milk and the girl sucked the thing dry.

The brown liquid dripped and slipped past her lips, tongue stretching to lick the stray droplets.

The aid wiped her chin with a napkin. “She’ll be off to sleep in about 10 minutes. For some reason chocolate milk helps to comfort her. Poor girl. So young.”

Patricia left with a warm smile and the girl curled up into her comforters without even a glance in my direction.

The day I’d slammed that bat into Jessica’s head was the day that ended life to her as she knew it.

I’d never thought things could ever go this far.