Pray for Plagues

My left arm pulsated from the pressure being applied. I closed my eyes to try and block out the wonderful punishment being given to me. I managed to inhale once through my nose as I gripped my wrist tightly with my right hand. I felt the sensation of cold steel slowly exiting my vein, and curved my lips into a smirk. I heard the obnoxious chugging of a train nearing.

“Caidin?” an unrecognizably close voice called from the distance. I felt twelve tons add to my back in the form of fingers and gasped, slouching forward from the weight. Anything that I’d eaten throughout the day raced up my throat as if being chased by the devil and relieved itself all over the musty tile floor. My eyes began to throb, and teeth chatter. The heaviness on my back gradually began to disperse. “You still with me?” The dry voice entered one ear and disappeared as if it no long existed.

Curtains began to fall from the top of my vision. Delicate, ebony. Their lacy trim danced in front of me, slowly engulfing my mind in darkness. My head fell to one side as the thin amount of light vanished, and the curtains finally fell.

The train I had heard earlier finally passed overhead, startling me from my euphoric slumber. I rolled over, feeling the Earth’s axis tilt along with me. The dull pain between my eyes finally eased as I squinted in an attempt to grasp reality.

These sheets seemed unfamiliar, though I knew I sleep on them every night. The locks of disheveled hair to my left weren’t my own. They were short, and the most sinister black I had ever seen.

“Cayce?” I called through my cotton mouth. My fingernails dug into the opaque feather comforter, stressing the fibers. I gasped in shock as two large hands held me by my wrists and heaved me up into a sitting position. I tried my hardest to find the arms connected to the palms, but could not. “Cayce?”

“I’m right here,” he chuckled. I blinked into a pair of muddy brown eyes, bleeding red from wear and tear.

I reached my shaky fingers up toward his illuminating cheeks and pressed softly on one. His eyes laughed, but he was silent. “What happened?” I asked, dropping my arm back to the pillow it had recently been resting on.

He sighed through sealed lips and moved my thin auburn hair away from my mouth. “You reacted…better than expected,” he shrugged. “You threw up, passed out, and that’s really it.”

I paused and pondered for a moment, desperately trying to escape my current state of mind. “…what did you put in my body?”

“What?”

“My arm. What did you put in there?”

His eyes widened as he slowly backed away from me. “Wait…I told you what it was before you shot up.”

“I know, just-“

“You can’t get mad at me or anything. You agreed…”

I furrowed my brows and shook my head, trying to regain the facts I had obviously missed. “Relax, Cayce,” I whispered. My vision finally began to focus on actual objects. Cayce’s worried expression gradually became more apparent. “Just…tell me.”

“You know it was a dope mixture, Caidin,” he shot defensively. My face didn’t show reaction, though a squall had formed in between my ears. He let his shoulders fall and seemed relieved. “Very little, though. Not even half of what I normally do.” He finally took a seat at the foot of the bed, and frowned when he noticed me pull my legs away from him. My blank face appeared to say it all. “You can’t get mad, you asked me to do it.”

“I’m not mad,” I said simply under my breath. “You know that.” I spoke slowly and carefully, as if I were a small child getting in trouble for the first time. I didn’t know why. “How long will this feeling last?”

“Hmm,” he mumbled, staring at the blank wall that never seemed to end. “Well, you shouldn’t be feeling high right now. It wears out when you black out.”

“What’re you saying?” I asked, strangely being able to feel my eyes gloss over. My pupils felt heinous.

‘It was your first time,” he smiled, cautiously crawling up to the pillows. He softly laid his hands on my shoulders and very carefully leaned me back until my shoulder blades touched the mahogany headboard. He then lay beside me, resting his fingertips on one of my knees. “So just chill, you’ll be fine.”

“I did drugs…” I trailed off, gazing into the deepest part of my mind that had never been revealed to me. It stretched forever, and could prove anything. Cayce gripped my hands loosely and nuzzled against my neck. He muttered something I wasn’t able to understand. “I did…”