seul’s Reviews > Nightshade > Status Update

A red mist sinks in around me, swirling around the rows of dumbbells behind us. I don't even remember pushing him, taken over by a violent fury. The glass mirror makes an audible crack behind Shawn's head. My fists clench his ugly top by the collar, as I glare down at him. "My what?"

"I tell you what, next time I take her out on a date, it'll be a fucking great job she isn't your sister. Reckon Ophelia is as quiet in bed as she is outside of it?"

My blood smolders in my veins. I shove him back. "She's not even quiet, you dick, you just don't shut up."

"Whoa, there. Better keep a check on those emotions, Green. Wouldn't want to turn into your psycho mother, would you?"

He must be completely devoid of hearing, because he cats on. "She's frigid to a new degree, man. Was she like that with you?"

I'm going to kill him.

I can't kill him. His father is on the board.

I'm going to kill him.

His father is on the motherfucking board.

"Well?"

"If you were talking about one of my sisters like that, I'd crack your skull, Miller."

"Was she uptight with you?"

I can almost see my reflection in his overly gelled hair. I'd club him around the head if the sheer amount of product wouldn't shatter the club.

Seconds pass, and he's still in front of me. Breathe in. Breathe out. In. Out. "Would she want you to be asking that?"

In the trees with Ophelia a few weeks ago. That was a break. A moment when my mind was in Sorrowsong and Sorrowsong alone. I thought of little else that day. She felt perfect against me; soft and strong all at once.

I should've kissed her.

"Love?"
I snort. Love is so far at the back of my priorities at the moment.

"She's not that sort of girl. She wouldn't want me to love her. We don't speak anymore. Why are we even discussing her?"

"We're discussing her because you need a break from your home life. You need to give yourself a break from your home life."

I've never been so perplexed by someone. She's fucking miserable, yet she makes me feel alive. She stains the corners of my gray cloud orange, but I have a feeling I make her bright colors gray. She never really smiles around me. I've always been like that to people. "She's interested in someone else. And I'm not interested, anyway."

I cope with the stress of life by clinging to one thing all the time. It was drinking, then it was smoking, then it was running, drawing, working. Now, I think it might be her.

Watching her with Shawn Miller was easier before I realized her tights were stockings.

Life was easier before I realized her tights were stockings.

"I'm frustrated at everything."

My jaw tenses watching a second year's gaze follow her a little too closely. She doesn't notice anyone admiring her; in her own world all the time, stuck in a mindless loop of her own thoughts. I know, because I'm in a similar torture of my own.

She's impossible to get close to, though. She's like that dumb Jenga game. You think you're getting somewhere, and then the tiniest move in the wrong direction and every little bit of progress I had made with her is gone again.

I guess she shuts people out because it's easier than getting hurt. I get it, but it still irritates me. I think we would be good together, but she doesn't agree.

And that sucks.