all and also she has Blue Ivy who I HATE because it's so unfair because Beyonce was supposed to be my mom.
"Beyonce's music is terrible," Yvette offers as we walk to dinner.
“Ah yes,” I say. “Let me just mark that down on this neat little list I keep entitled ‘ The 25 Reasons Why You’ll Be Joining Me in the Eternally Agonizing Lava Pit Portion of Beelzebub’s Kingdom ’.”
"You talk to yourself so much. Is it like, a birth defect?"
"It's a side effect of the radioactive waste my mother bathed in while pregnant with me, yes."
Yvette opens her mouth to say something else, then closes it and turns the color of a ketchup sandwich - white on the edges, red in the middle. I follow her gaze to a group of girls, but before I can pinpoint which fly lady has her attention, Yvette snaps out of it, clearing her throat and grabbing a bowl for soup.
"Anyway,” she says with much difficulty. “There's a music showcase down at Emel Hall. It's mostly sweaty dudes dicking around with drums and Alice in Chains covers. You should come, and educate yourself on the merits of true music."
"Wait, whoa, are we just gonna ignore the fact you -"
Yvette suddenly repurposes a vast amount of soup as floor cleaner. “That I what?” She snaps.
"Uh, nothing. Nevermind. Yeah, I'll come. Is there a cover fee, or?"
She relaxes visibly. "It's free. I'll see you at seven, then?"
I answer with a mean air-guitar rift, and she smirks and leaves. I take my pizza slice out onto the balcony, where the dying sun paints everything in pale golds and silvers. The tree shadows grow long, tangling in the shadows of passerbys and untangling again.
And that’s when I see him.
I try hard not to see him. I really do. My brain gives a sputter, and I forget how to swallow. My skin crawls, hot at first, then so terribly cold I might as well be in Alaska. I start sweating, and my eyes dart around looking for all the exits off the terrace – the stairs, the back stairs, through the cafeteria and out the door. I don’t even think about it, I just do it. I’m reacting instead of thinking as I pick up my plate and dump it in a whirling flash, two seconds is all it takes, two seconds and the terror has a complete and total hold over me as I dash inside the cafeteria and watch him approach through the window.
Curly, dark brown hair falls into his eyes. Steel-colored eyes, a blue so dark you can’t see the light through them. The color of swords and the ocean, both terrifying, both sharp, both can kill you. He killed a little part of me. His eyebrows are thick and his mouth pleasant, and if you squint he could be in a British boy-band, maybe, possibly. The freckles on his nose are still there, the freckles I’d written stupid poetry about. He’s taller than I remember – taller than most of the boys here and his biceps are huge, he’s been lifting and it’d make any girl swoon but it just makes me want to barf. All I want to do is puke, right here, all over the potted plant I’m hiding behind. But above the panic-static that’s currently turning my brain to mush, another part of me screams wordlessly.
What! The! Fuck! Is Nameless! Doing! Here!
Here, of all places, here , of all goddamn colleges. It has to be a joke. He has to be visiting a friend, or something. He can’t be enrolled here, learning here, sleeping within the same ten miles of me. He can’t be. He just can’t. I came here to avoid him. I moved to an entire state to leave him behind, and now he’s found me again. No, shit, there’s no way he’s here just for me. It’s a coincidence. His shitty, threatening emails earlier in the year were just last-gasp effort taunts, his way of – of – of what? Somewhere in the back of my mind, Dr. Mernich’s sessions stick with me, burning dark and hard. Triggered. His way of triggering me. He wanted me to remember. And now he’s going to get to see me remember. In person.
“H-Hey, are you okay?”
I look up. A girl with
"Beyonce's music is terrible," Yvette offers as we walk to dinner.
“Ah yes,” I say. “Let me just mark that down on this neat little list I keep entitled ‘ The 25 Reasons Why You’ll Be Joining Me in the Eternally Agonizing Lava Pit Portion of Beelzebub’s Kingdom ’.”
"You talk to yourself so much. Is it like, a birth defect?"
"It's a side effect of the radioactive waste my mother bathed in while pregnant with me, yes."
Yvette opens her mouth to say something else, then closes it and turns the color of a ketchup sandwich - white on the edges, red in the middle. I follow her gaze to a group of girls, but before I can pinpoint which fly lady has her attention, Yvette snaps out of it, clearing her throat and grabbing a bowl for soup.
"Anyway,” she says with much difficulty. “There's a music showcase down at Emel Hall. It's mostly sweaty dudes dicking around with drums and Alice in Chains covers. You should come, and educate yourself on the merits of true music."
"Wait, whoa, are we just gonna ignore the fact you -"
Yvette suddenly repurposes a vast amount of soup as floor cleaner. “That I what?” She snaps.
"Uh, nothing. Nevermind. Yeah, I'll come. Is there a cover fee, or?"
She relaxes visibly. "It's free. I'll see you at seven, then?"
I answer with a mean air-guitar rift, and she smirks and leaves. I take my pizza slice out onto the balcony, where the dying sun paints everything in pale golds and silvers. The tree shadows grow long, tangling in the shadows of passerbys and untangling again.
And that’s when I see him.
I try hard not to see him. I really do. My brain gives a sputter, and I forget how to swallow. My skin crawls, hot at first, then so terribly cold I might as well be in Alaska. I start sweating, and my eyes dart around looking for all the exits off the terrace – the stairs, the back stairs, through the cafeteria and out the door. I don’t even think about it, I just do it. I’m reacting instead of thinking as I pick up my plate and dump it in a whirling flash, two seconds is all it takes, two seconds and the terror has a complete and total hold over me as I dash inside the cafeteria and watch him approach through the window.
Curly, dark brown hair falls into his eyes. Steel-colored eyes, a blue so dark you can’t see the light through them. The color of swords and the ocean, both terrifying, both sharp, both can kill you. He killed a little part of me. His eyebrows are thick and his mouth pleasant, and if you squint he could be in a British boy-band, maybe, possibly. The freckles on his nose are still there, the freckles I’d written stupid poetry about. He’s taller than I remember – taller than most of the boys here and his biceps are huge, he’s been lifting and it’d make any girl swoon but it just makes me want to barf. All I want to do is puke, right here, all over the potted plant I’m hiding behind. But above the panic-static that’s currently turning my brain to mush, another part of me screams wordlessly.
What! The! Fuck! Is Nameless! Doing! Here!
Here, of all places, here , of all goddamn colleges. It has to be a joke. He has to be visiting a friend, or something. He can’t be enrolled here, learning here, sleeping within the same ten miles of me. He can’t be. He just can’t. I came here to avoid him. I moved to an entire state to leave him behind, and now he’s found me again. No, shit, there’s no way he’s here just for me. It’s a coincidence. His shitty, threatening emails earlier in the year were just last-gasp effort taunts, his way of – of – of what? Somewhere in the back of my mind, Dr. Mernich’s sessions stick with me, burning dark and hard. Triggered. His way of triggering me. He wanted me to remember. And now he’s going to get to see me remember. In person.
“H-Hey, are you okay?”
I look up. A girl with
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