Page 39 of Lessons In Grey

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September 27th, 2021

Rags was breaking me down.

It didn’t help that my brother was playing some sort of psychological warfare on me, or that I was falling for it. I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t eat. The rage was quiet and calculated, nothing like what I was used to.

I was waiting.

He was making me wait, and my fragile mind couldn’t fucking handle it.

Every creak, every closing door, everysoundin that house that happened after the sun went down, it had me preparing for the war that never came.

This morning, I was exhausted, but I was still aware.

I was aware of the way the Professor moved as he did his paperwork. Aware of the way he walked across the stage during class. Aware of his very essence during the lunch and eighth hour blocks during the day.

It was as if my body’s vibrations were slowly syncing to his, and there was nothing I could do to stop it.

I was chewing on my lip this morning, Remi, Cam, and Katelyn had taken up new seats before classes. They were sitting closer to him, I suppose so he could overhear all of the dirty things Remi was telling the other two that she wanted or had done with him.

Since that day, the disdain in his eyes had grown. Every time I walked in and Remi was on his desk, flirting with him, I saw hatred reflected back.

It was something, but the twisting in my gut only grew. Yes, he had made it clear and no, I didn’t care about them, but why was he not doing more about it?

I knew Remi. I had known her for years. She was a stubborn bitch, as stubborn as they came, but he was…he was Rags. He had a gun and a cat, shouldn’t he be able to do something about her? I mean, how dangerous could he be if he—

His eyes found mine.

My eyes shot to my papers. Fuck.

How long had I been staring?

My heart skipped a beat as I closed my eyes, cursing myself internally. Shit. Maybe I wasn’t as aware as I should have been.

“Hey, you okay? Your face is bright red, what happened?”

I was embarrassed. It seemed my permanent space in this universe now, embarrassment. “Yeah,” I muttered, shoving my hair back and finding her eyes.

She rose a perfectly sculpted brow. God, she was perfect. Everything about her was so perfect, but not in the uptight way, in the gorgeous face, gorgeous personality, gorgeous vibrations kind of way.

She was a pure soul with shitty parents.

I sneered, my heart pounding painfully in my chest. I wanted to tell her. I needed to tell someone so they could slap the reasoning back into me because clearly, this wasn’t working.

Her beautiful auburn eyes grew worried. “Emily, what’s wrong?”

I chewed on my lip again, tasting copper this time. Shit. I had to break that habit.

Just tell her. It’s not that big of a deal. It’s nothing. She’d convince me of the same things I was trying to convince myself of.

This was selfish.

I was letting him in on the suffering of my own mind, and eventually, it would lead to the same death my mom and sister succumbed too.

She would take me out to drink away our problems and we’d get so fucked up, I wouldn’t even remember why I kept that cloth in my bag, wrapped in a cute little scarf around Charlie’s bear.

My face felt so hot, I was sure the sun would consider me competition.