Page 5 of Flame and Starlight

Until you are tipsy in a bathroom with one of your best friends, you don’t really understand how much you can really love someone. Ashley was the friend who was always happy to see you, always happy for anything you accomplished. She had your back and was fierce for the people she loved.

She held my hand tightly as we squeezed down the skinny stairs, careful to not let me lose my balance. She continued to hold my hand as we snaked through the tables and people to get back to the front of the bar and around the corner to the big bathroom. As we passed the bar, I searched for Aoife but couldn’t find her. That’s weird, I thought to myself. Ash tugged me, opened the bathroom door, and ran her hand down the back of my hair to lead me in.

“You can go first,” she said as she locked the door and made her way over to the sink and mirror. Her hands ran through her chestnut hair, snagging on windswept tangles. She groaned and dug through her bag for a brush. “I just wish,” she started as she pulled it out, “that you two could just figure out whatever the hell it is you have going on.”

I rolled my eyes, not wanting to talk about this right now. I stood up and adjusted my dress. A gust of cold air fluttered across the floor from under the door. I shivered.

“Let’s not talk about it right now. I’ll keep these stupid hands to myself the rest of the night.” I looked up at her, and she was staring at herself in the mirror, lipstick hovering over the middle of her bottom lip. “Ash?” Gooseflesh rose up all over my body. She didn’t move. “Ashley,” I said a bit louder and took a step towards her. That feeling of unease tiptoed up over my shoulder and snaked its way through my hair. I slowly took a few more steps over to her until I was a hand’s width away from her. She wasn’t even blinking.

What the hell is wrong with her?

My mouth was suddenly dry; my tongue felt swollen and stuck.

I lifted my left hand slowly up to hers to try and get her attention and pull the lipstick away from her face. So quickly I could barely see her move, her other hand grabbed a fistful of my hair and slammed my head into the mirror. Blinding, white-hot pain seared through my scalp. As if in slow motion, stunned, my head bounced off the now cracked mirror and hit the side cast-iron sink as my legs gave out beneath me. Then I was on the floor, blackness filling the sides of my vision. I saw her feet turn towards the door, and the lock slicked open. The door opened just wide enough for a pair of boots to squeeze in, and then it was shut again.

“What a good girl you were, Ashley,” a deep voice purred. “You may leave now. Give a good excuse as to why your friend here won’t be joining you tonight.”

My heart was thrumming in my chest so violently I felt like I was going to be sick. There was a roaring in my ears, and my breaths came in and out through my nose too quickly, too shallow. I was hyperventilating. I blinked. The blackness on the sides of my vision slowly crept in further. Without a sound, Ashley left. I heard a pitiful noise escape my lips.

“Oh, little duck,” said the man as he squatted next to me. The English pet name rolled off his lips a little too easily. “I apologize for that, but I needed you subdued.” Cloudy black hair framed his outof-focus face. He pushed some of my hair away from my eyes. “Let’s get you off this dirty floor, shall we?”

His face barely came into focus before he swung me up and over his shoulder. The swift motion sent my stomach rolling and my head spinning. I could feel warm blood trickle into my hair. The bathroom door opened, and he carried me out into the bar, towards the door. Everyone was staring, whispering about how drunk I must be.

Can they not see I’m bleeding?

And then Aoife’s fountain of hair was at the bar, her back towards me.

“Aoife,” I thought I whispered.

And then…black.

I remembered my mom always told me that my anxiety, no matter how hard it was to deal with, would actually keep me safe. It would keep my walls up, my senses sharp. Anytime I would get upset about how hard it was to go places on my own or meet new people or try new things, she would wrap me up in her arms and kiss my hair.

“It can be such a blessing in disguise, Alys. Every time you enter a room, you are aware. That keeps you safe. Think of it that way.” Her thumbs would gently wipe my tears away.

I got too comfortable. That was why this happened. I was in a very crowded public space with no anxiety. Alcohol had me unobservant. Tom had me distracted. I wasn’t aware of everyone in the room, and I didn’t think it was necessary to know my exits. I thought I was safe.

I kept slipping in and out of consciousness. At one point, he slid me off his shoulder and cradled me in his arms like a small child. I managed to open my eyes, and we were still walking, my head slightly bobbing against his shoulder. No one was paying any attention to us. I willed my body to move, my mouth to open, but my brain couldn’t communicate with it. My head lulled back into blackness again.

He wasn’t even out of breath when I jerked back awake and my body gave a little kick. He glanced down, and his grip on me tightened like he thought I might try to escape. But that movement was involuntary, and I couldn’t do more than that before my eyes met his blue ones and my brain slid back into darkness.

“Can you stand?” I heard him asking.

I realized as I groggily came back to Earth that my feet were on the ground, but my legs were definitely not holding me up. My entire body weight was like a limp noodle pressed into him, my head barely even reaching his shoulder, even though I had heels on. His left arm was wrapped around my back, his right hand not so gently slapping me awake.

I leaned away from him and grabbed onto a cement wall behind me. He still held me up as I tried to take in my surroundings. I blinked away the blackness threatening my vision again. Nothing in my life had ever prepared me for this. We were still in the city but just far enough out to where it was quiet enough to hear the current of the river below us. My heart dropped through my body.

I pushed off the cement wall, now realizing that it was actually just a very short barrier between myself and the river. The river that so many drunken university kids had fallen into and lost their lives. I pushed myself back into him unconsciously and whimpered.

“No, no, no,” I said under my breath. I immediately knew he planned to throw me over this bridge. I didn’t know if it was my thalassophobia or the concussion I surely had, but I clung to him like he was my only salvation. “Please don’t throw me in there,” I whimpered as I looked into his eyes.

Look in his eyes. Make him realize you are a real person.

“So dramatic, sweetheart. I will not be throwing you in the river.” Relief washed over my entire body. “We will be jumping in together.” It was his turn to stare into my eyes. “I am going to sit up onto this little wall here, and then I will lift you up and we will go in together.”

He must be out of his fucking mind.

“You must be out of your fucking mind.”

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