Page 24 of Beasts

“If you don’t scream, it won’t hurt,” one of them says. I struggle as hard as I can, even trying to bite the hand covering my face, but I don’t succeed. I keep waving my hands around, but it only deters them marginally. I don't stop. I still try to scream, but I can't. Why is this happening to me? What did I do?

Tyson tries to keep my legs under control as he attempts to remove my pants. I hear my shirt tear as one of the guys pulls on the shoulder area roughly, but then I hear him scream. My legs are released, and I feel like I can finally move them. The hands holding down my shoulders are removed, and I try to stand up but fall to the ground. I’m still really dizzy and can’t understand what’s happening. I look around at the blurred faces and figures moving in the room. If my counting is correct, and I hope it is, there are four people in the room now, not just three. Did someone come to help me?

I try to get up and head to the door but fall again. Why can’t I concentrate? Why won’t my legs move? Using a nearby nightstand to steady myself, I stand up while hearing a lot of swearing and screaming. As my eyes slowly start to focus, I see the three guys pounding on someone, but he’s putting up quite a fight. He kicks one off, sending him flying to the other end of the room. I am in a state of shock. What did they put in my drink? This surely can't be real.

Another guy gets pushed into a nearby wall, and another is sucker-punched right in the face—Tyson, I think. The fourth figure comes towards me, and all I see are bright green eyes. He grabs my arm, and I try to scream again but stop when he says my name.

“Amelia, let’s go!” Oliver? What was he doing here? I don't resist as he drags me along through the house. I hear people shouting to us as we push through them and out towards the backyard where it's actually quite empty. Although I'm a little groggy, at least I'm now on my feet, but Oliver holding on to me is helping quite a bit. I think there are people shouting after us, so he drags me over to what looks like a garden shed. He pushes me in and closes the door behind us. From the outside, it looks like there would be enough room for both of us standing here, but there really wasn't. It was actually quite packed with a lot of things and a lot of items that were made for the garden. Standing there chest touching chest, I realized that this must be the worst possible situation for him to be in right now. I look up and see the pain in his eyes that he's suffering from, but this isn’t exactly a good situation for me either.

“What are you thinking about right now?” I ask him. He looks down at me and swallows, using his hands to pick up what's remaining of my shirt and trying to put it back on me properly. I think he’s undoing the knot on my shirt and buttoning it up as it is intended to be worn.

“You.” He states. “I'm just thinking about you.” I feel very dizzy. I also must be hallucinating because I know he didn't just say he was thinking about me. My heart's racing, but at least at the moment, with everything that's going on inside of my head at the moment, I don't feel as afraid of him anymore.

“What are you doing here?” I ask him grabbing onto my head with this little room as I have to move my arm.

“I've known Tyson for a little while. I know the type of guy he is and when I heard you were going to a frat party, I got worried. Things tend to happen to girls at those parties, and they can't seem to say anything about them afterwards. Looking at the state of you, I assume that was because of drugs.”

“I barely had two sips of that drink.”

“I guess it doesn't take much, but you're still with me at the moment. I assume much more would have knocked you out.” I want to cry. I can't believe I fell for it. I can't believe I always got tricked into being...used. I feel sick to my stomach, but I've also got to remember that there's someone else here with me, someone who is probably struggling a lot being this close to me.

“Thank you.” I say to him. I know we're in here because someone was looking for us, but I'm hoping that we can get out of here soon.

“Oliver? Amelia?” I hear voices calling our names, but they definitely don't seem hostile. They seem more familiar than that. Oliver goes to push on the door and we end up falling out a little bit, but still catching ourselves before we fall down completely. Then I realized that somebody else had caught me from falling, it’s Niles.

“Are you guys okay?” Hendrik asks, fear plastered all over his face.

“We’re fine. Mostly.” Oliver responds, looking over to me. “She had something in her drink though, so don't let her stand by herself.” As I look up and concentrate I can also see that Nolan and Richard are here too.

“Are you fucking insane?” Nolan shouts at Oliver. “You know we shouldn't be going out on our own and you decide to leave us a note saying you're headed to a frat party?”

“I only came to get Amelia. None of you were home yet.”

“So? How did you guys even end up locking yourself in a garden shed anyway? How long have you even been in there?”

“Just a few minutes.” I comment, hiccoughing along the way.

“You guys were stuck in that tiny shed for a few minutes and Oliver didn't have you for a snack?” Richard questions looking over at me and around my neck. “I mean, look at your clothes and you seem really groggy. Did you actually bite her dude?” He turns to Oliver who shoots him a wicked glare.

“I didn't bite her.”

“You want us to believe you are comfortable enough with being pressed up against her for a few minutes inside of a garden shed and you didn't proceed to bite her?” Niles questions.

I interject, “He really didn’t bite me. Give him some credit guys. He kind of saved me up there.”

“Saved you?” Nolan asks, turning and hearing a lot of questioning shouts from inside. “Never mind, let's just get back to the house and quickly.” As we went their way back to the front of the house, I can see people are starting to panic about something that's happening inside the house. I can only assure him that because of Oliver’s strength, that perhaps when he beat up the guys upstairs, they were in pretty bad shape when we left. We're better off escaping from the aftermath than sticking around.

Chapter sixteen

Death & Taxes

The next morning I wake up in my bed. My clothes aren't changed, but I do have another blanket thrown on top of me. I don't remember how we actually got home. Did we walk? Did someone drive their car? I shake my head and change my clothes immediately. I definitely don't want to be in these still. As I open my bedroom door, I can already hear that there's arguing downstairs. I guess going to the party has thrown everybody out of loop. I didn't intend for anyone else to get thrown under the bus just because I wanted to have a bit of fun.

When I head downstairs, I can see that they are having a bit of a debate around the kitchen island. I go in full preparation to apologize, but that's when I hear something I didn't want to.

“He's dead, Oliver.” Nolan's voice rings in my ear like an echo. Who's dead?

“I'd fucking hit him again.” Oliver retorts, a vicious tone in his voice.

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