Page 51 of Dangerous Deviance
I stared at Jan, her head lying on the ground, the blood growing around her. The two men, Edward and the other, picked her up, carrying her off to the woods behind the campus. But her blood soaked the earth. I had never seen someone die before. It didn’t seem real. My feet were sinking into the ground, into the dirt and blood, like quicksand. And everyone continued on like nothing had happened.
A hand tapped my shoulder. I turned; another woman, a fellow student. Without making eye contact, she nodded forward. She didn’t speak.
I caught up with the woman in front of me, glancing at my peripherals, trying to remain unnoticed. The rest of the women kept marching forward. Was it my fault Jan was dead? Had she only tried to talk to Izzy because I had stopped? I had been there for five or six months, but I was the only one who seemed disturbed.
Because it was normal. Because they had seen this before.
It was a resignation. Not murder. Not death. I had to force myself to think of it that way.
And yet one evening, before we were escorted to our dorm rooms, I hid in one of the cafeterias, waiting for the lights to dim. I snuck out, my footsteps silent on the floor. Maybe it was a death wish, but I had to know. Had to find Julie and get her the hell out of here.
I went to the dorm rooms. There would be a sign, I told myself. There had to be. If I walked into her dorm room, I would know it was hers by the smell, by a small trinket. By something. I would hide until she returned, then we would figure out a plan, because we were stronger together.
I walked into a room and a blood-soaked pillow stopped me. A red trail led to the bathroom sink; it must have been a bloody nose. I lifted the extra uniform off of the nightstand, looking for an ID card, a purse, or a wallet, then heard footsteps behind me. I stilled.
“Ellie, Ellie, Ellie,” Edward’s voice hummed. “Lucky me, finding you here.”
I grabbed the base of the small lamp, ripping the cord from the wall as I slammed it into Edward’s face. The shade broke off, but he didn’t budge. He grabbed me by the neck and twisted hard until the blood went to my head and I couldn’t even gasp.
“Little bitch,” he muttered, tightening his hands. The world fuzzed-out, and right before everything went black, he dropped me, letting me crash to the floor.
He yanked down my pants and underwear, using his body weight to pin me down. I dragged my nails across the floor, trying to pull myself out from under him, but my nails dug tracks into the wood, and he stabbed me with his cock, pressing between my legs, finding my cunt.
“I knew you were a sneaky little bitch,” he muttered.
“Fuck you,” I growled.
He punched me in the back of the head, knocking my face into the floor, a headache instantly wrapping its fingers around my skull. I shut down, escaping to that other place. Like a whipping. Like we had done this before. Because I could endure this too. In my mind, I was at Rubble River. Our parents were sitting at the park bench, fixing our picnic lunch. Julie was in the river, holding onto a float, sunglasses on her head, her cheeks sprinkled with water. She threw her hands into the river, splashing my face, and my body moved with the waves, with each thrust of the water. I splashed back, pushing away the masculine body of waves, and I laughed, couldn’t stop laughing, because it was easier that way. Easier to be there. Easier to not think. The sun beamed on the surface of the river, blinding me until there was nothing. No air. No water. No trees. No Edward.Nothing.
***
For the rest of my endurance training, when Edward beat me until I was bleeding, I never thought anything of it. It was the training, and as long as I obeyed the rules, I wouldn’t be forced to resign. I wouldn’t have to endure him. What he had done to me in the dorm rooms was a gift; he liked to remind me that it could have been so much worse. I knew that now. The blood dripped down my back, splattered the floor, but I didn’t feel anything. It wasn’t pain; it was empathy. Knowing what the victims had been through, what I could survive, for them.
When Dr. Bates watched my training for the first time in several weeks, I didn’t question it. And when Edward bent me over, making my hands touch the wall again, I didn’t think anything of it either. I was too numb to think. Too empty to care. Too exhausted to fight. I thought that there was little Edward could do to make me afraid anymore. The wall was cool on my hands, comforting, but slippery, and at least I could lean onto it.
Edward ran a hand along my back, then reached lower, but I blocked that out. He was superior to me, but he was not my leader.
“Sometimes,” Dr. Bates said, his voice cool as he stepped closer to me, “we must use all of our assets to convince the enemy.”
Convince them of what?
A sharp jab pressed into my pussy lips, pushing through. I turned back, seeing that Edward’s groin was covered in smears of my blood; he had used my sweat and blood to lubricate me. Dr. Bates stared at me, his eyes narrowed as if I was an object underneath a microscope, I turned back to the wall. What else could I do? Uncontrollable sobs unleashed from me, because Julie had been through this too. She had been so daring, so inventive, so much more rebellious than I could have ever been. Yet I couldn’t think of her in this position. How it would ruin her spirit. How it was my fault.
Tears wet the ground beneath me, growing into a reddish-pink puddle. Using my endurance training, I blocked out the motion of Edward’s hips. Washed them away. Went to another place, like I always did.
When Edward finished, Dr. Bates brought me a towel.
“Thank you,” I murmured, barely able to get out the words. I didn’t meet his eyes.
“Sometimes, we have to do things we don’t like,” he said. “Remember that, Ellie. You have to play the game. Figure out the players.” His voice grew softer then, like it pained him to put me through this. As if, no matter how hard he had tried, he couldn’t stop it. “He might think you’re weak. That you’re helpless. And he’ll prey on you like he preyed on her.”
Her? Who was he talking about? But I had no energy to ask.
“But you are strong, Ellie. If you hack his body into pieces like he cut hers, then you’ll be able to end this. For everyone.”
I blinked up at him, that smile gleamed across his face. Exhaustion rocked through my body, and I begged the universe that my training was done for the day. That Dr. Bates would be my comfort. A tangerine. A bread roll. Milk. My bed. Sleep never felt as good as it did in the Skyline Shift; I could even block out the ringing at night. Some students were taken in their sleep, never to return, and I begged the universe that if I was forced to resign too, that I could at least see my sister first.
“I am so proud of you,” Dr. Bates said, breaking me out of my thoughts.
