Page 31 of Heresy

Neither of us concerned about who will win.

This is how it’s always been, and we’re more than happy to continue the tradition.

Regardless of the consequences.

Regardless of anything at all.

Brinley

I’m about to give up on Everly’s arrival by the time the front door to the club swings open. A gorgeous blonde walks through, her head angled down so that her hair partially hides her face. Her shoulders slump forward, the posture of a person uncertain and afraid.

It’s so unlike the Everly I know that I almost miss her entirely.

My first instinct is to write her off as a stranger.

Dismiss her.

Look past her.

Certainly this can’t be the woman I’ve secretly been a little jealous of all my life.

That girl is vibrant.

She’s a touch ballsy.

She’s not afraid of what’s around every corner or lurking in the shadows like me.

Yet, there she is.

Everly.

In a mental and emotional state that just five seconds ago, I never would have believed possible had someone told me. Not unless I saw it with my own eyes.

I’m definitely seeing it.

But believe it? Yeah, I’m still struggling with that.

Regardless, I shoot forward, finally releasing my post at the bar.

As usual—and typical, it feels—the crowd grows thicker and more impassable the more desperate I am to reach her. I clutch my drink close to my chest, the soda sloshing too close to the rim for my comfort.

Prior to her arrival, I could have driven a large school bus through the space in the club. Now it feels like I’m bouncing off bodies and jostling for a simple inch with every attempted step.

Perhaps I’m too focused on her, and that is the reason I keep failing to observe the bigger picture. It’s not like me not to notice everything in my environment. Much like it’s not like Everly to appear so unkempt.

It seems we both are off tonight, and it only makes the situation that much worse.

Chaos erupts around me before I can see it coming, a chorus of shouting overcoming the thump of heavy music.

The crowd of bodies I’ve been fighting against becomes a thicker mass of frantic, multi-directional movement.

Before, it was a well-coordinated school of fish, ever changing in course but still something I could swim through.

But now the crowd is a dangerous beast, a stampede of sweat and skin and bone with no rhyme or reason, threatening to pull me down and trample me if I lose my tenuous footing.

“Fight!” a loud voice shouts practically against my ear.

And a fight it is. But not the kind the stranger heralded. It’s a fight of my very own.

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