How to Live | ✓

fourteen

>>fourteen

Evelyn never went to the hospital.

All she knew was that hospitals asked too many questions, none of which she could give an answer to.

It didn't matter anyway. Mother was proficient in first-aid— she always said that was enough.

Her wrist could be fractured, broken for all she knew, and all she had to support it was a fabric wrapping, but it did nothing to contain the pain, or help the swelling. It was like carrying the world's heaviest weight, only the weight was her arm, and this weight wasn't something she could let go off.

Even just existing was hard.

At school, people were suddenly paying attention to her. Apparently nothing else happened at that damned place that when someone got hurt, for crying out loud, they were thrust irrevocably into the limelight.

She realised soon, though, that the whispers weren't just about the wrist, but its implications. As she walked down the halls, her ears picked up on snippets and fragments.

Attacked.

Boy.

The other day.

Crazy.

Crazy.

Crazy.

Rumours spread like wildfire.

Whatever, she thought.

Nothing really mattered anymore.

She just need to get through these last few months, and pray to God, or whatever divine being there was out there, that her place at Oxford hadn't been compromised.

When the bell hit, she was the first to leave class. As she left the school, her so called class-mates miles behind her, she noticed Darren standing at the gate.

Such a sight elicited nothing out of her.

With her head down, she tried to walked around him.

"Evelyn, wait."

She walked faster.

"Please just wait— I really need to talk to you."

Hiding her hand behind her bag, she stopped. "Can you leave me alone please? I just don't—" She stopped upon seeing his face.

His face was smattered in violent shades of black and blue. His lip, those damn lips that had been pressed so delicately against hers not too long ago, were split and scabbed.

She bit down on her tongue. Hard.

"I don't know what you said, or did, but I wanted to thank you for standing up for me... For doing something I couldn't even do for myself." His voice was rough, and raspy, like he had to push them out lest the words get stuck in his throat.

His neck was an array of purple and blue.

So, so blue.

"Don't thank me. No one deserves to be treated like that."

He shook his head, in some sort of disbelief. "Do you even hear yourself?"

"What do you mean?"

"Why are you hiding your arm like that?"

"I'm not..." She said, pulling her arm a little closer to her chest.

"Let me—"

"It's nothing—"