Fever Dream Red

58

We were all pretty much pushed out of the room. Inez pulled me and Danny with her into the gardens.

Now was the perfect time to ask my question. But Inez asked it first.

"What actually happened?"
"What?"
"When you tried to escape, you idiot! What happened? You never told us." Inez seemed irritated, which I found a bit odd.

What happened at the dinner party thing that made her annoyed? I was there the whole time next to her and nobody said anything to her.

Maybe she had just realised Danny's dishonesty like me.

"Well." Danny swallowed before continuing. "What is there to say?"
"There's a hell of a lot to say Danny!"
"What's brought this on?"
"Just tell us, Danny!" I pitched in.
"Fine."

Danny hesitated several times before starting.

"Me and Zack decided to escape. We tried to escape, but we were caught by Nick and I was placed in a cell."
"What happened to Zack?"
"How should I know?"
"Do you not care?" I asked him, disgust probably littering my face.
"About Zack?"
"He could be anywhere!" Inez piped up. "Did you see Skye just then? They were in tears that their brother is nowhere to be seen. Do you even care?"
"Of course I do but-"
"You are the last person to see Zack. Do you have absolutely no idea where he went?"
"Sorry. Everything just happened so fast!"

Inez stared at him, a deep look of betrayal contorted with rage.

She had been brave to expect anything better from him.

I could feel bad for Skye, and part of me still did. But I was all too aware of what they did. They would never be the same to me. Part of their image would always be skewed with their hideous crime and their dumb reason for doing it.

So I could feel sad, but it felt like true karma watching them cry.

Why should they be happy when Fae and Lily weren't?

It was only what Skye had done to them. How could they complain?

"So this is what it's about is it? Making Skye cry?" Danny almost yelled. "They literally killed someone!"
"Don't be so loud! What if the others hear?" Inez frantically tried to quieten Danny.
"Do you hear yourself? Why do you care so much about Skye? They deserve this to happen to them. What goes around comes around."

Inez shut her mouth, mostly because she probably couldn't think of anything to counter Danny's argument.

"If that's it." I excused myself and went to bed.

My head was tired and I was pretty sure a storm of a headache was heading my way. The makeup felt heavy and enclosing on my face. I wanted nothing better than to be rid of it.

I also wanted a proper nights sleep. The bed at The Base was beyond comfortable. I couldn't wait to be in its grasp. I had grown tired of sleeping in cars and sharing beds between crushes.

So I sat in front of the mirror in my sleek bathroom and slowly started to rub the beauty off of me with water. It ran down the drain, turning into some kind of indescribable sludge now that it was off of my face.

It was a sort of ritual I had developed. It was theraputic to watch how my face devolved from a flashy visage into myself.

It was sad how I preferred my mirage over my own face, but I couldn't deny it.

I sat there studying my face again, willing myself to give up but finding myself unable to.

I sighed at my pitiful reflection and gave up on hating myself for the day. I dipped my face in the cold water, jolting my body awake for a few seconds until my body realised just how long it had been awake.

I then slipped off the pretty red dress, disowning it to the floor. I put on my pyjamas like a dead zombie, stumbling my way to me bed.

I didn't fall in it. I simply pulled the cover of the duvet open and invited myself into the cool fabric. It would quickly warm up with me inside, however cold my heart felt.

I slipped into the dystopia of dreams and it welcomed me back. My journeys with it lately had been rocky, but now I hoped it would all calm down.

I woke up in the middle of the night to thudding. I came back to reality slowly, but when I had landed back with much sadness I could hear voices. It took me a while to make them out.

"Where is she?"
"Eli!"
"I asked you a question!"
"I can't tell you!"
"Why?"
"Goodness knows what you will do!"
"Of course! What do you expect? She's the whole reason Zoe is going to be taken away from me!"
"Without Lily Zoe would be dead!"
"Without Lily Zoe wouldn't be married off!"
"You should be grateful! This is how you repay her?"
"Yes. It is. Nobody but Zoe has been made better because of you!"
"Really."
"Yes. Danny was locked up for a while. Zack still is. Let's face it: it's not looking too good for him. He could be dead in a ditch for all we know. Finny, Sunny, Doug, Alfie and Skye were so desperate they escaped. They did come back, but that's just because of their overwhelming stupidity. Inez was in pieces over it. And me and Mimi have been used to do all of your dirty work!"
"It's their own fault."

Eli wasn't done pushing Nick.

"You're a pushover. Inez forced you to show Danny to you. Skye wacked you unconscious with little consequences."
"Shut u-"
"They escaped, Nick! You have no power here. A murder was committed."
"And I am working to solve it."
"I already know."

A silence arrived, and I could sense the atmosphere thicken. You could almost hear Eli in his mind cursing himself.

Nick was desperate.

"Eli. Tell me."