Lady of Light #Wattys2016

Chapter 2

I had only gotten about an hour or so of semi-dozing sleep when the small thump woke me, so I was understandably a bit confused. At first, I just shrugged it off. I thought Lissa was moving around and had woken me up by knocking into something or dropping something. Then the truth penetrated the fog of sleep I was hovering in: my roommate was already gone.

I was completely awake in an instant, adrenaline pounding through my veins, heart racing. I didn't know how anyone would have gotten in my room, but they were going to regret it. How I was supposed to make them regret it was something I hadn't quite worked out yet. A small part of me was sort of frustrated. I had already had a terrible day, and it kept getting worse. This was the icing on the cake with a terrible exam, a lonely dorm room, and wanting to go home. I silently shut that part of me up since it tended to produce tears.

I mostly just really wished that David was here to take care of me. Having a boyfriend that was trained in self defense and built like a linebacker meant that you rarely got catcalled on public transport when you were out together. The few who did usually regretted it the instant they realized that the dark haired bodybuilder sort standing next to me was willing to tie their arms in a knot for comments like that. Even though he never would have done so. Probably.

All of this flashed through my mind in barely a moment, along with a torrent of swearing that I had to bite my lip to keep to myself. As it did, both of my arms shot uncoordinatedly in the direction that I hoped the intruder was so that I could hit them. My intent was primarily to distract, I needed to get to my phone, which was hidden in the blankets somewhere, and call the police. Unfortunately, before I could find my attacker, my wrists were caught in the iron grip of someone much larger and stronger than me. I could tell from the size and shape of the hands around my wrists that my intruder was male. This was not going very well. A flash of fear ran through me and I began fighting the grip, instinctively twisting, turning, and jerking my wrists in different, occasionally painful directions until I heard a familiar husky voice whisper,

"Stop that!" I froze. It couldn't be.

"David?" I whispered in shock.

"Yeah, it's me," he confirmed, sounding vaguely pleased. That tipped me over the edge. All that adrenaline needed an outlet, and it had found one.

"What are you doing here? In the middle of the night no less. Could you not have warned me you were coming? Or perhaps come during the daytime? I'm exhausted and haven't slept for hardly any time, thanks to you. If you are here to either pick me up or visit me, please don't wake me up by giving me heart failure," I knew I was being slightly unfair, but he had caught me at a bad time and had terrified me. "I can't believe you didn't warn me, I thought you'd crept in here to murder me in my bed or even worse! That was probably one of the most terrifying moments of my life! Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going back to sleep." I began to turn over, but was still unable to get my wrists out of David's grip.

"I.." he stopped, "Sofie, you're in terrible danger. I have to get you away from here. If I don't, some horrible people are going to try to kidnap you," his voice had the sound of someone who knew they were plunging head on into some sort of disaster but knew that it was the only way though whatever was happening. The tone shook me out of my exhaustion and rage leaving me with the remnants of my fear.

"Nice try," I said shakily. I was starting to be scared again myself, this was getting out of control so very quickly. I almost believed him- I had never heard him sound so scared before. But I couldn't. People out to get me? That went far past the realm of believable. I'm a 19 year old college student. Things like this don't happen to "normal" college students. They just don't. I was so confused, and didn't understand what he hoped to achieve with this. Was it a practical joke? If so, it was a truly terrible one.