By Chance | Book One |

Chapter Twenty Two

Lyra

I sat on the bed with the black comforter, my legs crossed under me and a blanket wrapped around my shoulders.

After looking at the pictures around the room, I soon came to realise this navy blue room was River's bedroom. There was quite a bit black furniture and decor around the room and pictures of him with Teddy and Sasha. With his parents, and brother.

There was a tv on the wall across from the bed and a few chairs in front of it, along with a fireplace.

The door opened and River walked in with his Football coach.

"You guys go have fun. I got this." He told his friends and I reassured both my friends that I'd be okay.

River came out to me as his coach sat on the chair in front of the tv. "Are you able to move to the chair?" His voice was low, and he sounded incredibly disinterested and done with this.

I didn't respond and sat in the other chair.

"I'm James, Lyra. How are you feeling?"

"My face hurts, so does my head." He grabbed a q-tip and wet it with someone out of a clear spray bottle before gently tapping along the scratch marks. "Her talons got me."

James chuckled. "You get attacked and you're cracking jokes."

"Worse things could have happened. How bad is it?"

He grabbed another q-tip and wet it before doing the same thing again. "I think it will heal fine, Lyra. You won't have a scar by the looks of things."

River stood off to the side. Leaning against the wall, his arms crossed over his chest. It seemed like this wasn't his first time taking care of Emily's mess or whoever Emily has chosen to fuck with.

"Thank you."

James gave me a smile and continued to clean the scratches. They stung a bit as he touched them as gently as he could.

"So who was it?"

"Emily." River answered for me.

Any buzz I had was now gone thanks to Emily attacking me. I felt sober, my body numb other than my face.

"I would have thought you'd taken her home?" He raised a brow. He put some sort of cool gel on my scratches, providing some relief form the stinging."Should heal soon enough."

"Thank you." I whispered.

"Did she do anything else?" He cleaned up the small mess he had made.

"She got a couple hits to my jaw, maybe one to my nose."

"Your head didn't hit the floor?"

I shook my head.

He nodded. "Stay up for the night just to make sure. You can sleep in the morning."

Great.

It's not that I would get any sleep, I never take my sleeping pills when I drink. Sleeping more than a couple hours without them was rare anyway.

"Alright." I nodded and grabbed the bottle of water River brought up. "Thank you."

"If you don't feel well you can call me and I'll be right over. We don't live far from here." He handed me a small piece of paper with his number on it. 

River walked him out and I bolted for his bathroom. Closing the door quietly, I looked at the long scratch mark on my face. I was more sober now and it hit me hard.

There was no way these weren't going to scar.

I stared at them a while longer until there was a knock at the bathroom door. "Williams?"