Chapter 6 | Stars Are Nothing Without Darkness
[Song of choice: Zola Jesus // Skin]
In and out. Black and colour. Black again. There was a hand around my throat, another up my skirt, tugging impatiently. The zipper broke at some point. Cold air cast a spell on my shivering thighs, freezing them together. I recall movement: my legs dragging bonelessly, my toes scraping a carpet, a mattress sinking under my weight. I remember a weight on my chest, too forceful to be Ralph's, too heavy to be Tate's. I remember puking on a mattress and a stinging blow to my cheek. I remember sprinting to the bathroom and locking myself inside as heavy limbs bulldoze the door down.
"Get out, you bitch. Come back in 'ere and clean up the mess you've made!"
My fingers move beneath me, a fingernail here, a knuckle there. I'm floating around the room in bits and pieces. Gravity no longer exists. Smack! I fall. The tiled floor scrapes my bruised cheek and I weep into my palms, blindedly patting the floor in search of my phone. My nails scrape the tiles and I see red, watery lines.
"Clean up your vomit or I'm coming in!"
"Leath me alone!" I wail, my limbs shaking on the floor like a rattling skeleton. I curl my fingers around my phone and fumble with the screen, watching liquid light spill out and blind me. "What dith you du to me?" I shriek as my mouth droops and my eyelids spasm.
Black and white square patches float by as if I'm watching a slideshow of optical illusions. I must be tripping. I've never taken acid before. Whatever this is, whatever is inside my head right now isn't made from colour. It's dark around the corners and the toilet has detached itself from the floor and is floating over my head. I scream for help.
"Come out of the bathroom, whore!"
I cry harder, ringing the first number and hoping I've speed dialled Sam's number and not Jack's.
"Roses are red, violets are blue, I seem to be busy, too bad for you," Sam's automated voice sings to me. I close my eyes and heave a racking sob. My chest widens into the size of a canyon, filled cold with fear. My fingers stumble over the shimmering screen, stabbing the next person on speed dial.
"Oh, so now you decide to pick up? I've been calling you nonstop for the past hour," a deep voice drawls. I clamp a hand over my mouth to muffle a whimper at the sound of a chair striking the bathroom door. "Honestly, Holly. Rani told me everything that happened so don't try to play innocent anymore. I mean, what were you thinking? What do you have against her? Just because she's famous or a Remington it doesn't mean that she doesn't get enough shit as it is from the media. Stop making her life miserable just because you're miserable with yours. Everyone has it hard. You're not the only one who-"
"Jack?" I cry into the receiver. "S-Sumfin is wronth with me. I can't. . . I can't feel my fayth." I yelp when the door handle rattles and another booming crash sounds. "Fuck! Jack, you've goth to helth me!"
He stops short, suddenly attentive. "Holly?"
My voice cracks. "I-I don'th know whereth I am."
Jack curses loudly and another sleepy voice comes in. "Is that her?"
To which he replies, "Something's wrong. She's never this far gone. Hold on a sec. Holly, are you still there?"
"Jack, I-I think he's going to kill me-" I jump up when an armchair strikes the door again, followed by a ground-shaking roar.
"What the hell was that?" Jack demands. I lower my phone and stare at it. It doubles and triples, wavers and trembles, refracts into a rainbow and reforms back into a solid. "Holly? Are you still there?"
