FEEL

52. Tillid

Tillid ~ humbled by how readily you place your life into the hands of random strangers

~ The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows ~

~°~

A cold wind sliced into my skin, the muffled sound of music and gleeful chatter echoing in the background. Some light traffic sounds also infiltrates my eardrums, a faded honk of a car in the distance. There's a voice in my main focus, one that I don't register until my eyelids drift apart and the dark evening sky comes into view.

“What the hell?” I mumble, barely hearing my own voice.

A male voice, very close to range, exclaims, “She's up! Shit, Aquila you scared us!”

“Get her in the car, Dre. I'm not taking any chances,” another voice calls from ahead.

That voice...

“Breanna?” I had meant to say it louder, but my voice seems to be suppressed by some weight, making it come out in a small whisper.

The sky falls out of my view and I'm placed inside what I soon process is the back of a vehicle. The door shuts and the people outside, one of which I think is Breanna, exchange a few words. Then, the front door opens and one of them enters the driver's seat. It is Breanna, I conclude when I catch a flash of honey blonde braids in the rear view.

“What's going on?” I then ask her, “How did I get here?”

She replies, while buckling up, “You were drugged.”

My full voice returns, “Drugged?!”

“Or that's what I suspect.” The car starts to move. “I found you unconscious in Leon's arms some five minutes ago, and he claims that he found you in the hallways already unconscious, but I don't believe him. He has some accusations on him when it comes to girls in parties, so I don't trust his ass one bit. God, Aquila, what the fuck are you doing here?”

I frown. “I don't know...”

She finds my gaze in the rare view mirror. Noting my expression, her tense brows soften. “Do you remember anything before you fainted?”

I try to recall what might have led me up to here. Everything comes together in that very second, like it had never been gone.

I was planning to have Cameron drive me to Breanna's, but he was so sick this morning that I woke up to him vomiting in the bathroom. After making him a vegetable broth and a banana - which he couldn't even look at without grimacing in discomfort (strange, because there wasn't a single fruit he didn't like), he dozed off and I decided against telling him that I would go to Breanna's by myself because I knew he would insist on driving me.

Although, my luck seemed on a bad streak, because she wasn't in her dorm at campus and some guy who knew her let me know that she was at a frat party, and even drove me there as he and his friends were on their way there.

“I remember coming in with that guy from your school who told me you were at the party,” I say when the memory clarifies, “After that, nothing.”

Breanna grits her teeth. “That bastard. If we get to the hospital and I find out that he did anything to you, I'll make him pay myself, I swear to God. Do you feel okay?”

I take a moment to assess myself intently. “I think so. Just a little dizzy.”

“We're almost at the hospital. You're talking well, but when we get there, I want you to try walking, okay?”