THE ORANGE GIRL

chapter two

Friday, 23rd October 2015

5:00PM | Delilah Woman's Prison

You are free to go, Miss L/N. May your new life never bring you back here again.

That was the moment you decided that the words new life were the grandest understatement of the entire three years that you spent cooped up between cement barriers. It should have been much longer than a measly thirty-six months, the sentence was not even meant to be considered, it was always supposed to be a rope around your neck and your feet giving way beneath you, or a rifle firing square at the centre of your forehead, or maybe even a chair that charges so much electricity through your limbs that your heart can only do one thing – stop, entirely still. But they let you off easy in exchange for secrets that are now nothing more than white noise surrounding your every single thought, a haze of what once was there, cotton stuffed into your ears.

Tilting your chin in farewell at the guard as you walked past him, you glanced down at your arms covered in thick grey wool. Such an unusual, even uncomfortable contrast to the orange that you were so used to seeing brush at your ankles and roll up to your elbows, which you had called home for so long. You were not too sure what home was anymore. A thought of running back into the prison and begging to be thrown into your cell once again crossed your mind before the end of a baton was pressed to the middle of your spine, prodding you forward with a move along, inmate.You further entertained yourself with the idea of twisting on your heel and screaming profanities in his face that would certainly have your wrists pinned behind your back and the familiar orange slipping back over your head until your ears pricked at the sound of feet shifting against gravel. Not your own, not the guard; somebody else.

"Hello again, Y/N."

The voice was soft as it rolled off a smile that had you a little breathless. You were not sure if it were because of his handsomeness, or because he was the first person you had seen without a gun slung across his black and blue chest and a taser at his hip. The man standing before a sleek black Chevrolet was beautiful in a peculiar way, tall with a fringe that bordered gentle eyes, hands wedged deep into a trench coat rather similar to the one that you wore, but his was settled upon broad shoulders. The peculiarity arose from how oddly familiar he looked, but alike to the rest of your memory, his face was drifting within murky waters, boundaries you have often tried to push only to be swallowed by endless waves of blinding white.

You gazed back at him measuredly, unsure of how to assess the situation. Friend, or foe? Not that it mattered anymore, you would be dead within a day regardless of whether you accepted his advances of opening the passenger side door or not, wordlessly ushering you into a seat of plush pearl leather that had your nose crinkling in distaste. You missed plastic chairs that made your lower back ache, the stone benches you had once watched a girl have her skulled cracked against.

The vehicle rumbled to life and you jumped unexpectedly, flinching away from the vibrations beneath your thighs and the anonymous man acted as though he did not notice. With the tires rolling carefully away on the gravel and not another word being passed, you pressed your nose to the window and gazed with wide eyes at the barbed wire fences that had kept you captive for so long, watching after it almost longingly as the road petered out into the forest that surrounded the vicinity, nothing but the silence following you.

You decided to wait before you asked any questions, patience was something you had become well accustomed to in the past few years. Instead, you focused on the canopies of green that melted together in the blur of driving at ninety kilometres, how the leafy formation slid across the sky and allowed pockets of brief, golden sunlight to filter through onto the bracken and twisted roots below. It had been terribly long since you had seen anything but cement and metal and wire, it almost felt like an entirely new world was blooming before your eyes, opening its arms and welcoming you back. But you did not know how long you would be returning for.

After a countless amount of minutes, maybe even hours, you found that your voice was creeping up to your lips. It felt as though you were screaming to your own ears, but you knew that the sentence only drifted around a whisper.

"Why did you say again?"

"Hm?"

You finally dragged your gaze away from the beautifully thick trunks that lined the winding road, swallowing you further into the seemingly never-ending forest. "When you greeted me, you said hello again. Is this not the first time we have met?"

The man looked slightly taken aback for a moment, but the expression was fleeting, passing with a kind chuckle that had you thinking maybe he is not so dangerous after all. "Ah, Y/N. Did three years really fade your memory that much, or are you up to your usual tricks? Spending that long in confinement clearly did not drain you of your sense of fun."

When Seokjin took his eyes off the road for a second to glance at you from your lack of response, he felt ice slide through his veins at your entirely vacant gaze. You had always been effortless when it came to maintaining a particular façade, completely convincing, so it was difficult for him to tell whether you were simply toying with him, or if the fears that had bloomed as he drove to the prison - that he did not dare to consult with Yoongi - were beginning to flower the truth. You curiously noticed the way his knuckles were beginning to whiten with his tight grip on the steering wheel, facial features contorting into an array of emotions until he finally settled upon a thin smile.

"Clearly," You at long last huffed, relaxing back into the seat and folding your arms, resuming your initial view of the trees blurring by. Seokjin seemed to calm slightly at your sudden casual demeanour. "It is rather difficult to remember particular faces when you see the same ones every single day for such a time. Though to be honest, I wouldn't have minded if a beautiful face like yours was my guard instead."

There it is, he thought with unexpected relief at your unabashed compliment. It sounded more like you, less airy than you had been acting ever since the pair of you met eyes, the unruly charm finally seeping through the cracks with confidence. Seokjin found himself grinning as the worries slipped from between his fingers, his tense shoulders loosening as the weight of concern was lifted. You were right, it had been an awfully long time spent in confinement, and his face was not a common appearance in your life beforehand anyway – only his name.

"Kim Seokjin, but my friends call me Jin," He offered as the forest began to dwindle into the outskirts of a city. You could not recall how long it had been since the drive began, and glancing at the clock on the dashboard was no use since you did not know the time that you stepped out of the prison. All you knew was that the sun was now beginning to set upon the skyscrapers in the distance, and when you had been buckled into the car, it was still shining brilliantly in the light blue sky above.

"And are we friends?"

He mulled over your question, taking a left turn and then another, before his eyebrows drew together and his fingers drummed against the wheel. "No, we most certainly are not."

You should have felt a chill run up your spine, a sense of panic overwhelming your thoughts, but you experienced nothing but pacific acceptance. There was no use in being concerned, no point in wondering about your fate, as you had already acknowledged that you most likely were not going to make it through the day anyway. Your suspicions were further confirmed when Seokjin suddenly pulled the car up into a carpark situated outside of a rundown motel, all the lots abandoned save for one that parked a similar Chevrolet in steel grey. Barely stifling a chuckle at the melodramatic scene, you looked over to the man, the stranger with a name, who was gazing back at you with a soft smile.

"Although it were only for a few hours, it was lovely seeing you again," Seokjin murmured, reaching over and tucking a strand of hair behind your ear before he unbuckled his seatbelt and exited the vehicle.

Your inquisitive eyes followed his figure, coloured dull orange and oncoming blue with the memory of the sun upon the skyline, as he walked around the bonnet of the car and to your side. The door swung open as you clicked at your seat buckle, taking his open palm with your own and allowing him to guide you to the entrance of the motel that reeked with the scent of your death. His voice hummed chillingly low.

"Good luck, and may your new life never bring you back here again."