1 | ONE BREATH | MINIMINTER ✔️

FOURTEEN

FOURTEEN
d a l l a s

The next day, Dallas didn't feel the slightest bit tired. In fact, she felt an abundance of energy that was most unusual for someone who only had two hours sleep. The hours after she hung up on Simon were spent staring at the darkness above her as she lay in bed, just dreaming of her future or if she even had a future because, in that moment, the bottom of the pool seemed most inviting.

Those thoughts alone would have kept her awake on any other night, but combined with the shifting features in her life there was no chance of her sleeping.

So as she sat beside Violet at the lunch table, she was surprised by her own energy as she chatted away to Violet with a grin.

"Don't look now," Violet says, her voice low. "But here comes James with Allison hanging off his arm."

Of course, Dallas looks.

Violet rolls her eyes. "Don't be mad, but I've heard that they're dating. Guess she finally got her claws into him, huh?" Dallas' lack of response worries her. "Look, it's a downgrade, let's be real here."

That gets a smirk out of Dallas. "You're right," She hums, taking a sip out of her water bottle as James and Allison approach the table. With her hand in James', Allison wears a smug smirk as they sit down side by side opposite Dallas and Violet.

Dallas says nothing. She just pulls her hand through the ends of her hair, busying herself with it.

"Hi guys!" Allison pipes up, smiling cheerily. But it looked wrong on her plastic face, beneath the layer of poppy red lipstick. A liar hidden behind a mask.

"Hi," Violet grumbles in response, tuning out immediately.

"Please don't look so smug, Al, it's not flattering," Dallas says, her fingers curling around her bottle and her eyes flickering between James and Allison for a moment. Her eyes linger on James slightly longer, but then they turn to Allison with an element of mischief and with an intent devoid of care for her former friend's feelings.

"Excuse me?" Allison squeaks.

"You know what else isn't flattering?" Dallas continues, gesturing to Allison with her water bottle and a provocative tone lacing her words like icing to a cake. "Being fake."

"Are you calling me fake?"

Dallas lets out a loud laugh, rocking backwards on her seat slightly. "Are you fucking stupid? Of course I'm calling you fake!" She exclaims. "You call yourself my best friend and yet you were sleeping with my boyfriend behind my back. You would do anything to get to the top, Al, even if it meant using us as a stepping stool. You're fake as fuck and I hope James sees that because even if I don't love him anymore, I sure as hell don't want to see him getting used by you."

Allison's mouth falls open. "How dare you say that about me. You're about as fake as it gets with your lies. I don't think you've said a word of truth in five years."

Dallas stands up, her fingers clenching harder around the bottle. Breathing in, she pulls her bag over her shoulder with all eyes on her and Allison as they argued. "Of all the things you could have called me, you chose to call me a liar. And with no evidence too! You just called me that because you knew I would hate it. You know exactly why I hate it too and yet you still accused me. You're disgusting."

Before Allison can respond with another one of her shrieks, Dallas turns and leaves the canteen with whispers all around her. Circling above her head, clouding around her and suffocating her. Her chest pulls tight and her palms sweat.

Three steps out of the door, she sees him walking the other way. Coming towards her was Simon. Their eyes meet and he frowns at her.

When he's close enough, he stops to ask her if she's ok, but she brushes past him and carries on walking.

Walking, walking all the way home with a lump in her throat and an itch that would not subside until she was in the grasp of the water.

-

And as she lay in the arms of the water, she found herself terrified. Not as a result to the water, but as a result of herself for the last time she had felt like this, she'd missed three weeks of school and gone missing, off the grid. None of her friends heard from her, she barely left the house.

She was sinking.

Sinking back into the pattern she'd tried so hard to pull herself out from, but the tides were strong and she was being dragged back into the state in which her entire self shut down and she became more of a shell than a human being. Awake but not awake, breathing but not breathing, eyes open but eyes closed.

She didn't want to sink anymore, so she tried to swim to the surface, but it was a long way and she was running out of oxygen fast.

How long she could go on was hard to tell.

Time was running out.

-

dallas ;-;