Burn With Me (updating slowly)

Chapter 4

I have never been one to be a big party girl. Growing up with rules and regulations made by people you were forced to live with makes the parties better but it doesn't make them good.

My first experience partying was when Craig snuck me out of the orphanage late one night. I was 15 and hadn't ever had a taste of alcohol beforehand in my life so to say I was nervous would be a complete and utter understatement.

Terrified, seems like a more appropriate word for the situation.

With Craig being 18 at the time and already knowing some people who got him in the situation he is in today, he knew that no one would question my age.

So, me being my quiet self at the time, decided to be daring and to get away from my bland life for one night. I was feeling rebellious, I felt like I was enjoying my childhood for once instead of becoming 'Annie' from the musical Annie. The story of an orphan girl who just wanted a family. I wasn't that girl.

I wouldn't allow myself to be that girl.

So with my new found determination in mind, we headed out to the party.

I remember the feel of my blood that pumped through my body as soon as I entered the building, Craig holding onto my upper arm pressing me as close to him as possible. I remember the looks I had got from perverted men as they looked me up and down, God knows what they were thinking and I never want to find out just what. That was the first rule I learnt that night. I remembered the heat of the bodies hit mine as if I had just felt wildfire for the first time.

It was truly and completely intoxicating.

I was sure that by the time I had grown more comfortable around the strangers that, most of them were too drunk to even remember their name and that they probably couldn't see a thing without it blurring and them tipping over, in some way or another.

I guess that's what made it so intoxicating to be there. Knowing that the hot guy who was dancing with you didn't give a damn about your problems or even your own name. You were just there in the moment, dancing, there were no labels, no judgements, you just were.

But it can also be unnervingly dangerous.

When you enter an intoxicated room where most of the occupants are college and university students drowning in their youth, there were the odd few who wanted more. Physically and mentally. And they would go to any lengths to get what they wanted, no matter the race, gender or sexuality.

So, me being my naive self, had no idea of this at the time. But Craig did and he made sure to keep me within arms distance, even when we broke apart to join dancing partners. One moment he was dancing with a hot girl a few feet away, the next he was within touching distance with said hot girl. At the time, I found it extremely strange and a little overbearing, but I learnt to trust Craig over the years together. I had almost become his puppet in training and he became the master, pulling the strings. I now know it was for my own good. The night I was at my first club was the night I learnt to trust Craig completely, no questions asked.

I remember being quite tipsy, I could still stand on my own two feet but my eyesight was becoming more blurry the more I drank, the beat of the song playing in the background as I danced with a college student, a few years my senior.

I never caught his name.

This college student had noticed that Craig was protective of me, he took it as a challenge, a challenge he needed to conquer. So after half an hour of dancing, with Craig being more relaxed with my new dance partner, the college student had pulled me in the direction of the fire exit and me, being my inexperienced self-thought he had left something in the alleyway of the club. So I followed him, no questions asked.