boundaries | e.d

S i x

"I'll do it! I swear!" He screams in my ear, rattling my soul with his voice.

"Let me go!" I scream, damaging my voice from the power. I'm surrounded by darkness, and for a second, I'm convinced this is death. The light turns on, revealing an unfamiliar room to me while I blink away the brightness.

"You're awake," Ethan breathes, looking down at my ruined clothes. "You fainted on the way in." He whispers to me, rubbing the dirt off his hands against the fabric of his jeans.

The memory of our escape comes back to me, "How long was I out?" I hoarsely reply, having no voice left in me to speak.

"Only a few minutes." He whispers back, looking up at the door next to me. It takes a minute for me to realize I'm laid down on the floor with a pillow beneath me. "The showers on." He speaks again, but I continue to stare at the door he nodded towards, worried about my brother, mourning over Louie, blaming myself - it's all too much. "Riley, you need to shower."

I nod with an unsteady breath, swallowing the lump in my throat before I turn back to him. "Okay." I blankly say, blinking a few times. Every time my eyes close, I'm cursed with another memory. Louie's brains on the floor. Ronaldo pressing a gun to my head. My knees in the blood of a dead friend.

"Okay." He says back, reaching for my hand as he stands up. I hold his palm for strength to lift myself to my feet. "You're bruised." He mumbles once I'm standing before him. Without having anything left to say to him, he looks away from the gun imprint on my head and pulls me towards the bathroom. Every blink leads to another flashback, which leads to less strength out of me. I was the reason for all of this, and at any moment - his gang will find me here.

"Here," He opens the glass door to his shower "If it gets too hot just turn the nob to the right, and if you need anything else just let me know." He turned the nob slightly, feeling the water before putting a towel on the sink counter.

"T-thanks." I hiccuped, slowly unraveling from the constant images in my mind. He notices I'm overwhelmed, turning himself towards me completely.

"Listen, you're safe now with me. I'm not gonna let anyone touch you." He rubbed my arm up and down slowly, smiling to reassure me. My eyes kept looking everywhere besides his, knowing I'd break if I did so.

"B-but Ryder, and Nat, and Louie-" I started crying looking down, embarrased at how much of a baby I was acting.

"Riles, look at me." I hesitantly lifted my head, afraid of the affect his hazel orbs will have on me. "You need to worry about yourself right now. You're drenched in blood. Please, just shower." His eyes coax me more and more into calming down, the exact opposite of what I thought they'd do to me.

I nodded, trembling subtly and he slowly slid his hands off of me and walked towards the door, sighing. This entire time we've been together, not a scared bone portrayed through his body. He was eerily calm through it all, only ever showing concern over my frantic body.

I looked at myself in the mirror and felt a hand clench around my heart, squeezing the soul from me. The sight of me was so bizarre, disgusting, and disturbing - my mind couldn't handle it. I shook my head and slowly removed my clothes to step into the shower. The water begins to wash away the remains of Louie, cleansing me of the memories it filled me with. Every drop of blood that rolled off my smooth skin, drained away with the images that haunted me. I closed my eyes and soaked in the heat, turning the knob more so that it'd calm my muscles and ease my shaking. The cleaner I became, the less my anxiety constricted me of the air in my lungs. I was suddenly able to breath, to think, to somehow change. The memories were in a sense, strengthening me the more I thought of them as a trauma. The gun was pressed against Bambi's head and brought back Riley.