The Alloys

Rufus

Rufus Redmond groaned and propped his pillow up, having given up on sleep a long time ago. His phone glowed with a message notification, lighting up his bedside table.

Everything on top of it served an important purpose. If an item didn't make the cut, it was demoted to one of the drawers, or possibly the dustbin beside the table. This habit had existed since his childhood. It may have had something to do with the fact that he was a student at one of the strictest private schools in Birmingham. And perhaps the whole of Europe. They'd demanded identically organized desks, among many other things, and whoever failed to have his or her desk in pristine condition during random inspections would be made to spend the next three hours in the small, drafty, closet that sat alongside his or her classroom. He had never been a victim of this punishment, but once word got out among parents, his own, horrified, immediately pulled him out of the school. He now attended the nearby state-funded school with much laxer rules, but the habit still stuck.

The top of his desk hosted his battered old laptop, his notebook, and, of late, ...an earth-emblazoned stress ball. Yes, it had been his mother's idea of a joke, and yes, he was the last person anyone would think needed one, but it helped him. He would never admit it in a thousand years, but he might even need it.

Now more than ever.

He tried not to even acknowledge that he'd gotten it. Yes, he knew it was unhealthy, but he most certainly did not want to be reacquainted to the emotions he'd felt while reading it. Every part of him had felt raw, as if he'd been dipped in a vat of acid. His instincts had told him to run, fight, do something! But, of course, there was nowhere to run, no one to fight, and nothing to do. The description could refer to anyone, he told himself. They're coming for you. His heart skipped a beat as he read that line. But, of course, that must have been the very purpose. This was clearly a prank. Some sadistic kid with a fancy vocabulary had decided that he was pathetic enough to believe all this. Which he wasn't. Obviously.

So why are you keeping it?
Because it's funny.
Keeping you up all night makes it funny?
It's just a bit weird.
Because it's real.
No, it's not.
Then throw it away.
Fine!

He got out of bed, and sharply pulled open the bottom drawer. There it was, crumpled up at the back corner. For some reason, he'd expected it to have magically unfurled itself or something. It was just a normal piece of paper, the product of an absurdly specific prank. He picked it up, still crumpled, and tossed it in the nearby dustbin. He then proceeded to lightly shake the dustbin, such that the contents (comprised mainly of paper) reordered themselves. It was nowhere in sight now.

He got back in bed, laying his pillow flat and pulling his comforter back up.

You should be able to sleep now, then.
I'm going to.
But you're not tired.
I am practically dozing off at this moment.
You want to look at it again, don't you?
Please just shut up.

With another groan, he propped up his pillow again, back to square one. After a moment of silent contemplation, he reached over his bedside table to sift through the trash can and grab it. In his other hand, he picked up his stress ball.

With a deep breath, his right hand smoothened out the paper, and he began reading again, while his left hand fervently squeezed the earth ball.

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A/N: So...I've come back to this story after more than a year. My friend advised me to post another part, which, at first, seemed laughable, but I reread my single previous part. It wasn't so bad. It was...workable. So this happened. Thank you so much for reading! Please let me know what you think.