Sweet Revenge

•Chapter 3: Sweet Irritation•

| C h a p t e r  3 |

I open my eyes to see new surroundings.

Where am I?

I'm back to the land of my bad dreams. The same place I've been stuck in for the last three years.

Tonight, I'm haunted by a smile.

His smile.

♕. ♕.♕. ♕.♕. ♕.♕. ♕.♕. ♕.

I'm jolted awake by my phone ringing. It's my mom telling me that she's scheduled to work and that dinner's in the fridge.

My mother is a registered nurse, a job which requires her to be present for her job at odd hours. I've never seen someone as selfless and caring as her. The thought of her warm smile alone is enough to make me feel calm.

I glance at my clock and realize that it's still not that late to go to the gym. I grab my phone, a protein shake, and slip on a pair of running shoes.

The walk to the gym isn't too far, and it warms up my body. Walking straight to the treadmill, I begin running without hesitation, increasing the speed as the belt goes on.

Feeling dissatisfied with the lack of burn in my legs, I walk towards the weights, and that's when I see it.

A punching bag.

The sight of it make me feel giddy. My knuckles start to tingle, almost as if pleading for release, so I pick up some wraps, kept conveniently right next to the bag, carefully but tightly tying the material around my knuckles.

With that, I start. I think of everything and everyone who's brought me down.

I think of him. Punch!

I think of his fake smiles. Punch punch!

I think of my inner demons and I start to punch so much that my body is begging for me to stop.

But I love the pain.

As I'm about to finish, I hear a wolf-whistle from behind me.

"Hot damn! She got a fine ass and she can fight too!"

I can feel him scrutinizing my back side. I throw one more punch at the bag. Take that asswipe! That one's for you!

"Shut up, Linc! Learn how to control your volume. You can be attracted to someone, but yelling it out just makes people uncomfortable as hell."

My body cries in gratitude as I take off the wraps, little bits of blood pooling at my knuckles. I try not think too much about it knowing that if I do, it might set something off in me.

"Dude she's soooo hot though!" He yells, probably to some perverted friend.

Little bitch! That's it. But when I turn around to yell at this guy, I'm met with a set of rock hard abs.

"I was waiting for you to finish. You stole my wraps! And I'm sorry about my friend," exclaims a familiar deep yet calm voice and I instantly feel myself freeze. I knew I'd have to confront him eventually, but not now!

I mumble an apology and being walking away with my head down, praying he doesn't notice. I'm just about to be successful with escaping when I hear the other guy, Linc call out, "Can I have your number hot stuff?"

I don't know if it's adrenaline pumping through me— or my general hatred for men— but I turn around, clutching onto my protein shake tighter and untwisting the lid. I walk up to him giving a sweet smile.

"I hope you like feeling sticky and gross as much as females enjoy being catcalled." 

And with that, I dump the contents of the bottle on him and storm off.

As I'm exiting the gym, I hear the sound of footsteps behind me.

"WAIT! You have to stop," a voice shouts, "I need to know your name because what you did back there was legendary and I've been waiting a long time for someone to talk some damn sense into him!" And with that, he turns me around so I'm face-to-face with him. He's flashing me one of his million-dollar grins.

As he stares into my eyes, I can almost see the recognition flash through him.

"A-Ashley," he says breathlessly.

I can feel my heart racing at a million miles a minute. I do what seems the most logical at that moment and shove him out of the way into a nearby wall, sprinting back home as if my life depends on it.