fire starter | l.s [1]

twenty-two

I had barely slept a wink, which isn't something new. Ever since the break-out of IAAN, sleeping was a challenge. When my teacher had first my class, I was eleven. A boy in that class, Jayden Greene, had fainted in the middle of a maths lesson. At first, we laughed, we thought he had just fallen over. But then his body started to violently shake on the floor and the class broke out into loud screams. That night, I cried until I couldn't breathe, I was so terrified.

However, the current reason I couldn't sleep was that my brain wasn't doing a good job at processing the new information I had gotten. Hybrid. Red. My fingers trembled all night, no matter how hard I tried to get them to stay still. I wanted to let out a frustrated cry many times throughout the night but I restrained myself, not wanting to draw any more attention to myself. It was quite obvious I was well known, judging by the lingering stares I had gotten for the duration last night. Though, I was wearing a fancy black dress.

When the sun had finally broken through the dark night sky, I climbed out of my bunk. Pulling on my boots and a hoodie, I exited the tent. Already, the campus was full of teenagers running around, holding buckets of food and clipboards. A group of boys dressed in black were coming from the outskirts of the woods, each carrying a rifle. Their boots hit the ground in sync as they dragged their tired bodies past me, the faces emotionless. I turned my head slowly, watching as the disappeared into the showers. As I turned back around, I crashed into somebody, ramming my head into their chin.

"Well, good morning to you too," Liam groaned, holding his jaw in his hand.

"Crap, I'm so sorry," I quickly replied, bringing my hand to his chin.

"Hey, chill out," Liam smiled, bringing his hands to cup my jaw, "You sleep okay?"

"Yuh huh," I responded, smiling slightly, "What about you?"

"Like a baby," he offered a side smile before twisting his arm around my shoulders, "You hungry?"

"Starved," I reply, looking down at my stomach and patting it gently with one of my hands.

"Well, let's go eat," Liam pressed a small kiss to my temple as he guided me towards another tent.

Under it sat a long wooden table lined with bowls, plates, and cutlery. Another wooden table nearby had large bowls filled with freshly sliced fruit. Clancy was walking along the tables, Caroline following closely behind with a clipboard clutched between her fingers. As we neared the tent, she welcomed us with a warm smile, quite the opposite of what Clancy was doing. He had his arms folded across his chest and his eyebrows were furrowed, not even a hint of a smile on his lips.

Liam took his arm away from my shoulders, picking up one of the ceramic bowls. Clancy was quick to disappear, his tall figure disappearing into a crowd of teenagers. Focusing back on the food, I grabbed a bowl and started piling the various types of fruit into it. We soon found ourselves sitting at another wooden table, joined by a few other kids.

"Morning, lovebirds," Chubs greeted as he slid next to Liam, holding his own bowl of fresh produce.

"Good morning Charles," Liam replied, leaning over to peck Chub's on the cheek, but Chubs was quick to realise what was going on and slapped Liam square in the nose, "Um, ow? Why are my two lovers being so abusive today."

I let out a quiet laugh and reached over Liam to get a high-five from Chubs, "Nice one."

"Now you're ganging up on me? Just say you hate me and go," Liam huffed, throwing his hands up.

"I hate you," Chubs replied flatly.

Both Liam and I turned our heads towards him. The dark-skinned teenager didn't show even a hint of amusement on his face. But when I pressed my lips together, trying to stop myself my smiling, Chub's did the same.