Stained

Chapter 11

Nonononono. This can't be happening. How can I be so stupid! He knows now, he knows. I can feel the ground shake beneath me, opening up, ready to swallow me whole. And I want it to. Anticipate it.

But it doesn't.

I cant look up from the ground, my eyes seem to be glued to it. How do I explain this? I feel like slapping myself. It's too late to be angry at myself though. Damiens seen the cuts and scars on my arm, there's no going back. Maybe I can run? But he's bombarding my way. Dammit.

"What the fuck..." he breaths out.

I practically have to tare my eyes off the ground, that's how much power my fear has over me. Whatever I feel from the realisation, it's gone within seconds because of the look on Damien's face.

I push him away with my left hand seeing as though I've sprained my right one. He moves back and before he can do or say anything I turn my back on him and get my jumper out of my locker. I need to hide my arm like I always do. Only a few have accidentally glimpsed my arm — my sleeve either rolled up or I forgot to pull it back down after rolling it up — but only a maximum of five people have seen it with fresh cuts and scars.

He's probably judging me, thinking I'm an attention seeker or whatever other mean things people think when they don't understand why people self-harm.

My sprained wrist is making it difficult to put my jumper on and not Damien staring down at me like he's trying to burn a hole into me. After a minute of struggling in extremely awkward silence, Damien startles the life out of me when he suddenly spins me around. Ignoring my shock and glare, he keeps his eyes pinned on my arm as he grabs it and gently leads it into the sleeve. I keep my eyes trained on him the entire time, trying and failing to gauge his expression. He's like a robot with the way he shows no emotion. I feel a weird urge to pinch him, see if he feels it... but I quickly decide against it.

Once my arm is through he grabs my left hand. No way! I'm not a child. I pull it out of his grasp, but he grabs it again. I glare up at him, but again, he's mindless to it. My hand is so small in his, my fingers barely going past his knuckles.

Damien pulls the sleeve up and I try to move away, but his grip is painlessly tight.

"Damien," I whimper when the fabric moves over a fresh cut. I squeeze my eyes shut, too much of a coward to face the truth. To face what I did. What I do every night without mercy.

He pulls it up to my elbow... baring all my scars to him. My eyes snap open and I look up at him, bewildered, but his gaze is already fixated on me. Our eyes lock and the intensity in his makes me avert my gaze.

Well, the robot assumption proved wrong. At least I won't make a fool out of myself by pinching him to test the absurd theory.

Keeping his hand on mine, he puts something in my locker. As he leans forward, I can't help but inhale his scent. Even sweating he smells nice and there's a hint of cologne and something else. I wouldn't be able to pinpoint it if my life depended on it because it's something I'm smelling for the first time... and it's far from bad. Comforting even. Does that even make sense?

'Snap out of it Hazel!'

Right, yeah. I move to the side to get away, but he blocks my way by placing his hand next to my head on the locker. I search his eyes and I know it's a bad idea because I probably won't like what I find and I know without a doubt it'll be disgust, but I don't see anything. No emotion. Is he a sociopath? Only sociopaths don't have emotions.

"Damien, let me go." God was that small voice mine?

He ignores me, again, and looks down at my scars, probably judging me. But then again, with him, I'll never know until he voices his thoughts aloud and I doubt that'll ever happen.