Sin of the Saint

CHAPTER TWENTY: BURNOUT

She'd woken up in the empty commons area, but she didn't move. She felt just as paralyzed as when Cupid severed her spinal cord. She lay curled on the ground, crying, refusing to open her eyes to her own reality.

This...this repetitive dying...could happen over and over again.

She couldn't do it. She wouldn't.

Nobody should have to keep doing this. It was torture. Ms. Chiaki, since the beginning, has been less than helpful, and Coach Luther...well, he tried his best with what he got. Getting Liv as a champion must have been a major step down from having Charity.

I'm only a kid! I'm still seventeen...not an adult...how could they ask me to do this thing? It's too much...it's too much for anyone.

"Young Olivia..." a voice like familiar distant thunder said.

Liv didn't move-she didn't even stir at Coach Luther's voice. She lay on the ground defiantly, numb.

"Young Olivia...you lost, didn't you?"

She said nothing and just stared at the deep red and off-white tile of the floor of the commons area. She couldn't bring herself to look at the adult responsible for her pain. Her constant pain. Her constant anxiety. She couldn't look at the man who couldn't prepare her for this situation.

She felt him kneel down behind her and pick her up easily, as if she were nothing more than a bundle of feathers. Liv flopped in his arms...all her strength completely depleted. She'd suffered true burnout. She had absolutely nothing left to give. Not even so much as a glance at Coach Luther.

"I'm very sorry, young Olivia."

She said nothing, her eyes floating away, looking away but seeing absolutely nothing.

Coach Luther had the office staff call Liv's mother, who picked her up. Coach Luther hadn't explained anything to her mother because Ms. Chiaki stepped in.

"Fainting can sometimes happen when you lock your knees-from what I understand, her last class of the day was choir. It's quite common for some of those students to feel faint after a lengthy rehearsal on her feet. Miss Yves must have had a residual effect. With some rest, I'm sure she'll be back to normal."

That last part on Ms. Chiaki's bogus explanation sounded like a warning for Liv-"Rest up and get right back to it so you can die for us again. Chop chop."

Liv's mother had driven her home with the intent of getting her car back by the afternoon. Liv laid in her bed for hours before falling asleep at long last. Her mother woke her for dinner, but she had no appetite and continued to lay there, numb.

No thoughts crossed her mind at all. Hour after hour she stared at her wall, curled up into a ball. Though the veil didn't allow Cupid's weapon to bring her mortal death, she still felt dead. She felt nothing-nothing at all. Her nerves had been severed in the veil, and she hadn't felt so much pain as before, though the burning sensation of the stab wound still traumatized her.

How? How could anyone feel this way even once and throw themselves back into it to do it again? It was insanity. Pure insanity.

Liv didn't remember when she'd fallen asleep, but she dreamed of those moments over and over again...of when Cupid would proclaim his love, try to convince her of it, call her the dreaded name "Caritas" and would then proceed to slay her beyond the veil. She dreamed of the many, many ways he could do it again...and how he would do it again. She soon realized that were so many ways to die by his weaponized bo-all the ways of her imagination. In every scenario, she couldn't find a way around it, nor could she find a way to stay alive.