Red

10

My breathing speeds up even more and my palms become sweaty. I was having another panic attack, I knew it. I needed my medicine but I didn't even know where my pills were.

Van puts his hand on my back. "Calm down," he says. His voice was emotionless. He didn't sound mad, but I heard no sympathy in his voice either. My breathing was still fast and I felt shaky. A few tears escaped my eyes.

"Has this happened before?" Van asks me. He takes one of my shaky hands in his and starts rubbing my palm. "Tris?" He says my name after I don't reply. I nod my head, admitting to having panic attacks.

He sighs. "Okay," he says. "That's okay. This should help," he was talking about him massaging my hands. Oddly enough, I felt like it was helping a little. My breathing gets a little bit slower. That was one thing I was thankful for; my panic attacks usually only lasted about five to ten minutes.

I eventually completely stop shaking and my breathing returns to normal. I felt tired; I usually was after having a panic attack. I knew I would be a little sore tomorrow. My eyes are focused on my hands which were wrapped in Van's hand. Van clears his throat and I move my eyes up to look at him.

"You doing okay?" He asks me, his eyebrows raised. He seemed like he was genuinely asking, but I couldn't be sure.

I nod my head and feel my face grow warm. I can't believe I already had a panic attack in front of Van. He must think I'm so weak. He lets go of my hand and I use it to wipe my teary eyes.

"Look at me," Van demands. "I need you to look at me when I'm speaking to you. Understood?" He's already back to being harsh again.

I nod my head and lift my head to look at him. My eyes were probably red from crying and I had tears stained on my cheeks. "What happened to your gauze?" He asks me.

"N-nothing," I manage to get out.

"Nothing?" Van questions and I nod my head. "Then where the hell is it, princess?" He smirks. I shrug my shoulders. "Do not like to me. Tell me what happened to it."

I sit there, digging my nails into my palms as I do when I'm nervous. Van notices and grabs my hands, holding one of my hands in each of his. "Go ahead, tell me," he says. I open my mouth and try my best to speak, but instead I let out a little whisper. "Use your words, princess."

"We went s-swimming," I breathe out. "And it fell off." Van slowly nods his head. "I-I didn't take I-it off, I promise."

"Your shirts not wet," he says. That wasn't the response I was expecting. "Why not?" He reaches up and grabs my hair, twirling it around on his finger. "Your hair is."

"I didn't want to get Annabelle's shirt wet," I tell him, my voice shaking as I spoke.

"Mhm," he hums. "So you swam with no shirt on around Sam?" He asks to clarify. I nod my head.

"And do you think that was appropriate?" He asks, cocking his head to the side.

"S-Sorry," I apologize.

"No. That's not what I asked," Van says. "Do you think that was appropriate?" He repeats the question with even more edge in his voice this time.

I shake my head, feeling ashamed. "You're right. That wasn't appropriate at all," Van says. His hand moves from my hair to the bottom of my shirt. He slips his hand up to the front of my bra and he lays a hand over a cup of my wet bra. My whole body heats up.  "At least you had your bra on." He removes his hand from under my shirt and holds my hand again.

"But I can't just let this go, can I?" Van says, shaking his head. "You broke two rules today." I thought it was a little unfair considering I didn't know about the second rule until a few seconds ago, but I didn't dare to say anything.

My eyes fill with fear. I didn't know what to expect. Van smiles. "I'll go easy on you this time, princess. There will be no hanging out with Sam alone and you will stay by my side for as long as I say so. You will not do anything tonight unless I give you specific instructions to do so. I can't have you running around now that I know what a bad girl you are. Do you understand?"

I nod my head. "Use your words. Tell me you understand," Van smirks.

"I... understand," I say quietly.

"Good girl," he says. "We're going to go find your luggage now so I can get you some pants to wear since you clearly can't handle not taking your gauze off," he explains to me. I nod my head and stand up after he does. "Looks like I'm going to have to reapply that medicine to your leg, too, since you just had it in the dirt."

I cringe thinking about the pain I felt earlier today and regret being as careless as I was to not notice it in the dirt.

We walk together to the plane. All the suitcases and bags were lined up and a few people were grabbing their luggage. "Go find your stuff and meet me on the plane," he tells me. I nod my head and he walks onto the plane.

I spot my black bag and walk over to grab it. "Hey, Tris!" Sam yells. He was running over to me.

"Hi," I say with a smile. I knew I couldn't stay and talk, though. Van would get mad.

"You should come play with us. We've got a soccer ball," he says. He had a smile on his face and I felt bad denying him.

"I promised I'd help Van with something on the plane. Maybe later?" I lie.

"Sure thing. See you around," he says before running back over to the group. I watch him run off and then leave, heading onto the plane with my bag.

The plane looked completely different. I was impressed that they managed to do all of this so quickly. They must've found screwdrivers or something because all the seats were taken out from the floor. Some of them were moved to the back forming a living room like area. Pillows and blankets were liked up along the walls for people to sleep on and they were separated using the metal poles from the chairs with a blanket draped over them.

I walk to the back into the flight attendants room where Van was and hand him my bag which he takes. He closes the door and places my bag on the small tabletop.

"Let's see what we have here, yeah?" He says while unzipping my bag to look for pants. I stay quiet, too nervous to talk. I hope he doesn't look through my whole bag.