Trouvaille

Chapter 8

Trigger warning: Mentions of sexual assault, anxiety, panic attacks.

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Churches are beautiful places. Empty churches are even more beautiful places. There's nothing like the peace that fills your soul while you sit in an empty church, with soaring ceilings and walls that heard millions of prayers from ages ago and would continue hearing prayers for ages to come. Churches would always have the peace and purity of a place where people came to pour their hearts out.

If you ever find yourself stuck in a dilemma, heartbroken, and doubting everything, a church would be the best place to find some peace. There's no place more conducive for some deep introspection.

Nikki had a hugely strained relationship with religion- born into a Christian family, she hadn't always doubted her religion, but soon she had realized that religion was largely a social construct and she wasn't someone who believed in religion anymore. She believed in God, and the faith that she had was something most people didn't understand and something she never bothered explaining to anyone.

Churches were always special to her. She never went for services but always slipped into an empty church, settling down in a pew to get some peace in her soul. And that was where she was now. A beautiful small church that she discovered while walking across the town. On her way back from the bar, she'd realized that she didn't feel like going back to the hotel, which was probably where the others were also staying, and had taken a detour ending up in this church.

Nikki had to admit that churches were spooky in the night time. The front of the church was lost in darkness, and Nikki's overactive imagination could sense malevolent creatures lurking in the dark, waiting for the witching hour to pounce on her. There was one lone ray of moonlight that pierced through an open window, barely illuminating the backside of the church. The night was cold, and strange noises came from around her. Nikki shuddered as someone walked over her grave.

The usual peace Nikki felt was missing, though, and she was jittery- her hands were shaking, she couldn't stop fidgeting and every single tiny noise seemed amplified in the quiet, dark church. Her thoughts were swimming around – Danford's leer, Calum's refusal to look her in the eyes, the single tear the left Kay's eye, Luke patting her back with a look of disappointment, the way Tom was going to react, the skittering she was hearing next to her- and her breaths were coming faster and faster. She plunged her hand into her bag, searching for her pills. Her hand was shaking so bad that she couldn't pick up anything in her bag, and she was growing more and more frustrated. She jerked the bag off the bench, and her phone went flying under the bench. Cursing under her breath, she tried to search for it, soon realizing that it was useless as her eyesight was getting blurry. She needed a pill- immediately.

She was on the floor now, her forehead clammy, her eyesight blurry, and her ears ringing. She grasped at her bag, yanking it off the bench. She emptied all the contents out on the floor, spreading them out to realize she didn't have a single pill. She groaned, trying to remember what her therapist said about controlling intense panic attacks. She leaned back against the bench, breathing in and out deeply, but it wasn't helping her as much. She needed a pill and she needed it right now. She shoved whatever she could grab back into her bag, abandoning the search for her phone when she realized the only way she could find it was with the help of a torch, which was on her phone.

She stumbled outside the church, and managed to call herself a cab, and spouted out the address of her hotel. She rolled the window, sticking her head out to gulp in the fresh night air. It wasn't helping- she was sweating like a pig, and flashbacks came at her from left and right assaulting her, leaving her gasping for breath.