No Dogs Allowed

Stars of the Sky and Call it A Garden

"It doesn't matter," he repeated. "I shouldn't have agreed to stay with them anyway, I know better. But it's over and Luan graduates this quarter, and we have Ramos. It doesn't matter."

"It does," Rosalie said. "We let this bastard go once, and as much of an idiot as Yun was—"

"I'm right here," I said.

"—we can't let him go on this twice."

"She has a point," Zahir said. "King."

Kane said, "It doesn't matter."

"He grabbed you," Diego argued. "It fucking matters. It damn well matters to us. I'm not gonna take a beer bottle to him, but we ought to press some kind of charge."

"Am I not right here?" I said.

"Not now, Yun," they snapped.

Kane rolled his neck. "It doesn't matter."

"Why do you say that?" Meredith protested. "He's never going to stop if we don't make him, so let's make him, we have to do something. We have to at least try."

"If they guy is going around attacking whoever ticks him off," Wynter added, "that in itself is some bullshit. Maybe Yun has a point, why walk away?"

"King," Zoe said.

Kane opened his eyes. He got to his feet, and headed back for his room.

"No," he said firmly.

The door shut behind him.

No one had dared tell Coach about the night before if they could help it. Coach would lose her head with debating on which of us to smack across the face first, and technically, no matter who swung at who first, we were all partially to blame for having remained in the situation in the first place. Besides, I was too sick to my stomach over my idiocy to dare shift, even if only a little, to worry about anyone else knowing about what happened. Luan's words were a haunting ringing in my ear for the entire night and morning. But, compartmentalize, I suppose. One storm at a time, was the idea.

I had to go to Ramos eventually, considering she was the only one with the equipment to properly handle my injuries, and although I could have soothed them myself, I likely would pay the price for my shitty aid during the next match. Therefore, I forced myself to her office that afternoon.

"Come in," she called after my knock.

I went in. She turned around, took a look at me, and sighed. "Oh, Echo."

I handed her a box of almond croissants and coffee cake. "You free?"

It took an hour for her to properly stitch up my lip and brow and apply the proper salves to my open cuts drawn my messy claws. She resorted to ice patches and packs for my ribs, heat patches for my shoulder and arm. She never asked me to talk, only complimenting the pastries a few times over and asking me how my general health was going (as you can imagine, not fantastic). It was only at the end when she went to grab a few painkillers from her cabinet that she said, "You should tell your team about being an Omega, Echo."

I frowned. "What?"

"They should know," she said.

"I'm not helpless," I snapped. "We're not helpless, Ramos."