His Muse

πέντε(5)|arcanum

My phone vibrated alive, I peeped at it, Magda had called me for the twelfth time. Her calls were often accompanied by a buzz - voicemail and then a shrill tone - message. I still stayed there, rocking back and forth, sleep deprived and exhausted but nevertheless moving because the idea of getting another nightmare was enough to keep my brain ticking. My heart erratically thudding, the drum of it, loud in my ears.

Thankfully, I was off, so I didn't have to will myself to shower or to call Chris and give him a lame excuse. After vibrating for what seemed like an eternity, my phone finally died - indicated by the ping of the system notification at 10% of battery followed the abrupt ending of messages and vibrations. I closed my eyes, trying to normalize my breathing but the icy eyes and now bloody snout, enlarging the longer I kept my lids shut forced my eyes open with a small, escaped yelp.

I heard the door bell ringing in it's joyful tone but I stayed on my wooden laminated floor, crumpled like aluminium foil around a soon-to-be revealed Christmas dish. It ringed a little longer before everything was silent again. I sighed, half satisfied that I was left to my own devices and half worried as to who it was at my door. Suddenly, I heard the front door creak open as heavy footsteps sounded on the ground floor of my apartment. I heard a few male voices as they rattled some kitchen appliances before they started making their way upstairs. I tried to get up but my legs were numb, completely numb without even a tinge of sensation so I dragged my body into the wardrobe behind the door, shutting it softly with my sweaty hands. My pocket knife was in my bedside drawer and in a panicked state, I forgot to grab it - rendering the point of the object null and void.

I heard whispers followed by a male shushing all of them. He took a sharp breath in, taking a step closer before forcing the door open. I screamed so much, I could actually feel the blood pumping in my brain - the energy pulsating through my veins before someone grabbed me roughly, his face obscured by a black, baseball cap and cupped his calloused palms around my mouth. I'd seen him before, similar dark features to Theo except he had smaller lips, almond shaped grey eyes...just different.

He let go, stretched out his right hand, "I'm Mark by the way, I was asked to check up on you".

"By who?" I asked licking my lips, before linking palms as he pulled me up. His pull was so strong that I bounced on my feet and slightly skidded on my heels when I landed back down.

"The chain of command is kinda endless but let me just say Magda".

"It's Theo?"

I already knew it was him. I just did.

"No Ivory, Magda, M-A-G-D-A" he repeated again, louder this time like I was actually deaf.

"Well since you've seen me and I'm well, you can go now" I replied as politely as possible. The last thing I needed were people around me.

"Magda wants to see you, she knows it's your day off by the way, she called the cafe earlier on today"

"Really? It's only been a few hours since the day broke" I cried incredulously, "fine, I'll be there soon"

"Good"

"Thanks"

"Don't mention it, we'll be waiting downstairs" he declared, turning back on his heels as the other people who came with him started walking out of my bedroom.

"No you wouldn't, Mark, I can reach her house just fine"

"No, we will accompany you" he said, his words hanging in the air with a tone of finality. Everybody turned to see what I'd say but I conceded, I could barely stand up straight because of how tired I was, talk less of arguing.

"Fine, see you in half an hour" I said, before forcing myself past the herd of people - who were still standing stoically in my room while their other friends were probably raiding my fridge or looking tentatively at my pictures - and walking into the bathroom, making sure that I slammed the door extra hard so he knew I wasn't one to boss around.

Gawd, I hoped I'd split his entire skin open with that weapon of mine now.

I bathed quickly, trying my hardest not to close my eyes often so that the face of Theo from earlier would not make me die from a heart attack. No joke. I did my hair in a half-braid up-do and slipped my army green crop hoodie, black leggings and black Nike's.

Reluctantly, I trudged downstairs to get a bite to eat. Being forced to leave the house by an irritating man didn't bode well with me. The boys in this town....I swear....

"You can eat when you get there" Mark said.

"Shut up" I replied, picking up a doughnut and eating as I strolled to the front to get my keys, "are we gonna go or what?" I asked sarcastically, before opening the door and walking out by myself to car- it was the only car that looked expensive guys, not a lot of logic required there.

Mark drove the car while I sat in the middle of two muscly young men, well sort of crammed like sardines because there seemed to be a score of us in that car.

"Hey, I'm Zach" the burly guy to the left of me introduced himself, "well, Isaac but you can call me whatever you like" he rattled off. His oval-shaped warm, grey eyes hidden underneath a curtain of light brown hair caused me to relax a little.

"Ivory, as you know from that block-head over there" I said, as he sniggered quickly. He immediately regained composure as Mark turned to look at him.

"I'll call you Luna instead, I think you look more like a Luna than Ivory" he remarked, gazing back at me for approval. His remark was followed by a chorus of praises, "good one Zach", "wouldn't have thought of that myself" before Mark, in all his ridiculous glory turned to smile at Zach, "we were going to call her Luna anyways, but thank you".

"Ivory's fine thanks.." I trailed off, these people were so not my crowd as I brought out my phone.

Well at that time.

"It's dead" the other guy next to me said, looking down at me disparagingly, "we'd tried it a few times before we broke into your house" he stated, "with all due respect, not everyone around here is as lovely as Zach so don't be surprised if peopl-."

As he said that, my mind wandered, mentally checking off everybody that I had come in contact with to note who were the Zach's and who were the...shit, I didn't get his name. I'll call him chocolate for now, because he had a rich walnut-y skin tone with huge dark brown eyes that were menacing if you pissed him off. But I didn't care for that, nobody had the capacity to make me fear them except...

"-Are you alright?" a voice sounded loudly in my mind, I looked at Zach waiting for him to give me a look but he was too focused on checking out a group of girls who seemed to have just finished yoga. I brushed the question off quickly, it was probably my conscience...or God...or both.

"-relax agapi mou" I jolted this time, this wasn't the voice of a divine Holy being, this was a man's voice.

"Luna, your hands are shaking, are you cold?" Zach asked. Immediately after, Mark slowed down.

Luna! Really?!!

"Luna?" Mark asked as he winded up the windows in the car.

Luna. Luna it is.

"No, I'm fine...I was just thinking of something" I replied nonchalantly as Mark turned into Magda's driveway.

"Your heart was beating so fast, I was concerned that you might have thought we were kidnapping you or some nonsense like that" Zach answered before getting out of the car and beckoning me to follow him out, "we're not as bad as people say we are"

I couldn't even focus on his last words because I was too preoccupied logically thinking of how he could possibly hear my heart beat.

But all of that seized when Theo suddenly came out of Magda's house, in a navy blue crew neck jumper with his arms crossed. His eyes locked on mine from the moment he opened the door, I could have sworn they changed icy-blue as he nodded at me, acknowledging our arrival.

Could have. Because my brain was working with no sleep.