I looked around at my new room. It lacked personality entirely. The walls were painted in neutral shades. The sparse furniture was made of pale oak and the rug was an indiscriminate color. I flopped onto the bed so that a small square of light from a nearby window illuminated a part of my face. A meaningless abstract painting full of rough lines and blandly perfect squares hung above my head.
I closed my eyes, leaving my bag unpacked. Why would I need to unpack it when there was barely anything there?
I lay there for a long time, feeling that warm patch of sunlight slowly slide down my skin as the sun fell down in the sky, and thought about Mom.
Her black hair that fell in waves, parting around her face, tickling me as I kissed her fluttering eyelashes goodnight. Her soft lips caressing my cheeks. Her fingers weaving together with mine as she sang sweet lullabies. Her smattering of freckles that I didn't have. The childish innocence in the wideness of her almond-shaped eyes. Her smile, sweeter than peaches.
They elicited a dry sob from my throat. It hurt too much to think about her, when she was long gone. I had been soft and weak and loving and trusting before she left. I had been all those things because she protected me, because I felt too safe to protect myself. But I should have known better. I should have known there would be a time when I would have to keep myself safe. Perhaps I did know, I just hadn't thought it would be so soon. After she had died, before she had faded to a memory in my mind, Dad began to train me. It had hurt and I had cried, unused to having to work hard at anything. But thinking about the lack of her had driven me on with an almost mad frenzy. I vowed I would never be hurt again. Never again.
I usually never let myself dwell on her, but today I did. Today was different. All my old wounds had been opened and I was reminded of the time when I was still soft and weak. I remembered my old self-a girl that was out of my world now, a girl long dead. My heart ached for that foolish little girl, that sweet little ugly duckling.
Seeing Jayden had made it worse. The way he could hurt me if he wanted to, the way I felt weak around him-it reminded me of things I didn't want to remember, stirred memories better left forgotten. I had promised to never let another hurt me, to have power over me. Yet today, all those promises had been unraveled.
Tears rolled from the outer corners of my eyes. What was the use of all that pain, all that training, if someone could still hurt me?
I heard the door crack open. I shot up straight on the bed, instantly alert, my painful memories shoved roughly into a dusty closet in my mind.
It was Jayden. Who else would it be?
I wiped away my tears roughly with my cotton sleeve, angry that I had let him catch me like this. "What do you want?" I asked brusquely, my voice still thick with pain.
His face had looked remarkably caring for a moment, before I had spoken. It was almost as if my tears had worried him. But that was impossible. Because nothing worried Jayden Taylor, because nothing could hurt him, not like it could hurt me.
He shrugged. "I just came to check up on you. But by all means, keep this sob fest going if you feel the need."
The jerk!
His brutal callousness gave me strength. "Get the fuck out. Now."
He smirked. "You didn't used to curse. But I see you're now familiar with that word. From person experience, perhaps?"
I hated his smirk, hated the way it made his face look more beautiful by shifting its perfect symmetry, hated the musical mocking quality of his voice. I hated him more than I hated anything in that moment. And I hated the fact that he made me feel anything at all, even if it was only hate. Because hating, loving, it was all the same to me. Because feeling hurt.
I sprang off the impersonal bed and strode towards him. I matched his careless tone and said, "If you need someone to get down with, go get a call girl. I'll let you borrow my phone. I suppose I'll just sanitize it afterwards. Oh, and make sure you close the door between us. I don't want to hear all the disgusting noises you two make."
I shoved him hard so that he stumbled in surprise and slammed the door shut, locking it before he could open it and disturb my peace again. I quickly walked over to the door leading to the bathroom we would share for the next nine months and locked that, too.
I collapsed onto my bed and cursed Jayden Taylor in my head.
