Survive, if you can // John Murphy

//03// Broken Flaws

Hands on my waist.

I'm spinning around, punching whoever's there by instinct. My hands tremble after, my skin continuing to burn with heat. The strange thing is that my head feels cold. As if my body hasn't caught on to what my brain knows yet.

"Shit, toy."

My eyes focus, finding John with his hand clutching his cheek. "Fuck, I'm so sorry."

"It's alright. Don't worry about me," he says, shutting his eyes tightly as he tries to sit up straighter.

"Right," I say, standing quickly and pacing. I fan my face as he starts to grin. His eyes are wandering my rapidly moving body. I groan loudly. "Please, stop that."

He sighs. "Sweetheart, I can't help looking at your body. It's my only weakness."

"I know your other weakness and I will abuse it if you don't stop," I say firmly, shaking out my hands.

"What's this about, Cam?" he asks, forcing my head to shake. I hear the covers rustle and see him standing out of the corner of my eye. I don't acknowledge him but he's in front of me, grabbing hold of my arms and looking into my eyes. "Tell me why you're freaking out."

"It's not your problem so you don't need to worry about it," I say quickly.

"It is my problem if you're gonna wake me up every night," he says, frowning and dropping his hands.

"Well, they aren't going away anytime soon so you'll just have to get used to it," I say quietly, crossing my arms over my still naked body. He has underwear on but nothing else.

"Every night?" he asks, eyebrows high.

"Most," I answer, chewing on the inside of my cheek. There are already scars there.

"What are they even about? Maybe if you face your fears, the nightmares will go away," he says, shrugging.

My traitorous eyes drop to my bag for half a second before I've even realized what I've done. He's already crouching down, looking through it. I tell him to stop, grabbing at his shoulders. When his hand grazes over the book, my breath hitches. He stops, going back and pulling the book from the side pocket.

He stands, twisting the little, tattered thing in his hands. "This?"

"Please, don't," I beg, hands clenching to fists.

"What's so special about this?" he asks, going to open it.

"No, please!" I shout, reaching my hands out to him.

"It'll take a lot more than that to get me to stop, sweetheart," he says, successfully opening the cover this time.

"I lied to you!" I shout, forcing his eyes up to mine. He shuts the book and I let out a breath, continuing. "The other night, when I was talking, I lied. You asked how I got locked up and I told you that my mom got floated for stealing portions. That was a lie. She was caught stealing that...for me. And I still haven't read it and I don't really want to at the moment."

His eyebrows raise as he looks down at the book. "So, you're running from it then?"

I sigh, nodding. "Yes. And she's in my dreams most nights, ordering me to read it. And I just can't."

"Yes, Cam, you can-"

"Don't tell me what I can do. I know what I'm capable of and right now, I can't read that...thing," I say, pointing a shaky finger at the book.

"Sweetheart, you killed a fucking jaguar yesterday. You can do pretty much anything if you can do that," he says, throwing his hands out to the sides.