Thrust

Chapter Four- The Benefits of a Shadow

How do I continuously allow myself to get into these kinds of circumstances? This was the question I had come to ask myself while my eyes moved around the table to find a collection of strangers forced together by an invitation derived from the nervous lips of yours truly. Inviting Brennan, Chase, Shane, and Jocelyn that next night as a way to prove to my brother’s best friend that I was truly invested into Chase with an impressive thespian’s display, I would now sit while tossing the peas over my plate while the boring conversations of current politics and sportscars would be spoken between my brother and my current ‘beau’. When the conversation finally became too dry to bear, I would offer to do the dishes and collected everyone’s plates before escaping into the kitchen that was separated by a wall allowing me a moment alone. But no sooner had I found this serenity, had Shane followed at my back.

“You missed one-” He explained while leading an overseen plate from the table and sliding it into the sink now full of suds made up from soap. Slipping my hands beneath the surface of the scaling water, I retracted immediately before finding him to hand me a fork.

“That one’s clean-”

“I know. I’m giving it to you…”

“For what?”

“To gag yourself so you can find some form of entertainment.” I rolled my eyes and turned back to my venture as he would replace the fork in the drawer before I brought a plate to the top layer of stacked crimson ceramic from the tips of my toes as I was three inches too short to reach effortlessly.

“Did you want to talk about what you saw?” Suddenly the plate slipped from my hand in an attempt to clench as I quickly gasped while it shattered at our feet. Without a word and only a simple pulse of his hand motioning forward to keep me from stepping on glass, he would move to the small closet set within the kitchen, before returning with a broom and dust pan. In his absence, I had moved to my hands and feet with the cover of a rag to try and pick up the pieces to force him away from me in quicker succession-but in doing so, only caused small pieces to become embedded in my fingerprints.

“God, you’re so impatient...run your fingers under the water while I clean this up-” I would only agree to the slight sting of small slits made in the edges of my touch as I would hear him cleaning at my back. He would dispose of the glass in the garbage bin before returning to me and quickly taking my wrists in his grasp.

“Let me see-'' But I would fight him while keeping my fingers beneath the water and he would now jerk me to face him. Although I was reminded of how he had pleasured himself less than twenty four hours prior in my own bathroom with one of those very hands, a part of me was thrilled at the memory as my heart rushed with his aggressive yet considerate dominance as he brought me to face him.

“Do you have tweezers?”

I nodded. “I’m guessing they’re in your bathroom?” I nodded, blushing as he was referencing that very heart-pounding moment that remained as one with my conscious and unconscious state for the last day. I would only be allowed about a minute as I heard him moving about throughout the house until returning with those tweezers. Once his eyes had met mine again, there was a sense of mischief in his eyes that left me temporarily anxious to his thoughts as they were seldom chaste and expectedly thrilling.

“I’m fine-” I attempted to cease his movements but he ignored me and instead lifted my fingers higher into the light while focusing on the small fragments now part of my body. My gaze would find his expression contorted in focus with the edge of his tongue poking through the side of his full lips as he would grunt in success when pulling piece my piece from my fingers.

“What changed?” His question would confuse me as it would go against the deception of his gaze as he now pulled yet another piece of glass from my torn skin.

“I don’t know what you mean-”

“A week ago, I was winning at P-I-G and now you’re almost sickened when I touch you...Because even if I’m not using my parent’s money to go to college only to end up inheriting my ‘purpose’ like Chase, I AM perceptive-And before you say it was for me kicking his ass, there was tension before that...prove me wrong…”

“How?”

“Stop shaking...you’re like a damn leaf...I can’t get this glass out if you keep moving like that-”

“It hurts.” I spoke sharply.

“Then distract yourself and explain to me why you hate me now-” Luckily I would be interrupted by Jocelyn as I would retreat my fingers quickly as he would pull the final piece of glass from my skin.

“All done…”

“Everything alright?” She would ask while observing my flickering gaze unsteady between them both.

“I intend to get an answer, ribbons.” I rolled my eyes at this incessant nickname as Jocelyn pulled me in the hallway that divided the petite foyer into the kitchen.

“What answer?!”

“He knows that something is different-”

“Yeah! You have this insane confidence now...I mean…” She now lowered her voice. “Doing what you did with the sunscreen was genius and it must have driven him crazy…”

“Yeah..” I hid my blush while moving back to Chase as he set his phone in his pocket upon my arrival.

“Do you want to get out of here?” He would finally ask as I would nod and leave Brennan at my back as Jocelyn would accompany us to a party at his fraternity house. Since I was a ripe eighteen, my brother instilled a sense of wry approval by that of a suspicious gaze warning me of the outcome of improper decisions smearing our family name. I nodded with a rolling of my eyes before finally being allowed to leave. But the second that I had left both Shane and Brennan’s gaze, Chase altered drastically. He no longer minded his touch or kept his curse words behind impressive vocabulary making him come across as a snob. Instead, he held his hand around my waist and wedged his grip over my thigh of my crossed legs within the passenger seat as we drove to his stomping ground.

All the while, even with Jocelyn discussing the college with Chase, a pull developed in my stomach to return home. I convinced myself these were nerves from my last party in which I woke up nude and beside Shane and therefore promised to not take a single sip of alcohol. But the minute we crossed that threshold, I was now a possession to my ‘date’ as he pulled me about with his arm across my shoulders as I followed him in politeness before finally convincing myself to take a leave and use the restroom as he spoke in vulgar descriptions of how having my inexperience was a turn on to him as he slid his touch up my leg and attempted to learn the fabric of my panites with a plethora of witnesses surrounding us. I was thankful for the sanctuary offered by the bathroom as I remained.

As I attempted to call Jocelyn through the loud rave beneath my feet, I refused to call for Shane to rescue me from my own actions as I believed I would be able to slip out of the fraternity house unseen as I seemed to blend in majority to those around me. But before I could even open the door, I could hear a sudden outburst of high school-level dramatics break the barrier of the music. With the words of some club song ceased, the chanting of encouraged fighting would bring my feet rushing down the steps as I knew Shane was somehow responsible, even if by the butterfly effect alone. But once my feet joined the hardwood of the main floor, my worries were proven true as I found Chase forced up against the refrigerator within the kitchen with Shane pinning him by the grip of his collar.

“Shane! Are you serious?!” I accused as he did not even break to look at me. Instead, he would keep his focus on Chase.

“He’s lost his mind, babe!” Chase commented with a chuckle omitted by a mix of fear and uncertainty of what would be done to him by this mindless hot-head possessing him.

“Don’t f*****g talk to her and don’t even look at her!” I pulled at Shane to try and get him to loosen his grip, but he was stronger than what my own muscles would allow to become successful. He was a stone and I was the worthless water rushing past him without an effect.

“Can someone call the cops, this guy’s unhinged!” Someone spoke in the crowd as I now grew angry at Shane.

“What did he do now? Speak to another girl-” It was with my words against him that he finally turned to face me.

“I caught him trying to drug a drink...the asshole thought he was clever…”

“What?” I asked with a small voice as a portion of my mind had feared this the night I had ‘overindulged’ as I didn’t actually drink enough to blackout as I had.

“He’s lying! I was adding salt to the rim!”

“Really?” Shane finally released him as Chase fixed his shirt as my brother’s best friend collected the drink in question and brought it to Chase. “Then drink it.”

“I don’t like vodka-”

“I don’t give a shit...if there isn’t anything in here...just drink it...prove me wrong...unless this would also prove you drugged her that night…” My heart froze as I looked at Shane who was fuming with clenched teeth and wide eyes as he just waited for Chase’s response. But instead of facing against Shane, Chase would navigate the crowd of people sharing in awe as the drink was now forced at our feet and Shane turned to follow him.

“Please...just take me home?” I asked as I was instantly nauseated at how closely my virtue would have been ripped from me if I wouldn’t have had Shane with me either tonight or the ones prior. Even if I knew Chase and I would not connect on any level, the fact he was willing to ravage me without consent or care was enough to make me weak in the knees with disgust. I just wanted to be as far from him or anything involving him as Shane would understand, wrap his arm around my shoulders, and take me to his car.

“Please don’t be upset, Brennan wanted me to follow you-” He began to speak as he stopped just before the car as I wrapped my arms around him in both relief and gratitude as the images of what could have been were conjured in my mind until tears revealed their presence. But instead of questioning me or inquiring on details or even taking this moment to claim ‘he was right’, he just held me; not as a lover, not as a friend-as a confidant, which was exactly what I needed in this moment.