Page 18 of Wicked Vile King
A door opens closer down the hall, and the voices are clearer now, no longer mumbled words, but names. Trixie stands and pads barefoot over to our shared closet before she starts rummaging.
"Well, I might as well tell you now," she says over her shoulder. "I'm in for bipolar with a side of un-aliving myself. What are you in for?"
"I . . . I don't know."
Yes, you do.
"Whatever," she shrugs, "tell me when you're ready or not, I don't care, just don't fuck my stuff up and I won't fuck your stuff up. Agreed?"
"Agreed."
She lifts her shirt, drops it to the floor, and starts changing, ambivalent to me. I feel weird staring at her and look away quickly, back out the window and the fog that turns gray with the ominous black thunderclouds rolling over the campus.
She dresses quickly, sliding her white dress shirt over her head first.
"I can't believe that turd used my getaway entrance to let himself in," she complains.
"You don't like him very much," I remark.
Trixie shakes her head and reaches for a green-and-black plaid skirt that matches the one Headmistress made me change into.
"No, I don't," she agrees. "Saint Laurier is a douche and a bully, and see, I got this thing about bullies."
"What thing?" I ask, blinking at her back as she finishes dressing, pulling on a pair of white tights.
"I don't like them very much," she answers with a grin as she spins on her heel.
"Look," she starts for the bathroom, "the way I see it, you got two choices, newbie. Play his game or don't. I suggest you don't because eventually he'll get bored like he always does and move on to someone new. But," she disappears into the adjoining bathroom, "then again, maybe play it if you're into the whole cat-mouse thing—God knows enough girls around here are, for that lunatic at least. Whatever you do, promise to leave me out of it, okay?"
"I'm not into that," I murmur before running water sounds from the bathroom, and she peeks her head around the doorjamb, saying something I can't make out around the toothbrush in her mouth.
Even if I could hear her though, I'm not sure I would be paying attention. My mind is elsewhere, on him, exactly where I don't want it to be.
I am a toy to Saint Laurier, disposable.
Just like I'm disposable to my father.
It's become a nasty habit I have no intention of making permanent.
I rub the inside of my wrists, feeling the thick scars beneath the sleeves of my Academy-issued cardigan.
"Be good this week," Trixie says, walking back out of the bathroom, "and you'll get your shit back on Friday. They'll remove all the fun stuff, but at least you won't have to wear the uniform to bed anymore. Have a fuss, get sent to lockup, and don't see your shit again." She looks over at me and cocks an eyebrow. "Got it?"
"Got it," I say, but my mind is drifting from him to that place everyone keeps warning me about.
Lockup. The hole. Isolation.
"Is it really that bad in there?" I ask her. "In solitary, I mean?"
Trixie lobs a pair of Mary Janes out of her closet. They land with a bounce atop her bed.
"Look," she says as she grabs one, slides her foot inside, and starts to latch the buckle. "You seem nice, so listen to me when I say you do not want to go there.Ever. That place can literally make you go crazy, okay?"
"Okay," I agree with a nod.
"Be bad enough," she says, balancing on one foot to slide on her other shoe, "and maybe you disappear entirely. God knows enough people around here have. There's always one a semester." She points a finger at me. "Don't let it be you, new girl. I like your accent too much, reminds me of my grandma. Plus, I don't need that bad juju in my space."
"What happens to them?" I ask as the wind picks up outside, whistling and howling around the building, before it begins to rain like God ordered the sky itself to match my mood.
