"Finally… yaagghhh…!" I screamed until my throat burned, hurling my school bag into the corner of the room with all the force I had left. Both of my hands shot up into the air as the raw, frustrated shout tore out of my lungs, echoing off the walls of my bedroom.
"Alex!! What happened? Why are you screaming like that?" Mom's voice suddenly called up from downstairs, loud and clearly worried, carrying through the still open door of my room.
"S-sorry, Mom…!" I quickly answered back, my voice still rough from the outburst. Without waiting, I stepped over and firmly shut the door, cutting off the rest of the house.
She kept yelling from downstairs, still scolding me for the sudden outburst, but her voice quickly grew muffled and distant the moment I shut the door. I walked back toward the bed without paying much attention to the fading noise and simply let myself fall backward onto the mattress.
A wide, almost silly smile tugged at the corners of my lips as I sank into the soft sheets. A long, heavy sigh of pure relief left my chest, carrying with it all the tension that had been building up for days. Exhaustion finally caught up to me, spreading through my limbs and making the bed feel ten times more comfortable than usual.
The reason behind all that screaming and this sudden rush of happiness was simple.
The exams were finally over.
These last few days had been complete hell. Day after day, night after night, nothing but studying. Textbooks, notes, papers, my desk had turned into a battlefield of papers and empty energy drink cans.
I wasn't the type who enjoyed burying himself in books. Studying had always felt like a chore to me, something I did just enough to get by. But this time it had been different. Something about these exams pushed me harder than usual, forcing me to lock myself in my room and grind through the material without rest.
One of the biggest reasons I had thrown myself so hard into studying was to use it as a distraction. A desperate, almost obsessive distraction from something that still felt unreal even though I knew every second of it had been true.
It had already been two weeks since that day. Two full weeks since I watched Rose get fucked by the one person I hated more than anyone else in the world. Just thinking of Mike's name was enough to make my blood boil and my fists tighten without me realizing it.
The memories refused to fade. I could still see it clearly whenever I closed my eyes, the way Rose's voice broke as she moaned his name, the way he rutted into her like an animal, saying the most filthy, degrading things while she took every single one of them. She didn't fight him off. She didn't push him away. She just endured it all, her body accepting everything he did to her.
And I had just watched.
The guilt still sat heavy in my chest like a stone. I had stayed hidden inside that locker the entire time, frozen and pathetic, while the girl I loved was used right in front of me. Worse than that, my own body had betrayed me. I had been so helplessly aroused by the sight that I ended up stroking myself in the dark, too weak to look away and too disgusted with myself to ever want to remember that part again.
We barely had any real conversation for a day or two after that. My nights turned completely sleepless, the ceiling above my bed becoming the only thing I stared at while the memories refused to leave me alone.
We still ran into each other a few times at school and managed to talk like normal, but once the exams truly began, the distance between us grew wider. Part of me was afraid to approach her, though I couldn't fully explain why. Rose had always been the smartest student in the entire school. She had a reputation to protect, and it was normal for her to pull away and focus entirely on studying whenever exams came around.
But this time the silence hurt far more than usual. I couldn't stand going so long without hearing her voice. Even during previous exam periods we still exchanged messages or short calls late at night, small conversations that somehow made everything feel lighter. This time there was nothing. No texts. No calls. Just empty quiet.
No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't push away the scene that had already burned itself into my mind, or the twisted feelings that came with it. So I forced myself to pour everything into the exams instead, using the endless studying as a shield against those forbidden thoughts that kept trying to surface.
"Huff…" I turned over on the bed and just lay there for a while, staring at nothing in particular.
Eventually I reached into my pocket and pulled out my phone, the screen lighting up on my face. I unlocked it and opened the call app, slowly scrolling through the contacts until my thumb stopped on Rose's name.
For a long moment I just stared at it. My thumb hovered right above the call button, but I couldn't bring myself to press it. Every time I thought about contacting her, that same uncomfortable, heavy feeling settled in my chest, a mix of guilt, fear, and something I still didn't want to name.
"Fuck…" I locked the phone and let it drop onto the mattress beside me. Then I buried my face into the pillow, pressing it hard against my skin as thoughts of my girlfriend filled my head once again.
I stayed like that for a while, face buried in the pillow, until the exhaustion finally won. I didn't even notice the exact moment my eyes closed. Sleep simply pulled me under without warning.
When I opened them again, the room had grown noticeably darker. Soft orange light was spilling in through the window as the sun slowly set, painting the sky in warm shades of orange and fading gold.
'When did I fall asleep…?' I pushed myself up into a sitting position and rubbed my eyes with the back of my hand, waiting for my vision to clear. My head still felt a little heavy. After a few seconds I stood up and walked out of my room.
The hallway was completely silent. My gaze drifted toward the door right next to mine, Lily's room.
I walked up to her door and slowly pushed it open, careful not to make too much noise.
"Lily…?" I called out quietly as I peeked my head inside, my eyes scanning the room before settling on the study table.
To be continued...
* * * * *
Read 150+ Chapters at Patreon:
Patreon: FloppyGeneral
Patreon.com/FloppyGeneral