As I strip the paint and makeup from her face, it's like revealing a treasure... which is exactly what she is.
I haven't felt longing like this in years.
My cock wakes slowly, coming back to life as I watch her blue-tinged lips move beneath my touch. When I drop the cloth, admiring my beautiful treasure, I hesitate just a moment before letting my touch stray to her face.
Her skin is like silk beneath my fingertips, dark lashes free of the clumps of her makeup now resting on her pale cheeks. One of them has a small cut on it, which thankfully didn't start bleeding again when I rubbed the washcloth over it. Her lip, too, is split on the top, like someone hit her.
That burgeoning rage in my stomach twists, mixing with the desire for her, the regret that I didn't hear anything last night, that I didn't go out for a walk last night, knowing this was coming.
I've never heard of them tying up a girl, though they certainly weren’t above using them as bait to lure me out there.
Christine knew I wasn’t interested in their stupid traditions, but she had begged me to go to the party with her that night.They were my teammates, but that didn’t mean I cared to hang out with them beyond the necessary. But I cared about Christine—she was the first friend I made when we moved to Hollow Fields. Too bad she was just doing her boyfriend’s dirty work, getting me out to the cornfield so they could haze me.
Team bonding, they joked.
If I hadn’t left after that, they probably would have expected me to act like nothing happened, to continue playing football like my own damn team wasn’t complicit in this cruel joke.
In every story I've heard of Hollow Night, it's a guy thing... a hazing.
It's stupid and mean, definitely the sort of bullying that should have died in high school, but as far as I know, it's never been violent.
You don't need to have an imagination to know what they did to her, and I suppose asking why wouldn't get me anywhere, since I can't level with that type of cruelty.
My poor little wraith.
She's a prize, but not one to be taken. One to be earned.
I can only hope that when she wakes, she will give me a chance to earn it. I hope she will let me worship her.
I leave her in the bath as long as I can stand to not be beside her, admiring the structure of her cheekbones, the bow of her lips, the beautiful pallor of her skin...
When I can take it no longer, I wrap her in a towel and draw her against me. I carry her to my room, tucking her beneath the blankets before stripping down and crawling in alongside her.
It's her sleepy moan that pulls me from a sleep like death.
I didn't even realize I fell asleep until that very moment when I was waking up.
My body wakes up, aware that she will likely need a minute to orient herself, and to realize that I am of no harm to her. I watch her, breathless, as her lashes flutter, slowly at first. And then the motions get rapid, less serene and more troubled. She's trapped somewhere between sleep and wakefulness; I place a gentle hand on her shoulder, hoping to settle her.
Instead, she shoots up so fast that the blankets fall away, resulting in a flurry of movement that stirs the stale air of my room.
"You're okay." I tell her calmly.
Waking up in a strange place, naked, after what happened to her, I expected her to be on alert. But when she turns to glare at me, it's not fear I see in her eyes, no trepidation of what I may intend to do. It’s rage.
"Who-" Her voice cuts off, choked by the rasp of how much she must have screamed last night. I watch her grip her throat, her fingers massaging over her trachea.
She watches too, enraptured by the motion of her fingers.
I stay silent, letting her work through this on her own as she holds her hand out before her, waving it slowly through the air.
"I found you out in the corn field and brought you here." I explain. "You were so frozen I thought the worst, but I bathed you and kept you warm."
I don't know if she hears me, though, because she doesn't acknowledge me. I don't get so much as a glance as she stares at her fingers like she's never seen anything like them.
"I... do you need anything for the pain? I think we have some Tylenol downstairs."
"Pain?" She blinks.
