“You should have allowed nature to take its course. In the end, it will anyway.” — David McCall, Fear (1996)
My body burns with so much fucking fury toward this man, I could light the whole fucking forest on fire. Who the fuck does he think he is? I didn’t even get a single answer out of him and I sure as well am not done trying but he makes it so damn impossible. He’s watching me, controlling pretty much what I do and now he thinks he can literally dictate me. Answer for me. In front of everyone? Like he hasn’t leftmeunanswered for four years.
Why can’t he just talk to me instead of insisting on playing these games? And then he confuses the hell out of me by handing me my jacket—which I know he stole from my room. I don’t even care about that though, what throws me off is the gesture of kindness. Of all the things he’s done to fuck with me and he wants to provide me a way to stay warm? And I hate more than anything that even knowing how vindictive he seems to be, that I still fucking want him. I quite literally crave his eyes on me, his touch and his demand.
His smell. His eyes. His voice. Even his tattooed hands. Especially his tattooed hands. I blush, remembering they were the same hands that had captured me in the shower. How he held me against his body as he teased me with his…
What the hell is wrong with me?
I push away the thoughts, clutching the crumpled up piece of paper in my jacket as I find my seat around the bonfire. I feel Trace watching me but I avoid his gaze. Sage and Evrin come up next to me, and I ignore them too. Then I hear Alli, I look up to see that she’s in between Banks and Evrin and she looks over at me and smiles. But I don’t return it, I feel so out of place. Or maybe I’m just starting to realize that I don’t even know what I’m doing here.
After a few minutes, the hat finally gets to me. Sage hands it over and I don’t even look at him as I accept it. I take the little piece of paper in my palm and hand the hat to the person next to me.
“What’s your number?” Sage leans in and asks me in a much more friendly tone than we shared earlier.
I roll my eyes as I hide my number from him, not like it really matters.
“Mind your own,” I snap, and I hear Evrin chuckle next to him. Sage turns to Evrin and they start mumbling to each other, so I take the moment to open up my little note and see the number thirteen scribbled on it.
After all the numbers have been claimed, Natasha stands and requests everyone’s attention.
I cringe at the sound of her voice, hating it brings out memories of Declan. He and Natasha dated for a while and, truthfully, I never saw what he liked in her buthe kept her around. Though, a few months before his death, he broke up with her. I never knew why but she pretended like it didn’t matter to her. But she sure as hell made it a point to elicit pity from everyone when he died, acting as if he was her whole world. It's for that alone that I roll my eyes are her when she speaks.
The only other time I’ve really interacted with her was at a summer party before school started that year, the year of the murders. Seren and I were sitting by the pool and out of nowhere, she storms up to us and dumps her soda all over Seren. I had jumped up immediately and asked her what the hell her problem was while Seren sat still with a smile on her face, acting like nothing had happened. Natasha stormed off and that was that. Seren didn’t tell me what her problem was and I never found out.
Everyone quiets down, turning their heads to listen to her as she starts to ramble off an introduction.
“First of all, welcome to truth or dare. To start, everyone already took a number and that number determines the order in which we will go. It just makes it a little easier. Once you’ve gone, toss your number in the fire. Next, when it’s your turn you must choose someone to challenge. That person then has to flip a coin and if they land on heads, it’s truth. Tails is dare. You then have the responsibility to give them said truth or dare.”
The whole time the instructions are being told to us, I’m looking down at the ground. I know he’s watching me. He’s not very good at hiding it. I need to look up at him, to quell the urge to see his eyes on me, but I know that I can’t. I don’t want to give him the satisfaction of knowing that I care enough to entertain his little game,but it’s too much. It’s too much and I can’t fucking take it anymore so I do the only thing I can think of.
“What happens if I refuse to do any of it?” I don’t even look up at everyone as I blurt it out. But I know everyone is staring at me. At least it takes the heat of Trace’s glare of me, trading one distraction for another.
After a few moments of awkward silence, I finally decide to lift my head and I have to force myself to look past Trace, finding Jensen not far over and ultimately, he’s the one who answers me.
“Then why the fuck are you even here, Olivia?” Everyone looks at him, then looks back at me.
I meet his eyes, betrayal pouring off me. I can tell he’s still a little salty about what I’d said to him earlier. It’s to be expected. But he doesn’t have to present himself to be such a dick about it.
“Yeah, stop being so fucking boring,” someone else whispers before more and more voices start to speak.
Jensen is right though. Why am I here? I haven’t made much progress in any of my intentions here and I’m starting to realize that I have no fucking clue what I’m doing, just hoping that something lands in my fucking lap.
I sigh, feeling very foolish for thinking I could do this. I look back up to see Jensen still looking at me, but then my head turns inadvertently toward someone else. Trace.
His eyes are no longer on mine. Instead his head is down and his fists are clenched and I wonder what’s going on in that head of his.
“Don't let them get to you,” Alli says as she leans over Sage and Evrin.
I give her a light smile and go back to looking down at the ground. The fire pit in the center of everyone crackles even as rain seems to be swallowed up by the beautiful amber flames. I drown out the noise, needing to remind myself of the reason why I chose to come. Why I chose to participate . . . I have to let it all go. And if I can find answers in the interim, then maybe I can finally have closure. And right now, unfortunately, that means sitting in on these stupid games. Anything can trigger a memory at this point and even though I’m not sure I’m gonna like what I see, I need to try.
“Okay, well now that that’s settled, who has number one?” Natasha asks.
“Me!” I look over to Alli, who seems eager and excited as she stands to toss her number in the fire. Everyone quiets down as they wait to be called on.
She looks around, finger on her chin and then she sees someone, tilting her head. “You. Rhea.” Everyone looks over to the girl with dark brown hair and glasses. Jensen tosses her a coin and after catching it, she flips it.
“Heads,” everyone around her shouts.
