Wes walks past where I’m trying to stanch John’s wound and into a toilet stall.The wall shakes, there’s a resounding plastic snap, and then he comes back out with a full roll of toilet paper and the broken cover of the dispenser.It’s more hysteria than humor that makes me laugh, but I still catch the roll in my free hand and press it into the wound.The white two-ply paper soaks up the blood and almost falls apart in seconds.I toss it onto the floor and the damp paper hits the tiles with a wet smack.
John groans when I push the heel of my palm deeper into his wound to try to constrict the flow, and Wes drops to the floor on his other side.He falls back into first aid mode by tilting John’s head back to look at his pupils, pressing two fingers to his neck to check his pulse.
“Keep that pressure on.That’s good,” he instructs, and I look up to meet his gaze.He looks like he’s proud of me for shoving my fingers into some guy’s open wound.Like he wants to kiss me.I’d even say it’s the kind of look that makes me think that if he knew I forced my friend into an air vent it would factor high on his list of hotness traits.It’s a fleeting thought when John tries to shake out of Wes’s grip.He looks like he’s annoyed with being fussed over, which is pretty badass considering he’s just been stabbed, but then I notice he also looks like he’s going to throw up.Blood keeps seeping out from around my fingers.He doesn’t wince when I increase the pressure.He barely reacts, and that’s when I start to get worried.
“We need to get you out of here,” I say.“We need to find somethingthat will stop the bleeding.”
John nods slowly, drunk from blood loss, his eyes narrowing as he glances up at Wes and mutters, “Funny how you’re gone, and I get stabbed.”
It’s the first time I’ve heard him sound hostile all night and it’s jarring, uncharacteristic.It’s an indication of how much pain he’s in, how scared he is, but still, I can’t help but be a little shocked.
“John—”
“It’s fine, Jamie,” Wes says.
He isn’t offended; he barely even blinks at the unsaid accusation as he bends down, instructs me to keep the pressure on John’s shoulder while I push up from my knees to stand, then pulls John off the ground without breaking a sweat.It’s not the time to be thinking Wes is very strong.If he can pick up a fully grown, limp man he’d have no issue with me…
My priorities are very warped.
“I thought I found a way out,” Wes says as he takes most of John’s weight and we move as one toward the door.I reach down and grip John’s hand with my free one, keeping my left palm firm against his wound and feeling a little comfort from the way he’s able to slip his fingers through mine and give a weak, assuring squeeze.
We push through the bathroom door and back into the corridor, Wes holding his knife out in front of us as we head toward the main hallway as a unit.John’s grasping the broken bottle again and his arm is looped around Wes’s shoulder for support.The edge of the glass is dangerously close to Wes’s neck, and an unwelcome thought of how John could easily nick an artery if he wanted to comes to mind.We’re lucky we’re all on the same side.
“I found a door,” Wes continues.“A normal one without a code, but the lock was jamm—”
“—and the killer just happened to reappear at the same time,”John murmurs as we move back into the main hallway.
Wes stops to prop John against the wall so he can extract the flashlight from where it’s tucked into the side of his pants.I catch a glimpse of his abs when his shirt gets caught in the process and rides high over his ribs as he jerks the flashlight out.He squints at John.
“You honestly think I’m the killer after all this shit?”
“You always seem to be gone when he’s around,” John mutters, his head lolling against the wall.
When we were in the bathroom it seemed as though Wes was willing to overlook the slight, but now he’s ready to get offended.He scoffs, slipping the flashlight under his arm as he pulls his shirt up again to tuck it into his pants properly, and I can’t help but stare at the second preview I’m afforded of his muscled stomach.It is… defined, and looks like it’d be fun to run your fingers over.Maybe even your tongue.
Mine goes dry at the thought, and when I try to get my mind back onto something other than body parts like tongues and stomachs and fingers, I’m reminded thatmyfingers are sticky and stained red with John’s blood because I’m still trying to plug a wound I can’t see, and I wouldn’t know the severity of it even if I could.
Wes uses the flashlight to point accusatorily at John.“Yousaid there wasn’t a door down there.”
I’m about to suggest that this conversation could be delayed until a later date, but then the slightest movement at the edges of my vision draws my eyes to the end of the hallway where Wes went to find Billie.
“I said it was a dead end,” John says, but I suddenly no longer care about Wes’s abs or missing first aid kits or dead-end doors.
“Guys…” I breathe.
There’s something standing in the darkness.Idling in the shadows and watching us as Wes and John continue to snap at each other.
“And you didn’t think to tell uswhyit was a dead end?”
Maybe it is just a shadow, or one of the other daters, but if that’s the case,whyare they juststandingthere?
“What are you trying to say, Wes?”
“Guys.”
Wes and John glare at each other, completely unaware we have an audience, and once again my brain is frozen, trying to rationalize what I can see at the end of the hall, when the most obvious explanation is the most terrifying.
“What I’m saying,John, is that you—”
