Everyone is shouting over each other, their words indistinguishable. Leather, sweat, floral perfume, floor cleaner; every breath brings another scent to add to the conflicting mess, becoming unbearable to choke down. The light bounces off of the white tile, catching on everyone’s watches, and driving straight into my brain, a migraine blooming instantly.
“Scarlett.”
Sliding until my back is pressed to the wall, I close my eyes, but it does nothing to dispel the dozens currently on me.
“Hey, it’s alright.” This time, Jack’s words are followed by a tentative touch on my ankle that I flinch away from. “Shit,” he murmurs.
Shallow breaths. You’re okay. One, two, three.
Jack’s blood is pulled in with my next inhale, so I hold my breath as long as I’m able to before releasing it. Each subsequent one is barely a puff of air, and the headache drilling into my skull grows worse. Damned if I do, and damned if I don’t.
Damned’s about right.
Everything feels wrong; I don’t even know how to breathe anymore. Each inhale sends pain either to my head or my lungs, and every nerve ending prickles painfully across my skin. I knick my tongue on one of my fangs, desperately scrambling for something to ground me. As soon as the flavor coats my mouth, I gag, bending forward as my stomach threatens to revolt.
Nothing’s mine anymore, not even my blood; it’s the monster’s that turned me. It’s cursed. Toxic. And it’s everywhere. If I could just drain all of the tainted blood out and put mine back, I could be me again.
I can’t breathe.
I’m vaguely aware of the tears streaming down my face as I frantically claw at my throat. My airway continues to constrict, tighter and tighter, until the only scent left is that of the foul blood growing stale on my tongue.
Hands grip my wrists, prying them away. “Hey, it’s alright. I’m here. Talk to me.” Kasen’s smooth baritone wraps around me, cutting through the chaotic noise.
I can’t breathe.
A heavy pressure settles on my chest, steadily increasing until I can’t even draw in a shallow gasp. My head threatens to split in half, but everything else is becoming so numb that I’m barely aware of where my limbs are. Hot tears stream down my cheeks as I keep my face scrunched tight, not wanting to see the disappointment on his face, to see the crowd staring and whispering in condemnation.
I don’t want to do this anymore.
“Scarlett! Come on, baby, tell me how to help you.” There’s a desperation in Kasen’s plea that manages to break through the brain fog, resonating with my own.
With my wrists still trapped in his unrelenting grip, I jerk them towards me to pull him closer. Turning my head, I try to convey my meaning the only way I’m able to, the pressure too heavy to wade through. I’m drowning, and need someone to save me from myself.
“I’m not gonna do that to you.” He presses a soft kiss to my shoulder. “I’ll get you out of here, but babe, you need to start breathing for me, or we’ll be headed for the hospital instead of the apartment.”
I’m burning and freezing, everything both numb, and hurting to the point I can’t tell which way’s up anymore. The pressure becomes all consuming, crushing me from every side, and the temptation to let it grows with every new stab of pain in my skull.
It’s little more than a weak whisper of air, but I manage to shove it past my abused throat. “Help.”
With a growl, pain explodes in my shoulder, chasing away some of the numbness. It gives me something to focus on, a landmark to ground me as I tumble aimlessly through the dark. I manage a small inhale that sets my throat on fire, Kasen’s woodsmoke and thunderstorm scent filling my screaming lungs.
“That’s my girl,” he praises softly. “Is it a panic attack, or is something else going on?”
“It hurts. Everything hurts.”
He tenses before releasing my shoulder and wrists, cupping my face and resting his forehead against mine.“I didn’t mean t-”
“Not the bite.Me.It hurts being me.”With my hand free, I instantly reach for my throat again. “I can’t do this.”
His thumb strokes a steady path over my soaked cheek. “Can you take another breath for me, beautiful?” It scrapes down my raw throat like I screamed myself hoarse, but still; I did it. A full inhale, even if my aching lungs protest by sending me into a coughing fit. “There you go, it’s going to be alright now; I promise. What do you say I take us back upstairs where it’s a little easier to breathe and we can talk about it?”
I nod, but as soon as he pulls away, a ragged sob tears its way out of my battered lungs. Kasen slips a hand beneath my legs and the other wraps around my back, pulling me into his chest. I hide my face against the side of his neck, small inhales easier to manage with his scent overpowering the pungent ones surrounding us.
He takes the stairs, so it’s twice as long before we reach the hallway that separates us from home. “We’ve got to take the elevator up, but it only leads from this floor to the penthouse.”
“I’m not traumatized of elevators.”Before I know it, we’re inside, already on our way up.
“So what happened, beautiful?”
