Hornet's Nest Ch. 05

"Yeah, Keane is all my mum's side."

"Oh, wow."

I brushed hair behind her ear and kissed her forehead. "He broke out of that world. He got away from it all. He did it, and you can, too."

She smiled. "You believe in me, huh?"

"Why wouldn't I? Just keep doing what you're doing, denying them, or whatever. Don't do whatever they say."

"What about you, fucking idiot. This whole fuck-up with Myles?"

I touched at my brow and screwed my face up for a moment. "Gonna call Wes."

"Mate," his voice said as he picked up. "Where are you?"

"Vi's room in halls. I'm staying here tonight."

"Probably for the best."

"What's going on there, is Myles gonna call the cops on me?"

"No, mate, nah. He's too embarrassed."

We both just snickered, like little kids. When the moment was blown over it was easier to laugh about.

"I've talked to Vi," I said, hoping he'd pick up on all the hints.

"Everything's good?" he asked.

"Yes."

Violet and I laid on her bed talking for a little while longer. She told me one story about what her parents' 'jobs' involved, but no more. I couldn't expect too much at once.

When she was drowsy and laying with her eyes closed, I remembered that I'd called up my dad in an absolute state. Fuck. What was he thinking now? Had he been talking with Mum?

"Everything's ok," I texted him. "Sorry for calling you up like that."

"It's fine," he replied. "I'm glad you did."

Maybe the true weight and possible danger of Violet's situation just didn't sink in to me. Maybe I was so blinded by affection for her that I wouldn't think something bad. She had revealed something large, but as far as I was concerned, nothing changed. It was a separate world - so long as she was with me, she was away from it.

*

It's amazing what people will forgive you for, when they can't be fucked to deal with it.

In one sense, I was lucky that Myles had macho problems. He didn't want to go 'crying to the police like a little bitch', in his own words. I mean, it could've been worse. It wasn't like I'd hospitilized him. He stayed indoors for a couple of days to let bruising go down, calling in sick to class. He was moody with me, but surprisingly cool with it all. If anything, he only seemed frustrated that there'd been some kind of fight, and he'd lost it. I could relate. I'd felt the same upon having my arse handed to me when I was 15.

The strongest thing he appeared to feel about it all was, 'at least I still got the fucking coke'. He'd already paid Vi before the cops showed up.

He was still a prick, and we were never going to be friends, so nothing particularly changed.

For a couple of weeks, Claire wouldn't talk to me. She avoided me, tossing me the rare glance, like I was some neanderthal brute. Eventually, even she went back to normal. I actually missed the silence.

Adrian was a bit timid, and talked about getting his rent sorted.

We didn't find out who had ratted Violet. Both Myles and Adrian tried to ask their 'friends', but it was hopeless. Adrian throught it was some girl Myles had been involved with, but Myles disagreed - he told me he figured out exactly who it was, but couldn't prove it or make them own up. He gave me the name, probably hoping I'd go apeshit and beat up that guy as well.

I wasn't going to. I had rumours to deal with.

Violet was the 'drug dealer', and now I was her 'thug' of a boyfriend, who'd beaten someone up when she got arrested. There were different stories floating about, but the general details stayed the same.

Yeah, reputations. They're fucking great.

I didn't like the looks I got. I hated what had happened. I felt like I'd let my dad down. I'd let myself down.

I guess it was worth it, for Violet. It made her realise that whatever affected her was going to affect me, too. That we were in this together. I was going to be there for her.

*

Violet eventually talked to Wesley. I didn't tell him anything - I waited for her to decide to do it. They were both still in his room when he sent me a subtle text.

"Holy shit."

"Yeah," I thumbed with a grin.

She bounced in ten minutes later, throwing herself into my lap, arms around my neck. She pecked my forehead with kisses, down to my cheek, then my mouth.

"Okay," I said in a gap where her lips weren't smothering me. "All good?"

"Yes." She kissed me again. "I love you." And again. "You're awesome. Wes is pretty awesome, too."

He was. University would've been... different, if he hadn't been there.

I thought he was getting along fine, but as usual, he made it hard to know. His behaviour was as erratic as ever. He'd shake his head and slump around, exaggeratedly sighing at things like the world was so impossibly hard. Then he'd be hyperactive and almost crying with laughter, jumping around like life was the best thing since sliced bread.

He got drunk, he got high, he spent stretches entirely sober. Some things never changed - he still liked going out. Friday nights he routinely spent clubbing, and sometimes the best hangover cure was more clubbing the following Saturday. He made friends in the way Wesley does - always having people around to talk to, random high fives down the street, hollered greetings across campus. Social and energetic. He had this pumped up bravado that convinced everyone they wanted to know him.

He brought a few girls back to his room, stayed over theirs' sometimes. One became clingy and he quickly broke it off with her, but was bombarded with angry texts for a week. Then eventually a guy did come into the scene. I caught Wes in the hallway shortly after he left that Saturday morning.

"So?"

Wes pulled a humourously wide-eyed look and shook his head, as if I shouldn't have asked. "Let's just say, that guy knew what he was doing."

"And was it good?"

"I don't know. I don't know if I'm even comfortable with what happened."

"Yeah, we heard you."

"Fuck. Well that's my payback, mate. Heard enough of you. Vi is one thing, but when you get going..."

I chuckled and averted my gaze to the floor. "Yeah, well, she likes to be in charge."

"Does she tie you up?"

"Not yet."

"Not yet?" He threw his head back with an eruption of laughter. "Fucking hell, Dave."

"This coming from the guy who took it up the arse all night."

He laughed again, shoved me, and disappeared inside his room.

Whatever he was doing was pretty normal. I suppose students and experimentation go hand in hand. I wasn't entirely exempt from it, either. I was just making all my discoveries with the same person.

Violet and I did go clubbing with Wesley a few times, but Violet liked it even less than I did. I could swear she simply had better hearing, better smell, and even better sight, than the average person. Whenever too much was going on around her she became increasingly jumpy and irritated, and just wanted to get out.

Not that she wasn't a thrill seeker. Those clubbing nights usually involved us staying for a couple of hours, then disappearing outside for some 'exercise'. One time she'd had a bit to drink, gotten herself tipsy, and still wanted to do parkour. I struggled between fits of laughter and worrying she'd split her skull open.

We climbed up high and she performed a handstand at the edge of a building's roof, grinning at me with flushed cheeks. I couldn't watch without grabbing hold of her ankle to be sure she wouldn't fall. She did a lot of acrobatics that night, flipping off walls, somersaulting in the air, showing off. And convinced me to join in.

Maybe she also had a better sense of touch than the average person. She was like a fiery ball of passion, and after all the months we'd managed by then, it still felt like she couldn't get enough of me. She'd shove me into bed, straddle me, push me onto my back. I knew what she was like, yet it still gave me butterflies. Her fingers would lock with mine and she'd hold down my arms, kiss me while grinding her body on top of mine. She liked to tease me, ride me slow, bring me close over and over until I lost control and wrestled her down.

I'd have a twinge of guilt during the afterglow sometimes, worrying I might go too far. Closing my hand around her throat to hold her down might be walking a fine line. I left hickies on her, a few accidental bruises. I didn't mean to be so rough, but I only did what she drove me to do. She never told me to stop. Her eyes were never filled with anything but pleasure. I guess I was her bedroom thrill.

---

Violet

The weather was getting warmer, the days were getting longer. David and I turned 19, five days apart, during spring.

"Are you having a joint party?" Wes asked.

David let out a scoff from the flat's sofa, eyes fixed on his phone, replying to birthday messages from family. "It's not like it's a number worth making a deal over."

"Yeah, easy for you to say. I turn twenty in May. Do you know what a shitty number that is? Not a teenager anymore, but it's not twenty-one, either. Complete limbo state."

"Yeah, think you're still gonna get a sports car by twenty-four, and beat Tyler?"

"Shit. I'm running out of time. I need a job."

David chuckled and finally looked up from his phone. "Good luck."

"Mate, I'm gonna get everything straight this summer. I'm gonna get my license, and I'm gonna get a job. Even if it's just flipping burgers, I'm getting a job."

"You need to stop wasting money on weed and start saving."

"I'm already cutting down."

Wesley wasn't cutting down on the weed for his own interests. He was doing it to limit his contact with Romain. It was for me, partly, but it wasn't entirely selfless. When Romain couldn't get hold of me, he'd started asking Wesley my whereabouts, how I was doing. Wes didn't want any chance - or any risk - of being drawn in. To anything. I should've been flattered that he chose being friends with me over getting stoned.

I was his brother's girlfriend, and that made me family to him. He'd become more and more accepting of my presence, until he might've been the loudest and most adamant about the fact that I was going home with them for summer.

David was equally verbal about it. I wasn't really given a choice in the matter.

It did make most sense, after all. It's not like David was telling me not to see my parents, but he was scared what might happen to me if I went back to 'that environment', 'those people'. And it's not like we wanted to spend weeks apart, either. We might as well have been joined at the hip.

I wasn't looking at longterm solutions. I was thinking about the now. And honestly, all that meant was settling into the new lifestyle I found myself in.

I had a lot of work, I had a lot of typical student things, but I also had David. He wanted to look after me, and after all his tireless insistence I finally relaxed, and let him. I'm not even sure if 'stubborn' was a good word to describe him, and how he was. Maybe 'overpowering' was more fitting.

I'd thought he was naive, and innocent, and clueless. I'd thought he couldn't possibly understand the cold truths of my childhood. But he wasn't as sheltered as I'd thought. I'd also come to realise that he didn't have to be rougher and tougher than me. He didn't have to fight the world I'd come from, to 'save' me from it. The fighting was my own. All he had to do was give me a way out.

Somewhere, at the back of my mind, this had all been my plan, of course. I'd come to university looking for more than just an education. I'd come looking for that escape.

Find a rich boyfriend. What a potentially easy and flawless plan. And yet in the cold calculations in my mind, I'd somehow glossed over a key detail. That I was going to care about this person. That I was going to fall in love.

What had the previous me been thinking? That I was just going to put up with some rich dickhead, and try to ride off it, and live the high life? Be some token wife?

I wasn't even passive - or disciplined - enough to pull that off.

David put up with me. All of me. And I was fortunate that he did. He somehow treated me like the most precious thing in the world, while still being so brash and blunt to call me out every time I was an idiot. If someone had ever openly insulted and heartily complimented me in the same sentence, it was David. Maybe Wesley got close, but he lacked in the compliments department.

*

The plastic money fascinated me. I watched David's card slot and swipe away, paying for everything with the punch of numbers on a pad. Invisible payments. Electronic numbers. How did the money actually exist? At one point I forced him to an ATM just so he'd withdraw something physical, so I could see him hold some real money in his hands.

Everyone I knew while growing up mainly dealt in cash. Ideally, cash was harder to trace. More anonymous. That debit card just highlighted David's stark contrast to me. His name was on everything he did, and he had no reason to worry about it. Didn't even think about it.

He wasn't a massive spender, and his money wasn't limitless, but he did like to put it to periodic use. We ate out at cafes and restaurants a few times, and he bought me a few things, including a new summer-friendly jacket, and some new boots. I spotted them, and liked them. He offered to buy long before I asked.

We didn't initially go out shopping for me, though. He started complaining about clothes not fitting.

It's not that he'd gotten taller. He'd gotten wider. And I'm not saying he'd put on weight. Well, he had. It was muscle. It'd slowly built up and it was hard to see the gradual difference without something to compare, but from my own memory, I guess it was visible. Everything looked a little more defined.

"Vi, you've ruined my fucking life," he said. "I'm in between sizes now. Oh my God. Do you know how much I hated finding clothes already?"

I didn't see the big deal. A few t-shirts were tighter around the shoulders and chest, but he was uncomfortable with it.

I threw a white tank top at him. "Start showing yourself off. Weather's good for it."

He looked at me like I'd just called him a piece of meat. "That's really gay."

"Your uncles will be proud."

He guffawed and threw the tank top back in my face.

"Or better yet, just go topless."

"I'll look like a total douchebag."

"No, you'll look hot. If you got it, flaunt it."

"Jesus Christ." He took the top from my hands, hung it up on the rack, grabbed my wrist, and dragged me out. He tugged me through the shopping mall, straight to a Victoria's Secret.

"Oh no," I said. "No, no."

He started pushing me inside. "Yes."

I struggled, shoes sliding on the floor. "They won't have anything my size!" Bra shopping had never been easy.

"With all the size zero models? Sure they do."

"Oh my God. What's the point of buying something if it's just going to come off anyways?"

"It'll look hot for those ten seconds that it's on."

"Oh God!"

Laughing makes it really hard to fight back. We were receiving some funny looks. I mean, a boyfriend was dragging his girlfriend kicking and screaming into a lingerie shop.

*

It was a matter of weeks until the first year of university was over. By June all classes would be finished until September. There was still some ongoing work, projects being reviewed and sent back to tweak before re-submitting, but we had no reason to stay around the campus premises. Which was why David and Wesley wanted to go home as early as possible.

David was utterly exhausted while things came to their close. He sat in his chair, head down on his desk, and didn't move for fifteen minutes while I restlessly paced the flat building's stairwell during a phonecall to my mum. We were having the first heat wave of the incoming summer, and although the forecast said it would be over by tomorrow, David still grumbled and complained.

I stopped in the kitchen on my way back to his room for a glass of cold water. Upon seeing him in the exact same position I'd left him in, I poured it down the back of his neck. He jolted with a comical yelp, his elbow narrowly missing my face.

"Fucking hell, Vi!"

"Are we running tonight?"

He slumped again. "I will die. I will literally die."

"Your poor baby." I leant on his shoulders and nuzzled my nose into his hair.

"Just think," he mumbled. "This first year is all foundation stuff. What the fuck's it gonna be like after summer?"

"Worse?"

"One more year. Then I can drop chemistry."

"Mm-hm." I kissed his ear, then his cheek, and he let out one of his affectionate grunts. I'd discovered he had a wide range of conversational grunts, from 'fuck off', to 'I love you'.

"You spoke to your mum?" he asked.

"Yep."

He sat up. "Everything's good?"

"Yep."

Mum's reaction had certainly been positive, maybe even funny - "Get in there, girl." She approved of what I was doing, but Dad was a little more apprehensive about letting me out of his sight. Seeing me off to university was one thing, and now I was gallivanting around with this mysterious, rich boyfriend. It had always been like that. If I fell, Mum told me to climb better. Dad wanted to be there with a cushion for the next time.

"Are you sure it's all okay?" I asked David.

"Why wouldn't it be?"

"I'm just, like, a stranger, living in your house the whole summer."

"You're not a stranger." He got to his feet and peeled off the wet shirt sticking to his back.

I perched on the bed and gave him one of my smiles.

"No," he said.

"Yes."

"It's too hot."

"Are you gonna be like this all summer?"

"No, it's just..."

I gave a little fidget, straps of my bra and tank top slipping off my shoulder. There was a brief flicker in his expression, but he contained himself.

"I'm going to have a cold shower. You're welcome to join me."

He could return it on me just as much, with the subtle, enticing flex of his shoulders, the smirk and twitch in his brow. Fuck sake.

---