Hard to Hate You // Michael Langdon

Part IX - Headaches

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Coco asks as I lean my head against the dining room table.

I'm aware of almost everyone's eyes on me, but I couldn't care less; the excruciating pain in my skull is enough to make anyone pass out.  "Just a headache," I groan, attempting to play it off.

"Either sit back up or have Ms. Mead give you a medical examination," Ms. Venable states from the head of the table.  "You're disrupting dinner."

I sigh as I force myself to sit up.  "I'm fine," I insist as I rub my temple.  This pain has been torturing me for the last hour, ever since not long after my heat-of-the-moment kiss with Michael.  God, if he caused this, I will not hesitate to snap his neck.

Everyone turns back to picking at their gelatin cubes as Coco leans towards me.  "Seriously, Valentina, you don't look good," she whispers.

"I just need to go lay down," I state as I stand up.

"I did not excuse you," Ms. Venable says as she glares at me.

I sigh as I slip into her mind.  "Ms. Venable, I just need to rest," I insist.

"I suppose that is fine," she replies nonchalantly.  I probably could've done a better job at making our interaction feel more natural, but my head is hurting too much to do anything besides simple mind-control.

I quickly exit the room, pushing through the pain.  I need to get to my room before I collapse.  

I stop outside of Michael's room, realizing that my pain is piquing as I pass the door.  "That asshole," I mutter.  He has something to do with this.

I slam open the door and step in, but Michael is not in the room.  Suddenly, my feet start moving towards a door at the side of the room.  My hand lands on the locked doorknob, but I unlock it with a simple tilt of my head.  I push the door open and gasp at the scene before me.

Michael is sitting naked in the middle of a pentagram made from his own blood, blood dripping from his arms as snakes slither around him.  His eyes flash black as he looks up at me.

"What the fuck are you doing?" I seethe.  "And are you the reason my head feels like it's about to implode?"

He sighs, his eyes flashing back to their normal blue.  "Took you long enough to figure out that I was the reason."

"Why the hell would you do that?" I ask as the pain increases.  "Oh shit," I mutter, leaning against the doorframe to stabilize myself.

"I didn't mean to," he sighs.  "I was trying to communicate with my father, then I started thinking about you, then I accidentally cast a spell that would cause you torturous pain before eventually killing you."

"How the fuck do you accidentally do that?" I scoff.

He rolls his eyes.  "It's not hard to do when you're feeling extreme emotion towards said person."

I sigh as I rub my temple.  "Just make it go away."

"I can do that," he nods as he stands up.

I quickly turn away, casting my gaze into his bedroom.  "Put a damn towel on while you're at it."

He rolls his eyes as he raises his arm and a towel flies into it.  He wraps it around himself as he walks toward me.  "You're going to need to get in the circle."

I scoff as I turn towards him, not bothering to tone down my sass.  "If you think I'm going to do some Satanic ritual with you just to get rid of a headache, you're dead wrong."

I gasp as the pain intensifies and my vision to go blurry.  I double over and grab onto the thing nearest to me, Michael's bloody arm, but it slips through my grasp as I fall to the ground.