Charming by Haig Moses (1st Draft)

Chapter Fifteen

A DAZE

I don't know what I'd be without Kappa. This is my first year as a sister to the sorority and already I feel connected to these girls as if they were my own. We pledges have been through hell and back, but we did it together.

Beatrice, our chapter president just told me as I was being brought into the sorority, that I had the potential to be a future president. "Resilience and honesty," she said were the two thinks she looked for and that she "had her eye on" me.

Right now, in this moment, I can say that I Carolyn Wright have never felt more seen.

I no longer found solace in my mother's words. Everything she had written was leading up to or during her experience as a Kappa and this was only a sore reminder of what was happening to me. Because as quickly as my world had formed itself everything collapsed; true to her word, Ana had quickly put my name on the black list meaning every sorority (and even some frat guys) stayed a good distance away from me.

While usually this wouldn't have bothered me because I wasn't one for company. There was something psychology damaging to being actively avoided instead of the one actively avoiding people. It was as if I had a disease that was spreading by mere eye contact. To me, nobody spoke a word or even came within six feet of me less Ana caught them interacting with me.

"It'll pass," Inez said a few days after my ex-communication. She had named Tatiana as her Big and occasionally would be seen at our dorm to talk or get advice about the upcoming recruitment trials. "Give it a few weeks, I mean with how quickly people move from one thing to the next Ana and everybody else will sure forget all about this and just let it pass."

Tatiana had only shaken her head. Despite her also not caring about Ana's blacklist when we were in private quarters, she too followed instructions and stayed clear of me around other people. "You said you have the money," she huffed.

"I did have it," I defended. "But then, if you remember, I got fired from my job so I figured paying off this semester's tuition was more important than buying my way into a sorority."

My roommate rolled her eyes. "Then you should've came to me. You know I would've loaned you the money. Then you could've... paid me back or something."

We had been through this so many times I didn't even respond to Tatiana's comment. The past few days had been followed by her passive aggressive remarks or me staying in bed trying my hardest to avoid the world as much as they were avoiding me.

The fact of the matter was that I had not only failed myself, but my mother as well. She had made it through these trials, been more resilient than I.

My mind wandered back to that basement door Jacqueline held me in front of. The distant wailing from below stirred something inside of me. A fragmented memory I had spent a long time keeping buried. "Harriet, help me." the broken voice called out for me reaching its' talons through time and gripping me in the present. Hand enclosed on the red string tied around my wrist I shut my eyes and turned my body on my bed.

"You're dead," I seethed through tight lips and clenched teeth. "You're dead, you're dead, you're dead."

I should've went into that basement, I found myself thinking. I should've bombarded past Jacqueline and helped whoever was inside, but instead I found myself paralyzed by fear. I found myself to still be that little girl standing in the dark helpless against the likes of those more powerful than me. I should've, I could've, but I didn't.

I didn't and now I saw all the other pledges who hadn't turned in their donations as ghosts of themselves. Around campus they followed Ana or the other sisters like pets with vacant eyes and stylish clothes.