INCAPABLE - BOOK I: THE FALLEN

C H A P T E R 8

I SLOWLY tried to open my eyes, squinting in a light hovering over me. I saw faces peering over me, through my glossy vision.

"Look" one of the girls, leaning closer, said, "It's the girl who slept with one of the board members." A few girls stood behind her cackling.

"What?" I asked, laying there, dumbly, trying to get up, but I couldn't access my balance.

She pushed me back down. "You know what you did", said the girl. I recognized her from earlier, when I first arrived here. She was the one with the long auburn hair, and piercing green eyes, that burned almost as much as her words did, opening my eyes.

"No, I don't know what I did" I stammered, before I could even think about what that must've sounded like. I was too scared and had no clue of what was happening. She peered at me and stood so close that I could see the tiny flecks in her eyes.

Smirking menacingly, she asked, "What was it, Valerie?" I nodded. "Well Valerie" she continued, "we all know that you spent the night in Cole's quarter. And we also all know that any girl who stays in there, isn't just sleeping."

"But I was!" I interjected as she laughed, cuing for the entire room to erupt with laughter along with her. Except, I noticed, one girl in the back row of bunks, who didn't. I sat up on my elbows and gave her a pleading look. She smiled sympathetically and I recognized her by her smile instantly. Jack.

The girl turned back to me, silencing the room on command. "Sweetie" she said, batting her eyelashes, "You're not the first to fuck Cole". I looked at her oddly. "But you are the first to hook up on the first night, and then lie about it."

I felt the tears pool under my eyes, but I tried to hold them back. Don't cry. Don't cry. At that, I wanted nothing but to faint again.

"But that's not what happened" I squeaked.

"Sure" she replied sarcastically.

"She said she didn't hook up with him", someone said from the other side of the room. I glanced up hopeful, and smiled.

"What do you know, dike?" she questioned Jack, turning around with her back to me. I laid there speechless, completely helpless on the floor. While she turned, I snatched the opportunity and stump led to my feet with no help from anyone at around me. My head pounded and I was drastically confused, but I wanted to watch, needed, to watch as the girl defended me.

"First of all, I'm not a dike", Jack said firmly, "And second of all, leave my friend alone, Casey. If she said she didn't sleep with Cole, she didn't."

"And what are you going to do if I don't?" Casey asked, laughing, clearly unaffected. She motioned her hands up and two chests lifted from the floor in front of the bunk beds, to Casey's tall height.

"Do you want a repeat of last time?" Jack questioned, smirking. Casey's sneer quivered, but remained stationed. Jack swung her hands up and copied Casey's chests with two of her own, then two bed tables, and finally two bunk beds, piled high with items, almost touching the quarter's low ceiling. She twirled her index fingers and the beds spun simultaneously with them, followed by the accessories. Instantly, the hovering chests fell to Casey's feet with a loud thud.

"That's what I thought", Jack said before gracefully landing everything without a sound. The other girls climbed back into their beds and began quietly talking to one another again, as I suspected they were before I arrived. Some were louder than others, but many opted to levitating their books, or pillows, or jewelry. I looked at Jack, who motioned me to her bunk in the back of the quarter.

"Better go sleep with you dike friend, slut" I heard Casey whisper as I rushed by. "Never ever talk to Cole again new girl", she said before I could get out of my ear's range. "He's mine."