CONDEMNATION ✓

Chapter 42

You weren't sure exactly how you ended up on the roof of Halcony Hall, but you did know exactly why you had a bottle of Jack nestled beside you up there. A small glass, that could fit a few hefty shots in it rested between your folded legs. It's diagonal shape grazing your fingers as you fiddled with the smooth cold glass, ice rattling within every time you'd shift in your spot.

No matter how hard you wished, roof shingles weren't the most comfortable seat, but they did have a rough texture that prevented you from slipping down the slope and go rolling right of the edge. It was dark to think about, but you questioned if falling from the three-story mansion was that bad of an idea. Of course, it was.

A pair of thick, fleece, blue pajama bottoms kept you cozy and warm in the cool night air. A loose black robe cloaking your torse and revealing the simple spaghetti string white tank top underneath. Not your most fashionable attire, but who was there to judge. Barefaced and eyes wide awake, it was just you and the stars now. To which you could barely see over the radiating glow of Stocgate in the distance.

Raising the glass to your lips, you let Jack try and soothe your worries. Trying to wash away the fond memories that began to dance in your head of your once 'normal' life with your parents. Long before you knew about the crime, the drugs, the murders. Before you knew your brother was a pot-dealing hoodlum that terrorize the city. A decade before sex and men ever became an issue that weighed so heavily on your shoulders.

It was so simply back then. Your worries included finishing your homework before it was due and making sure you were nestled into the couch on a Friday night before 7 pm when they were showing one of the many Disney movies on T.V for the hundredth time. How did life go from so simplistic to cannibalistic?

It was a dog-eat-dog world now. A world that garnered no trust from others, nor any given to those around you. A world in which you could only rely on yourself, not even your brother was someone to be trusted anymore. Mono was one of the worse people living under the roof you now sat upon. How did things go so wrong?

Maybe you warranted the dismay when you decided to dive headfirst into the life you barely knew anything about. Perhaps you were trying to fit in. Just trying to show your family you were just like them when in reality, they wanted you to be different. They wanted a woman who didn't know the life of a crime. A girl who could finish high school and run off to college before settling down with a good-hearted nine-to-five man who would provide for his future family.

No. Even as a child you were far too wild and erratic to ever settle into a life like that, surely your parents knew that. Evil was littered in your DNA, crime was the only profession that belonged to you. Even if you never found out what your parents really did for employment, one way or another you would have ended up right where you already were.

Alone. Untrusting. Traped and doing the bidding of an over-lord that was far more powerful than yourself. There was no point in dweling on what was already done. You made this life for yourself, it was your obligation to own up to it and take the bull by the horns.

How much longer were you going to let R control you? To own you like a piece of property that he could use to do his bidding whenever he saw fit. How much longer would you need to be his bitch?

As the anger started to boil, once again you chased it with a heavy flow of whiskey and cool ice. Hoping the intoxicating mixture would cause you to forget, at least just for a while, but it wasn't the whiskey that brought you out of your self-pity. It was the buzzing in your pocket.

Pulling your phone from the slit in your robe you head it up to eye level. Hitting the power button you let the screen blind you in the face as you attempted to read the message displayed.

"Dinner is getting cold. Where are you? - Mono"

At least via text message he didn't write like an idiot, most of the time anyway. R must have forked up your new phone number to your brother since he had disposed of your last phone without an explanation as to why. Rolling your eyes, you carelessly flung your phone behind yourself.

It hit the roof, bouncing off the tiles before hitting the surface, screen down. The cool metal began to slide across the roof in a bad dash for the gutter and taking a swan dive off the edge. Though must to your displeasure, it got caught on one of the shingles and stopped just before it tipped over the edge. Once again, your eyes rolled.

You didn't need dinner. Mr. Jack here was enough of a meal for the night, plus who really wanted to go back inside and mingle? What, see Jimin and have to pretend to be some ditzy college student? Talk to Hoseok and act like you had a single thing in common? Or converse with your brother as he tried to pretend like a good older sibling who gave a damn? No thanks.

Reaching for the bottle of Daniels, you refilled your glass before setting it back off to the side. The cool night air and dimly lit stars were enough company for the evening, all the company you could tolerate for now.

When the sun started to rise, maybe then you'd slither back into the house and find comfort in your king-size bed. Until then, whiskey under the moonlight was good enough.