Dark Hedges

The Meat Contradiction

Bianca Garrick's death brought the Dominion down to its knees.

Two days after the harrowing night, no one inside that forlorn house dared speak. All eleven inhabitants under that roof walked by each other, silent and distant, parallel lines unwilling, or perhaps unable to meet. Like phantoms trapped under the same curse, they creeped up and down the hallways, mourning, dragging the chains they slowly accumulated with each new sin. Soon they all became phantasms, mirages of their previous selves, condemned to repeat their mistakes over and over again.

At times, Teddy wondered if something else might've died besides Bianca Garrick.

Out of all the Stags, and much to Teddy's surprise, it was Renata Rutherford who seemed the most affected by Bianca's suicide. The redheaded girl cried all through the day and well into the night after the party. Not even her dashing boyfriend, the heartbroken Tony, managed to calm her down and when it became clear he wasn't helping in any way, shape or form, he chose to leave her alone, locking her in her room.

Her sobs echoed in every corner of the Dominion, howls that brought new purpose to the house, feeding its darkness, quenching its thirst. The blood that dripped from these walls now threatened to drown them all and Teddy pictured them, adrift, castaways holding on to their last remnants of decency, fighting to stay afloat against a red tide that imperilled to take them down.

Since the fatal Halloween night, Teddy and Tripp had spoken not a single word. As a matter of fact, it seemed both actively avoided the other, something Teddy was perfectly okay with. He had not the strength nor the will to stand before Tripp and try to salvage their friendship, if it ever existed; he knew the consequences of confessing his love. For his part, the raven haired boy shielded behind Violet, whose fragile condition gave him the perfect excuse to lock himself in her room and ignore the rest of the world.

Emilia, for her part, took the girl's suicide deeply personal. The guilt of both Bianca and Stuart's deaths hit her like a storm and she too shut Teddy out, telling him she needed some time to process everything. As such, Teddy found himself alone again. With everyone voluntarily locked in their own prison of plaid, and classes cancelled because of the tragic chain of events, time became a currency he did not know how to spend.

And so he wandered the rooms of the Dominion, only he and a bone-chilling silence, the kind that becomes an involuntary friend after a while. Left alone with nothing but his thoughts and impulses, Teddy found himself sinking into a pit of thoughts, a trap of dreams, a maddening spiral of deserted longings and unfulfilled wishes that would undoubtedly lead to the same forsaken road that Bianca and Stuart had solitarily tread.

And he couldn't take it anymore. Grabbing the first coat he found, Teddy ran down the stairs and exited the Dominion. The refreshing autumnal wind crashed against him, cooling the fire that raged on his insides, pulling him out of the depths of the nightmare he and everyone in that house now shared.

With his mask off and his flesh now exposed, he walked around the deserted campus, dragging his feet, too weak and too unwilling to put any kind of enthusiasm into his behaviour. There was no point in pretending. No one saw him, nobody cared. He was but a stranger in the light of day, an erratic wanderer, an observer of realities who refused to take part in the thing they called life.

Before he noticed it, Teddy realized his aimless walk had taken him across campus, all the way to the grand gardens behind the Queen Elizabeth I dorms. Standing before the building that once housed Stuart, the sting of regret punctured his heart and brought the downpour to his eyes, which so far had managed to remain arid. Knees shaking, his hands involuntarily clench into fists, teeth chattering at the useless desire to touch the bespectacled boy's face once more.