Page 15

I knew because Jeremy had told me, and Jeremy was my best friend. I knew that she had lured him in and that he had fallen for it, having little to no attention from women.
And now she was winking at me, and I could feel myself falling for it, too.
I shook my head and watched as another woman took Delia’s place, but my eyes strayed from the scene in front of me to Delia.
She was a few feet away, tossing her water bottle back and gulping greedily, letting water spill down her chin and onto her chest.
She saw me looking and smirked. She mouthed, ‘I win,’ and stared into my soul.
I looked back at Jeremy, at the woman struggling underneath him, and I felt for him. He still cared about her, and she only cared to win.
A loud sound, short and cracking, cut through the air from outside. My body reacted before my mind could, and I ducked, screaming, “Shots fired!”
I sprang into action, running toward Delia, slamming her body against mine, and pinning us both to the ground. I looked around at the others and screamed, “Get down!”
They all stared at me, frozen to the spot, and I could feel panic coursing through my body, a tension so thick that my body didn’t feel like mine.
I was outside of it, watching myself move. I got up to my knees and army crawled to the other women, tugging on their arms, trying to get them to understand.
I was transported to a battle ground, dirt beneath my knees and kicked up into my ears, a ringing so metallic all around me that I felt it in my teeth.
I could hear the difference between a shot that died in the air and a shot that hit a person. I could smell the difference instantly between a brother in arms who was alive but injured and a brother who had already died.
My body was alert and electric with adrenaline, and I was holding my jaw so tightly that my teeth ached.
I looked up, my face sweaty and cold, and realized where I was. Delia was a few feet from me, on the ground still, looking at me with gentle but wide eyes.
“It was just a car backfiring,” she whispered.
I looked around at everyone’s faces and felt the familiar shame that my PTSD had made a home for me.
“Excuse me,” I muttered as I stood up. “Jeremy, can you—”
“I got it,” he told me, a flat smile on his face. He pitied me. It made me want to flatten his smile and his nose.
But instead, I nodded at him and walked out into the hallway to compose myself. I tried to force myself to breathe. I stretched my ribs out and told myself, “It was just a car. You’re safe.” But I could feel myself losing it every second that passed, could feel the old panic and anxiety mounting.
I pinched my wrist with my nails, letting them really dig into my skin to try and ground myself.
The doors opened, and Delia walked out, concern written all over her face. Scoffing, I turned my face away, embarrassed to be seen this way but also angry that she would insert herself.
“I need a moment alone,” I told her gruffly, continuing my stretches.
“Why don’t you sit down?” she murmured, standing next to me and leaning against the wall, her eyes fixated on me.
“I don’t want to sit on the ground, thank you.”
“Why not? You were just army crawling on it.”
I shot daggers at her with my eyes. “I fully understand that you don’t like me. Now is not the time for whatever games you want to play right now. Please go back to class.”
She propelled herself off the wall with her hands and bounced back against it a couple of times before saying, “I just wanted to see if you were okay.”
“I am,” I lied, even as the familiar panic that I’d grown accustomed to shot through my body again.
“You don’t seem okay.”
I glanced at her, at her gentle expression, one of someone genuinely concerned, and I felt something resembling appreciation flow through me.