[u]Evelyn Noblezada[/u] The men in the back of the ambulance had on hazmat suits. Their faces were lost to Evelyn; someone else's looked back at her from the screens over their eyes. It had a passing resemblance to her own, she thought, but she did not ever look so rough. A sister? A mother? "Not Leesburgh General," Evelyn said. She wriggled her fingers and toes. It was the most she could do without making the pain worse. She had to be ready if another one came, another rock. Something had taken a huge bite from her side, she thought, a bear, or the rock-beast. It had eaten her, finally, and this was all some fever dream. A boy had bitten her, once, making out, and she hadn't much cared for it. Had that happened? The suits stopped moving for a moment, then began speaking to each other again. There was a swirl of machines beeping and monitors blooping. [i]Ignoring me,[/i] Evelyn thought, the glare through the back window shining for just a moment before it dulled entirely. "I didn't," Evelyn murmured, each breath a bit more difficult to take in. Her lungs didn't want to go all the way. "Fucking, fucking stutter. Leesburgh General - it - six times malpractice, I don't -" Evelyn blinked. The ambulance had gotten smaller. The edges were darker, the rock thing had begun to swallow it whole too. "I don't consent, I don't - " Evelyn stared at the back doors, which were shrinking, being pulled further away. It had grabbed onto her face, wrapped something around the back of her head, and the air seemed thicker, sluggish. Someone, maybe outside the rock beast's mouth, said it didn't normally take this much. Then she was asleep. -- "Good morning, Miss Noblezada!" Evelyn did not look up from her phone. "How are you feeling today?" "Really bored." "Ah, well, I'm sorry to hear that. You need to stay here a few more days, however. You took a -" The words faded. Evelyn scrolled. A few days? Hours, at the most, she thought. "-and after you change the bandages at home, you - Oh my God!" Evelyn glanced up. There was a deer with its nose pressed to the hospital window. St. James was near the woods. He had in his teeth some kind of roots that he dropped at the windowsill. The nurse blinked. "He keeps coming by," Evelyn said. "It's honestly annoying." "Um, I -" Evelyn did not want this conversation to continue. She glanced at the nurse. She was old. Maybe 25. She had some tattoos on one arm, and none on the other. [i]Removed.[/i] Evelyn let her eyes wander down to her fingers, where she found an uneven tan. Her eyes went back to the woman's chest. The clothes fit too loosely. She'd bought them a size up. "You seeing anyone?" Evelyn asked, casually. The woman fumbled with the IV. She left shortly afterwards. --- Evelyn stood naked in front of her mirror. She had gotten out of the bath an hour ago, but none of the warmth and steam in the room had left. The cane she'd been told to use for the next three weeks was sticking out of the trash can. The cut. Dark and red and inflamed and crooked like a broken bone. It throbbed as she stared. Her cheeks were defiled by a handful of scrapes and cuts, already near-healed, her hands cut and bruised in a few places, her knees skinned to the bone. But the cut. She let her finger trace it, the pain stabbing into her chest all over again. When she blinked, sometimes, she was falling again, and the rock thing got her, it snapped off one of her legs and she could see half her bone jutting out from the red and the meat. Then she opened her eyes and she was talking to some fucking nurse. Evelyn ran her finger along the scar. [i]I always heal back,[/i] she thought, but in her mind, she sounded like Becky. She ran through the swimsuits in her mind. It was winter, soon, there would be heavy jackets and sweaters. Layers. She would have months before she was bared to the world again. The fucking idiot runner boy had passed out, he may not have remembered. She should've kicked his stupid head when he was on the ground. Hopkins wasn't dumb enough to say anything. [i]Tattoos,[/i] she thought. Someone on the west side was sleazy enough to give one to a minor. It was so ugly and wrong, like when she had painted in the fourth grade and Tyreese Johnson had accidentally spilled his water bottle all over her painting of a puppy. Ruined. Mottled. She stared. It was far too close to her breasts or her abdomen for comfort. She was so stupid. If she'd fallen a half second earlier, a half second later, she may well have wound up a bigger freak than Becky. As it was, it fell where Hopkins had those guns that hung under his shoulders. From a certain angle, she supposed, it could be intimidating. Evelyn couldn't remember if she'd been running away or not when she fell. --- Evelyn grimaced as she stepped out of the car. Her purse - worth more than all the clothes you're wearing now - hung under her right shoulder, the strap gripped closely by a mittened hand. Her knuckles were still bruised and swollen from punching the stupid thing's head. [i]You were an idiot,[/i] she thought to herself, [i]But smarter than that thing.[/i] Evelyn glanced up the driveway, where a mish-mash of hand-me-down cars were parked haphazardly. It was like a carousel of the pretenses of the middle class. She could turn on these radios if it came back, Evelyn thought, so suddenly and abruptly she was walking toward one of the door handles to see if it was locked before she caught herself. At the top of the hill, of course, was Charles. The house was [i]fine[/i], she supposed. Gaudy in all the subtle ways. [i]New money,[/i] Evelyn thought, hoisting the handbag higher. Defending coal miners was what it was, but his dad didn't have the cunning of her father. [i]After Friday, all the money in the world's going to be on some class-action when one of these mutants goes Columbine.[/i] Still, she couldn't imagine putting so much money down in Leesburgh no mater who you were. It was pretty boring, even with all that golem shit. The slight bulge from the bandages was masked quite thoroughly under her cardigan, and the bag was insurance. As she walked, the smell of weed drifted down the hill, and was immediately repulsed by a gust of warm air, giving Evelyn a scent sweeter than any perfume. A pristinely, HOA-mowed lawn, fresh-picked flowers. She walked. She met up with Jamie Armistead, a gay kid at the edge of Evelyn's orbit. Junior, 5'8, also in theater, but a techie. Evelyn thought of him fondly; he was one of the few people neither trying to fuck her nor the guys she wanted to fuck, so there was a certain honesty between them she didn't find very often in school relationships. The two chatted as they meandered up the hill. There weren't people Evelyn really fully considered friends, she supposed, as Leesburgh was far too much a stepping stone to put down roots, but Jaime was probably the closest approximation. He was better than Becky, at least. A drunk soccer player Evelyn allegedly sexted the past year stumbled up, smiling wide. His name was Mark or something. "Hey, Evie," he slurred. [i]Evie.[/i] In that moment, Evelyn could've punched through the golem head, had it been on Mark's body. A few years prior, Evelyn recalled one of the varsity players getting blown by Mark's sister at halftime. [i]Now what had his name been?[/i] Evelyn gleamed with conversational ease. "Hi," Evelyn said, "Do you know where Alex is?" The last happy smile Mark would have of that school year left his face. "Oh, uh - " The two walked past. Jamie said nothing, but approved silently. Such was why Evelyn liked him. [i]Evie.[/i] Evelyn hadn't had a boyfriend in a few months. It wasn't necessarily that she didn't enjoy the attention. But the gall. [i]Evie.[/i] As they stepped into the party, the energy noticeably improved. The sloppy drunks stood slightly straighter, the weed more biochemically potent, the alcohol smoother, sweeter. Evelyn could feel eyes upon her, not least of which was Chad. [i]Sunglasses inside,[/i] Evelyn thought. [i]And Oakleys at that. New money. Coke, maybe?[/i] Evelyn gave him a dazzling smile, admiring his jawline. He'd had three previous crushes on Asian girls, Evelyn knew, but she had always been one to help break down racial barriers in Leesburgh. Chad meandered through the crowd, pretend-casually, in their direction. Boys were cute when they tried. Chad was an upperclassman, and Evelyn a mere sophomore, yet being the Marlo of the school's sexual gang wars had done little to slow her social climbing. This was not the first upperclassman party Evelyn had been invited to. A dalliance with a baseball player the previous year had worked wonders for that last year, and these events were far more fun than hanging out with the amorphous cloud of Beckys that clung to her. There had been a brief pause to her party-going the previous year when the two broke up. Being found with weed after cheating on Evelyn was an unfortunate end to his college aspirations. Her mind was alight with the joy of being out with people after the stay in the hospital, quiet and bleach-smelling and boring. Upstairs, Evelyn could distantly hear a girl faking an orgasm, and the gutshot-groan of some boy. There was a non-zero chance he was thinking of Evelyn, she supposed. She pulled the purse tighter to her side as she heard the bed shake, suddenly a bit cold. She glimpsed Willow at the outer orbit of a conversation, perhaps looking for a break in, or maybe a break out. Evelyn didn't recall seeing her car in the driveway, and that monstrosity was memorable. [i]Or is it the car of that other girl?[/i] Willow was an odd one. Kept to herself. She wasn't necessarily ugly, but she was like a child. Quiet, quiet, the sort of quiet you'd think meant there were schemes to shoot up third period if she'd been a boy. Evelyn watched her for a moment. She assumed Willow disliked her, though Evelyn had never really had much of an issue with her. Evelyn rarely had problems with people who didn't really threaten her in some way, which, as callous as it sounds, is probably more magnanimous than most would give her credit for. The little ghost girl was certainly weird, but she wasn't a 12 foot crocodile. Or someone visibly deformed or marred in some way. Evelyn checked to make sure her jacket was zipped up. Jamie raised an eye at Evelyn as Chad drew closer. [i]You can stay,[/i] Evelyn telepath'd with a nod of the head. Jamie smirked. Chad drew closer, and Evelyn admired the brief glimpse of his abs under his shirt, though she thought, adjusted for sex, hers were superior. She turned to say something, twisting her torso, and her right side screamed with agony. Evelyn did not flinch. She did not smell broken concrete and her throat did not feel so dry she thought she was going to choke to death. "Grab me a drink?" She said, sweet as summertime, toes digging into her shoes so forcefully she thought her feet might break. "I'm so glad you invited me. Have you met Jamie?"