Chapter 70 Delilah
DELILAH
Nova doesn’t talk about the fact she saved my life.
Neither do I. We went back to our routine of her glaring at me while we eat, work out, anything.
But I’ve taken her advice, so I don’t cry or beg when they take me to the Rooms. I stare through the mirrors, meeting my own eyes and allow my hate to be seen.
It’s stopped them from selecting me since I’ve also stopped reacting.
No matter what they do, I haven’t screamed.
But I can’t earn the drugs. I’m going crazy in the dorm as I pace on my third day without sleep.
My veins are on fire. I keep getting hot then cold, throwing up, yet the lack of sleep is the one that’s making it unbearable.
My mind is fracturing in this fucking place, stuck in time, each day endless without any reference while I stare at the empty fucking room, begging my mind to let me sleep.
The door slides open, interrupting my pacing as hope of getting anything to stop this torture makes me run to the end of the bunk. My face falls when I see Jasper softly smiling at me.
“You’re moving dorms,” he says, still smiling.
I scratch my arms and hands as I follow him out of the dorm. Anything to reduce the burning. Fuck, why has my blood turned to fire? It’s never felt like this before. I continue scratching until I draw blood, needing to alleviate the burning.
At least I’ve stopped throwing up, so I don’t have to battle my stomach as we walk through the disorienting hallway to another dorm full of people of different ages and races, like a sample of civilization has been trapped here.
They all stay on their bunks, some curled in on themselves so I can’t see their faces as they tremble under the thin sheets, others glaring at me as Jasper guides me through the bunks.
“Your bed is over here,” he says gently, pointing at a corner of the room as I look around the dorm.
I nod, attempting to speak, but no sound comes out. Why is my body shutting down? The nausea returns as I walk through the bunks. It feels like they’re closing in on me. The little pockets of chatter get louder. Everyone is looking at me, talking about me while I try not to throw up on them.
Jasper gently holds my elbow, guiding me the rest of the way until I collapse on the lower bunk below Sienna, who’s peering over her bed with worry lining her face.
“Are you okay?” she whispers.
I nod as I roll on my side, weakly wrapping the sheets around me without the energy to crawl under them.
The thin foam mattress doesn’t offer any protection from the rigid metal grid of the frame it’s resting on.
There’s too much pain. I rub my feet together under the scratchy fleece to get the pains to go away, but they intensify.
“It’s okay.” The bed creaks as Jasper sits on the edge, gently rubbing circles on my back. “Sienna, can you get the tub from the bathroom please?”
I whimper when she moves, shaking the bed. Nova lays on the bunk opposite me with her feet pressed to the mesh of the bunk above. Her body looks like the letter L until she raises her hands to make a U.
A sob cracks my chest at the letters so close to spelling Luna.
Jasper continues rubbing my back as he softly whispers, “You don’t have to cry.”
“I lost them again,” I sob. “I lost my babies.”
Somehow he manages to understand me through the pain. “You’ll get them back.”
I shake. Not just my head to tell him it’s not possible, my entire body trembles. I can’t get it to stop or warm up, but he lays beside me, allowing me to cry into his chest when he’s a child.