I screamed as plaster and rotten wooden beams rained down around us. Rufus hunched farther over me, shielding my skin from every splinter. It was getting hard to breathe, but I was not about to complain with him taking the brunt of the roof on his back. All around us, I could hear people yelling. The last of the roof fell and it began to quiet down.
"We're fine," I told Rufus, my voice muffled by his body.
Carefully, with white dust falling off his clothes at every move, he unwrapped his arms from me and stood up, the debris crashing to the floor from his back. He held out a hand and helped me up. My knees were shaking. As he helped support my weight, I saw Rufus wince, then glance down at his left leg. I looked down too. There was a rip in his pants, and I could see blood beginning to soak through.
"Sarah," he mumbled, beginning to sway. Then his legs buckled. I steadied him, both of my hands on his shoulders.
"We're not fine!" I gasped, almost hysterically. "You're hurt!"
Then other people were there, teachers, making him lie down and checking me head to foot for injuries. There was not a scratch on me, while Rufus had small bruises and cuts everywhere from the debris.
"Sarah," he kept saying over and over again.
"Is he alright?" I asked everyone around me. I was caught in a flood of hands and a sea of bodies, all pulling me towards the nurse's station.
"They're taking him to the hospital," the music teacher finally answered.
"I should go with him," I said. "I'm the reason he got hurt."
"Really?" Bea questioned, suddenly appearing behind me with a smirk-grin on her pretty, heart-shaped face. "Because I would have said it was the ceiling. Relax, Sarah. He is not going to die."
I glared at her, but I could not help smiling back. "He is really scared of dying," I giggled, wondering if my extreme reactions meant I was suffering a mental breakdown of some kind.
The nurse made me move every muscle in my body, asking me if it hurt. "No," I answered again and again, like a machine. How did he know? I wondered as the inspection dragged on. How did he know the roof was going to fall?
"How did he know the roof was going to fall?" Victor demanded.
I squeezed my eyelids closed. "I have told you, Victor. I do not know."
"Father wants to know," he said, in almost a helpless way. "He wants to meet him."
I sat up on the divan so fast it made my head ache. "No!" I squeaked.
It would ruin everything. Rufus would never want anything to do with me again. No one ever did, except for Bea, because she was oblivious. "I'm to ask him over once he returns from the hospital," Victor said guiltily; he knew I would protest.
I did, but not aloud. I set my lips and stared ahead viciously.
"Do not be angry with me, Sarah," he said pleadingly. "I promise I will not let Father scare him. It is a small thing, really. He is just curious."
"Bad things happen when your father is curious, Victor," I said, remembering the long nights I had been forced to sit on a precariously high stool in the basement while Mr. Rodenmaar questioned me about a cup and about the voices I had heard.
Victor did not answer this - he knew it was his fault. He was the one who had betrayed me. He owed me everything now, and he would never make up for it, not while he kept accumulating debts. "I am sorry," he said. "I have to do what he says. He is all I have."
"You had me, once," I said stiffly.
He left, as hurt as I had intended him to be.
Why should I care what he thinks of me?
I sighed, letting my weight sink down in the couch until there was no air left in me. I closed my eyes, and suddenly I could hear it all. I could hear the roof creaking as the house began to cool for the night. I could hear the window in the attic banging because it never closed properly. I could almost feel the rats running through the walls, I could smell the tasteless dinner cooking in the kitchen. I was intensely aware of it.
The house.
Stay away, it was saying to me.
Stay away from him.
Thanks for all the positive reviews! I especially loved the one from justkeeptyping - a lot of words makes me happy :) I'm definitely continuing the story.
Just out of curiosity, which of the guys are you liking so far? Are you for Rufus or Victor?
