Wow, over 50 reviews. I'm beyond thankful for all of your feedback...especially for last chapter! I have to put in a triggering warning at the bottom of this note, so if you are sensitive to triggers then read. If you don't want to be spoiled, then you can skip the last sentence.

Teresa-Anything is possible between Sage and Holly. I'm sure we will find out in next several chapters. I have not decided when exactly yet.

Guest- you must be one of first reviewer to have a dislike for both Gail and Sage. Interesting! I'm glad you're enjoying the story so far though.

Guest2- Yes, we will find out the exact nature of Gail's crime eventually.

TRIGGERING WARNING: There will be mention of sexual assault after the second line break. (not including the one between notes and beginning of chapter below)

Gail props her forehead against the thick studio door and cumbersomely knocks with what little energy she has left. She waits several minutes before realizing that knocking is kind of pointless if the other person in the room can't exactly hear.

Right… Idiot. Gail tells herself. She turns around and slides down the wall by the door. She takes out her cellphone to type a message for Ciara to let her in. She closes her eyes and reflects over her weekend as she waits. This weekend has to have been one of the worst series of events in a long time. Probably since the infamous summer in high school. No support from her family besides her brother's silent backing. She loves Sage and their friendship, but right now she is extremely jealous. She knows she will hurt Sage with bitter remarks, so avoidance is the best tactic for now. Before her mind drifts to the heartbreaking moment, the door opens and Ciara peeks out at her. Ciara nods her head back, signaling to come in, and Gail follows her in the studio.

Gail trudges to the huge table where Ciara usually devises her art, and she notices two plastic tubs; one full of grey dust and another black; next to a canvas with abstract monochromatic brushstrokes. She turns around to glance at Ciara with curiosity. She notices black and grey smudges all over Ciara's face and fingers.

"What are you doing? Fingerpainting?"

"Something like that. I kind of borrowed bags of charcoal from those stupid frat boys living in the frat house near my dorm building without asking. I grinded half of them in black powder and burnt the rest in a grill to collect the ashes. I want to use my fingers instead of the brushes this time. I'm trying to feel more connected to my work."

"And it works?"

Ciara ponders for few moments. "I have not decided yet."

Gail nods her head in acceptance and takes her seat on the chair next to the table. Ciara drags another chair and sits face to face toward Gail.

"So what brings you here? Another art therapy session?"

Gail simply shakes her head. "Just a shitty weekend with my family, and apparently my roommate was fucking someone in our room. I don't need to be there for the gross display."

Ciara chuckles. "Ah, the college life. Full of sexual energy and nearly no privacy. Well, you're more than welcome to stay with me."

"Thanks."

"As for family… They're just people you're related to by blood. More often than not they think they know you, but they don't truly know you."

Gail blinks her eyes in surprise. "Sounds like you say that from experience."

"Oh yeah. Don't get me wrong. I adore my parents and my brother. I'm fortunate to even have some kind of relationship with them. Most Deaf people barely can communicate with theirs, and we all endure being different from everyone around us including family. My dad is an economist and my mom is an old fashioned homemaker. I'm pretty much the black sheep because I'm Deaf and an artist. They don't exactly believe in art as a profession. Plus they're scared I won't survive because of my deafness, which is totally ridiculous."

"I am a black sheep too. Everyone is either a cop or working in a related field, and here I am… studying languages. Mother thinks it is absolutely a waste of my time and I won't get anywhere."

"Ah, so you have high expectations and I have low expectations."

"Must be nice. Not being expected to be the perfect child. My brother is already one, and I'm the screw up."

Ciara squints her eyes and burrows her eyebrows. "No. It's not exactly grand growing up not being expected to amount to anything, except to be a hearing kid. Hell, even my own name represent my dad's bleak outlook for my future."

"Your name? What does it means?"

"Dark. My mom always said it's for my brunette hair and brown eyes, but my baby photos showed me donning blonde hair that eventually faded into brown. I was born Deaf, so first thing they thought was that I had no future and my life would always be a struggle. My brother told me once my dad wanted to name me Dorren, but my mom refused."

"And what is the meaning behind Dorren? I assume it's something bad."

"It means sullen."

"Ouch."

"Tell me about it. I'm already past feeling hurt about it. You just gotta set expectations for yourself, not following others'. Believe me, life is so fruitful when you live it for yourself."

"I wish it was that easy."

"What worthwhile is?"

"Since when did you become so enlightened? Did you live in Tibet for a year or something?"

Ciara laughs out loud. "Nah. I just woke up and realized on my own. Maybe you will too someday."

Gail scoffs. "Whatever."

A slimy green envy crawls upon Gail's spine as she ponders Ciara's comments. Would it ever be possible for her to just go for what she wants, without worrying about consequences from her family? Obviously she will not have that chance with Holly since she is with Sage now. What does she even wants to do in first place? She may not have an answer to the question, but she knows exactly just what she wants to do right now.

"I want to get drunk tonight."

"I'm down for it. Where?"

"I don't know. That bar where we met?"

"I don't think so. It's Sunday night. It's gonna be full of sad alcoholics and people watching boring football."

"True….ideas?"

Ciara gives out a Grinch-like smirk. "Well, I do know of several house parties we could check out… There's Plymouth House, Yellow House…"

Gail waves her hand in interruption. "Wait. Yellow House? Do I even want to know why?"

Ciara shrugs her shoulders. "The house is yellow. Plymouth House is on Plymouth Ave. They're not exactly creative with the names. However, we should hit the Animal House. They got a full sized half pipe built in the backyard, so we could just drink beers and watch people make fool out of themselves with skateboards."

"Really? Animal House? How original."

"I told you. They're not exactly creative people."

Gail gets up and claps her hands. "Let's get the hell out of here."

Ciara gets up as well and looks over at two canvas leaning against the wall. "What are you planning to do with your paintings?"

Gail dismisses Ciara's question. "I haven't thought about it. You can throw those away. I don't want them."

"Why don't you give them to someone? Like that second one. You had someone in particular in your head when you painted that huh?"

That someone is never going to be hers, so it would be pointless to give her the painting. All that will do is create more complications and Gail certainly doesn't want any more complications in her life.

"I didn't."

Ciara's eyebrows raise in disbelief but she does not call out Gail's bullshit. "Alright, I'll leave it there until I have to clean out this room at end of the year."

"Whatever. Suit yourself. I don't care."

Ciara lightly slaps Gail's shoulder. "Let's go then."

Ciara parks her car on end of the street and the destination is on the other end. The street is packed full of automobiles of all kinds, and most of the houses are in deteriorating condition. They are in not so great neighborhood that Gail's mother always complains about at the table during dinners. Gail begins to doubt her decision to tag along with Ciara to this party. She watches Ciara taking out some cash from a purse and shoves it under her carseat. She looks up at Gail and asks, "Got any cash on you? They usually charge five dollars for keg, but if you want shots then it will be ten."

Gail nods. "Yeah I got some on me."

"Alright, I wouldn't recommend you to bring anything other than that, so just put whatever you have on you under the seat."

Gail is even more unsure about the whole thing. "You sure it's alright to go to this party?"

"Yeah, I've known the people who live in that house since high school. They're alright. If you don't feel comfortable then we can just buy pack of beer and just drink in my room. Up to you."

That probably will lead to deep conversations about things Gail definitely don't want to talk or even think about.

"As long as you're fine, I'm fine."

Ciara shakes her head in reassurance. They both get out of the car at the same time and walk side by side along the sidewalk in silence. The Animal House is a detached brick row house with concrete porch in the front and the wooden stairs seem to be missing a plank or two. All of the windows are covered by blinds but Gail can see people walking back and forth behind the windows. As they approach the Animal House, Gail notices a body flying up and down in the air above the tall wooden fence. Another person spins in the air several feet away from the other one. Gail realizes they are riding skateboards on the halfpipe behind the fence. She hears some really loud cheering and whooping from behind the fence.

"Are you really sure it's safe? They are pretty loud. Won't the neighbors be pissed and call cops to bust this party?"

Ciara smirks with not an ounce of worry on her face. "Nah. Half of the houses on this street are rented by college students like us. That house to the right is owned by a drug dealer. The house over there on the left is rented by this Deaf couple. None of them want cops' attention on this street, so we are good. Animal House has been around for a long time, so relax. If for some reason you want to leave, just let me know and we will go. The offer to chill at my place still stands okay?"

Gail nods and they enters through the wooden gate. The large wooden half pipe literally take over nearly the whole backyard with a small walkway between the house and the halfpipe. There are people sitting on the top edge of the pipe and standing around on the ground as well. A scrawny guy runs and captures Ciara in a big hug before facing her. They begin to sign rapidly and Gail struggles to catch on what they are saying to each other.

"….doing here…"

"…Party… where…"

"Yes… who…"

Ciara looks over at Gail and signs noticeably slower. "This is my friend, G-A-I-L. This idiot is my close buddy since we were kids, D-E-R-E-K." She shows Gail Derek's name sign. Derek smiles at Gail and gives her a big hug too. Gail hesitates and waits till he lets go before saying, "this is not how I communicate."

Both Ciara and Derek laughs and looks at each other. "Hearing people."

Gail raises her eyebrows in confusion.

Ciara smiles and explains, "we are just laughing at social differences. Hearing people don't normally hug when they first meet someone. Generally anyway. It's Deaf culture to hug everyone even if we meet for the first time. We tend to treat new people as if they are part of the family."

Derek points at the back door and informs, "drinks are in the kitchen and you can pay for drinking wristbands there too. I'll be mingling around here, so enjoy yourself!"

Ciara grabs Gail's arm and drags her along to enter the house to pay for their drinks.

Gail is standing near the beer pong table with a cup of beer in her hand, watching Ciara dominating the game against Derek, and she is having a great time actually. She is surprised considering her shitty weekend and is glad she decided to tag along with Ciara tonight. Maybe things will look up at least a little bit. She is not exactly a social butterfly, but most of the people don't seem to mind. Ciara introduces her to a couple more people and they all seem so laid-back and didn't care about the fact she's hearing. She is surprised to find she is not the only one though, there are couple other hearing people here and there. She supposes that in the big picture it makes no difference as long as they all are there to have good time.

Her phone vibrates in her pocket, so she takes it out to check and sees Sage's name flashing. She is so tempted to just ignore it, but she knows Sage will not give up and technically she is supposed to be "home" in the dorm room tonight. She never left any kind of note informing Sage where she was tonight, and she remembers how mad Sage was a few weeks ago when she left the bar with Ciara. She doesn't need a repeat of that, so she walks outside and away from the others to answer the phone.

"What?"

"Where are you? You still at home?"

"Nope." Gail pops the "p."

"Oh. So where are ya at? You planning on being here any time soon?"

"Probably not. I'm at a house party, and having a grand time." This sentence is dripping in sarcasm.

"Okay… Well, it's kinda important that you get back here when you can. I need to talk to you about something, and Holly's here-"

Gail interrupts with an angry tone. "I know. I saw."

Sage sounds surprised. "Oh? When? Why didn't you stay? We could've talked."

"No. Next time, you really should warn me beforehand, so I don't need to see you guys in bed. I don't care if you are fucking or whatever, but I don't need to see that. It's not any of my business."

"What? What are you talking about? We're not-"

"Look. I don't care okay? I know you dig her and I'm sure she digs you a lot. Have fun. I'm staying here and I'm gonna crash at Ciara's. Don't worry about me and just screw each other some more."

Gail hangs up before Sage has a chance to response. She throws the phone down on the ground and kicks an empty beer bottle off the grass. God, last thing she wants to do is be a third wheel to Holly and Sage. She just can't deal with listening to them beaming about how they started dating or whatever it is they're doing. She covers her face with her hands. She can't continue to think about them. She knows what she needs right now. She walks back in the house to the kitchen and takes two shot glasses of an alcoholic concoction from a table and drinks them quickly in row. She grabs an empty plastic cup and fills it up with beer from the keg, then chugs it all up in one shot. That should erase the pain from her heart at least for now. She takes a deep breath before wandering aimlessly around the ground floor. She starts to feel pressure filling up in her bladder. That tend to happen when one drinks a lot of booze at once. She decides to climbs up the stairs and try to find a bathroom. All of a sudden, she feels really dizzy and she loses control of her limbs. This is not normal. She has strong alcoholic tolerance and she can handle herself even while drunk.

Something is wrong.

Gail tries to turn around to go downstairs and find Ciara, but someone grabs her from behind. Her mouth is covered by a hand, and an arm wraps around her waist. A warm and heavy breath creeps in Gail's neck. A creepy voice sneers, "Sshhh. I've been waiting so long for someone to take the shot glass. You're a lottery winner."

Gail is being forced to go up the rest of the stairs and dragged to a bedroom. She struggles hard and attempts to kick the intruder from behind, but she loses her balance and falls down on the bed. She feels a puncture on her arm. Shit. Shit, she is being drugged even more. This is it.. She cannot believe she's so stupid to take a random drink without thinking. She is losing consciousness and last thing on her mind is the deep brown eyes and that gorgeous mole…