The familiar number flashed on my new phone, the number not saved into my contacts. I pressed ignore on instinct, as I have done numerous times over the last few weeks. However, every time I saw his number, or a text or an email from him, my mood plummeted.

Lissa, who was sitting behind me on her bed cross-legged, trying to braid my hair into some kind of fancy twist, sighed as she saw me ignore the call.

"You know, maybe you should answer one of these times. Hear him out."

It was two hours past curfew on a Tuesday, and Lissa and I were alternating between playing with each others hair, some horror movie running in the background. If it weren't for the various books and old scriptures about spirit bizarrely splayed across the room, I would think that we were back in Portland, on our little 'vacation'. It felt like before spirit and Victor and… Dimitri.

"Excuse me, I did answer him. Once."

I could literally hear the eye-roll. "Emailing him 'fuck off' and then blocking his email is not responding."

"Well, if he wanted to stay in contact so desperately, he could have just stayed. And besides… I emailed him that there is no way anyone would willingly leave the Dragomir princess to guard some Zelkos Lord, so I obviously was not good enough for him. Then I emailed him to 'fuck off' and blocked his email."

Lissa compassionately squeezed my shoulders. It felt good to finally be able to talk to her about everything, and not get caught up in all the secrets and lies. It was in some ways a blessing, Dimitri's disappearance, as it somehow managed to fix the rift that had grown between Lissa and I since returning to St. Vlads.

After Dimitri unveiled that he was leaving, I hid out in bicycle shed at the elementary school campus, crying my eyes raw. That shed was the place where

Lissa and I used to hide together and talk, so it was no surprise when she found me there, hours later, hiding from the world. I told everything. I couldn't bear it anymore.

Since then, we are basically attached at the hip, much to the annoyance of Christian. For the rest of that first week, she helped me evade Dimitri, who constantly was trying to push his bullshit propaganda of 'I'm not leaving you,' onto me. She checked every corner and managed to sweet talk one of the administrative workers into giving her his work schedules, so we could see when to avoid him.

Once he left, it hurt more than I thought it would. It was as if I was experiencing phantom pains, even though all my limbs were attached. I would normally scold myself for being so seemingly dependant on someone, but Lissa quickly manage to fill that extra gap.

When I saw his name on the caller id the first time and slammed my phone into the wall, yelling profanities at the broken piece of glass and metal, Lissa was already on her laptop ordering an updated version of my phone by express shipping.

When I snuck into her room one night because I just couldn't take the loneliness, Lissa proceeded to quickly shove Christian onto the floor, and spooned me until I fell asleep to the smell of her minty toothpaste breath. Christian didn't stop complaining about that until weeks after. Lissa definitely had the right priorities.

She enjoyed taking care of me, as I had been taking care of her a lot since Spirit became a thing in our lives. Now, with Dimitri's incessant need to try and contact me to stay involved with me, I needed her more than ever. It was in Lissa's nature to nurture the wounded, and I was definitely wounded.

Wounded, and very, very angry. It seems I manifested my pain into anger, resulting into destruction of property. I would get rage fits during the most bizarre moments, even when they had nothing to do with Dimitri. The therapist, after I vaguely described what was happening, told me it was probably my unconsciousness acting up in specific moments, yet seemed baffled when these moments had no common tread. Three weeks after Dimitri left, I now have to replace a broken lamp from the common room, a broken bookshelf from the library (this resulted in a library ban) and a broken chair from my room.

"Hey," Lissa shook me out of my train of thought as she was still threading and braiding my hair, "Don't think so much. We all know if you think too much it ends in disaster."

At that I smiled.

"I can't help it. You know how weirdly emotional this whole thing has gotten me. I don't exactly like thinking that much either. I want to be the girl that doesn't take everything so seriously again."

"Well, that girl died as soon as we decided to leave the Academy. Rose, you're so passionate and strong headed about the things you care, so it obviously hurts more than you expect when things don't work out your way."

I sighed, "I just… I don't know. I'm not exactly used to crying over guys. This is new territory, and you're being a very good tour guide, so thank you."

"Hey!" Liss whacked my arm, "Are you saying I cry so much over guys, I'm the tour guide? That's so rude."

I turned my head to see her grinning at me, flashing her shiny fangs. I smiled back, until her grin turned into a grimace.

"I don't know what I did to your hair, but to defend myself, you were moving a lot?"

I stood to view the braided updo Lissa has been working on for a decent twenty minutes in the mirror. It was absolutely horrendous, and nothing like the photoshopped girl in the magazine Lissa had been getting instructions from.

"Oh my God."

"I can fix it, I think? Okay, you just have too much hair to work with and-"

"Lissa, shut up," I started laughing at the absurdity of my hair. "I found one thing perfect Lissa Dragomir can't do: style hair."

I raised my hand to take out the pins and ties, but found everything glued shut with hairspray. It only added fuel to my laughter. "What the actual fuck were you thinking?"

Lissa was laughing super hard as well, trying to rip out the pins out.

"I- I- I- can't explain myself… I really can't."

Our hysterics were interrupted by a banging on Lissa's door. Uh oh. We were busted. I quickly dropped to the floor and rolled under the bed, in action movie speed. Lissa paused the horror movie, where the ditzy chick was being murdered brutally, and tiptoed to the door.

"Don't worry, its just me. Open up." Christians hushed voice rang through the door, and I made my way out from under the bed. That was a horrible hiding place anyway.

"Hey babe," Lissa smacked her lips to his in a peck, still giggling. "It's way past curfew, what are you doing here?"

"Yeah, you're cramping our style." I shot him a glare at interrupting our girls night, but considering how many date nights I have been crashing lately, I can't be too mad. It's hard to share Lissa.

Christian took one look at my hair, horrified, "I would have a witty comeback for you Rose, but just looking at your hair is traumatising me."

I rolled my eyes smiling, as Lissa starting trying to undo the strange braids. Christian and I have come to somewhat of a truce while I was coping with being mentor-less. He seemed to understand I was going through something, and therefore needed more time with Lissa. He, however, assumed this was because my supposed PTSD was acting up. Either way, I appreciated it, even though we did still exchange daily insults.

"Word of advice: if your girlfriend ever asks to try out a hairstyle she saw in a magazine, run. Run to Idaho." I said.

"Hey!" Lissa nudged me as I turned on the horror movie again, screeches of pain ringing through the room, "It's your own fault for growing out your hair. If you kept your hair short, we would not be in this situation. Now seriously, what are you doing here?"

Irritation seeped through the bond. This was unusual; Lissa never felt annoyed at Christian's presence. Did they have a fight?

"What does it look like? I'm crashing a weekday sleepover. I never had one of those, so this will be fun." Christian spread himself out on Lissa's bed, stretching like a cat.

"Christian," my hair was forgotten as Lissa turned to focus her attention on him, "I spent all day with you. You have to respect that I need time with Rose too; she is my best friend after all."

Lissa spoke calmly, sounding very diplomatic, but through the bond I could feel the turmoil knotting up her stomach. He had rubbed her the wrong way.

"Oh, as opposed to me, the lowly boyfriend?" Christian didn't seem to grasp how serious Lissa was being, and just rolled off her comment with a joke.

Something snapped. It consumed Lissa.

"The lowly boyfriend who needs to understand when he is wanted and not fucking wanted." Lissa swearing is so rare I forgot what it sounded like.

Silence reigned as I sat uncomfortably on the bed, feeling like the women being murdered onscreen. Watching couples fight is rarely fun.

"I get it. It all depends on you, huh? This relationship has to all be on your terms or there's no relationship at all, right?" Christian's eyes were flaming.

"Guys." I hold up my hands, feeling guilty about being the reason they begun to fight. They ignored me.

"Excuse me, I am very compromising about making this work-"

"Oh really, what compromises? You-"

"Guys! Stop!"

"-But if you don't respect my wishes and my time, you don't respect me, obviously. Did your parents never teach you to respect people?"

Lissa's question shut us all up. Christian looked like he had just been slapping in the face.

That's when I felt it. A murky little ball of anger progressively starts clinging and spreading itself through my body, until I was consumed by it.

Lissa had already started begging for forgiveness, saying she didn't mean it that way, while my fists clenched into her sheets. I could have murdered in that moment.

Christian and Lissa's incessant conversation infiltrated my train of thought, and made me realise that they were the reason I was having this anger episode again. Lissa felt much calmer through the bond, but I just grabbed my bag, and left the room, slamming the door behind me.

I saw the dorm matron turn the corner, so I walked the opposite direction, ignoring her telling me stop. If I stopped for the dorm matron now, I would do something I regretted. Like hit her. Or worse.

Once I exited the dorm, the fresh spring air and sun did little to calm me down. Normally these would be the moments I'm at my most serene, but honestly the sun was just too bright, the birds were too loud, the wind was too cold. It was all pissing me off.

I walked straight to my own dorm, not caring if I am caught. My bag was constantly knocking against my leg so I smashed it against a tree and leave it there.

I took five more steps before I turned back to pick it up, but kicked the tree as hard as I could. Violence was the only way I calmed down. My toe throbbed with every step back to my dorm, until I threw open my own door, and sat on my cold bed.

I took a moment to breath in the stale, cold air through my nose. The curtains darkened the room to the extent that I couldn't see anything.

I checked through the bond, hoping to get some positive emotions, only to find them already half naked. Guess they have forgiven each other quickly. Looks like Lissa and Christian were only trying to get rid off me to fuck.

Fuck Christian.

Fuck Lissa.

Fuck Dimitri.

The memory of his face pushed me to my feet. I grabbed blindly at anything, and threw the object at the wall. I heard a satisfying crack as I moved onto the next thing I could throw. This item I recognised as a book, and dropped it on the floor and stepped on it so I could crack the spine.

Fuck books. Dimitri read books.

I grabbed the next book, but I recognised this one due to the leather texture. It was a book on spirit I read when I can't sleep. I hesitate. This anger, after all these times of experiencing it these past few weeks, it felt familiar. But not familiar in the way that I had experienced it before, but in a way that I've read about it.

This anger, it was the same anger as Lissa's, and probably Adrian's if he weren't self-medicating. I throw the book, but not with as much force as before.

This wasn't my anger, this was Lissa's. But no matter who's anger it was, I was still being ripped up inside, feeling the urge to burn down my room.

If only I could forgive as quickly as Lissa and Christian.

Lissa's cool, content feelings hummed through the bond, being the the only thing that is keeping me sane right now. But I needed my own Christian to anchor me to sanity. I had my own Christian.

I sunk to the floor as I rifled through my bag, praying to God that I grabbed my phone as I left Lissa's. My heart was racing as my mind conjuring images of despicable things I could be doing instead. Those thoughts aren't me, I told myself.

I found my phone, and with shaking hands tried calling Dimitri. I misdialed twice before I could actually press my phone to my ear, measuring my heart rate to the beeps, waiting for him to pick up.

Please pick up.

Cool relief spilled over me as I heard rustling over the phone, but the release only lasted a moment before my mind fogged up with violence again.

"Hello?" His voice is laced with sleep, which makes sense considering how late it is. "Rose?"

My name from his mouth shocked me, and the longing I felt for him was distraction enough for me. I tried to control my erratic breathing before I could respond.

"Is everything alright?" I wanted to shout at him, to slam my phone into the wall again.

"No," is all I can respond. I needed to stop shaking.

"Rose, are you having a panic attack? Your breathing is way too fast."

I didn't respond.

"Listen to my voice and breath. Like that one time we did in practice. Breath in," I could hear him demonstrate, but my mind was too foggy to process. "Hold your breath for two seconds, then breath out. Breath in…"

We sat like this for a while. Me on my uncomfortable bedroom floor, clinging to my phone and trying to follow his instructions and battling whatever was consuming me, while Dimitri was in his room, God knows where, teaching me, just as he always did.

He did succeed, after a long time, to clear my brain.

"I think…" I stuttered, "I think its gone."

"Okay," His voice was brimming with question but I was too fragile to answer any at this point and he realized. He always knew when to talk.

"Can you stay? I mean," my voice was rough and hard to understand, "can you just… talk or something? Tell me how its going."

He understood that I just needed to hear his voice, and talked about nothing important, about how he bought groceries today but forgot the milk. How could I stay mad at someone as amazing as him?

I lay my head down on the ground, and grabbed a discarded jumper and used it as a pillow. I was so exhausted at this point that I could not exactly discern what Dimitri was talking about, but his baritone voice was like a lullaby.

I don't know if I dreamed this or if it actually happened, but I whisper, "I need you," right before I fell asleep.

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I'm kind of insecure about this chapter, so please review