DANGEROUS ELYSIUM

PART THREE

OLIVER

"Raine?"

"Hmm yeah." He replied, while slowly stirring his spoon in his coffee mug.

"Do you think I could stay at yours for a few days?"

"Huh," he said, confused. "Why? Don't you want to be in the dorm?"

"Not really," I mumbled and stared into my coffee cup and winced when I noticed a thick layer of skin had formed over my now cold coffee. "...just don't feel like being there." I prodded the skin and watched it crinkle and slowly form a nasty blob in the cold brown liquid.

"What happened?"

I looked up at Raine and I tried to smile, but the look on his face meant I wasn't doing a good enough job. "...don't look at me like that…"

"Like what?"

"Like you are."

"Oh right, sure. But I know you and know something happened. So what happened?"

I gulped and turned my eyes down back at my coffee. I felt sick looking at it, yet I couldn't look Raine in the eye and lie. "Nothing happened. Just wanted to stay at yours is all. I like your place."

"Alright. You can stay but you gotta stop with the lying Oliver. I'm your friend, we share everything."

"I know and if I had something to tell I would, but I don't. Campus just gets to me."

"Sure," he breathed. "So if you're staying what do you want for dinner?"

I took a deep breath. I was so glad he didn't badger me. But I also knew he would, at some point. "Pasta."

"Pasta? I'm definitely positive I can do better than pasta."

"I know, but I like the way you make pasta. Like how my mom used to make it."

"Alright. Pasta it is. But I'm telling you now Oliver…." He paused and my eyes slipped back up to meet his blue ones. "You will tell me everything. You got it?"

"Okay," I said softly, swallowing myself. He had the right to ask me that. He needed to know and I guess a deeper part of me wanted to spill everything. I can always trust Raine, with anything. "I'm not liking you very much right now….though."

"I know. I accept that, but I'm not sorry I asked. We've been friends for years. I will always be there for you whether you like it or not…."

"God I know," I bit, cutting him off. "And I will tell you. Just let me think for a bit."

"I will, over pasta."

"Well you best make the pasta extra special then."

He smiled, satisfied. "I will. Shall we get going? You need to get stuff from your dorm room anyway."

"Oh yeah. I kinda didn't think about that."

When he snorted at me I laughed out loud. Such a douche. "Anyway, when do you ever think?"

"Now that's low...even for you. I do think. I'm thinking right now."

"About what?" He asked and leaned on his palm, giving me a warm Raine smile.

"About pasta."

"You are one of kind Oliver. Seriously."

"Yeah."

"Alright, come on. Let's get going." I took one last look at my coffee and gave it the stare of death, why? I don't know or maybe it just reminded me of someone. Someone who used to be warm and smooth. Someone who was sweet, yet had a bitterness to him. Someone who was now like that thick layer of cold skin. That nasty glob you'd pick out because it would just be disgusting if you swallowed it. Then I got up and left.

The air was cool and the leaves had already started to turn, reminding me autumn was nearly upon us and as soon as break would come I'd leave and go spend it at my uncles place. He left a couple years back, but he still supports me as much he can, I do the rest. I work a few days a week in a cafe not far from the campus. It's a nice place, Raine's mother and sister own it together, that's how I met Raine a few years back and we've been friends ever since. "Hey Raine," I chirped, catching up with him and linking my arm around his. "Are you coming to visit my uncle with me when break starts?"

"Ahh sorry gorgeous, no can do. I gotta work at the cafe. Molly is going away for a little bit and you're also taking holiday."

"Oh shit, yeah. Sorry."

"Don't be."

"Shame though, would have been nice having you there too."

"You'll just have to make do with video calls…." Then Raine's voice trailed off and he took a quick intake of breath that had my eyes snapping forward and looking in the same direction.

"Oh fuck," I whispered. "God…"

"It's alright. Calm yourself…."

"Hey….Raine," Morgan announced, walking up to us. Then his eyes very slowly moved over me making me feel like I was in the middle of a snow storm. "....Oliver," I huffed at him, which had him smiling. "Your sister in the cafe, Raine?"

"Why?" Raine bit.

"She makes my coffee the way I like it." He looked at me again and smirked. I was glad he never came in when I was working. I'd be tempted to put rat poison in his drink.

"Go see for yourself," then Raine's grip tightened on my arm. "Let's go Oliver." Morgan sniggered and walked around us and I finally felt like I could breathe again. "It's alright Ollie, let's just go straight to mine. You can wear some of my clothes and we'll sort the rest either later or tomorrow."

"O...okay." And we kept up our pace. Then suddenly my thoughts were transported back in time. To that moment. To that night. Sharna's hands around my neck hadn’t been a game, it hadn't been a way of trying merely to subdue me. And that crazed look I'd seen in his eyes… all I knew was that I kept coming back to the idea that that look had been more about survival than anything else. His survival. But I was more afraid of him now or more afraid that my feelings still stick with me. Even after the events of 'that night,' I’d tried making excuses for Sharna's behavior. I’d tried to convince myself he wasn't truly a violent person. I’d tried to come up with some reason to explain why he’d done what he’d done that night. And maybe I'd hung on to that all these years to make that sting of betrayal just a little less painful. But it was hard to get past the fact that the boy back then could have easily killed me, if he wanted to. Yet I still felt it then, even more since the music room incident only earlier. That would be twice that I'd struggled to hang on to my control. Twice that I'd tried to keep him from noticing my shaking body. Shaking that hadn't had as much to do with fear and confusion and anger as I would've liked. No, I'd been shaking for a whole other reason. Even as a kid, I’d been physically attracted to Sharna, though I hadn't fully understood that at the time. I’d attributed my accelerated breathing, sweaty palms, and racing heart to some weird ailment that I’d yet to be diagnosed with. It'd been a couple years later when I’d felt something that had been even remotely close to those sensations, and then he made me his enemy. 'Then hate me with all your heart...hate me so much I can never forget you.' Those words haunt me. I do hate him or I hate the fact that maybe I don't. He's right though, I could never forget him, he'd stay with me for the rest of my life.

"Oliver…" I blinked a couple of times when Raine's voice brought me back to the here and now. "Don't think about them. They're nothing. They're not worth it."

"I know," I laughed, but it fell flat. "I'm trying to."

"You want wine with dinner?"

"Oh my god, I thought you'd never ask." I'm so happy I have Raine at my side. He's always there when I need him, no matter what. He's never judged me, even when I've been less than angelic and took my frustrations out on him. He would just hold me in his arms and tell me that everything would be okay and it will get easier. It's easier when I'm with Raine, He's kind of like rain I guess. You know, the cool rain in summer that cools off your burning skin from being in the sun too long. That's Raine, cool and calming. My friend. My best friend. My only friend in this bitter and twisted society.

"Just remember Ollie, I will never abandon you or make you feel less of a man. No matter what. Remember that." His words were comforting but confusing at the same time. But maybe it wasn't his words that were confusing, but the realization that they were true. He's never made me feel any less of who I am. I trust him, whole heartedly.