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WILLIAM'S CLASSMATES THOUGHT HE WAS WEIRD. Well, in William's exact words, "some sort of alien", "freak", "antisocial wreck". That was what he told Naomi the night they finally shared the demons they had been battling all this time. He started slow, telling Naomi about the little instances that bothered him at his summer school. The names he was being called, the eyes people sometimes gave him at lunch, but soon, as one word was uttered there were ten more pouring out behind it. The words, or more-so the meanings they held, edged William Morgan toward something unavoidably tragic. He probably didn't realize it, even as he tripped over his words and his fists opened and closed unsteadily, but Naomi was forced to bear witness; deja vu shuddering her bones.

William Morgan was sat atop his bed that night, rambling himself to the brink of a steep and rocky cliff. Each painful incident he thought out loud and each fight he described, ushered himself that much closer to the fringe, a place where his throat seemed to shut by itself and a relentless pain battered at his eyes. His body began to tremble as he looked over the precipice.

Then, he fell. He did it in such a quiet way that his sister almost never recognized. There were no screams or fits of struggle, his face only contorted and his eyes snapped shut. Then, he was free-falling. Naomi caught his body and rested his undoing into her lap. His remains splattered against her, tiny pieces of youth and happiness lost in the shattering.

As the blood of William Morgan soaked through his sister's clothes, she struggled to find the right words. For all the times that she had cried, she never once had an audience to console her. This was new territory. She found herself mumbling expected 'it's okay's and 'it's alright's' and other nonsense she was sure he couldn't even hear over the sound of his own destruction in his ear. After a while, she decided to simply say nothing.

Time stretched, and as it did the siblings sat there against one another, the walls of the Morgan home pushing outwards as if it would expand and cover all of Riverside. Naomi Morgan consoled her brother with a circling palm on his forehead, calling his name lightly until she realized that his mumbled exasperations and shaking shoulders withered into nothingness. It all stopped, and she realized he was asleep.

Naomi Morgan sat there in the silence for a few moments and immediately knew two things. The first being that she never wanted to unload her problems onto anyone ever and the second being she would always want her brother to unload his problems onto her. She faintly stroked his hair at the resolution, only a few minutes before her own eyes grew heavy and she drifted off into sleep.

Then, they never spoke of it again.

*

The next episode automatically began playing, Naomi an attentive audience. This one was another series that Naomi tended to binge during the day— a time killer until her brother came home from summer school and they could spend the night talking about nothing and enjoying each other's misery. She was a little invested in the over-the-top drama— a bit more than she'd ever care to admit— but she had to be. She couldn't afford her thoughts to drift ashore to a place she'd long since left behind. Not now.

From the corner of her eye, she caught a movement. Naomi looked up. Mrs Morgan was standing by her ajar room door, her lips moving at a rapid pace. Naomi paused the episode.

"What?" she asked, removing her headphones from her head and letting loose her wild hair in clear need of a perm.

"You need to turn that down."

Mrs Morgan, just like her son and all the other Morgans, had a knack for ignoring the elephant in the room. After Naomi's hand had laced her cheek and there was a resounding sound to assure her struck-still person of the reality of it, Mrs Morgan had still done an excellent job of pretending like it never happened. She didn't punish Naomi or address the obviously malicious silence when they were confined in the same space. Instead, she made an effort to never bring it up as if her faux oblivion could erase it. Naomi thought of the things her mother told her in her bedroom that night, about how she had to leave her country to escape her wicked things. Her mother was a strong woman, she supposed, but looking at her now she seemed worked with resilience. Naomi wondered if powerful was always this temporary. Or if it was only a curse laid upon the Morgan women.

"I was saying," she continued, "in a few minutes you can come downstairs. Dinner is almost ready." Or perhaps she's waiting for an apology, Naomi's mind continued to wander, even taking all her sick and vacation days from work just to hear you say it.

The spoken words began to register. "This early?" From her window, the Riverside sun was still taking its turn jeering her before the moon swapped in.

Naomi's mother opened the door to exit. "Doctor Gonzales said you should eat earlier, remember?" she said over her shoulder, a plea slipping into the syllables of her following words, "Please come downstairs, Naomi."

She grunted, looking back at her laptop screen. "Can't you bring it up?"

Mrs Morgan didn't entertain the idea. She left through the opened door, "Come downstairs," being the only thing she left lingering behind her. Naomi slumped further into the mattress. She supposed it was time for her to finally see the kitchen and living room again. She'd spent every day avoiding them because her father would always be down there when he got home in the evenings. Perhaps, even after he did every unspeakable thing to his mistress. That meant, for the past weeks Naomi's travel was limited to that of the amount of steps it took to get to Will's room, her bathroom and back to her room. Today, that was about to change.

She threw the sheets off and didn't bother to pull her fingers through her hair. Instead, she pulled her loose pajama pants up to her stomach and plopped down the stairs, one step at a time. In her own miserable thoughts of her father and her mother and how they called themselves parents, Naomi missed a few key things. The more she descended the clearer the whispering voices became and as her feet greeted each step there was a heavy shuffling somewhere in the Morgan house. In hindsight, she should have seen all these things and ran back upstairs, locked her room door too just for good measure. But when she thought of her father, nothing else had the opportunity to survive in her own mind. His evils consumed her and she never really paid the price for that, until now.

Naomi Morgan got to the last few steps and saw that there were clearly people awaiting her downstairs. Only, she didn't realize the scope of people until she got to the landing. Naomi Morgan stilled. The entire Riverside Dance Academy was looking right back at her.

"Surprise!"

The Riverside Dance Academy was still in compression shirts and tights, smiling wide with exasperation and sweat. Naomi searched the crowd but her eyes kept drifting to the same people. Alex, the boy that could laugh while he danced and make jokes no matter how exhausted he was (everyone always laughed with him too), across the room was Samantha whose size was unbecoming for ballet but her humility and kindness were material enough to mould her into any role. Then there was Lucas, lazy yet talented. Bethany, chatty yet smart. They all flooded her vision in a way that she couldn't ignore. The Riverside Dance Academy was here, looking up at her, waiting, smiling, expecting.

But she had nothing left to offer them. Not even her usual plastic smile.

"Naomi?" a voice called.

Her bottom lip trembled. Not again.

"Naomi, are you okay?" She mastered enough power to move her neck, seeing two figures briskly wade through the crowd. Scattered smiles fell one after the other, so slowly she never realized it was happening until they were all gone. Emerging from the huddled bodies that were the Riverside Dance Academy came Ben and Mr Carson, the two of them coming to stand just below her, at the foot of the steps. Ben was still smiling.

He put out his hand to meet her. "Yellow, come on."

Her eyes flashed back to the crowd, switching between the strange faces again even though she was afraid of what they would tell.

She saw Aspen closer to the back, her friends clearly whispering something into her ear but her focus resting on her. Their eyes settled against one another and the room dipped into oblivion.

When she felt the tears coming, she gritted her teeth and blinked until she was seeing everything through flashes. "Get out."

"Naomi—" Mr Carson started, but Ben put a halting hand on his shoulder. He shook his head.

Naomi didn't see that though. Her eyes were too busy bouncing around the room, searching for some explanation or cause for her embarrassment. Then it was there. Closer to the kitchen was her mother, looking aghast with a plate full of sandwiches in her hands. Naomi's nose flared. She looked back to the crowd. "I don't want any of you here," Naomi kept saying, shoving every amount of authority and strength into her voice as she possibly could, "Get out."

When no one moved, she decided to let them know just how serious she was. She took one step back up the stairs, then two before wholly spinning her body away from them and leaving completely, trying to care less about the deafening quiet she was ignoring in the living room. A hand stopped her. "Naomi, all these people are here for you," Mrs Morgan said urgently, standing just behind her daughter in the stairway. "You cannot leave."

"I don't want them here."

"They care about you."

Naomi watched her mother say that with an unfaltering face and felt the humour build in the air between them. "I had one friend in ballet," she said, "and she's dead." She pulled back her arm, an involuntary apology glinting in her eyes before she continued to recede up the stairs.

That night, Naomi Morgan did not cry. She lied awake and thought and pondered and wondered but nothing seemed to hurt as much as it once did. One thing was for certain however, all those terrible things that she once felt swimming beneath the surface of her chest were still alive and well. Their teeth were sharp and their stomachs were hungry for destruction.

Author's Note

Again, I just wrote this omg I'm so sorry but I hope it's not that bad! 😬 (Tell me in the comments if it is).

This week's dedication must go to @Collage_ 

bc she's amazing and she spammed me with comments. Ilysm thanks for your support 😭❤️.Guys it's getting a lot harder to pick people for dedications so I'll be prioritizing people who comment! So guys if you want a shoutout go comment!

Also, you guys should really follow my Instagram because I post updates and sneak peeks on my story all the time like, if you're not following me then??? Link in my bio!

So, what are we thinking about the chapter, guys? What's going on with Naomi? Is she getting worst or better? Can't tell? Lmk in the comments!

IN THE NEXT CHAPTER...

Mrs Morgan met them at the doorway. At her side, stood Ben, his usual smile a little sadder than normal, but bright, nonetheless.

"Jesus,Yellow. In here stinks."