Me being drunk may have cured some plotholes, but holy FUCK does my head hurt!

“You knew?!” I stared at Vanessa with a dumbfounded expression.

Vanessa nodded with indifference.

“And you didn’t tell me!?” I yelled, only realizing afterwards that the girls may hear me.

“Didn’t seem like my secret to tell.” She shrugged.

“Oh, but spying on two of them fucking wasn’t a big deal?” I spat. I didn’t mean it, but I was upset that the person I’d consider my biggest ally had kept something so important from me.

Vanessa squinted at me. “Fuck off. You already know I regret that shit, not to mention that’s not what this is about. Like I said, they hadn’t even told me when I was alive.”

“So how’d you find out?”

“It isn’t like I had anything better to do when I first died. I learned a lot about everyone… more than I’d want to, like those two’s sex schedule. Not like ‘every night’ is much of a schedule, but you get my point.” Vanessa floated down onto the bed.

“So were you listening just now?”

Vanessa gave the ‘half-and-half’ hand sign. “I was focused on something else, but I caught some of it. I heard about the invitation, but not much before it.”

For the next couple minutes, I explained the events of the robbery and my apparent… ‘changing’ to Vanessa. She listened raptly. She did guess that Ava would heal me before I could get to that part, so she really did know about them. I knew that Vanessa had been holding back information regarding her past, but I wasn’t sure how to cope with the fact she kept life-threatening information from me. Realistically, I shouldn’t have been putting any trust in her anymore, but it felt too good to get today’s events off my chest some.

“So, do you think they’re testing some sort of skin-toughening **** on you?” Vanessa asked after she was caught up.

I shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe? I mean, theoretically it could be a combination of the mystery **** and the truth-shit, right? It’s hard to tell when I don’t know what’s in me.”

“Are you going to ask Hana about it?”

“I… I don’t know.” I hadn’t even considered what’s next. The introduction of… what did she call themselves, the fucking ‘Changed Few’?… had distracted me to any other thoughts. Did I even have a choice? Hana and Vocx held all the cards, right? I wasn’t even sure how my power worked. What if I tried to hide it, then they can’t get any of the shots to go in me because my skin hardens?

Maybe they’d help me. Explain it. I mean, they were testing it to make this wide-spread, right? They sold medicine. Before this could go public, they’d have to figure out the kinks of issues. Maybe they’d explain how I tanked forty-or-so shots and then crumpled under one.

Unless this isn’t what they wanted from my tests. Maybe this was a fuck up, and they’d need to dispose of me.

Fuck. Now I was worried about being invited to a suicide pact by my roommates and about my job possibly killing me for being successful.

I felt lightheaded. Too many thoughts at once. I needed to sit down.

I sat on the edge of the bed. I think Vanessa could tell how I felt, because she wrapped her arms around me from behind.

“I know life sucks, Michael… but it will get better. Trust me. It has to.”

I didn’t know what she meant by that, but I was too tired to ask. I just tried to enjoy the comfort of her body pressed against me (even if it may not be real).

“Michael, can I tell you something without you freaking out?” She asked me softly. Her breath(?) tickled my ear. Is this what having a girlfriend was like? A pillar to make you strong when you felt weak? Someone who makes you feel so many things when they do anything? Their touch bringing a unique warmth (even when the person in question is technically cool to the touch)?

“Michael?” She asked again.

“Sorry, I was… thinking.”

“About the girls?”

“Uh… yeah, something like that.”

“Oh. Can I tell you something, or are you still thinking?”

I found it very cute that she offered to let me continue thinking. “No, no, go ahead, Vanessa.”

“Okay… well… I was just thinking about what Kenzie offered you… and… I think you should join them.” She said, almost in a whisper in my ear.

Chills ran down my spine, and it wasn’t because her chilly-ness.

“I know what you’re thinking, and yes… it’s dangerous. But they’ve been doing this for a while! Kenzie is a very smart leader, and they don’t just do anything they want. And… they can help you, right? Maybe they can figure out a way to get you out of your deal with Vocx.”

“I don’t know, Vanessa…” I played with my hands nervously. I could hear the reasoning, but I was… scared. I was fucking terrified.

The bomb felt like something I could understand, right? I knew the rules.

With vigilantism, that’s an entire new world.

Maybe I was just scared of responsibility. I don’t know. You can hyper analyze me, but all I know is that I’m scared shitless.

I was about to tell Vanessa ‘no’ when she did something that broke me.

She started crying.

I couldn’t see her face, but I could feel her shake with the rhythm of someone holding back tears and failing.

With shaky breaths, she said, “I don’t want you to be a **** to them. To Vocx. I… no one deserves to be a **** to someone else.”

I could hear a history that I didn’t understand in her voice. She had such venom in her voice. She understood the chains that burdened me to the company. How shameful; she had hated her chains, and I had found comfort in them.

I needed to become strong like her.

“Okay, Vanessa. You’re right. I’ll… I’ll join them.”

I heard her sniff, but her sobbing slowed down. I imagined she was smiling.

I couldn’t smile. I was digging my grave deeper every day.