Too Small To Be Afraid

Chapter 11

Brittney's words echoed in my mind all the way home. I guess I haven't really paid much attention to how I've been handling my fear. It just sort of screams at me to get away from pertheans by whatever means necessary, and I've been listening to it. I thought I was doing a good job of handling my fear, but... could I have hurt my deskmate in the process?

"I don't have time to think about this," I utter to myself as I approach apartment 825.

I take my apartment key out of my bag and insert it into the lock on our door. When I turn the key, I hear a click, and quietly push the door handle downwards to open it. I creep into the apartment's entryway, carefully closing the door behind me and locking it back. I then begin to tiptoe through the apartment, ever so quietly, lest Dad hear me and start bombarding me with questions about my day. I'm pretty sure I have nothing to worry about, though, since he's sitting on the couch focused on his laptop and likely didn't hear me come in. I turn to enter the hallway. Now I just need to get to my room.

"How was school?" Dad says from the couch.

Drat. Should I make a run for it? I sigh, turning around. I've done enough running for today.

"Terrible, just like I predicted," I say.

"Terrible, huh?" Dad says, setting his laptop down and turning around in his seat.

"It was crowded with pertheans everywhere I looked!"

"That's kind of the point, dear."

I shift in place, my blood beginning to boil. Of course that's the point, and that's the problem. I just don't understand what good being forced to intermingle with the very people I'm afraid of is going to do for me. If I have to endure one more minute of 'open hand' or 'balcony' etiquette, I might just explode! I take a deep breath and hold it, pursing my lips together.

"Well," Dad says, pushing up his glasses, "was there anything about the school that you did like?"

I cross my arms and keep my eyes glued to the floor. "The time I didn't have to spend with my deskmate," I scoff.

"And how is your deskmate?" Dad asks. "What are they like? How are you getting along?"

"I— he—" I stammer. Images of my deskmate hurt by my rejection flash through my mind. His brows upturned and his wide eyes without that spark they had when we first met. That big, stupid smile of his, gone. I'm quick to shake the thoughts away. I sigh. "Dad, I really don't want to talk about this right now."

Dad scratches his head and nods. "I get it. I do. This is all new to you and you're still processing everything."

Right. He totally gets what it's like to live in constant fear of being grabbed or crushed by someone twenty times your size. Their fingers wrapping around your entire being, weak and pathetic by comparison, their grip on you tightening at a devilishly slow pace while all you're able to do is stare up at their sickening smile and into their cold, narrowed brown eyes—begging them for mercy as you struggle in vain to cough up the blood that floods your crumpled up lungs and threatens to drown you. My whole frame trembles at the very thought of... that face. Those hands. That... demon...!

I'm brought back to reality by the sound of Dad, now in front of me, snapping his fingers. When I look up at him, his furrowed brows and widened eyes relax. He lets out a sigh, and with both hands, begins to wipe away tears I didn't know had started to creep down my cheeks.

"You're going to be okay," he whispers. "Don't go back there. Look forward."

Against my better judgment and in spite of my temper, I do exactly as I did when I was a little girl. I lunge forward, sinking my face into Dad's chest. He wraps his arms around me, and with gentle shushing, he strokes the back of my head with his hand. Immediately, I'm taken back to when I was a little girl.