𝑾𝒉𝒆𝒏 𝑮𝒐𝒍𝒅𝒆𝒏 𝑺𝒐𝒖𝒍𝒔 𝑪𝒐𝒍𝒍𝒊𝒅𝒆 | 1

40: Holiday Getaway🌅

Kam

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"I'll only hurt you
If you'll let me."

-Billie Eilish
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"So start from the top again. What did that bastard do to you?"

"That asshole needs a good beating to put him in his place."

"How dare he lay his hand on you."

"Give me his address. I just want to talk."

"Tell us what happened, Kosi."

We were all gathered in Bread Basket, early that morning.

Everyone took one look at Kosi's face and decided to skip classes that morning. We had just concluded final exams last week and classes nowadays consisted of book clubs and chess games, so we decided skipping school today was entirely worth it.

Kosi rolled her russet eyes and took a deep breath.

"I went through his phone 'cause he had been acting so weird lately and I was right to have been worried."

She was nervously wringing her fingers together, trying to stop her hands from trembling. She was fighting back tears, angrily, choking on sobs and hiccups. Her huge dark shades and heavy makeup covered her bruised cheekbone and split lips, her uniform, covering up the bruises on her arms.

My fists tightened as I tried to rein in my anger.

What asshole had done this?

"He had been texting some girl. Another hot-shot model on instagram. They were sexting a bit... Exchanging nudes and even hooked up twice, already. Planned to meet up again, later this week. I was so hurt. So angry. I blacked out. Confronted him and started yelling, all up in his face."

She took a long, shaky breath and hung her head low, her long box braids, bounced against her face every time she moved her head and she kept tucking the braids behind her hair.

"I didn't know he had been drinking. He gets more... Violent when he drinks."

Everyone drew a collective breath.

Jordan put his hand around her shoulder and looked at her, for once, with a worried expression. "Why didn't you tell us?"

Her lips quivered as she looked away. "I dunno... I loved him... Maybe, deep down, I wanted to stick with Trevor, to prove that I could be loyal. That I could be faithful... That I wouldn't be like my mum."

That last whisper made us fall silent and in the silence, shards of pain and heartbreak, pierced the air.

Everyone knew about Kosi's mother, the over ambitious matriarch of a beauty empire, that everyone knew had slept her way to the top and bragged about it to anyone that would listen.

This country has made it impossible for young women to become successful without having to give up their bodies to senile old fools at some point, she said once in her article. I did what I had to do to get me to the top and I'd do it again if I had to.