I know The Devil

Just in case you foolishly forget

I’m never not thinking about you

I stared at the mirror three days after Tristan had put ideas in my head.

I could remember how Rob normally told the neighbours I was adopted as a joke because I looked way different from him and mom. I hated to believe I looked like a man that had caused mom so much heartache and had hated his plain features the minute I could tell that I would have been prettier if I had mom’s green eyes or blonde hair like Rob’s.

The fucker even keeps a bun, a special way of rubbing it in if you ask me. But, one thing was certain I was never the type to linger in the mirror, not just because I was pretty sure there wasn’t much to see but because I hated staring at my self knowing I might be a splitting image of the man Rob resented and mom foolishly adored yet, I’d survived this memory but now? The idea that I wasn’t plain Jane?

I couldn’t tell what had pushed me to grab the body-length mirror owned by Rob, he is the better-looking one amongst us something he vehemently denies though I could tell it was a guy’s thing. Men liked their strength to be acknowledged, their masculinity and not something as petty as looks and for a while, I’d begun to see myself as one of the guys. I only used the mirror to make sure I didn’t leave out a button of my shirt in a hurry or of recent to check if the grease on Rob’s shirt was much visible.

But today like I was being controlled, I carried the mirror I don’t know perhaps propelled by the numerous insta follows I had gained the very day Gloria had succeeded in making me reconnect with social media and perhaps life again, perhaps it was the messages I received on my inbox on a daily that was beginning to seem too consistent for a prank and the guys who suddenly wanted to hang was becoming increasingly uncomfortable but anyway for whatever reason, I looked at myself.

Plain black hair.

Brown pools nothing remotely striking as mom’s green or Law’s grey.

Damnit.

I was back to my brain forcefully pulling back the one person I try desperately not to think of every day, the one person whose existence still shook me albeit his brief run-in my life, the time he had been with me nonetheless still left me raw and shocked.

I dropped the mirror feeling foolish that I had let Tristan’s words get into my head. He was just being a good friend at the moment and knew I desperately needed a confidence boost.

Perhaps he had been worried about me which wasn’t misplaced since the spiralling gossips about Law and Titiana were driving me to the edge. In the washroom, in the classroom and even in the hallways everyone was talking about how good they looked together and blatantly to my face more than once, I have been asked by some of the chirpy cheerleaders if I didn’t just think Law and Titiana’s children will be a dream.

We were 17!

In high school!

Why would they even be imagining Law and Titiana’s babies?

Why would they ask me out of everyone my opinion?

How dare they purposely go out of their way to hurt me?

How dare they mock me so?

How dare Law do this to me?

I had been perfectly content with my life when all I had to do was to be invisible, it was senior year and I was almost done living like a ghost, I found myself reminiscing once again painfully, regardless of how many times I told myself I won’t be the girl who can’t get over someone who hasn’t even stuck around that long?

But most times I tried to remind myself constantly that he had made all the memories he had with me in barely two weeks and not in a lifetime, it felt like that sometimes and although he had lied to me to achieve what? was still confusing to me because although Law gave he seldom demanded anything in return but yet, I couldn’t forget he had made me have faith in him and then stomped all over all I had thought we share in public making a mockery out of me. It was still quite unreasonable that he was able to imprint himself into my life and make me sometimes cease to want to breathe without him next to me.

And yet again there were also these crazy nagging feelings, this familiarity that I had felt when his hand had brushed mine like it had happened countless times, and when I elevated my head to meet his, it was almost like my body somehow couldn’t resist a magnetic pull to his which was totally ridiculous and crazy.

Losing interest in flirting with the lies Tristan had spurred in me, I dumped the mirror and lay face down on the bed with a defeated sigh. Most beautiful girl he had said, I scoffed. The first guy who had talked to me in years now looks past me like we never exchanged pleasantries or he didn’t once hold my gaze with his now empty eyes and made me feel things that should be a felony.

The guys were all coming because I was the first girl to hang around Law after all and perhaps were enthusiastic about wanting to spin the tale of whatever they thought I had done that had made him stick around for more than a while in law’s book and I was tired of explaining to anyone at all who could just stop making ridiculous assumptions that it was all a game, I was played. Victim not Victor okay? But somehow the habitants of Evans high school were just way dumb than I had once evaluated to make good use of this piece of information.

So more invites to different parties which I never attended partly because I didn’t have a beautiful first encounter with those since I had gotten into an argument with the hostess of the first party I had attended, slapped her and now she was having her pound of flesh by not only flaunting Law who was with her now but making sure I didn’t miss out on any of their pictures or videos, and partly because I didn’t want a part in a life that was merely a misconception.ConTEent bel0ngs to Nôv(e)lD/rama(.)Org .

I walked into the school hallways amidst other students after Biology class, my hands tucked into my loose cargo pants even as I tried to avoid attention being drawn to me but that had been shattered the minute, I heard Titiana’s loud whiny voice calling a mocking semblance of my name.

“Prudyyy.”

In a school where everybody wanted to be in the know of the shit going on in your life so it could make them feel perfect about their less ideal life, you could imagine how dependent they were on lapping at the juicy topic of what to be discussed in homeroom amidst the homeroom teacher going through our attendance.

From my peripheral side of view which was an interesting shade of black, I could see students bringing out their smart iPhones not even pretending that they didn’t expect drama from what was going to happen right now.

A snarky current girlfriend calling out a wallflower nobody who somehow had gotten under her skin and even slapped her while she was with the school’s bad boy for a while.

Yes right, even I would have liked to watch how this would go down but the part of me who didn’t like being in the scene and embroiled in the drama that only Evans high school could offer held unto the straps of my school bag and made to leave.

I felt the tight aggressive grip of Titiana’s hand on my shoulder which was in sharp contrast to the sugary fake smile she directed at me. Batting her attached lashes more than once like seeing through them is becoming a problem.

“Can I help you Titiana?” I finally voice out not at all wanting her to get the idea I had time to spare to entertain all her skirmishes.

“Help me?” She threw her manicured fingers in the air like she found that truly amusing. “You, help me?”

I gritted through my teeth trying to rein it all in, “Hope you are not hard on hearing?” I asked with a scowl etched on my face, which I hoped was able to convey to her to get on with whatever she was up to since my time was of the essence to me, “Yes, help you.”

“You can’t help me even if you spend your lifetime and you’re being lent another by your fellow peasant who doesn’t feel the need to waste oxygen so don’t even bother.”

I almost grinned, almost. But couldn’t help but be irritated that Titana was dafter than I gave her credit for if she expected me to indulge her in her back-and-forth aimless banter like we are an old married couple or something.

“Since you don’t need my help,” I shrugged off one of her hands which was on my shoulder casually, “Why did you stop me?”

“Because regardless of what you would like to think I’m a good guy.”

Yeah right, I thought and then made to leave.

“Your brother is dead.” She blurted out.

I forgot how to walk.