AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I turned on my heel and marched into the back rooms and began to tidy up.
I felt angry, flustered. Why did the new Prizes always have to open up their hearts to the beasts? They always let them down.
Always.
I dumped broken chair legs and other impromptu weapons into a pile in the corner and immediately felt the crushing weight of heartache press down on me. I almost bent double, and braced myself on the wall. It was like I’d been hit in the gut by a brutal blow.
“Lily?” one of the Prizes said, placing a hand on my back. “Are you all right?”
I slapped her arm away and didn’t even turn to look at whoever it was. “I’m fine!” I growled. “Get this crap cleared away. We have to prepare for when the competitions begin again.”
I moved past the makeup desks and changing rooms and entered the bathroom. I splashed some water on my face and got a grip on myself. I looked at myself in the mirror.
It was just the stress of the riots, I told myself. Nothing more. Then everything would go back to normal.
A pair of Prizes moved past the bathroom, their hushed whispers magnified as they bounced off the hard tile walls.
“What happened to her?” the young gleesarian asked. “To Lily. To make her this way.”
“The rumor is she had her heart broken by one of the inmates,” an older Prize, whose face I couldn’t recall, said.
“She fell in love?” the young gleesarian said incredulously. “Seriously? How is that possible?”
“I know it seems impossible now, but they say there was a time when she actually used to smile.”
“Her? Smile? I don’t believe it.”
“I’ve never seen it myself, but that’s what they say.”
They passed the bathroom and were gone.
After all this time, after all the Prizes I’d known back then had gone, replaced with fresh female flesh, my past still haunted me.
He still haunted me.
I could still recall how his arms felt wrapped around me, how strong, yet caring, reassuring. And the caress of his soft lips against my skin, and the hard press of his cock against my back…
Stop it!
I scowled at myself in the mirror. Stop being so weak! You’re better than this! You’re stronger than this!
And still, the tears threatened to roll down my cheeks.
There was one reason not to fall in love, and that was once it ended, and your heart was torn from your chest, you were left with nothing, and remained an empty shell for the rest of your life.
That was what I wanted to tell the young gleesarian. That was what all the Prizes needed to know.
But that would mean exposing that I had, in fact, once been in love. And then there would be their questions, their endless, probing questions, that could only open my wound further and cause more pain and anguish.
Let them think they knew the mystery of me. They didn’t. And they never would.
I straightened up, blew my nose, and dabbed the dampness from my eyes. And there I was, back to normal. Fully myself again.
A knock came at the door. There was no need to tell them to enter as it was standing open.
“Yeah?” I said.
“It’s the Supervisor,” the Prize said, head bowed deferentially.
