Page 185 of Lessons in Cruelty

Every person in the photo was born for this shit.

Me? I’m just some Riverside piece of trash.

Will this nightmare never end?

Or maybe the nightmare is that part of me actually wants to go. Wants to walk in there and watch their faces. Show them that this trailer trash bitch can play their games too.

I stab my phone’s power button and set it down on my nightstand.

This is the event I’m expected to attend? Don’t these people realize the whole reason I was awarded the grant is because I can’t afford swishy dresses and manicures?

I own two dresses, and one of them just got slashed into ribbons.

My fingers drift to my ribs, finding the cut through my t-shirt.

It’s still bleeding, just a little. Tomorrow it’ll scab. Next week it’ll scar.

Another mark.

Another reminder.

But scars are just proof that you survived something that tried to kill you.

And I’m really fucking good at surviving.

Chapter 46

Bastian

The first thing I see when my alarm shocks me awake is Evelyn’s gift-wrapped package lying beside me on the bed. My curiosity finally got the better of me last night, but I couldn’t do more than tear off a corner to reveal the thick stack of pages inside.

It’s a manuscript. Mother must have written another book. I don’t even have to open it to know what will be inside.

Ego death through psychedelic experiences. Evelyn loved her Golden Teacher tea. Shadow work, and the collective unconscious, and archetypal patterns. Or, depending on when she finished it, it could all be delusional ravings and gibberish.

Like mother, like son.

My delusions walk around campus in dirty jeans and daddy issues.

I groan, rolling onto my back, dragging my fingers down my face.

Too much bourbon last night.

Way too much fucking coke.

I wince as a headache stabs at my temples when I reach to silence my phone’s blaring. Two Advils on the nightstand, a glass of water.

How kind of me.

I swallow them down, and fall back into my pillows, trying to convince myself to get up.

My phone vibrates on the nightstand. I snatch it off with my free hand, glaring at the string of messages on my lock screen.

This is why I set my phone to ‘do not disturb’ at night. Students thinking they can message me at whatever ungodly hours they want, asking for extra credit, submitting late assignments. If I’d received more than a handful of dick pics or titty shots a semester, I wouldn’t have minded as much. But it’s all work, all the time.

I scroll through my notifications, already sitting up, then I flop back down again. My hand grips my cock, giving it a brutal squeeze.

I’m rock hard, and it’s not morning wood.