Fly With Me | ✓

24

Everleigh hated exams. Even when she knew the answers, she hated exams. Exams were fucking stupid and Everleigh never felt dumber than when she sat in a silent lecture hall where even the smallest of stomach gurgles was like an IMAX movie. (Breakfast was still difficult.) (Waking up to an empty fridge was not inspiring—Maverick probably would've killed her if he saw how little she'd bought herself to eat.)

It was something to say that training for being a flight attendant included emergency protocols. Everleigh knew how to behave when a plane was crashing. On land. In the ocean. A ball of flames as each engine went down. There were ways to navigate emergencies and panic and she was trained to do so. The training was hard, but for fuck's sake, Everleigh would take a thousand rounds of that training if it meant she never had to write another fucking nurse exam.

There were things Everleigh knew she studied. She could picture where the information was on her notes—carefully colour-coded with specific information on hand drawn sticky notes that let her know the information was important. What she lacked was the ability to read what the note said. Fucking hell.

Maybe it wouldn't actually help but staring up at the ceiling like she was willing someone to come down and slap the stupid out of her felt like it was helping. Staring anywhere else would've gotten her exam taken away for plagiarism, so the ceiling was the most useful. If she wasn't on a time limit, she probably could've counted the holes in the tiles. Looked at them for hours like stars in a clear night's sky.

It was a toxic stare, think of an answer, write it, and repeat cycle. Everleigh was going to need to pay a visit to a chiropractor if she kept craning her neck the way she was. She remembered when she was little and her back would hurt. Troy would lay her down and try to rub the knot out. Never the trained massage therapist, but always one to try. He'd sit with her after and ask what was stressing her out so much that she had such bad knots. It usually ended up being some lame excuse like school—she wouldn't mention that her life had reduced itself to reducing herself and the space she took up. Now it felt like that was the exact reason for the knot was school. All those times she'd lied had caught up to her and it was unlikely her father would sit patiently and rub the knots out for her. (Maverick might've.) (But Maverick was on the other side of the ocean and then some.) Everleigh's only hope was trying to massage it out while praying the answer she scribbled was legible enough that she could mostly get the mark she needed.

A cough from somewhere else in the lecture hall. Everleigh stared down at her paper as a few heads turned to look. How did they have time to take a look at someone else? She felt like she'd be lucky to finish before the five minute call. The clock ticking was agonizing, and what came out on the other side? More anxiety about her results? There was no winning.

After nearly three hours of writing the exam, Everleigh heaved a sigh. The last question was answered. Reviewing it would make her second guess herself. Collecting her papers, she rose from her seat and walked her exam to her professor. Sitting at the front of the class was somehow more stressful than when her teachers used to roam between desks with their hands behind their backs, silently judging the answers they read.

The overwhelming urge to turn on her heel and sit back down hit, Everleigh's heart pounded in her chest. It was too late, her professor made eye contact with her. No turning back. Something about reminding herself she had semisolid lunch plans with Roman, all she had to do was call when she was done her exam. That would be good. Going out for lunch. Help her rumbling stomach and avoid grocery shopping for one more day.

Losing weight had always made her feel some type of awful happy. Her bulimia made sure of that. Rewarded her for being shit to herself and sent butterflies through her stomach across the bridges of protruding ribs cutting through her skin. The fact she simultaneously wanted to starve herself and feed herself because a bulimia versus someone noticing she was bulimic was a terrible battle that she constantly fought. Donny? She was sure he knew. Never said anything, though. Simply had sex, slept, and left. That was a good way to act. Don't ask, don't tell. But now Everleigh had someone who would ask until she told and that was terrifying.