House of Anubis

House of Hyper p3

I woke up the following morning feeling just overall tired, I sat up in bed, only to find Nina and Patricia both on their own beds staring at me.

"Welcome to the world of the living, sleepy head." Patricia teased with a smile. "Have a nice nap?"

I looked at the two of them with a raised eyebrow. The two of them... in our bedroom... not because they're asleep? Willingly? Ok, I missed something, clearly.

I looked around for my laptop, but didn't see it around, Nina holding out a clipboard for me as she says "Its probably still downstairs, when Amber took it away from you at the party. How're you feeling?"

Right, the party.

Wait, then how did I— I don't remember coming back to—

I found myself frowning as I grabbed a marker. Turning the clipboard around.

'I had an episode, didn't I?' The looks on their faces said it all.

"I take it you don't remember anything from last night, then?" Patricia asked with a slight frown. I only shook my head before writing.

'I remember the party; Jerome and I kissed a lot.'

"Yeah you did, and it was disgusting." Patricia said with her face scrunching up, but didn't seem actually annoyed or foul. "Surprised you two didn't start swallowing the others tongue."

I shudder at the though; the mental image an unpleasant one.

'I remember talking to you and Mara in the kitchen. Then the cake.' I paused in my writing thinking back, 'then there was Alfie the party animal... then... nothing.'

"I don't blame you," Nina huffed, "Victor was pretty scary last night. More than usual."

"I don't think I've ever seen him so angry before." Patricia snorted. "Thought his head was going to explode!"

'Nothing happened, right?' I asked, turning the board around, after writing on a new sheet.

"Aside from some hair pulling and head banging, trying to knock the thoughts out of your head; no." Patricia answered, mimicking the head hitting as she mentioned it.

That's good... if Victor was as terrifying as they claim, I'm surprised it wasn't a steeper breakdown.

"We're grounded, by the way. Don't know if your breakdown left you exempt." Nina adds, and I end up tilting my head. Why were we/they grounded?

"He found out someone had gone into the attic during the party," she explained, "and while he was trying to remove the animal head off of Alfie, I slid the key by his office so he couldn't search us for it."

"Then everyone banded together to not snitch on each other." Patricia finished. "Captain curfew wasn't happy about that."

'I'm sure.'

I licked my lips before asking; 'so you're still swapping rooms with Amber, right? Now that things are... good?' I ask, referring to her and Nina.

"Yeah, we're obviously going to be working on the swap all day." She groaned, laying back down in her bed. "Her and Mara are the ones at odds now, remember?"

I only puff my cheeks, the conversations I had with Mara coming to mind, which resulted in me nodding in understanding.

"So, are you feeling ok?"

I rub my hands over my face, expressing how tired I felt before making a joke at the expense of my trauma. 'I feel like I have a hangover minus the fun stuff that lead up to it.'

Patricia snorts while Nina gets up saying she'll go and get me a glass of water before stepping out of the room.

"So..." Patricia says as we fall into silence. "We good?"

I tilt my head, staring at her, this weird feeling in my chest. 'I... don't know. You and Nina seem to be getting on fine suddenly. But...'

She sighed, kicking her feet over her bed, her back slightly hunched forward as her hands rested on her knees. "You were right.. about a lot of stuff. I was wrong. And everything you said was... pretty well deserved." She admits with a frown. "My anger towards Nina, and then still not trusting her, and going through her things just because the two of you were sneaking around. I should have minded my own business."

I nodded my head near absent minded, and things got quiet again.

"....Do you really think I'd put my hands on you? Like that?" She asked quietly and I bit my lip. "And I don't mean if it were you instead of Nina, cuz, I don't know myself anymore. Maybe, but probably not as far as choking. Now, I mean."

Well at least she's clear that even in the case of extreme measures of interrogation, she's got limits.

It took me a while to answer, not knowing what I thought anymore, or how to put whatever pieces I did have flying about together. Finally finding my response.

'Patricia... I want to say 'no'. I want to believe your violent acts and cruelty were solely fuelled by wanting to find Joy; but I had nothing to do with that. And you pushed me into the attic and could have seriously hurt me.'

'That night... it wasn't the first time I've been locked in a room.'

I wrote that part separately, unsure if I wanted to talk about this. If I do, probably not in full depth.

Her eyes widened before her face screamed nothing but guilt. "So when you said I was added to your list of abusers..."

I nodded slowly as I wrote. 'It was because you had done something they had. It's happened a lot more than I'd care to admit.'

I run a hand through my ruined curls. 'Honestly I'm surprised it hadn't sent me into an episode right there and then. But I suppose being locked in with someone who was even more scared than I was, and me feeling more anger than fear could have been the reason I hadn't had one until I blew up at you the following morning, and went to school.'

"I sent you into an episode..?" I almost think I heard her heart shatter. "Victoria... what did I make you do?"

I shook my head, 'Patricia, I don't want to talk about it. You aren't my therapist.' Where is Nina with that water??? I'm starting to think that was all a lie.

She nodded slowly, "That's fair... Trudy might want to talk to you about that, actually. She mentioned it last night when she saw you like that."

I let out a sigh, figuring as much. 'Alright, let's go get breakfast and get this swap going so we aren't working on it for days, while also showing everyone I'm not dead yet.' I wrote, showing her the board as I stood to my feet.

Patricia scoffed/sneered, "Shut up!" Grabbing a pillow, whacking me with it. "You're not dying."

I send her a cheeky smiles, 'Actually we all are; it's called "aging".'

"You're an idiot, you smart ass."

'Well which is it? Am I a smart ass, or an idiot, I can't be both.' She rolled her eyes, looping her arm with mine and we cascaded down the stairs.