My peace and wallowing didn't last long. Soon after I curled up under as many blankets I could find, blankly staring at the black television screen, I heard a knocking at the door. I tried to ignore it, but the knocking soon turned into a banging.

"Go away," I yelled, not caring if the ruler of the entire world was at the door. I couldn't be near anyone at that moment, I was a danger to anyone that I could come in contact with. I could feel my aura pulsate as I tried to calm my breathing. My body was too on edge, and there wasn't anything I could do about it but wait and hope I didn't hurt anyone else. I had to stay away from people, to keep them safe from me, and that meant I wasn't going to answer that door to anyone, wasn't going to let anyone in.

Unless, apparently, they had a spare key. Then, there wasn't much I could do to keep them away.

"What have you done?" I jumped as the door opened, the harsh tone snapping me into reality. And creating a few holes in the couch. Standing by the entrance was Adriana, her dark hair windswept and breathing heavily. And worst of all, she looked pissed. "Do you even know what you have done?"

"I, I mean, I didn't mean to—"I tried to explain myself, but Adriana didn't even wait for me to give a pathetic attempt. She charged at me, somehow dodging the armchair and the coffee table, before pulling me off of the couch and slamming me onto the floor. I felt my chest tighten, but for some reason, I was convinced that I shouldn't yell. Convinced that Adriana shouldn't get in trouble.

But why? I wasn't quite sure.

"How many time did I tell you? Tell you not to hurt her?" Adriana asked, even though I knew I couldn't answer, or she'd kill me. I tried to sit up, but she just punched me in the nose a disgusting crack coming from the punch. "And you still went and nearly tore her arm off."

"I, that's not what happened!" I wiped my nose on the sleeve of my shirt, only to see blood on it as I pulled my arm away. "Do not tell me you just broke my nose."

"I hope I did. You deserve it." She went to punch me again, but this time, I had enough sense to try and dodge it. I rolled to the side, gracefully hitting my head on the coffee table as I did so, but Adriana's punch did miss, so I did something right. And, it gave me time to stand up and scramble away from her. Her eyes dug into me like bullets, and even though she didn't have fire, or poison, or guns, or anything else of the sort on her side, I was more terrified of her than I was of anyone else that had ever attacked me.

"I don't want to hurt you, so please, just, just stay away." I should've realized how dumb those words were. How easily they could've been used against me. But, I didn't know anything else to say, so I just kept my words true. And my hands down by my sides.

"Oh, so you don't want to hurt me?" And, there it was. "What about Nadia? Did you want to hurt her? And here I thought you cared about her."

"I didn't mean to hurt her, Ad—I, you're not even going to listen to me, are you?" I watched as Adriana stood up, the fury in her eyes not dulled by my cheap words. "I'm sorry."

"I kept telling her how naïve she was being, how, stupid, she was to trust you." Adriana walked up to me, stopping only a few feet in front of me. "And yet, she didn't listen. She still went and trusted you. She loved you." She basically spat those last few words out, clenching her fists. "I knew you were a monster the first time I met you."

That hit me harder than I wished it did, and much harder than if she had said it just a few months prior. My chest tightened as soon as I heard the word "monster", and it felt as hard of a punch as when she lunged at me, her fist connecting with my eye. I stumbled back from the hit, feeling the aura around my hands flicker even more. It just made things worse. I couldn't breathe.

Adriana wasn't done with me, though, even as I began to stagger, and struggled to stand properly. I knew it was just like what happened in art, but she hadn't been there to see it. So, she didn't care. She punched me a few more times for good measure, including once more on the nose. Before I could retaliate, if I would have wanted to retaliate, she grabbed me by the collar of my shirt, staring me down.

"What? Now you're not one to attack? Acting innocent and all that?" She yelled, smirking as if she just caught in some sort of elaborate scheme. "Well, at least your injuries will heal. You'd just bett—"

I totally wished that I could've heard the rest of her scolding, but as she spoke, I could feel my legs giving out underneath me, as I suddenly got very, very dizzy. And then, everything went black.

When I woke up, I was lying on the floor, my head hurt like hell, and Adriana was nowhere to be seen. Of course, she wouldn't help me.

I sat up slowly, licking my lips without thinking about it beforehand. It wasn't a pleasant taste, but it certainly woke up a lot. It was then that I felt the paper in my hand. I fumbled to open it up, even though reading it just made me dizzy. The handwriting was almost a scribble, and hard to read. But, it only took me five minutes to read the two-sentence long note.

Dear Giovanna,

If I ever see you near Nadia again, I will send the whole football team on you. And rip your throat out.

LOVE, Adrianna

"Wow, send the football team on me and rip my throat out? I think that's just being overly generous, Adrianna," I muttered, tossing the note to the side and forcing myself to stand up. Stumbling to the bathroom, I looked into the mirror as soon as I got in, actually turning on a light for once and surveying the damage.

Now, I said that I looked awful after the death of Nadia's parents, but that was nothing compared to how I looked then. My nose and right eye were beginning to swell, turning my skin into shades of yellow, green, and purple that may have looked nice on flowers, but not on my face. Blood from my nose somehow ended up all over my mouth, making it look like I had just straight up eaten a person. Even my visible eye looked wrong, all dull and sullen. I looked like I had just walked through hell and back, for lack of a better saying.

How long had I been out for? Was it just a minute, or for hours? Since it had already been dark when I got back to the apartment, and I had never looked at a clock once in my life, I had no way to tell.

The only thing I knew in that moment was that I had to clean up a bit, before my dad got home and saw the blood everywhere. I didn't want to worry him, even though I would have to find some excuse for the busted up nose and swollen eye. I grabbed a washcloth, cranking the cold water on and washing my face in the sink. It would have to be hidden until I could do laundry, but at least a washcloth was easier to hide than blood all over my face. Lucky for me, though, it seemed that my nose had stopped bleeding, so I was safe there.

After that, I had to change my shirt. It was stained with blood on the sleeve, and a little on the collar, but I just had to hope that it would get out in the wash. After all, I really liked that shirt. I threw it into my laundry basket with the washcloth, and changed into a sweatshirt. The one that I had grabbed was way too big on me, and it was probably Ray's but I had no clue how I came into possession of it. One of life's great mysteries.

I wanted to watch TV after all of that, just to try and take my mind off of what just happened, even though I wasn't really feeling anything at the moment about it. It almost seemed like none of it had happened, even though I had the injuries to prove it did. My body was not in for it, though, for as soon as I laid down on the couch, I passed out into a dreamless slumber.

If I had known any better, I would've started to worry that I had a concussion.