chapter ten / blood stained carpet

tw: sexual harassment, drug abuse

    Kook house parties were not a protective habitat for species like Ilyshah Tūrei. She knew as much as she followed behind Spencer through the entryway, the bass of Highest In The Room drummed off the white walls and echoed through her ribcage. The thick, stifling air dripped with liquor, sweat mixed with clouds of pot, heavy cologne, and chlorine near choking her as her palms clung to the sticky countertop. Spencer wasted no time with his camera, determined to capture every moment as people posed before him.

     When it was time to join the rest of the Kooks down the rabbit hole, they sucked on their lime wedges after downing a shot of tequila. Going off the deep end into a glass pool of mercuriality.

"To sobriety?" Spencer raised his glass, cracking a toothy grin as Ilyshah shook her head with a smile and clinked their glasses. One tequila shot, two vodka shots, four downed leaving a dull, burning sensation as the liquid slicked down her throat like it belonged there all along.

Sobriety. That all went to hell with Rafe Cameron's arrival, welcomed like King of the island. Ilyshah could read Spencer's intense gaze as it tore away from the small talk with two other people from the party, even when he came back to the hazy confines of their conversation—he wasn't all there. Not until Rafe snaked his arms over both their shoulders as her body uncontrollably stiffened under his touch.

"I'm wondering where the party is and it seems to be over here," he smirked devilishly, shaking Spencer more vigorously, "and fish without a mai tai in his hand?"

Spencer shrugged with a coy side smile. "I'll get to those, just wanted something stronger to start with," then snapped his head towards a group of people calling out to him for photos and excused himself.

    On her list of people Ilyshah didn't want to be left alone with, Rafe Cameron took first place. Even being stuck talking to Kelce about how much he benched in the gym was preferable to the hostage of his darkened stare. First it was indifference when they met all those months ago at The Island Club until it soon melded into him becoming a stranger to her good graces.

    "How about you, Ilyshah? Enjoying yourself?" Rafe questioned, voice liquid smooth.

   She turned away from him to mix herself a vodka guava, her movements growing more languid as the liquor seeped into her system. "I'm enjoying myself just fine, thanks."

    He audibly sighed, leaning his elbows on the counter beside her as he chewed on a strip of gum. "You know come to think of it, you and Spence are so alike."

   "Oh yeah? How so?" She distractedly asked, avoiding eye contact with him as she focused on the ice cubes as she dropped them into her cup.

   "Well you're both so quiet and shy you see," he drew in her attention as he straightened, "hard to get a word out of either of you sometimes."

She locked eyes with him, narrowing her own. "Maybe I don't like to waste my words on people who don't deserve them," she bluntly commented before she took a sip of her drink and kept eye contact. Tequila made her bold in the presence of the devil.

He hummed with a nod, lips pursed slightly before he brought them inches away from her ear with their chests touching as she frowned. "But you know what they say about shy girls, right?"

She held her glare on him even as Spencer returned. "What did I miss?" He asked.

   As Collard Greens boomed across the room, Ilyshah pasted on a smile, "I want to dance," she blurted cheerily as she put her hand in his, dragging him away to the crowded dance floor as Rafe fixated intensely on them.

   At least the music redeemed the party as Kendrick's discography faded into old school r&b. Having Spencer on the dance floor was her ultimate loophole for not getting any unwanted attention from stray guys, one that would soon open into a sinkhole when Spencer yelled into Ilyshah's ear he needed to go to the bathroom and left her high and dry.

   In Spencer's absence from the dancefloor, Ilyshah made the mistake of not retreating back to the outskirts where they were once drinking. Rafe disappeared from his post up, and that's when she knew—euphoria bled into regression. That's also when a guy she didn't even know of, over six foot two clad in a checkered shirt and khakis ghosted his palm over her behind and gave it a squeeze making her choke on her drink, and when Lani Tūrei came out of the shadows, hand gripping his crotch with a harsh twist as he grunted.

"Touch my cousin or any girl like that again Eric and I'll cut your dick off then staple it to your forehead," Lani snarled, a dark deadliness behind her irises as he cried out in pain.

He frowned deeply as she let go of his groin and Kelce grabbed him ready to haul him off. "You're one to talk, dressed up like a whore."

"Suck my dick, Jacobson it's a pool party," she spat like a viper, looking down at her fuschia bikini ensemble paired with the Louboutins she stole from her mom's closet, "and this is Dolce and Gabbana, so you can fuck off now."

As the crowd jeered while Kelce tossed out Eric, Ilyshah stood there still stunned, the room of flashing lights now slightly spinning in her vision as Lani turned to her. "You okay? Where the fuck is Spence?"

"He said he was going to the bathroom," Ilyshah slurred as Lani helped her over to the kitchen and handed her a bottle of water from the fridge. "But that was like... ten minutes ago."

Lani closed her eyes and muttered a curse under her breath. "Okay, just—stay here and I'll go find him," she rubbed her shoulders in a rare moment of comfort and strutted off in search of Spencer.

Ilyshah didn't listen, she wanted solace from the blinding lights and booming music, especially after she spotted the guy who just groped her sneak back into the party undetected. She figured her best bet would be the wooden pier a fair distance from everyone else while still just close enough to stay connected to the wifi.

Her legs swung over the edge as she fumbled with her phone for several minutes and eventually scrolled down her list of contacts. She gnawed on her bottom lip as she came across Sea Cowboy, even if she were able to contact him—it would be too much, she would probably end up drunkenly blurting her life story to him in a disaster waiting. She continued scrolling until she landed on Tāmati Tūrei and didn't hesitate to press video call.

     "Lysh!" A voice exclaimed from the other side of the phone after only 5 seconds, a wide smile spread across the face of her younger brother by a year, Tāmati as he held the phone upright and lit up her face with daylight highlighting the caramel streaks in his darkened curls from halfway across the world. "We haven't heard from you all week."

   Each question about how everyone from back home was doing led to ten more stories told enthusiastically by Tāmati as Ilyshah simply listened with her chin resting on her tucked in knees while sobering up. She heard about the new job he landed at the bakery down the road, their kuia harvesting a new grove of kumara for the season, their baby sister Arahia's first steps. In amongst all of that, she could still hear the ringing of her two younger sisters Kamaia and Mahia in her ears of Lolo don't go. As she saw the rosy cheeks of their baby faces when Tāmati turned the camera on them, she wondered to herself why the hell she was still here if she could be home with her family instead. As if being in that pixelated moment built a bubble around her to the world around her. Then, she remembered why she was there and that bubble popped leaving soapy residue pooled at her feet.

   "Where's Mum and Dad?" Ilyshah questioned blankly as Tāma's face dropped slightly, the same fear of reverence reserved especially for the ones who raised them written like a map into their features.

   "They went down south for a tangi a few days ago, probably a good thing since you're at a hui and they'd tell undool," he responded with a huff of amusement. "Eh, why are you even talking to me when you're at a hui? Go do some vortekes for me sis," he joked, throwing up a shaka.

She shrugged. "It's a boring hui I guess... and people don't do vortekes here, egg."

"Whatever g, I gotta put down Ara for a nap but hey give your friend Sarah a kiss for me," he puckered his lips and imitated kiss sounds earning an eye roll from Ilyshah.

"In your dreams, boy. Ka kite anō au i a koe."

As soon as the screen went black, so too did her mood. Ending any calls with her family achieved that black hole void wilting her into a jaded husk. In the shallow depths of this island, she lost sense of who she was—or maybe the tequila had too loud of a voice tonight as salty tears of despair joined the water below. On record, the shittiest party Ilyshah ever attended.

"Hey," Sarah softly called out pulling Ilyshah out of her thoughts as she hastily wiped away any wandering tears, plunking down to the pier carrying her sandals by her side wearily. "Are you okay? What are you doing down here alone?"

"M'okay, I just wanted to call my brother," she sniffled as Sarah gave a concerned look and broke into a short lighthearted exasperated laugh, "he told me to give you a kiss from him."

"Well, since you must oblige," she replied, tapping onto her dimple twice as the two shared a giggle before Ilyshah gave in and planted a sweet butterfly kiss on the delicate tear streaked skin of her cheek then rested on her shoulder. "Some party, huh?"

"Some party," Ilyshah repeated in a low whisper. "Did you at least have fun?" She asked, and reading the shift in Sarah's features answered her question before she even opened her mouth.

  Sarah quirked up the corner of her lip wistfully as Ilyshah lifted her head. "Topper just... we were about to," she paused with a frown, "but I couldn't do it, and he got so mad—and I don't know why I couldn't do it, Lysh." The last part came out in a whisper despite no one else listening in.

  "Maybe you didn't want to do it here," Ilyshah suggested meekly as she lightly shook her head, "I'm starting to think they're all like this, Sarah... Even Spencer," she mumbled sullenly.

   "Yeah, I saw him and my brother coming out of a room on my way down," she commented as they lamented in their combined disappointment until Scarlet called out for Sarah, "I'm being dropped off home, you want us to drop you off too?"

   Ilyshah shook her head as she gave a sigh. "No, I should wait for Spence. You go, and message me when you're home safe."

               "Of course," she whispered into her shoulder as they quickly hugged.

   Spencer stumbled down to the pier as Sarah passed him with a glaring eye roll, failing at fixing his white shirt with several undone buttons. "Lysh, been looking all over for you," he slurred.

"Where were you?" She asked stiffly.

He raked his fingers through his tresses as he sat down beside her, bumping his knee up and down as it hit the wooden railing trapping them from the water. "People just... wanted photos you know," he sniffled, instinctively wiping his nose with the back of his hand. "Why . . ." he swallowed thickly, "why are you down here?"

  "Needed some air..." she murmured, resting her chin on the wooden railing.

His ticks were now painfully obvious as she turned and watched him look out vacantly to the water in a daze. Eyelashes fluttering as he blinked at forty miles a minute, nervous scratches at his temple as he casted prayers disguised as curses under his breath, and his parted smile settled into shadows of a ghost.

He licked his lips as his nostrils flared. "Is he still here? Tell me what he looks like and I'll go find him... I'll go find him Lysh, and fuck him up."

    "Lani dealt with him already, you don't need to do that."

"No, no it's not fine I am so fucking sick of guys thinking it's open season on you," he snapped into a frenzy, startling her slightly. "Who was it? Was it Kyle? Last time it was Gabe, he has such shit tattoos like who gets a wolf on their sleeve anymore, douchebags that's who—"

"Spencer, stop," she scanned his face in scrutiny as hers contorted into incredulity under a veneer of disappointment. "You've got a little..." she swiped a finger across her nostril as he mirrored her movement to rid of the white residue stuck to his own.

    That fucking Rafe Cameron. No matter how many times Ilyshah helped Spencer flush his shit down the porcelain toilet, supply and demand became evergreen between the two. Apples in the orchard ripe all year round ready for the picking.

He grabbed her wrist as she abruptly stood up and began to storm away. "Lysh, I'm sorry," said Spencer in a more gentle tone.

"I've told you before, I'm not going to be around you when you're like this."

   He closed his eyes as he let go of her hand. "It was just... it was two bumps that's... it's hardly anything," he hugged his knees as his head continued to wag from side to side.

"You know, you told me the other night to be careful of the Pogues because they've gotten you in trouble before, and yet you still hang out with Rafe... why?"

"It's complicated," his groans were muffled as he wedged his face between his kneecaps.

   In that moment, Ilyshah didn't see her friend, her Spencer. Who would go on for hours about his favorite anti-hero as they floated on her bed and simply existed, who dragged her to the coveted passata day in his backyard and clung to his nonna like a koala as she crushed vine ripened tomatoes, and proudly showed her his first ever short film of their lives in the obx. Someone with ambitions, hopes and dreams lost into the ether of white lines and mauled into the manifestation of a creature she didn't recognise.

   "I'm going home, Spence. You can either stay here, or you can come back with me," said Ilyshah coldly, taking off halfway up the hill before he pulled himself up and caught up to her.

  "I can't let you walk home alone," he mumbled, slipping his hands into his pockets as they bypassed the other partygoers still raging into the sun and a blood stained carpet to show for.

I. mai speaks

for anyone confused whose already read these two chapters put in one i've decided to split them for consistency and easy reading ! (and because it flopped but let's not talk abt that)

heavy chapter ikik and i'll expand more on ilyshah / rafe / spencer past in future chapters of sunbleached ( which i haven't abandoned ! ) that lead to what you just saw in spencer's behaviour mostly fuelled by the influence from rafe and the broken family he has at home but i hope you enjoyed also seeing a snippet of ilyshah's life as the oldest child and sister before moving to the obx, oldest childten rise !!! ( even tho i'm the baby of my family myself aksdjdk )

i also wanted to balance out the heavy topics with more lighthearted moments ( aka sarlysh my fav soft girls ) because i'm shy of the angst writing despite LOVING when i read it. jjlysh returning in full force next chapter 🫶🏼🫶🏼🫶🏼

anyway please continue voting and commenting i'm still gobsmacked and warmed by every single one this book is growing so quick and it makes my heart go 📈📈📈 ok love u guys mwah xxx

Whale Rider ━━ JJ Maybank
Chapter Ten, Blood Stained Carpet
Outerbanks S1 ━━ Ep. 3 The Forbidden Zone.