Her hair was messy and her robe was light pink, a fluffy cotton contraption that hid her curves underneath that tugged a smile to my lips.

She usually always wore such dark clothes that seeing the opposite, cheerful color on her was...well, different.

"What do you want to talk about?"

Cami's eyes were glazed over, almost like she'd had the most exhausting day of her life and she could fall asleep standing if she were so inclined.

The haze of a bright lamp in the corner painted her in a backlit silhouette and tossed sprays of warped shadows along the off white walls.

She stared back at me impassively, like this was the most uninteresting conversations she'd ever had--and I wondered what had changed so drastically since the last time we'd spoken to each other.

When had that been, even? Was it the day of the field trip? Could it really have been that long ago?

I'd been so wrapped up in Colton's drama and Alec's mental health crisis that I'd barely given a second thought to Cami, save for when Colton had complained about her, over and over again.

"Look, I'm sorry for how my friends acted earlier. I just wanted to say that I don't hold any hard feelings or anything against you."

"Hard feelings?"

Her voice was a monotone symphony of unfeeling boredom, almost like the interested girl I'd met on the school bus at the field trip was completely and totally gone and in her place was a cold hard shell of a person who refused to give even an inch as for what she was feeling inside.

Her brown eyes were dull and dead inside, the expression not unlike the one Alec had been sporting of late.

The same expression that Grey had on his face the last few months leading up to his attempt.

Was that what this was? Was this breakup with Colton something that had thrown her over the edge?

I'd known she'd lived a life of hardships...maybe this was her last straw.

Who knew how Colton had treated her, or how he'd dumped her.

With the way he spoke about her in our group...I just knew that it wasn't pretty.

He'd been telling everyone at our table that he stood her up after she'd done the same to him as payback. He said she was too easy, and that he preferred to chase girls rather than the ones who just gave it up so willingly.

I hated how he spoke about women, but I couldn't find it in me to shut him up--Alec had been sitting right there, flicking his lighter up and down and staring into it like he was tempted to light his entire hand on fire just for fun.

He had the exact same look on his face that Cami had on in this moment.

Flashes of a football game brawl shot through my memory like a torpedo, momentarily knocking me off my train of thought.

There was a flash of near blinding light, searing pain, and then a beautiful girl's face smiling at me, talking to me, getting to know me...

I had just caught sight of her deep set brown doe-like eyes before Cami snapped her fingers in front of my face.

"Hello? Anyone in there?"

I shook my head and rubbed my eyes, surely that hadn't been a hallucination or anything, right?

Ever since my concussion during our first scrimmage game earlier in the year, I'd been having more and more flashes.

Most of them were gruesome--flashes and images of Grey hanging from that belt in his closet and swinging limply back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, his face a bloated and purplish mess as his neck was turned at an unnatural angle.

Some of the images didn't make sense--some showed Grey with more blood around his neck than there had been, some even came with auditory aspects, as well--like the sirens blaring in the background as I rocked back and forth, back and forth, back and forth on the ground in a ball as tears fell from my eyes and splashed onto the carpet beneath me.

But this one was different, less cloudy, more crisp and real, like it had just happened yesterday.

Was I regaining the memories of the night of the scrimmage game? And if so, who did I meet that made my mind focus on that one moment of speaking to that girl?

"Sorry, uh...headache. But yeah, since you and Colton broke up, I just wanted you to know I wasn't taking sides, and that I was sorry for inviting him over here only for him to act like such an ass. I don't know what all went down between you two but--"

"Nothing. Nothing happened between us. We weren't dating or anything."

"But...you were together at one point, weren't you?"

If it was possible, she shut down even further, eyes unfocused and a distant glaze in her face that hadn't been there moments before.

"Cami?"

A tremor went through her body and...didn't stop.

"Are you cold?"

She wouldn't stop staring at that spot above my head, so of course I turned to inspect just what it was she was staring at so intensely.

It was nothing. Not even a picture frame behind me.

I waved my hand in front of her face and that seemed to do the trick.

"Are you alright?"

"Yeah. I just zone out. Are we done here? I need to go to sleep."

"Shit. Uh, yeah, I guess we're done. Sorry if I bothered you--"

But she'd already slammed the door closed in my face.

Pre-dawn light filtered in through the curtains covering my windows and I quickly shoved them aside so that I wouldn't go right back to sleep.

I launched myself out of bed and immediately set to writing down my dream that I'd just had.

The dreams were getting increasingly ridiculous.

Last night, I dreamt I was getting chased by an evil clown and no one would do anything to stop it, thinking that it was part of a comedy show. The worst part was at the end, when the clown took off their hideous makeup and it was Parker underneath it all.

At least it wasn't another nightmare, though it had been close.

My last dream I'd turned into a short story that I'd submitted to our local lit mag and was still under review.

'The Abyss' was my first attempted publication, so my fingers would be crossed, if I actually ever bothered to do that.

I had just finished pulling my pants on and t-shirt for the day when there was a knock at my door and my mom entered sheepishly, half a hand over her eyes in case I was indecent, like she wasn't already peeking to see anyway.

One of the many downsides of not being able to talk--basically no privacy because people will just barge in after knocking instead of waiting for you to come answer the door yourself.

I'd lost the rights to lock my door whenever I pleased after I tried to off myself.

Apparently that's where parents drew the line.

"I need you to stick by Cami today. She's going to need a lot of help adjusting."

I lifted my eyebrows in silent question, not feeling the need to sign to get my question across.

"I know she's been at school for a few months, but...well, I can't tell you. She could just use another friend. Keep an eye on her. Don't let anyone bother her. Please."

I gave her one solitary nod in response and she sighed out a big whoosh of air that seemed like it had been collecting in her for hours.

More than once, I wondered what my mom knew about Cami that I didn't, considering that she'd told me almost her entire life story the night before.

Whatever it was, it was enough to have my mom spooked, so that meant it was serious.

I wasn't planning on letting Cami out of my sight the entire day, and I didn't care what she had to say about it.

The shower in the bathroom that was connected to both mine and Cami's rooms turned on and I couldn't stop the grin that flew onto my face.

She definitely hadn't lost her spirit, that much was for sure.

I thought back to the night before, when she'd promised to shower at night and let me have the mornings. I wondered if this was just to test me and see if she could get a rise out of me, or if it was a shower out of necessity since she couldn't get one last night.

Her mood from the moment she got off my bike was concerning. It was like she'd become a different person entirely.

Mom left my room and I couldn't help but test my boundaries even more; to see if that spunky girl from last night was still in there somewhere.

So I turned the doorknob to the bathroom, and sure enough, she hadn't locked it.

These Jack and Jill bedrooms were meant for me and Parker, but we continuously fought over every little thing that it was easier to put Parker in the larger guest bedroom with its own bathroom down the hall than to let the fights continue on much longer.

Steam so thick I could barely see my hand in front of me almost suffocated me as I eased my way inside.

Jesus. Did she have to have it hotter than a sauna in here?

That temperature couldn't have been good for her.

The soft whimper of pain that came from the shower alerted me to the fact that the temperature was definitely not good for her.

Without thinking, I shot my hand into the shower where I knew the temperature knobs were and blinding felt for the single handle that you turned one way for hot and one way for cold, finding it completely turned on the hot side with nowhere else for it to go.

She was going to give herself third degree burns with the water this hot!

I yanked the water completely over to the cold side and almost started to regret my decision when Cami's loud yelp of surprise and fear had her peeking her red, flushed and dripping wet and most likely the most magnificent sight I'd ever seen in my eighteen years of life.

Her dark hair fell in curled wet strands around her face and in a large clump behind her, though most of it I could tell fell down in front of her chest even though the white shower curtain hid her chest from view.

Not like that was what I was trying to see, but...

The burning, fiery passion smoldering behind her eyes almost turned the brown shade golden, the color of flames that danced under her skin.

"What the hell are you doing in here?"