d a m s e l i n i m p a s s e

Ean's words had thrown me completely off-balance. This - this was new. I'd been warned about the previous initiation and had had ample time to prepare Miles for it. But this time, no prior warning had been given.

And this time, it was a hazing round, not a simple pledging.

The next thing I knew, I was grabbing the cell from Ean and pressing it against my ear. My heart raced with trepidation, but the underlying current of desperation and fear I was feeling was blanketed by a thick layer of annoyance.

"You could've told me earlier," I snapped at Marcel, who was on the other end of the line, "Why didn't you call me?"

"Well, I tried. I couldn't get through your cell, and I was trying for the past ten minutes."

Reaching into the pocket of my shots, I dug out my cell and glanced at it. The screen was blank, and no matter how many times I pushed the on-button, it didn't flicker to life. No battery.

Should've known.

With a sigh, I stuffed my cell back into my pocket. My annoyance was now directed more at myself than at her. It was my fault, really. If I wanted the latest updates about the Hell Weeks, I should've had my cell charged and with me at all times.

Grabbing Ean's arm, I pulled him towards the direction of the main exit. Marcel was still on the other end of the line, and I said, "sorry, cell died. So what's happening?"

"I'm not sure at all. Liam didn't tell me much. All I know is that it's a classic middle school situation, and they have exactly one hour to get out of it. You better hurry, Darce, you don't have much time left."

An hour. We were now down by fifteen, heading back to the beach was going to take another twenty-five to thirty minutes only if the bus arrived punctually. It was like racing against time, and Marcel was right, there wasn't much time left.

"You should've called me earlier!"

"Liam didn't tell me until about ten minutes ago!" she snapped, sounding rather frustrated with the situation herself.

There wasn't going to be any use arguing, and I knew it. Marcel was incredibly snappy when she wanted to be and so was I when something aggravated me, so I simply thanked her and ended the call.

Ean's eyes were wide with curiosity as he stared at me, but I shook my head, urging him to continue walking. "Tell you along the way."

And I did. I found myself hyperactive on the bus ride back to the beach; I could hardly keep still, and my explanations to Ean were often interspersed with uneasy shifting and impatient foot-tapping. The bus ride seemed to take forever.

Eventually, we did get to the beach. Instead of heading for the shack, we headed straight past it, to the public bathrooms as Marcel had indicated earlier. There was the usual line leading into the female bathroom, but the male lavatory was strangely deserted.

I faltered in my steps, unsure of what to do next. Were the frat boys going to be inside the bathroom? And if so, what then? It wasn't like I could charge right in there and demand they let Miles go.

Ean nudged me. "You think he's in there?" he asked, jerking his head in the direction of the toilets.

Taking a deep breath, I tried to calm my racing heart. I - we - needed to keep a levelled head in this situation. "Could you check?"

"Me?"

"Yes. I don't think I can exactly waltz into the boys' bathroom. Get in there and tell me if it's safe to go in."

Ean jogged on ahead, and I waited, rocking anxiously on the tips of my toes. And as I checked my watch again, I couldn't help but feel anxious. Ten minutes. Ten minutes left and I hadn't a clue as to what was going on.

But I didn't have to wait long. A few seconds after Ean had disappeared into the bathroom, he came out again. His face was tight with fear and he vigorously waved me over. "Darce! Come on!"

This couldn't be good. Ignoring the blatant gazes of the people around, I headed straight for the guys' lavatory, stopping immediately when I saw that the door, while ajar, had two yellow stripes taped tightly across the doorframe.

"Just go on in!" Ean urged, when he saw me hesitate, placing his hand on my shoulder. "I think the frat guys did that to keep people out. I thought the janitors were cleaning this place at first too, but then I realised that they usually put a post outside. They've never done this before."

He was right. Easing under the tapes, I stepped into the bathroom and headed inside. A quick glance around the exterior told me that Miles was nowhere to be found. In fact, the whole place was empty, and I faltered.

"He's back there," Ean pointed in the direction of the bathroom stalls, and I shot him an uneasy glance before stepping forward.

For some reason, Ean's tone was tentative, half-scared. He wasn't like this often, which made me even more worried. And as I rounded the corner and peered into the open stalls, I immediately knew why.

"Miles!" His name left my lips in a horrified gasp as I took in the terrible scene before me.

He was wearing the exact same thing I'd seen him wear for other initiation rounds - yellow polka-dotted trunks, and nothing else.

But he was tied tightly to the toilet with a white rope, and upon closer inspection, I saw that the rope was knotted up in a complex, intricate method that wasn't easy to undo. His face and neck glistened with droplets, and his hair was dripping wet, like he'd just been doused in water not too long ago.

Doused in water.

It finally hit me. I didn't need Liam to tell me what the sixth round of initiation entailed, it was right there, staring me in the face.

Middle-school.

Bullying.

The toilet.

The puzzle pieces had slotted together perfectly. The frat boys had probably pulled the classic pranking scenario. Miles had his head shoved into the toilet bowl and they'd flushed it. Probably had it done several times, if the expression on Miles's face was any indication.

He now seemed completely terrified, his eyes were wide and stricken, his breaths coming in shallow gasps, and I soon realised that he was close to having a panic attack.

Rushing up to him, I found my hands reaching out for him, but I stopped when my fingers had almost come into contact with his skin. His gaze was vacant but turbulent, and I didn't know how to help him snap out of whatever trance he seemed to be in.

"Miles," I repeated, my throat dry and voice scratchy. Steeling myself, I gripped him gently by the shoulders and pulled him upright. "Miles."

Repeating his name seemed to help, because his gaze began to sharpen. His eyes locked in on mine and they lit briefly as he recognised me.

"Darcy. Hey," he smiled weakly as an expression of relief crossed his face.

Tears pricked at the back of my eyelids as I stared at him. It wasn't like I was sad or anything, I was terrified for him, and to know that a simple hazing round had made him like this was utterly heart-breaking.

"Are you okay? Are you hurt?"

I was close to freaking out, and would've pressed him more had not Ean's voice stopped me just in time.

"Darce, there's only seven more minutes left."

His words quickly snapped me into action. "Shit," I swore uncharacteristically under my breath, and shifted away slightly. "Ean, get over here, help me with this."

Wordlessly, Ean went to work on the knots that bound Miles's legs, while I worked on the ones that tied his hands behind his back.

There was a pattern, complex but not completely undoable, and I slowly began to see that this was the second part of their tasks for this round of hazing. They had to get out of the ropes before the hour was over.

The second Miles's hands were untied, I felt his fingers curl themselves around my arms. He gripped me tightly, like he feared I was going to leave, like I was his only lifeline and no one, nothing in the world could tear him apart from me.

Dropping the knot I was working on, I briefly reached up to cup his cheeks. His blue eyes were dull, but they focused on me nonetheless. "Stay with me, okay?" I murmured, and he nodded. "We're going to get you out of this, just hang on."

And hang on he did - his one hand still curled around my arm tightly, while the other worked at pulling the ropes off the rest of his body. The knots at Ean's side were trickier, but amidst my continuous encouragement, he eventually got through with them as well.

Then we were hauling Miles to his feet. He seemed far more collected now, but his legs seemed numbed from having sat in that position for ages. Sharing his weight between Ean and I, the three of us were about to head out of the bathroom when I heard another sound close by.

A wrangled, frustrated noise.

It made me whirl around immediately, and my eyes latched onto another boy. He was lying three stalls away from the one Miles had been in, but my eyes widened as I noticed that instead of simply being knotted, he was also taped to the wall behind him.

And his mouth was gagged.

I didn't know how I had missed him before, perhaps because he was in the far corner. But the helplessness in his eyes were the same, and I knew if he could talk, he'd be begging me to help him as well.

"No," Ean's voice was low and firm, which made me realise that Ean had already noticed him way before I did. "Leave him."

I knew that was the ideal thing to do. The cards had also been played in our favour this time - Miles wasn't gagged or taped. Liam had kept his word and made it easy for him.

But still I faltered. "Ean, we could - "

"Forty seconds, Darce! Let's get the hell out of here."

Taking a deep, shuddering breath, I wrenched my gaze away from the boy's, and followed Miles and Ean out. I heard another muffled noise from behind me and wished desperately that there was a way to unhear what I had just heard.

Even though it was tearing me apart not to go back for him, I knew without a doubt that this was the way Liam had planned it out.

That boy - not Miles - was supposed to fail the sixth round.

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It was clear that the three of us were thoroughly shaken after that little ordeal. Ean was unusually silent, unlike his usual, sarcastic self. Miles still seemed to be in a daze from what he'd been through. And I was feeling like a shitty person for what I'd done - or not done, for the other boy back in the bathroom stall.

We made our way past the bathrooms back towards the sidewalk. It was difficult for Miles not to attract curious looks from passers-by. He was, after all, in the most brightly coloured shorts.

But that was the least of our worries. What frightened me was the way he was behaving. His fingers still gripped my arm tightly, his jaw was clenched and gaze vacant. It scared me, because of all the times I'd seen Miles, it was the first time I'd seen him so worked up.

"Ean," my voice made the both of them stop, and they turned to look at me. "Run down to the shack and get me a towel. I'll take Miles back."

"Home?" Ean's eyes narrowed. Clearly, the earlier conversation was still a sore point with him, and even he knew that Miles's father wasn't going to take kindly to seeing Miles in his current state.

I shook my head. "Our place."

On other occasions, Ean would've slanted me a positively naughty look at my words. 'Our place, huh?', he'd repeat, in a suggestive tone, and I'd probably whack him on the head.

But this was different. So instead of making a joke out of it like he normally would have, he simply nodded sombrely and headed off to the shack to get a towel.

As soon as Ean was out of hearing distance, I turned to Miles. The afternoon sunlight was unrelentingly glaring and I had to shade my eyes as I looked up at him. "Are you okay?"

He nodded and belatedly released the grip he had on my arm. "Yeah."

He wasn't. But he'd thoroughly clammed up, and I decided it probably wasn't the best idea to probe. So we stood there on the sidewalk silently, the sort of silence we hadn't ever shared, ever, because it was filled with tension and unease.

Ean soon returned with a towel tucked under his arm. After handing the towel to Miles, who silently draped it over himself, Ean turned to me. "Mom asked if you needed help."

In retrospect, it was a good thing that we hadn't brought Miles to the shack. My mom was probably going to freak out if she saw. She was the kind of over-affectionate person who'd cry if she saw Miles in his current state, and the last thing I wanted was for Miles to get more overwhelmed than he already was.

"It's fine," I told Ean, and waved him off. "I'll see you in a bit."

"Alright."

He headed back to the shack, and then it was just the two of us, Miles and me, again. I looked at the brown-haired boy. His expression was shuttered and I hated it, because I hated having to read or gauge other people's feelings. It was difficult, and my direct manner often made me say or do the wrong things.

"Come on," I said, at last, reaching up to latch my fingers around his arm. His muscles tensed beneath my touch, but I tugged him forward. "Let's go."

Slowly, we made our way back. My house wasn't far off from the beach. And after heading down the sidewalk for a little way, we came to the rows of houses that faced the beach-front.

Those nearer to the seaside were generally for rent, for people who wanted a short vacation during the summer. In summer, these houses were full, but during the winter, when the weather was harsh and cold, they were always vacant.

My house was along the third row, nearest to the beach, which was not only convenient but well-known in this neighbourhood. Marcel liked to host summer beach parties at my house, and my parents liked having their friends over for barbecues as well.

But the house was empty when Miles and I entered. My mom was down at the shack with Ean, my dad was working. The afternoon air was stale and I immediately headed over to the windows and flung them open.

"Make yourself at home," I called over my shoulder, to Miles, who stood awkwardly in the middle of the living room, watching me with guarded eyes.

He looked very much like the boy I met that first day, a long time ago. It was as though he'd reverted back to being a total stranger to me.

So when Miles didn't budge an inch, I took it upon myself to lead him up the stairs, to the bathroom which my brother and I shared. After telling him to wait right there, I slipped into Ean's room and pulled out some of his clothes. Miles was slightly taller than Ean, but it was going to be fine, and I doubted Ean would've minded anyway.

Then I returned to the bathroom, and set the clothes by the sink. "Clothes are here, it's Ean's but he won't mind," I added.

Miles smiled slightly, and for a second I heaved a sigh of relief, because he seemed like he was going back to his normal self. "Thanks, Darcy."

"Don't worry about it."

I waved his gratitude away and shut the door behind me. Not five seconds later, I heard the shower being flipped on, water raining down against the tub. I dismissed it as Miles needing a shower, but I had just taken the first step down the stairs when I paused, and realisation hit me like a brick wall.

He looked like he'd had a panic attack earlier on. Maybe he was having one now too.

Call it a sixth-sense, perhaps, but Miles's strange behaviour, combined with the sounds of the water, had begun to worry me. So I retraced my steps and knocked on the bathroom door.

"Miles? Everything okay in there?" When he didn't answer, I knocked again, more forcefully this time, "Miles."

But he was silent inside, and all I could hear were the sounds of the water like a torrential, rapid rain during the monsoon season, thudding against the porous mats at the base of the tub, drowning out everything else there was to hear.

"Miles? Are you dressed? Can I come in?"

There was still no answer, and my anxiety was escalating by the second. My hand went to the doorknob, and I twisted it a little, realised that it was unlocked.

"Okay, I'm coming in."

Taking a deep breath, I pushed the door open slowly. Somehow, the sight that greeted me didn't take me completely by surprised. It was as though I had pre-empted it, knew that I was going to see Miles still wearing nothing but his yellow trunks. His hands were braced on the surface of the cabinet, he stood in front of the sink and his head was bent.

And that was when I realised that, even though his posture wasn't thoroughly unusual, the tremor of his shoulders was. They were shaking, tell-tale signs of sobs that wracked through his body despite his attempts to stop them.

Biting my lip, I ignored him first and went to turn off the shower. And, in the silence that ensued, it was then that I heard him. Back at the beach, he'd barely held himself together, and this, this was his breaking point.

I recalled how I saw the look on his face when I saw him back at the beach. How terrified he'd looked. And how, I had once observed that he wasn't the kind of person who was popular back in middle school or high school. And if he hadn't been popular, if he'd been the timid, shy kind of person that got picked on a lot, then this sixth round of hazing wasn't anything new to him.

Maybe he'd been through this before. And maybe having to go through that again was a trigger, which pushed him past his breaking point. They say bad things don't last forever, which is true, but you also never forget them.

These thoughts were running through my head as I went up to him and pulled one of his arms away from the sink. The space between the cabinet and him was small, but I slotted myself in between.

My suspicions were confirmed, he was crying, and his eyes had a haunted look that was completely foreign to me, but terrified me all the same.

"Miles," somehow, I couldn't think of anything else to say but his name.

He didn't pull back; instead, he seemed to instinctively gravitate closer, even though it was an unconscious action on his part.

But he averted his eyes from me, brushing a hand hastily across his face. "Fuck," he said, his voice rough and unsteady, "I-I'm sorry, Darcy, I didn't mean to - "

"It's okay," I murmured, reaching up to press my palms against the contours of his face.

My thumbs brushed briefly at the tears staining his cheeks, and he automatically shut his eyes when I reached further up, threaded my fingers through his hair, felt the knots and tangles against my fingertips.

Pulling his head down slightly, I pushed myself up on the tips of my toes and pressed my lips against his forehead. I felt the shudder that wracked through his body, the slight hitch of his breath, and wondered if a girl - or anyone, for that matter, had ever kissed him like that before.