#Animosity

“Charlotte Belle”

Misha doesn’t recognize Honey’s voice.

He’s looking directly at her face, watching her lips move around a scowl so deep it cuts into her cheeks and he can’t recognize the scratch of her raw vocal cords.

It sounds like a curse, not just a swear word passed between adversaries, but a spell you’d cast on a poor soul to stab themselves to death. The kind you wish on your worst enemies.

Honey had been right when she said her little outburst in the classroom had been just her in a ‘bad mood’.

At the time she looked like a feral animal, ready to pounce and eat its prey alive. She glared daggers. She spoke low and threatening. She spewed fumes of anger.

This was worse.

Much worse.

She had no expression. It was almost serene, the infamous furrow of her brow and the scrunch of her nose nonexistent, everything smoothed out like the face of a placid sculpture. And by its calmness, by its statuesque quality that could’ve been carved into marble, it becomes all the more terrifying.

Honey’s not just mad.

She’s enraged.

Misha thought he knew Honey, but not like this.

The unrestrained hostility emanating from her golden blond head aims at one individual and one individual only.

Charlotte.

Charlotte, if her name was spelled with a variety of carefully selected profanity and served on a platter with an apple in its mouth and a knife through its heart.

“Honey, dear,” 

Charlotte says so sweetly it drips as it comes off her peach-colored lips. 

“I haven’t seen you since you left Vainglory Academy.”

If Honey didn’t look like she had just stepped out of a burning building, completely ablaze from head to toe to searing eyes, Misha would’ve taken Charlotte as a normal girl.

Maybe even a kind one.

But then there’s this sinister chill to her words, a sharpness in her doll-like green eyes that makes him doubt his first impression. The sting in her tone makes Misha a little glad that what she says isn’t directed at him.

There’s also no comfort knowing they’re directed at Honey.

“Your new bangs look lovely,”

It’s at this, the string keeping Honey together, holding the very fibers of her composure by figurative threads, snaps.

She lunges.

Manicured nails suddenly turn to claws, reaching for Charlotte’s tiny little throat. Hellbent on the closeness of revenge, the temptation that everything she wanted could be right there in front of her if she could just break its filthy neck.

She might be striking to kill.

Misha moves to grab her, he can’t let Honey do something she might regret, but he won’t stop her in time. If he could stop her at all.

The weird thing is that Charlotte never flinches.

Even when Honey’s close enough to grab her, Charlotte doesn’t take a single step back. Like she knew Honey’s ferocity wouldn’t so much as brush the collar of her shirt.

She's stopped just inches from Charlotte’s choker adorned neck that lets a tacky heart charm nestle between her collar bones.

Honey’s legs are swept out from under her and she’s knocked to the floor with a resounding thud. The noise seems to reverberate off every corner of the warehouse.

She doesn’t break her fall. She doesn’t even try to protect her head as it hits the concrete hard and bounces once.

For a second, she lays there, motionless.

There’s blood staining her golden hair, drying in her curls and turning it a grotesque, dark brown.

Misha breaks through the crowd, Elias close behind, but as he pushes past onlookers his feet come to a skidding halt.

He stops dead in his tracks.

A boy stands between Honey and Charlotte.

He has one foot outstretched, the same one that hooked around Honey’s ankles and threw her into the dirt. His foot returns firmly back to the ground. Squashing cigarettes under its soles.

Choppy brown hair that looks like it’s been cut with safety scissors sticks out of his head in every direction and it’s cropped so short above his ears, Misha can see his single black piercings.

He has a round face and big eyes. Plain, ordinary features that seem unable to twist into a bitter expression, unlike Honey.

There’s nothing threatening about this boy.

He’s shorter than everyone around him, much shorter so that his head only reaches most people’s chins. He could disappear amongst the throng if a few of the spectators decided to stand in front of him.

None of them do.

Instead, they move aside. Everyone in the warehouse has stopped their fighting, their bickering, their cheers of victory, their laughter and chattering, even their heaving breaths, for this one boy.

Joshua.

The King of The Midnight Fights.

Misha really wishes he didn’t have that nightmare. He wishes Honey didn’t hear about this god-awful game. He wishes she gave up on it the first time she asked. He wishes whatever happened between her and Charlotte never did.

He wishes he never let her get so involved.

He’d wished the same thing about Elias years ago. Between the sight of his shattered legs and the long run to the hospital. Wishing he hadn’t let it happen between aimless prayers for Elias to stay alive.

It’s like he’s living in a goddamn loop.

Honey stirs. Still on the ground, she bares her teeth like a cornered animal, ready to lunge again although now her head is bleeding profusely from a small cut just above her brow.

Misha’s feet refuse to move. 

He wills them to take a step, to inch forward, to do something other than stand there helplessly on the sidelines and watch Honey struggle to get to her feet. But he’s shaking.

Joshua was never supposed to be King.

Not like this. Where nothing had changed and The Midnight Fights remained the same brutal game that kept taking more than the glory it gave.

Before he became Joshua. Before Elias fought for the last time. Before everything.

Misha considered him a friend.

Now as Joshua runs a hand through his messy hair and waves to the warehouse to carry on, Misha can’t spare him an ounce of empathy. He looks bored, careless and most unforgivable, indifferent.

Like he had forgotten.

Honey recovers dangerously fast. Her fists are clenched so tightly her bloody knuckles rip at the seams, dotting the floor with spots of red. She’d be painting a mural where she stood, the floor now smeared with the bright color.

The vicious snarl curling at her lips made every smile she ever wore feel like a lie.

“Get out of my way,” Her voice is coarse still, gargling stones and bits of glass.

Honey looks ready to lunge again.

And Misha knows Honey’s capable in a fight, but not when her head is muddled with persistent thoughts of revenge, willing to do anything to achieve a bloody victory.

She wouldn’t stop.

Honey has no brakes.

Charlotte’s tinkling whimper is a trill in Misha’s ears. Some spectators, both rugged boys and girls, fawn over her like she’s got them on leashes. Yanking on nonexistent collars until all their heads turn to watch her.

She grants them some sparkling tears, wiping at her eyes with the sleeve of her sweater. It’s incredibly convincing paired with her darling rosy cheeks and glistening green irises.

The crowd goes wild over it.

“Oh, Honey, I thought we were good friends,” Charlotte sobs.

“Fuck you,”

Charlotte makes a watery face. Misha almost feels bad for her.

Almost.

But the audience is convinced. They’re cursing Honey, telling her to have a little compassion, calling her a monster, a demon, a villain. Defending Charlotte at the cost of their lives and Misha understands why Honey’s so obsessed with her popularity.

The crowd’s favor.

The power Charlotte holds although she doesn’t look like she has an intimidating bone in her body.

Honey’s ready to attack again.

Joshua looks ready to fight her.

They can’t do this. Not like this. And by the look on her face and the way her nails dig into her palms like it’s the last thing holding onto her fleeting sanity, she won’t win today. Or she’ll be hospitalized trying.

Honey moves. Joshua’s poised to attack.

Misha won’t let that happen again. He can’t let it happen again.

Elias is much faster than Misha is though. Completely disregarding the stiffness in his legs and the strain of the motion, Misha can hear how Elias’ knee pops and shudders as he sprints across the ring and in front of Honey.

Joshua had been ready with a kick.

Elias meets him halfway.

The movement is beautiful.

It’s just as elegant as Misha remembers.

A clean pivot on Elias left foot, twisting his body around to deliver a kick that matches Joshua’s so perfectly, they could’ve been mirrored images. Their legs clashing in midair between them.

In the same sweeping motion, Elias’ hand has found its way onto Honey’s shoulder. Forcing her back although she’s desperate to move forward. Keeping her from Joshua.

And Charlotte.

All in one graceful action, Elias has stopped the altercation.

Honey tries to shake him off, but Elias’ hand never moves. Her eyes burn holes right through him like he’s completely transparent and doesn’t exist.

Her precious face was stained with blood that drips onto the floor in large red drops, some of it staining her sweatshirt with polka-dots, some of it dribbling down the side of her face and matting in her hair. Some of it she spits out.

“Honey,” Elias warns, taking his foot back and pushing her even farther away from the platinum blonde. Charlotte’s still sniveling like a bratty child who didn’t get enough attention from their parents.

“Back. Off.”

Honey’s eyes are so red with hatred, Elias shudders under her relentless glare. She’s swaying whether from her tumble earlier or from her ire, it’s impossible to tell.

Joshua’s face falls.

The haughty authority in his demeanor moments before had drained from his features and what’s left is something Misha doesn’t expect. An expression not filled with spite or contempt. Not even a single morsel of pride.

It looked more like regret.

“Elias,” Joshua says, quiet enough for only Elias to hear, but Misha can read the name on his lips like it was printed into his flesh.

The tone is too soft. The crack in his voice is too telling.

Misha doesn’t want to hear the apology that Joshua has half stuck in his throat. Joshua had made his decision to stay King and although given a second chance to destroy The Midnight Fights, Joshua would make the same choice again.

They were friends once.

Now Misha won’t make the wrong decision.

He grabs Honey, who tries desperately to keep her feet firmly planted, but they’re trembling under her own weight, and when Misha tugs on her hood, she falls against him immediately. There’s no resistance other than her scrambling limbs and snapping jaw.

She doesn’t have the strength left to pry herself out of Misha’s arms or crane her neck around Elias’ shoulders or whatever she could’ve done to get back to Charlotte and find out how many ways she could ruin her.

Joshua’s eyes land on Misha, the recognition comes fast, but Misha doesn’t want to spare him another moment.

Joshua’s expression is clear. It is guilt.

But he says nothing.

So neither will Misha.

He wraps an arm around Honey's waist and hauls her away from the ring, away from the crowd, and away from The King. And most of all, away from Charlotte.

Nobody follows them.

They’re outside of the warehouse now, the cool night air hits them like a frozen slap to the face, making Misha’s skin itch and his eyes water.

He thought he’d rubbed them dry before coming here.

Honey thrashes in his grip. Elias tries to calm her down by holding Honey’s arms as she flails wildly, though she’s much weaker now. His limp has obviously gotten worse, now that he keeps weight entirely off one leg.

They’re all incredibly weary.

“Honey, we’ll be back, just-” Misha feels his eyes begin to prickle “please stop.”

Unexpectedly, her struggle dies down. She rips herself out of Misha’s grip and both boys are ready to catch her before she goes barreling back into the warehouse, but she doesn’t.

Instead, she snatches the detachable skates still hanging from Misha’s shoulder and straps them on with more aggression than she has the energy for.

Rage no longer takes up her expression, it’s still there but lesser now.

Now it’s replaced with something he never thought he’d see on Honey.

It's shame.

“You don’t understand what she did to me.”

Then she skates and disappears down the narrow alleyway they used to get there, wiping blood off her face with the heel of her hand.

Misha really doesn’t understand.