NEW REALITY 1.2

The next day’s lectures went straight over my head - they weren’t as distracting as I’d naively hoped they would be when I dragged my sorry self out of bed that morning.

I was undoubtedly glad when five pm rolled around so I could escape the constant chatter about ‘Mythicals’. As if it wasn’t bad enough that it blasted from the background of my internal monologue, no matter where I looked or listened, it was all anyone was talking about. Some of the staff and student body hadn’t turned up at uni’ out of fear that the world suddenly wasn’t a safe place.

I wasn’t scared, per se, because how my life would alter hadn’t really sunk in yet, I’d just anticipated that it would. All I felt was confusion over my current situation. I was also a little pissed off that my parents had kept such a massive, life-altering secret from me for twenty-odd years.

My friend Lindsay’s room wasn’t the haven I had hoped for either. Theresa let me in, and I was immediately engulfed in the very topic of conversation I was hoping to avoid. My mind was a mess, my nerves were frayed, and I couldn’t even tell my best friends why - my mum had made me promise to keep my identity a secret until they had figured things out, whatever that meant. Luckily, Lindsay and Theresa believed me when I said the reason I looked as drained as I did was because I hadn’t slept the night before. It was only a half-lie.

“Did you hear about the killings in Moscow?” Lindsay asked as she looked back at me from over her shoulder. She was sitting at her dressing table, straightening her bleach blonde hair into her favoured pin-straight style.

I mumbled in a daze. “What?” I'd just sat down on the bottom bunk of her bed.

“You’ve got to have seen it! It’s all over the bloody news. There are riots in America, talk of revolution in Europe, and the Russians have reacted about as badly as possible - which is no fucking surprise if you ask me. They’re rounding them up like cattle for execution. It’s total carnage!” She continued as she stared at her reflection in the mirror.

“All this talk of genocide and ‘us and them’ is so medieval.” Theresa rolled her eyes. I loved that she was Lindsay’s opposite. Theresa was mild and of few words, yet whatever she said had thought behind it and rang with profound wisdom. “When will everyone realise it's easier to get along if we've all got to exist on the same planet...”

“They’ll be another Holocaust, I bet,” Lindsay replied nonchalantly and set down her straighteners to top up her eyeliner. “D’you reckon that hot guy I’ve got my eye on will be at the Omen tonight?”

How easily Lindsay flitted from such a grotesque topic to wondering if she would get laid blew my already shattered mind. I blinked rapidly in bewilderment at Theresa.

The short twenty-year-old with a cute, red pixie cut merely gestured to the back of her corset; she wanted me to fasten it for her. By now, we should both have been used to our mutual friend’s affinity for downplaying the devastating. In truth, Theresa was better at handling her than I.

“Subtle,” Theresa whispered, shooting Lindsay a look to show how uncouth her comment had been.

“He’s been there for the last three weeks, and you still haven’t made a move on him. Do you think tonight is the night you grow some and throw yourself at him?” I asked, attempting to be witty, which was an effort considering my mood.

Usually, Lindsay was not the type to wait for a guy to approach her. She had a ‘go get ‘em’ attitude toward men that I admired. I was by no means a prude or a wallflower, but I was pickier and preferred boyfriends over fleeting sexual affairs.

Admittedly I was currently going through an agonising dry spell, having been dumped by my boyfriend of two years three months before. I still hadn’t found a suitable rebound. The thought of getting involved with someone else at that moment left an unpleasant taste in my mouth.

Unfortunately, it was getting increasingly difficult to keep my 'inner goddess' at bay - she was a hungry mistress and required male sacrifices to remain tame. Increasingly she invaded my thoughts and filled my head with erotic and blush-inducing imaginary scenarios at the slightest thing, and sometimes alarmingly inappropriate times. Sometimes she made me feel like a predator on the hunt for flesh. Some nights I wished I could let my hair down like Lindsay and be brave enough to go in search of the human touch I pined for. I sometimes felt trapped by the fact and not safe in the knowledge that wasn’t a slut. Perhaps, Lindsay fell into that category a tiny bit. She didn’t even attempt to keep her lust in check. She let her loose and regularly consumed as much male flesh as possible.

Here I was stuck with a high libido that I struggled to keep up with alone. All four of my past boyfriends had left a lot to be desired. I had made do dining at the table of sub-par teenage fumbles. Even if one of them had been the renowned high-school man-whore, he was a quantity over quality kind of guy. As long as he got his kicks, it didn’t matter about mine. Still, underneath all the bravado, he was a sweetheart, and I revelled in the fact that I had stolen him away from all of the ‘popular, pretty girls' and had him all to myself. Apparently, I was alluring enough that it didn’t matter if I was the unpopular grungey-grebo type associated with a clique of equally unpopular ‘alternative’ people. But it was also a little ironic that that was probably the extent of my allure - I was somehow ‘exotic’ to him.

Linsday’s voice snapped me out of my reverie.

“Could be!” She beamed, turning around from the mirror with a grin. “I’m looking crazy hot tonight.” She giggled as she squeezed her upper arms into her chest to show off her cleavage that peeped through the mesh fabric of her top.

“You’re not going to pull anything in that get-up, though, Ana,” Theresa stated, eyeing over the outfit I had chosen to wear. She was right, it didn’t do anything for me, but I was past caring. I was also not in any mood to argue when Lindsay stripped me out of my baggy top and threw a velveteen garment my way.

“Without the bra.” She demanded. “What’s the point in wearing something sexy if your underwear screams grandma!”

“So... This is better?” I asked, eyeing myself in the mirror hung on the back of the dormitory door. I supposed the gap between the hugging velveteen fabric of the crop top and my black acid-washed combat pants showed off my flat, toned stomach and pert, ample bust.

Lindsay, in all black - black heeled boots, black fishnets, a black PVC skirt, black bra under a black sheer long-sleeved top, completed by black liner around her twinkly baby blue eyes, agreed and nodded eagerly.

Me and my two best friends huddled together and stared at our reflections. Giggling and grinning in appreciation of our shared style and taste for ‘underworld’ fashion, an eclectic mix of something reminiscent of the 1990’s grunge and emo style, slightly influenced by the punk scene and a smidge gothic too.

Tiny Theresa hugged my upper arm. “You look hot, babe.” But so did she! Her five-foot frame dressed in a faux corset and frilly ra-ra skirt, her platform heels doing little to help her on the height front.

Contrarily, I had chosen to stay in my flat combat boots. I was already freakishly tall for a twenty-one-year-old woman at five foot eight inches - now I knew about my elven heritage; my physic made sense. Long pin-straight black hair, pensive grey eyes, porcelain skin and a svelte figure, were how I would have described myself. Neither pretty nor ugly, but I figured there had to be someone out there who thought I was breathtaking.

Pulling on my black denim jacket, I was ready to head out to our bar of choice, Omen.