The desperate plea in her eyes died immediately at the finality in his tone. It was more than enough and there was nothing left for her to say.

Elara’s gaze swept from Adrian’s cold face to Chloe’s triumphant smirk, taking in the scene one last time.

Without another word, she turned and walked out. Chloe’s low, mocking laugh rang behind her, followed by the sound of Adrian pulling her into an embrace.

“Finally,” Chloe murmured, wrapping her hands around Adrian as she pulled him down for a kiss.

The walk to her shop-like apartment was long and Elara felt exposed, as if the shame and humiliation were a visible stain on her skin. Her ruined mascara smeared on her face drawing a few stares from the passersby.

Once she got home, she sank onto her thin mattress, the springs groaning in protest.

“A transaction.” “I’ve always hated you.” “You’re a vacuum.” She pressed her hands over her ears to stop the words, but the voices kept echoing inside her head. She couldn’t stay here. The silence was going to drive her mad.

She found herself pulling on a clean shirt and jeans, she didn’t bother with a jacket. The chill in the night air was nothing compared to the ice that had settled in her veins. She left her apartment and started walking, her feet leading her to a bar she had only walked past.

She pushed open the door, the air inside thick with the smell of stale beer, disinfectant, and cigarette smoke. A handful of people were scattered in booths and along the bar.

She slid onto a worn vinyl stool at the far end of the bar and a bartender, a large, tired-looking man with a tattoo snaking up his forearm, gave her a brief glance. “ID?”

She fumbled in her wallet, handing it over. He looked at it, then at her red-rimmed eyes, and nodded, sliding it back. “What’ll it be?”

“Whiskey,” she answered, her voice hoarse. “The cheap stuff. Double.”

He poured a generous measure of amber liquid into a glass and set it before her.

She didn’t sip it. She picked it up and threw it back in one burning, searing gulp. It felt like drinking lava, scorching a path down her throat and settling in her empty stomach like a ball of fire. She did not care. She welcomed the pain. It was a feeling, a real, physical sensation that momentarily buried the emotional pain in her heart.

“Another,” she rasped, pushing the glass back toward him.

The bartender raised an eyebrow but said nothing, refilling the glass.

This one she drank more slowly, the initial fire mellowing into a warm, fuzzy haze. The room began to soften. The loud clink of glasses became distant. Adrian’s face, Chloe’s stupid smirk, their cruel words, they all began to recede, muffled by the comforting burn of the alcohol. She ordered a third, and then a fourth, losing count after a while.

Despite her almost drunken state, she was aware of a man sliding onto the stool next to her, his voice low as he slurred a murmur. She ignored him, focusing on her drink. He persisted, his hand brushing against her arm. A surge of panic shot through her. She jerked her arm away.

“Leave me alone,” she slurred, her tongue thick in her mouth.

The bartender looked over. “You okay, kid?”

She nodded, though the room was tilting. The man beside her, getting the message, mumbled something and moved away.

“On the house. Drink it.” The bartender said, dropping her a glass of water.

Elara ignored the water, fumbling in her pocket for cash to pay her tab. She threw a crumpled bunch of bills on the counter, probably too much, and stumbled off the stool.

The floor felt unsteady beneath her feet as she weaved her way through the tables and out into the cold night air which hit her like a physical blow, doing little to cut through the dense fog in her head.

The walk home was a dangerous journey as she bumped into various things like a lamppost, tripped over a curb, and barely registered the blare of a car horn as she staggered across a street without looking.

She had to walk slowly, putting one foot in front of the other until she found her building.

She fumbled with her keys for what felt like an eternity before managing to unlock the door. She collapsed face-first onto her mattress without bothering to switch off the light or taking off her shoes. The last thing she was aware of was the nauseating spin of the ceiling.

***

Elara slowly opened her eyes, she winced holding her head as it felt like a jackhammer was pounding inside her skull.

Her mouth felt like it was filled with cotton and sand as a wave of nausea rolled through her, so intense she had to clamp her jaw shut and breathe deeply through her nose to keep from vomiting.

She groaned, rolling over, her body aches as if she’d been beaten.

She squeezed her eyes shut against the light, she wanted to sink back into the nothingness. But this is reality and her phone had been buzzing nonstop on the floor beside her bed, where it must have fallen from her pocket.

‘Ignore it’, she muttered to herself, covering her head with the blanket. ‘Just ignore it.’

But the buzzing was continuous. A text. Then another. Then a call that went to voicemail, followed immediately by another flurry of texts.

A cold dread, separate from the hangover, began to seep into her veins. This wasn’t normal. No one had contacted her this much. The only people in her life to contact her this much were…

Her eyes flew open.

She scrambled for the phone, her heart hammering painfully against her ribs.

The screen was lit up with a barrage of notifications, all from the university class group chat. Dozens of them. Hundreds. Her stomach dropped.

With a trembling finger, she tapped the icon.

The world stopped.

Pinned at the top of the chat, shared by an unknown account, was a photo.

Her photo.

The same private, intimate photo she had sent to Adrian.