The Dorm Guard

*

I was still tying my tie as I walked down the stairs, the moment my foot hit the ground I could feel vibrations in the floor. The vibrations turned into applicable noise as I glanced down the hallway of Amada"s gaming room. I looked around for one of my other dormmates to confirm the strange sounds and vibrations weren"t just figments of my imagination, but I was alone.

I ventured curiously down the hallway and pushed the door open, my head immediately throbbing in time with the base of the stereo systems. I rubbed my eyes and temples as I scanned the room for someone, but it was empty.

I cringed at the music being played, it was an amalgamation of loud rock bad instruments and metal screeching. Who listened to this? I could feel my eye b.a.l.l.s shaking.

The closer I got to the amps the more uncomfortable I became. It wasn"t necessarily loud, I could just feel the vase on my skin and vibrating up my spine.

I walked around the lounge and reached for the stereos, but got surprised by a Robyn, laying on the ground in front of the TV, eyes closed, hands opened palmed on the ground. I bit the inside of my cheek, for a moment just looking at Robyn, how equally content but troubled she seemed. While her face was soft and expressionless, her fingertips dug into the wooden floorboards so hard and consistently she was able to scratch the floor. I noticed she wasn"t in her school uniform, rather blue jeans and a striped white and navy shirt.

I turned the base down, prompting her to open her eyes and sit up.

Her gestures were slow and heavy, as if she had just woken up. "You startled me." Her sluggish movements made that hard to believe.

"You sure?" I managed to sign, I squatted down in front of her, "What"s going on?"

Robyn crossed her legs, her eyes dropping to the floor as her head lolled slightly from side to side. Her hands rested awkwardly in her lap, occasionally twitching as if she wanted to sign something, but didn"t have the energy to do it.

That"s how she looked. Exhausted. At the very least drained of any kind of spark.

She managed to lift her eyes to the stereo next to her, eyeing the t.i.tle of the metal song she was feeling, watching as the volume and base columns shot up and down the "louder" it got. At the sight of this, her eyes swelled with tears in the strangest way. She didn"t splutter or sob, but her eyes continued to fill until they dripped, when she blinked they streamed down her cheeks faster, and she didn"t even acknowledge them.

Through her mess of hair, I saw she wasn"t wearing her hearing aids anymore. "Ava is taking me to the doctors," she signed, her eyes still watching the soundwaves on the stereo.

I could only offer a nod. "Is something wrong?" Robyn narrowed her eyes when she watched me signed, prompting me to re-sign again until she understood.

She bit the inside of her mouth and sighed through her nose. "I"m scared of what they"ll say," she informed, "And what I"m going to have to say."

Before I could ask what she was scared to say, she turned the k.n.o.b on the stereo and the loud base returned, shaking the floorboards beneath our feet and returning my eyeb.a.l.l.s to a vibrating state. She reached a hand out and rested it on the box, closing her eyes as she seemed to listen to the hardcore music in her own way.

I stood up to leave Robyn alone, but at the doorway Ava was leaning on the frame, arms crossed, head tilted as she watched. Robyn opened her eyes and looked to the doorway, the pair sharing a silent stare before Ava signed with one hand, "We"re leaving in twenty minutes."

Robyn"s eyes dropped to the ground, eventually closing them to resume her music listening.

Ava gestured for me to follow her, either ignoring or use to the loud metal screeching base radiating from the opposite wall, before disappearing down the hallway. Blinking profusely, I followed close behind.

Ava was sitting at the stairwell by the time I caught up with her, periodically running her hands through her hair until I sat next to her. "Can you come with us?" she asked bluntly.

I blinked. "What?"

"To today"s doctors" appointment. Can you come with us?" she requested looking at me.

I had already gotten dressed for school. I raised an eyebrow, "Why do you want me to go with you?"

Ava puffed out her cheeks, making a strange clicking noise before answering. "I don"t trust myself to keep it together when we find out what"s wrong," Ava informed, "But if someone else is there, I"m more likely to compose myself."

"Ava, I"m sure you"ll be fine," I a.s.sured standing up.

Her hand was quick to grab the side of my shirt, her grip so tight I nearly stumbled over. "Landon," her voice was serious, "Please."

I had known Ava to be this hands-on girl who cared a lot about her friends in the dorm and was often the driving force, in her own way, to solving or facing our problems. I recognised she could be emotional, but it stemmed from a place of great worry and care.

But in this moment, I had never seen her seem so fragile, so close to shattering. Her expression was maintained, but everything was rigid, her skin was a sickly pale and she seemed to struggle swallowing a lump in her throat.

I reached down and patted her hand. "Okay. I"ll just make sure everyone else is all good, okay?"

Ava"s breath was shaky as she breathed out, dropping her head downwards like a great weight had been lifted. "Thankyou."

*

Despite the invitation to go, Ava and I weren"t allowed in the doctor appointment, for whatever reason. We waited in one of six chairs outside of the office, flicking through magazine after magazine available on the side tables. And not the ones with fun, pointless quizzes that Estelle and Ava liked to get, but the ones that made me question whether that kink in my neck was caused by a tumour and the colour of my nails meant I wasn"t eating enough protein.

Alexis tried to occupy me for a while with some hilariously misspelled text messages, but eventually she too went quiet, likely due to cla.s.s.

Ava wasn"t very good conversation in the forty-minute wait. Every time I looked at her, she was leaning heavily on her knees while biting her fingernails, her eyes yet to move from a spot in the floor.

I tried to comfort her, but it was met with either silence or an automatic grin designed to make me shush.

Whenever a door open, Ava would startle me by rising from her seat, only noticing it was a different doctor, or the nurse apologising whenever she had nothing to report since she was doing things for other patients.

When I lifted my head at another noise, I watched Robyn emerge from one of the rooms, her eyes staring unblinkingly at the ground with a mixture of terror and deadness, her fingers were pinching each other and when she walked her feet dragged. The doctor was beside her, a grim expression on his face as he adjusted his spectacles when he looked at the papers he was holding.

Robyn"s eyes didn"t register either of us when they approached, Ava asking earnestly for an answer.

*

We stepped out of the building, a thick silence blanketing all three of us as we waited for a car Robyn"s parents had arranged to pick us up. I leant against the wall, the girls standing on their own a few feet from me.

Despite the news we were given, both girls externally seemed to take it well, if not reserved. Robyn"s expression was yet to change from her blank, slightly stunned look she had walked out with, while Ava pressed her lips together, crossing her arms and hopping slowly from one foot to the other.

I didn"t know how they could hide it so well. The diagnosis left me feeling quite ill, and angry, at myself and whomever had done this to Robyn, or confused if she had done this to herself.

In the corner of my eye, I saw the change. Ava"s arms untangled themselves to rest by her sides, her hands curled into trembling fists, her eyes hardening while the beginnings of a snarl made her nose twitch. Then quite suddenly;

Ava grabbed a fistful of her friend"s shirt and slammed her against the brick wall beside me, her forearm pressed against Robyn"s shoulders and neck, her other hand angrily signing as she screeched at her face, "What did they do to you, Robyn!?" Ava"s voice cracked, Robyn"s own façade cracking as tears streamed down her eyes, "Answer me!"

I yanked Ava off Robyn, causing her to stumble back and fall over, the moment she impacted the ground however, she was back on her feet, and close to coming at her friend again, rage in her eyes.

"Ava!" I snapped, holding her back.

"What?" she hissed, shoving me.

As if to answer, Robyn started crying behind us, each hand pressing against her head as she slowly slid down the wall until she was a small ball on the floor, hiding her face in her knees to try and smother her sobs. In the moment, I couldn"t tell if she was crying because she was hurt, or if the shove pushed her over that emotional edge.

"Repeated forceful removal, resulting in scarring and further damage to the eardrum and surrounding ligaments," the doctor had said.

To oversimplify, Robyn was accused of taking out her hearing aids without care. There was evidence that the lack-of-care over time caused scaring on her eardrums, and that was what caused her remaining hearing to diminish completely.

"Have you seen any odd behaviour lately?" he had asked me, "Sensitivity to certain sounds? Perhaps a change in habits?"

I didn"t know Robyn well enough to know her habits, or if she was sensitive to certain sounds other then the bells we had at home, but at the mention of it, certain reactions came to mind when she was surprised, and how often she pulled on her earlobes when she was just standing around.

There was a phone call to her parents, largely between them and the doctor, they seemed shocked by the news, and expressed they were coming out immediately.

I kept Ava at arm"s length, worried she would lose her temper again, but she seemed genuinely frightened by what she had just done, and opted to step back at her own accord. I kneeled to Robyn and tapped her on the knee, prompting her to look at me with her blood-shot eyes as she tried to stop crying, and failed.

"Robyn," I said slowly, still not confident in my signing ability, "Did you do this to yourself?"

Robyn"s lower lip trembled, making her press them together, as she slowly shook her head. She had such a far-off look to her eyes, as if she was looking through me. I clicked my tongue, "You knew, didn"t you?"

Robyn saw my signs, sucking in her lips as she closed her eyes, fresh tears streaming down her face. She kept them closed, no longer wanting to talk to me as she pressed her eyes against her knees and continued to cry.

Not wishing to fan the fire, I stood up and turned my attention to Ava, who was sitting on the curb, knees to her chest, glaring at the ground with a snarl. Tears of frustration made her eyes turn a bright red as she angrily wiped them on the back of her sleeves, when I stood next to her, she made a final wipe and sniffed. "It was them," she said, her voice laced with contempt.

I made a short sigh, "Av"

"Who else could it be?" she snapped, giving me a sideways look, "She"s had no problems with her hearing aids or anything until we started this year and she started hanging out with those…" Ava got to her feet during her tirade, and in her anger kicked a metal pole. The hollow sound echoed for a moment, the sign at the top shaking slightly from the impact. It was a loud kick, but Ava either ignored the pain in her foot or was simply unaffected. "Those a.s.sholes! Those sons of b.i.t.c.hes!" She punched the pole this time, visibly cringing as she retracted her hand and heeled over.

I pinched the bridge of my nose as Ava grunted and continued to swear under her breath. When she straightened, I grabbed her arm and made her hold out her hand to me. It trembled slightly, where her knuckles impacted the pole started turning red, but there weren"t any major disfigurations. She tried to pull her hand back, but I gripped her wrist, "Let me look."

Begrudgingly, she let me hold her hand. I gently played with her fingers, checking their range of motion with the winces she occasionally made. "Doesn"t look like you"ve broken anything," I commented as she s.n.a.t.c.hed her hand back.

"I know," she hissed, forcefully running her palm over her knuckle. She screwed her eyes closed, unable to hide her tears as she pressed her hands to her forehead, "G.o.d d.a.m.nit!" Ava wrapped her arms around my shoulder, burying her face into my shoulder as she continued to curse, gripping fistfuls of my hoodie as she leant against me.

I caught her, one arm hanging by my side while the other rested against her upper back. "It makes sense, Landon," she stuttered, "The missing hearing aids, the distant stares, the startled jumps whenever someone touches her." She pulled away, biting the inside of her cheek, "What have they done to her? Why the h.e.l.l would they do that to her?"

I shook my head, looking over my shoulder at the still distraught Robyn, "I don"t know, Ava." I looked back to her and grabbed her shoulders, "But you need to calm down, Ava."

"Calm down?" she pulled away from me.

I nodded, "Remember why I came, Ava. Don"t lose your head, we don"t know if they did anything," I reminded, "And even if they did, is yelling and screaming really the best thing for Robyn right now?"

Ava looked past me to Robyn, still squatted on the ground, and sighed.

A car pulled up and the same driver that had dropped us off opened the doors for us, offering no words as he waited for us to go in. The moment my fingertips touched Robyn"s shoulder, she was up on her feet and marched past both me and Ava to get in the car.

Ava pressed a hand to her forehead and sighed, climbing in after her friend, me shortly thereafter.