By the time I made it down the hallway, I was no longer thinking at all. I just needed the noise to stop. I hammered on the door with my fist, barely able to keep my mouth shut. The last thing I needed was everyone on the floor staring at me.
It took a second for the door to open. Brandon stared at me like he wasn’t sure what to say. I didn’t give him time to say anything I flew into his apartment, rushing right past him, with my hands over my ears. “Make it stop!” I begged him, bending over and pulling at my hair. “I don’t know how to make it stop!” He probably thought I was crazy. Maybe I was.
“Make what stop? Cass, what’s the matter?” I could hear the concern in his voice. He reached out for me, trying to stabilize me, I assume. I was thrashing all over the place, not sure how to shout to Brandon what was happening over the noise in my own head, though I was aware he couldn’t hear it and didn’t know what was going on.
I was aware that Elliott was in the hallway, but he didn’t come any closer. Whether he just wanted to see if Brandon could help me or he was afraid I’d lost all of my marbles, I didn’t know, but it was the idea that Brandon would stop the voice that had led me here, so I tried again to make him understand. “He won’t stop laughing!” I stomped my foot in frustration as Brandon took hold of my shoulders and tried to get me to look at him.
“Who won’t stop laughing?” I met his eyes and the voice in my head was temporarily dulled by the fact that Brandon was there. He wanted to help me. “Cassidy, breathe! Tell me what’s going on.”
“It’s Daunator. He’s in my head, and he won’t get out. I was trying to... find them. The people. And I did. But now... he won’t get out of my head.” It was disjointed and clumsy, but it had to be enough for him to sort it out because I couldn’t say it any other way.
He got it. I could tell by the way his eyes enlarged slightly and his upper lip stiffened. In a calm, firm voice, he said, “Cassidy, it’s okay. Look at me.” I thought I had been, but my eyes had darted away from his. I trained them on those familiar green orbs. “Stop listening to him for a second and focus on me.”
With tears streaming down my cheeks, I kept my eyes glued on his as he continued to speak in a confident tone. “Tell him to get out. Build a wall if you have to, throw a shield, but he can’t be in there without your permission. Order him to stop.”
“I am, Brandon, but it’s not working! He won’t go!” I’d tried all of those things before I’d come running down the hallway. He had no idea how hard this was.
“Yes, he will. He’s not stronger than you, Cass. No one is as strong as you are. Come on, now. Take a deep breath and push him out.”
I didn’t feel strong, standing there in front of my ex-boyfriend with tears streaking my cheeks and my hair crazy from the way I’d been flipping around. I felt like a small, defeated child, one who had no power and had to submit to the monster in her head. But, as I looked into Brandon’s eyes and saw his assurance that I could do this, I realized it was Daunator putting those thoughts in my head, making me doubt my own power, making me doubt my strength.
I set my teeth and kept my eyes locked on Brandon. The laughter continued, but I was more self-assured than I had been in a long time when I said, “Daunator, get out! You are not welcome here. You’ve underestimated me. Now leave!”
“That’s it, Cass. Come on, you’ve got this.” I hadn’t spoken aloud, but Brandon could see by my expression that I’d regained the strength I’d lost when I was alone. “Push him out. Tell him to go back to where he came from. You’ve got it.”
Daunator’s laughter was fading, but I could hear his voice. “You think you are stronger than I, but you are not.”
“I know I am stronger than you are. You’re about to find out. You said you’d know when I was near? Good! I want you to smell your death approaching. You have no power over me, you wicked monster! Get out of my head, now!” I began to build the wall Brandon had mentioned. Brick by brick, I put the layers in place, one after another until it was almost to my eyes. By then, Daunator’s laughter was a faint echo in the distance. I continued to build, my eyes still fixed on Brandon’s. When the wall was as high as I could reach, the laughter faded away. I let out a slow breath and realized I was sweating and my heart was racing again. But he was gone.
“Did you get him?”
Brandon’s expression shifted from determined to hopeful to that same mournful longing I’d seen the day he’d broken up with me. I nodded, not able to answer yet, and put my hands over my face, no longer able to stare into his eyes and see what I’d done to him. He pulled me to his chest and it was all I could do to keep from breaking down.
I’m not sure how long we stood there. I know that Elliott left us alone, and we didn’t say a word to each other for what seemed like hours. I could hear his heart beating through his shirt, my arms wrapped around his waist in the same familiar place they’d rested a thousand times before. The familiar scent of him, the way his arms felt around me, I didn’t want to leave any of that. I didn’t want to walk away from him again. He might’ve broken up with me, but I was the one who’d driven him away.
But we couldn’t stand there forever. I’d come to his apartment uninvited in the middle of the night, past my curfew. It was time for me to go.