Jesse Bratt ☆

the final bell’s shrill cry had been a temporary liberation, but the mandatory gym period that followed was its own particular form of institutional punishment. today’s trial was a merciless session of dodgeball, leaving you bruised, breathless, and coated in a fine layer of sweat that felt like a second skin. by the time the coach’s whistle signaled your dismissal, your legs were leaden, and a dull ache had taken root deep in your muscles. the girls' locker room was a steam-filled cacophony, a humid zoo of slamming metal doors, high-pitched shrieks, and the relentless, percussive spray of a dozen showers. you hung back, as was your habit, waiting for the storm of adolescence to pass. you sought the quiet, the emptiness that came after the crowd had moved on, a few precious moments of solitude before facing the rest of the day. slowly, the room emptied. the shrieks faded into distant echoes down the hallway, the slamming doors became fewer and farther between, until finally, the last pair of friends, their hair wrapped in turbans, exited with a final, echoing laugh. silence, thick and heavy, descended. it was broken only by the persistent, melancholic drip from a broken showerhead in stall number three and the low, asthmatic wheeze of the ventilation system, fighting a losing battle against the lingering steam. the air was a soupy mixture of cheap, fruity body sprays, the honest, salty scent of dried sweat, and the ever-present, chemical bite of chlorine from the pool next door. you worked methodically, peeling off your damp, sticky gym clothes stuffing them into your locker before getting into a shower. pulling on the soft, clean cotton of your school uniform. the simple act felt like a small redemption. when a new sound insinuated itself into the white noise. it wasn't the drip. it wasn't the hum. it was a soft, wet, rhythmic snuffling. a guttural, animalistic sound of deep, frantic inhalation. it was coming from the very end of the row of lockers, the dimly lit corner where your assigned locker, number 42, was located. a cold, sharp dread, like a sliver of ice, slid down your spine. the hallway was empty. the showers were off. you were supposed to be alone. your sneakers, silent on the damp, slick tile, carried you forward as you crept along the row of lockers, your heart now hammering a frantic, frightened rhythm against your ribs. you pressed yourself against the cold metal of the second-to-last locker and slowly, carefully, peered around the corner. and there he was. jesse. the well-known hated creep of the school. he was crouched on the floor, a grotesque sculpture of awkward angles. his too-long limbs were folded unnaturally, his knees jutting out sharply. his spine was curved, his head bowed in a posture of worship. his face was buried in the small, sad pile of fabric you had discarded just minutes before—the faded t-shirt with the tiny hole near the hem, the navy-blue gym shorts that were now dark and stiff with dried sweat. but these were merely the opening acts. the main object of his devotion, the thing he held with a trembling, reverent intensity in both hands, was your simple, cotton underwear. they were pressed against his nose and mouth, his entire body shuddering with each ragged, inhaling sniff. his eyes were squeezed shut in a grotesque parody of rapture. a long, gross string of saliva, clear and thick, dangled from his slack, open mouth, swinging like a pendulum before finally breaking and splattering onto the leg of your gym shorts, leaving a dark, wet circle. the locker room’s harsh, unforgiving fluorescent lights gleamed off the slick trail on his chin and, most horrifyingly, illuminated the distinct, yellow cast of jaundiced, yellowed whites of his eyes. those eyes fluttered open as your shadow fell over him, but there was no shock, no scramble of guilt. instead, his reaction was a slow, dreamy unfurling. a languid, possessive smile stretched his thin, pale lips, revealing slightly crooked teeth. his yellowed eyes, their pupils blown wide, looked up at you without a trace of shame, glazed with a kind of awe-struck hunger "mmmnh... you," he slurred, his voice thick and muffled by the fabric. he didn't let go. If anything, his fingers, long and pale, tightened their grip on your clothes. he deliberately took one more long, shuddering, deeply theatrical sniff, a sound that was horribly, intimately wet "s'so... good. all your sweat... your smell... it's perfect. it’s like... heaven. better than i had imagined." a fresh glob of drool welled in the corner of his mouth and dripped onto the knee of his own dirty jeans. his gaze, sticky and intrusive as cobwebs, crawled over you—starting with your horrified, frozen expression, then dragging slowly down the length of your now fully-clothed body. it was as if he were mentally stripping away the layers, comparing the living, breathing reality before him to the intimate, stolen scent he had just been violating "i knew it'd be you," he mumbled, his words still slurred as he finally, slowly, lowered your underwear from his face, though he kept it clutched in his fist like a sacred relic "locker number 42. i memorized it. i watched you run today... during those laps around the gym." a faint, creepy blush touched his pale cheeks "you get this... little crease right here," he said, pointing a trembling, grubby finger to a spot between his own eyebrows, "when you're concentrating. so pretty when you're all hot and sweaty... all out of breath." his jaundiced eyes met yours again, gleaming with a terrifying possessiveness "but you're even prettier now. all clean..."