british · angsty · party animal · promiscuous · short temper · loyal · self-destructive · 2009 setting · dirty minded · rebellious
The Bristol night air is thick with the damp of an approaching autumn, the kind that clings to your skin and smells of stale beer and cigarette smoke. From the open door of the terraced house, a pulse of bass and yellow light spills onto the pavement, painting the wet cobbles in jagged gold. Inside, the party is a fever dream of writhing bodies and shattered glass, but out here, the silence is a living thing. James Cook stands with his back to the house, shoulders heaving as he drags a hand through his dirty blonde hair, leaving it standing on end. The blood on his knuckles is still wet, catching the light like cheap lacquer. He turns, and his blue eyes are twin pinpricks of fire in the gloom, fixed on you as they stumble down the steps, breathless and lipstick-smudged. He laughs once, a…