"Books?" Her eyes were blank — they always were, as flat and dull as Conor’s were fiery, but he remembered a time before they put vials in her hands and pills between her teeth when they danced with a spark of life that couldn’t be prescribed. He hated it, what had happened to her, with a sick sort of pain in his chest that only got worse now that he was standing in front of her, all tense muscles and wary glances. If he were caught in this act, it wouldn’t bode well for either of them.
"This isn’t what makes you feel, Books!” He had one of her vials clenched in his fist, waving it in front of her face in the hope of eliciting some sort of offbeat reaction, some flicker of the girl who hadn’t needed potions or brews to feel anger or love or quiet contentedness. No response. Conor looked at the label, willing the blocky letters to sift into a word: caml? Calm? Calm. She had taken Calm.
Though Books was evidently feeling very serene, Conor was anything but, fingers trembling, growing more agitated as the moments passed. Soon her aunt and uncle would return, and he would have missed his narrow window of opportunity. Without thinking any further (that had never been his strongest point), he threw the bottle at the ground, letting the glass and the misty-looking liquid inside splatter his shoes.
Books listened to Conor blankly, head tilted slightly to the side like a child only vaguely intrigued by something new. A faint smile remained fixed on her lips as he yelled at her, and she honestly couldn't care less about what he was saying. The words bounced uselessly against her like water off a duck's back.
She took a step back when the bottle shattered on the ground, blinking her eyes once, twice...but that was it. Quickly, she strode over to the kitchen to grab a towel to clean up the broken vial. It wasn't like it was any loss to her; she had dozens of those vials stocked in the cabinets, alongside all the other drugs the doctors had prescribed to her. Joy, Calm, Empathy, Love--all stocked in bottles and boxes, ready to be taken and felt.
"Why'd you do that?" Books asked levelly, crouching down and beginning to pick up the pieces of glass. Her dull eyes flicked up to him. "Are you taking Anger? The doctor said some people take it to get an adrenaline rush, but it's not healthy for you..."
