Chapter 28 Ares
Ares
“Why did you steal it?” Mr. Murphy asks Ares for the tenth time, leaning forward in his armchair, his expression furrowed
in that way Ares has seen on the faces of so many teachers before: worried, disapproving, deeply unhappy to be here.
That makes two of us, Ares thinks to himself, and contemplates punching an exit route through the classroom wall.
A clock ticks above the whiteboard. With every second, he can feel the vision slipping further and further away from him.
What is Chanel up to? Was this whole necklace scheme her way of getting back at him for the prom rejection? He wouldn’t put
it past her. Has to almost admire her for her nerve—if he weren’t trapped here, the only person in detention, watching the
sun stoop lower behind the trees while Mr. Murphy tries to introduce to him the concept of moral integrity.
“. . . can’t be about the money,” Mr. Murphy says. “You are evidently in a very fortunate financial position, Ares. Few people
have donated as much to the school as your mother.”
He frowns. “My mother? No, that can’t be right.”
“I assure you it is,” Mr. Murphy tells him. “She donated a significant sum only last semester.”
He considers reasoning—But dead people can’t make donations—except he never brings up his mother, and certainly won’t now. There must have been a mix-up.
“Is it for the thrill of it? The adrenaline rush?” Mr. Murphy goes on. “Is that what you’re chasing? I know, with all the
media youths are consuming nowadays, you might have been led to believe that stealing is cool. But I can tell you, Ares, that
it is very much uncool to steal from your classmates.”
“I didn’t steal it,” Ares says flatly.
Mr. Murphy sighs. “I would like to believe you. I really, really would—”
“Believe me, then.”
“But you cannot expect me to think that the necklace unchained itself from Chanel’s neck, sprouted a pair of legs, and wandered
into your pencil case on its own, did it?” Mr. Murphy asks. “So what’s the real reason here? I won’t judge.”
It could just be the quiet of the room, but the clock’s ticking seems to grow louder. Ares clenches, then unclenches his jaw.
“Will you release me from detention if I give you a reason?”
“No,” Mr. Murphy says simply. “Either way, you should take some time to think over your actions today.”
He doesn’t have any time left. Maybe he can just make a run for it. There’s no way Mr. Murphy would have the speed, stamina, or willpower
to actually chase after him. . . .
The classroom door slides open, and Ms. Hoang steps inside, her teacher’s badge swinging over her blouse.
“Oh, is my shift over already?” Mr. Murphy asks, looking visibly relieved.
“You’re free to go,” Ms. Hoang tells him. “I’m on detention duty for the evening.” She turns to Ares with some surprise. “And
what did you do to land yourself here, young man?”
“He stole a necklace,” Mr. Murphy says, but moral integrity doesn’t seem to hold very strong against the relief of clocking
off, because he’s already on his way out.
“I didn’t,” Ares mutters. “They think I stole a necklace.”
“Ah.” Ms. Hoang nods, like this could be a real possibility. She waves politely to Mr. Murphy. “Have a nice night, Jon. Hope
you get some quality time with the kids.” When the door shuts after him, she turns back to Ares. “You’re saying you were falsely
accused?” Still with the same receptive expression, sympathetic even.
And Ares feels a faint flutter of hope. Thanks to his help with the peer tutoring sessions and his consistently impressive
math grades, Ms. Hoang is much nicer to him than any of the other teachers. He’d daresay that she even likes him. “Yeah,”
he says. “Exactly.”
She nods slowly. “Hmm.”
Sensing an opening, Ares asks in his politest voice, a voice that doesn’t even sound like his, “Do you think I could go get
my math workbooks from my locker? There’s nothing else for me to do in detention, so, you know, I might as well prepare for
the next math test.”
Ms. Hoang considers him for a moment. “That sounds like a sensible idea,” she says at last.
“Thank you,” he says, with genuine gratitude. He stands, the chair screeching behind him, and heads out into the bluish light
of the corridor, but he doesn’t stop at his locker. He keeps walking, his strides lengthening, phone in his hand as he calls
the earliest available DiDi to take him home. He just has to hurry, and everything will be okay. He will meet Long Ge, and
his brother will be safe, and there will be a fire tonight.
Chanel’s here.
Even in the darkness, even from a distance, he knows it’s her. He could recognize her just by the shape of her silhouette.
The very sound of her breathing. She’s as inevitable as the future, as familiar as his own past, and for reasons he can’t
possibly fathom, she’s waiting below his apartment on the night everything changes.
He’s still struggling to process the fact that she’s here when she whips around at his footsteps, marches right up to him,
eyes blazing, and grabs him by the throat.
“Chanel? What are you—”
She crushes her lips to his, the smooth, floral notes of her perfume enveloping him. He can’t think. Can’t do anything except
kiss her back. He forgets the meeting, the deadline, everyone and everything except Chanel.
Her fingers snake around the top two buttons of his shirt and she’s pushing him toward the front entrance, somehow keeping her balance while leaning her full weight against his body, her mouth on his the entire time.
She tastes like cherries, and his mind dances toward some old poem about forbidden fruit before everything goes dangerously fuzzy again, because her hand is braced around the nape of his neck.
“Let’s go up,” she whispers into his ear.
He’s barely aware of himself fumbling for the key card in his pocket, the automatic beep of the entrance as it unlocks, and he shoves his shoulder against the heavy glass, unwilling to lift his hands from her waist
for even a second. A small voice in the back of his head reminds him that he’s meant to be mad at her for framing him and
for something else, other things, he forgets now, but her touch is like a sedative. All the anger leaks out of him as she
tugs him toward the lift.
The second the doors slide closed around them, she’s backing him into the wall, kissing him hard like she’s never kissed him
before. Without restraint, without any care for who might see them, the security cameras blinking down at them from the top
right corner. More half-solid thoughts about how this is a terrible idea appear, then vanish in Ares’s head, erased by the
sensation of her quick, uneven breaths against his neck. He knows the elevator is moving upward, but he feels like he’s falling,
down and down and down, stomach flipping, the air rushing around him. The whole world seems to blur into the background until
there’s only her.
She’s standing so close that he can see the dark flecks of mascara smudged just underneath her waterline, the tiny mole above
her full lips, the shiny powder dotted on the very tip of her nose.
She’s beautiful.
She’s so beautiful it’s unfair, there should be legal warnings that come with this kind of thing, the same labels you find
on gunpowder and deadly poisons, because who could possibly stand a chance against it? She shifts even farther forward, her
leg pressing into the space between his. Then she lifts her knee by just a few calculated inches, and all the blood in his
body rushes to the point of contact. A hoarse, almost pained sound escapes his lips, and he can only hope the security cameras
don’t have audio systems built in.
Then they’re on his level, stumbling through the corridor, into his apartment, and he’s struck by this sense of unreality
as she discards her jacket at the entrance, revealing a white lace dress perfectly fitted to her body. Selected for the occasion,
he suspects, as a soldier would select their best sword before riding off into battle.
“Do you want me?” Chanel asks, taking his hand and lifting it to the delicate strap of her dress, her gaze intent on his.
He freezes in place, his heart throbbing behind his ribs. He almost laughs. What kind of question is that? There is no universe where he doesn’t want her.
“If you want me,” she whispers, “you can have me like this. You can have me in any way you want. Just stay here tonight.”
Her fingers curl into his hair, the gesture as intimate as it is possessive, and he thinks, woozily, that if this is what
it feels like to be possessed by her, then by all means, go ahead.
No, another voice rattles in the back of his mind. That’s why she’s doing this. Even when she’s kissing him, she’s being calculating, determined to gain the upper hand. She must have an ulterior motive. Maybe this is another form of revenge, like the setup with the necklace—
But she’s trembling.
He wouldn’t have been able to detect it if they weren’t so close, if he couldn’t feel her fingers quivering at his throat,
couldn’t hear the hitch in her breathing.
Something’s wrong.
“Wait,” he says, pulling back.
Chanel stops. Stares up at him, confusion flickering through her eyes. “What? Don’t you like it?”
“It’s not that. Tell me what’s wrong,” he says.
She shakes her head. Even manages to laugh. “Nothing’s wrong.”
She’s such a good liar that he has no doubt she’d fool anyone else, but he knows her better than that. “You’re clearly upset,”
he says. “Did somebody hurt you? Or is this—is it about prom, still? About me not going with you? Because I really do want
to, Chanel, I just—”
“Why do you care?” she cuts in, and finally, he catches a glimpse of real emotion underneath her act. It’s odd, because Chanel
Cao can be so worldly, so mature, navigating every social interaction with ease, carrying herself with more grace and confidence
than most adults he’s met before. But right now she only looks like a girl who’s scared, who doesn’t know what to do.
“I care about you,” he says. Swallows. “I thought that was obvious.”
She falters, her eyes searching his face like she’s running his words through an invisible lie detector. Then the shrill sound of a ringtone breaks into the space between them.
She steps back, pulls her phone out, frowning. “Hello? Mom? What—”
He can’t hear what her mother is saying, but Chanel’s face pales.
“No,” she whispers.