Chapter 15 #2
How could I not fix my gaze on him, when in this dull reality – away from my writing – he was the sole thing that made me feel so intensely and full of anticipation, alive in the moment?
The millimeter-sized bead beneath the skin below his right eye. The even indentations on both sides of his straight nose, as if it had been molded like clay. The fine, parallel lines of his lip relief. The swirling cornflower galaxies that his iris fibers formed...
Concentrate, Quill.
“It's a name that doesn't remind me of my parents.”
“The parents waiting for you in Canada?”
His slightly arched eyebrows wandered upward, but his lowered voice didn't match the critical expression on his face. It was as if he were focused on something else in my face, only I couldn't interpret what his gaze had settled on before it found its way back to my eyes.
“Or are they made up too?”
I swallowed awkwardly and his gaze immediately moved to my throat.
The urge to tilt it slightly for him and swallow slowly while daring him to return to the staring contest was a tempting one.
“How did you find out?”
His focused eyes broke away from my throat.
“Monica told the board that she had you in her interview.” His jaw moved. “Just to thank me afterwards for admitting you to Maplecrest.”
Shit.
Thomas had never mentioned anything about an interview.
“I...”
“I have never lied to that woman in my life.”
I clenched my teeth.
“Tell her the truth.”
I stepped back, forcing myself away from his seductively pleasant proximity, because everything that glimmered between us was just another trap that neither of us should fall into. Even if it tempted me.
“Then I’ll leave quickly and you’ll save yourself a lot of trouble.”
Idea 25 - Slowed + Reverb
Gibran Alcocer, Andrea Vanzo
With a forced smile, I turned away, walked across the room, and ran my finger over the dust-covered benches, feeling his gaze on the words I had written on my hands in moments when I hadn't had any piece of paper available.
Nothing was more fatal than forgetting a good idea.
“Because that's what I bring with me.” I stopped, placed a second finger in the dust. “Chaos.”
Good thing I hadn't said those words in front of him while making eye contact. It would have been a death wish. Or maybe just shown my addiction to a touch that I couldn't possibly have experienced just once in this life.
I glanced over my shoulder and he immediately looked away.
The heat in my face escalated.
“Why did you do that?” He cleared his throat. “Weren't your grades good enough? Are you running away from someone?”
Those would have been refreshing reasons. Reasons for someone who brought hope for a new life with them. Not for someone who had lost it.
“Maybe from myself?”
With a turn, I faced him, placed my fingers on one of the tables on the other side, and stepped back cautiously. Toward him.
“Quill...”
Did I hear concern?
I looked up, searching for that sentiment.
Davian didn't even try to hide it, and yet it made no sense. He had known me for two weeks. Why would he be concerned about me?
“I never wanted to study at Maplecrest,” I continued quickly. “All I'm here for is research.”
There was his truth. Half-truth...
He blinked, narrowing his eyes as if he were confused.
“Wait...”
His head tilted slightly and he stepped toward me again, as if subconsciously seeking my proximity. That mere thought was a burning light for my moths.
“You're here to...”
“...research for a book. Surprise.”
His astonished look made me grin.
“Who would have thought that another author would look at me with more disbelief than my friends?”
He immediately looked away, ran his fingers through his hair, tousling the ash brown until his rebellious strands fell back onto his forehead.
“I haven't been an author for a long time.” He scratched his neck, letting his hand wander into his shirt. “And you are...”
“What?” I laughed again, raising both eyebrows. “Insane? Crazy? Stupid?”
“...the first author I've ever met who risks everything with such passion just to write a good book.”
The fascination in his voice dragged the rug out from under my feet for a moment.
Wasn't it funny that everything else in me was gradually dying, but the one thing that would never die was my devotion to the architecture of words.
The heaviness in my chest returned.
“If it's the only thing I'll ever be good at, then I want to sacrifice everything for it.”
I walked past him to the other side of the room, to the table where professors must have once sat before this room had lost its function.
“I only have this one life, Davian. And I want to spend every last breath on this earth getting to know every high and low that comes with being an author.”
When I looked up, he had already turned toward me.
His jaw was working again, as if he were caught up in his thoughts. A place I would like to visit.
I often wondered how the time we spent wandering this earth changed the structure of our thinking.
Did he think like me? Did authors have similar brains?
“When did you give up?”
Secretly, I hoped he never had.
“Eighteen years ago.”
How old must he have been then? How old was he now?
Lara had once said her dad had turned forty. Last year?
How often had he taken refuge in an exception? Just one night in his office. Him, alone with the voices in his head. The ink in his blood ready to finally spill out into a work of art?
I slowly walked around the table.
“And let me guess. The emptiness is unbearable?” His fixed gaze spoke volumes. “There is a desperate part of you screaming to write again?”
He didn't reply. Sometimes silence was enough of an answer. Even for those who communicated through the fabric of words.
“An author can't just stop writing. He will always feel that something is missing. The weapon he learned to survive with.”
This time, I approached him.
“Good for you that you have the choice to decide whether to become an author.”
Tension resonated in his tone.
What had taken away his choice? What excuse was he trying to use to avoid facing the painful truth?
One more step, and only three feet separated us again. Three feet that I had to leave it at. I had to be reasonable. For Lara. For his job.
“Being an author isn't a decision. It's a calling that we either follow or suppress for the rest of our lives. Writing is...”