7. Building Fortresses
Building Fortresses
Elias
October starts with a storm and a phone call.
The storm lasts three days; it rattles the windows of the Old Manor classrooms, damages several roofs, and uproots the black mulberry tree in the arboretum.
The phone call lasts fifteen minutes—the exact duration of the time slot Mr Pearson’s admin team have set aside in his calendar.
It’s been the same slot ever since I started at Spearcrest: quarter past five, every first Monday of the month except for December and August.
I was sixteen years old when the Pearson family formally adopted me—only two years away from officially aging out of the foster care system.
It’s rare for things to happen this way—I’ve been reminded many times. Nobody wants a sixteen-year-old boy. Like a textbook that’s been scribbled all over with smudgy genitalia.
So when the news came that the Pearsons, the shiny white-teethed, clean-skinned, Burberry-clad family from the news, had filed the paperwork for my adoption, I didn’t actually believe it.
Even Miss Cooles and Miss Singh, my caseworkers, didn’t look like they believed it. They looked at each other and laughed, and Miss Cooles patted my arm with an awed smile and said, “What a godsend, eh?”
I laughed and nodded and didn’t tell her that God had never once sent anything my way—that if he existed at all, then he must’ve lost my address a long time ago.
Not that I blamed him. I had more addresses in my young years than some people collect in a lifetime. I don’t blame God for any of it.
What would be the point? It wouldn’t fix anything. I’m smart enough to know that the universe is too big, and that I’m too small, for my suffering to be calculated or personal.
The Pearsons had enough connections and power to get the adoption processed in record time.
They didn’t have enough connections to guarantee Mr Pearson being voted Member of Parliament—that’s where I came in.
Overnight, I was plucked out of my underfunded, overrun state school and parachuted into Spearcrest Academy, which looked like a fairy-tale castle.
Spearcrest Academy, I came to learn, cost over ￡50,000 a year—not including uniforms, formalwear, school trips, private music lessons or specialist tutoring, exam fees and discretionary spending.
That’s a lot of money to spend on a scrawny nobody, you’d think.
I thought so—until I overheard Mr Pearson on the phone with his campaign manager.
“He photographs well,” he’d said. “Scrappy but grateful. And he doesn’t sound like he was scraped off a council estate.”
And it’s not like I believed I was adopted because I’m charming (I’m not), or easy to love (also no), but it still came as a shock.
A bit of research told me that Mr Pearson, newly announced parliamentary candidate for the South-East, was under fire for allegations of classism, nepotism, outdated views on foster care reform, and so on and so on.
Adopting a rough-around-the-edges scholarship kid? Not so much redemption as clever PR.
Miss Cooles had called it a godsend.
It was only ever just good optics.
Although the storm’s finally passed, it’s still raining heavily outside my bedroom window when the call comes in. I glance at the time. Just got to get through the next fifteen minutes.
What’s fifteen minutes in the grand scheme of my life? Nothing.
“Mr Pearson.” I silently blow out the lungful of smoke I dragged in right before answering, watching it dissipate in the cold night air. “How are you?”
Even though I’m perched cross-legged on top of my desk in my old grey sweats smoking a cigarette out of the window, I try my best to sound like a Spearcrest kid instead of—well, me.
My way of encouraging Pearson to keep paying my school fees, I suppose.
“Very well, Elias, yes—very well, thank you. I trust you’re having a good start to the year?”
Made several hundred pounds pawning a priceless heirloom for a petty sixteen-year-old and blackmailed an international socialite into dating me for clout.
“You know it, sir.”
“And your classes, all going well?” His voice has a pointed, almost dubious inflection to it. “I was told the school wants to put you forward for some physics scholarships?”
He’s dubious because he can’t wrap his head around me being good at anything academic, let alone physics. Like intelligence is the gift fairy godmothers only ever grant princes and princesses.
“I’m not sure, sir,” I answer cautiously.
I still don’t know whether it’s better for optics if I’m smart or not. All I know is that Mr Pearson likes me scrappy, elastic, and grateful.
“I’m just glad for being here. Good teachers.”
“Yes, yes.” Mr Pearson sounds pleased. Comforted, he’s finally able to spit out what he called me to ask. “I was wondering if you read the email Maria forwarded. The article…”
The Sentinel is running a piece on Mr Pearson, and Mr Pearson wants a couple of quotes from me. I nod, gazing out at the campus under its veil of rain. Night’s already fallen, casting the grounds in shadows. The grand Spearcrest spires puncture the dark purple clouds like needles.
“Of course, sir,” I say. The cigarette I’m holding has burned all the way down, and I let it sear my fingers before crumbling and falling off the window’s ledge. “I don’t mind speaking to the journalist.”
“Yes, yes, excellent. She’ll want to know a little about your journey, how your life’s changed since your adoption, that kind of thing.”
But there’s no need for the instructions.
I’ve been doing this since I was sixteen, since the day I was adopted.
Interviews, articles, photographs. The evergreen monkey always prepared to be displayed.
I was interviewed the day I started at Spearcrest, wearing a uniform that fit for the first time in my life.
I’ll be interviewed on results day, undoubtedly, when I’ll have to pass the credit for my good results to Mr Pearson.
How long will it continue?
Will I be interviewed on my first day at university? Graduation? My first job? My wedding day?
“Yes, sir,” I answer dully, through my clenched-shut jaws.
No, I think. Fuck that.
Since Desdemona doesn’t answer my text, and since she won’t come to me, then I go to her. I find her in the only place where she’s guaranteed to be every other evening.
The tennis courts.
Trust Spearcrest to have the fanciest courts imaginable.
Sky-blue floors, white lines, floodlights, stands.
The school crest emblazoned on the sides of the umpire’s chair.
Even the air smells clean and crisp, the faint scent of fresh paint mixing with the smell of the pine trees and cedars that luckily hide my approach.
I stop right on the edge of the court, under the shelter of the cedar branches that are fanning out above the fence, and watch Desdemona with the curiosity of a child watching a predator in a nature documentary.
She races up and down, trading shots with her partner—a lithe, hawkish girl in the same kit—whacking the green ball with all her might.
Her arms and legs are taut with muscle and gleaming with sweat.
Translucent beads of it whip free from the end of her ponytail every time she makes a sharp turn.
And when she scores a point, she spins and laughter bursts from her chest, triumphant, unguarded, almost childish.
Her friend rolls her eyes but smirks, and the two resume playing.
At the end of the rally, Desdemona catches the ball and tosses it to her friend, grinning.
She turns towards her equipment bag—Ralph Lauren, of course—which sits right next to me.
Her ponytail traces a golden arch around her head as she turns, half a halo.
Funny how young she looks to me, for the first time, agile and joyful in a way that’s completely antithetical to everything I’ve ever thought about her.
And then she spots me.
The spell shatters like smashed porcelain. The smile disappears. Her whole posture changes: her body, an elastic, living thing a mere second ago, becomes instantly rigid, back stiff, shoulders squared.
Her friend, drawing closer, glances between us, dark eyes glinting with curiosity.
“Who’s that?”
Desdemona springs into motion. She throws her bag over her shoulder and grabs my arm in a cool, impersonal grip.
“Come with me,” she mutters—not a request. “Nobody!” she calls lightly behind us, marshalling us away from the court. “Catch you tomorrow, Zaff.”
“Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do!” Zaff calls mischievously back.
Desdemona’s fingers tighten on my arms so hard I wonder if she’s going to leave a bruise—but she doesn’t reply. In real time, I just got to witness her withdrawing inside herself. Interesting.
Desdemona, it seems, is a builder of fortresses. Fortresses of academic and athletic successes, of names and rules and achievements. What are they all hiding, I wonder?
A little scared girl, probably. A pile of buried desires.
Couldn’t be me. I don’t bury my desires: I raise them up and feed them with fuel. I burn them high and bright. And in the barren cold of the cosmos, I warm my hands by that fire.
Not for the first time in my life, I find myself shoved unceremoniously into a closet.
The equipment shed is small and warm despite the cold outside; above us, a single lightbulb stutters dimly to life, as if startled by our intrusion. I cough, choking slightly on the air, which is dusty, dense with the smells of rubber, resin, sweat.
Desdemona shoves me into this dimly lit, suffocating space, the edge of her racket bag clipping my hip. She slams the door shut behind us, sealing out the bright court and its clean air, the trees, the school, and any prying eye.
She whips around and faces me.
“What are you doing here?”
“Watching you play.”
Her jaws clench.
“How did you know I’d be here?” she snaps.
“Where else would you be?” I retort. I grab the towel out of her bag and toss it at her. “You’ve been ignoring my texts.”
“I’ve not gotten around to replying,” she lies.
Her hand is still wrapped firmly around the handle of her racket, knuckles practically white from the force of her grip.
“You wouldn’t be trying to wriggle yourself out of our deal, would you, love?”
“Of course not.” A dull flush rises in her cheeks. “I’ve been busy, that’s all.” Her jaw clenches so hard that I see the tensing of the muscles all the way to her temples. “I’m sorry.”
Something catches in my chest. Taken by surprise by her apology, I step back, putting distance between us.
“I’m not asking you to fall into bed with me or shout your love from the rooftops, alright? Let’s start off easy, nice and simple.”
She nods. Her fingers slowly loosen around her racket handle, and she sets it aside. “What are you thinking?”
“Lunch.” I tilt my head. “Together. Tomorrow.”
She licks her lips. She’s nervous, but I don’t quite know why.
“It can’t be that humiliating, can it?” I say aloud, my tone amused even though my stomach feels tight with sudden shame. “Having lunch with me?”
She shakes her head. “It’s not. It’s just…”
And then she glances at me and stops herself. She snaps her mouth shut, as if she’s caught herself about to say something she shouldn’t. For a moment, we stare at one another.
“Lunch tomorrow,” she says, firmly, like a schoolteacher. “Yes. But I think it would be wise to lay down some ground rules beforehand.”
I almost laugh. There goes the golden girl prefect. Desdemona, painting out white boundary lines around our deal. She’s just as scared as I am, I realise, with a mixture of surprise and disdain. Scared, with nothing to lose.
“What kind of rules?”
The words are barely out of my mouth before Desdemona snaps:
“First rule: don’t summon me. I’m not your dog.”
I shrug. “Granted, but in that case—second rule: don’t ignore my texts.”
She visibly bristles at that. “Third rule: we don’t meet in your bedroom.”
As if she didn’t choose to come to my room last time.
I tilt my head, needling her with a conspiratory smile. “I thought you’d appreciate the privacy.”
She doesn’t take the bait. “I’d prefer somewhere private and neutral.”
“Such as?”
“The head girl’s study.”
I laugh in her face; I can’t help it. “You’ve got an office?”
She remains unshaken and says bleakly, “It’s a study.”
“How is that more neutral than my bedroom?”
“It’s a study,” she repeats in a tone that suggests I have no more intelligence than a worm. “What’s more neutral?”
“It’s your study,” I retort. “Not neutral.”
“More neutral than your bedroom, in any case,” she says. And, with a shadow of a smirk, “I won’t be half-naked, for one.”
Hah. Well played, Head Girl. I step closer, crowding her space, and snatch the victory from her with a calculated lowering of my voice.
“Shame. Perhaps we could remedy that.”
“Perhaps not,” she retorts. “Fourth rule: keep your hands to yourself.”
It wouldn’t surprise me if that was a rule with all her boyfriends. Nevertheless, I say, “Won’t that make it difficult to pretend we’re in a relationship?”
She rolls her eyes. “Fine. Fourth rule: keep your hands to yourself when we’re alone.”
“You might regret making that a rule,” I murmur humbly.
She sneers. “I can promise you I won’t.”
“Never say never, love.”
“I didn’t say never. Fifth rule: don’t call me love.”
“All your rules so far only make it more difficult to pretend we’re together.”
She hesitates. “I just…” She licks her lips. “I just think it will make it easier to fake a relationship if our own relationship outside the subterfuge has clearly defined boundaries.”
Subterfuge. Why does she speak like she’s fifty? Is that part of her fortress-building, I wonder?
“I disagree,” I tell her. “I think we should muddy the waters as much as possible. Otherwise, nobody will ever buy it.”
She smirks, this time, a little sly curving of her lips, that makes my heart stutter.
“Why not?” she says. “Because a girl like me would never willingly choose a guy like you?”
Of course a girl like her would never choose a guy like me. Does she think it would hurt to admit that? Before I met her, I didn’t even think girls like her existed.
“Maybe not, but a girl like you would still kneel on the bedroom floor of a guy like me.” I smirk right back. “Doesn’t that count for something?”
And I know I’ve hit my mark because Desdemona, probably for the first time in her life, has absolutely nothing to say in reply.
If she wants to take shots at me and aim where it hurts, Desdemona has to learn I’m willing to return fire. And now that we’ve established that, I nod.
“Alright,” I tell her. “We’ll define boundaries, if you think that’ll help. But I’m not remembering a million and one rules. Let’s choose five and stick to those.”
Desdemona’s eyes narrow. “Which five?” She crosses her arms. “Are you willing to negotiate?”
She really was raised by a lawyer, huh?
“Yeah.” I huff out a laugh. “Let’s negotiate.”