Chapter 56 #2
“The Ethics Committee would not hesitate to disqualify you and your golden boy,” the director continued, his tone laced with hair-raising menace. “And that would be a great shame, wouldn’t it?”
Of course Monica intimidated him.
Troy looked as if he had tried to cross the railroad tracks, but a train had appeared out of nowhere.
“But...”
His father stared him down with a look of resentment, and there was something threatening about it. At the same time, it was as if his son was wasting his time.
“Don’t you have a lecture to give?”
Now it was Troy who clenched his hands into fists, swallowing and looking down at the ground before staring at me as if he now really wanted to see me dead.
Finally, he nodded to his father, who was already looking back at the documents in front of him as if all this were just a minor inconvenience. A fly that had strayed into his office.
I wondered what he and Father had been talking about.
Troy turned away, giving Davian a look that I couldn't see as he left. However, it set Davian's jaw in motion, which was enough to know that the two would probably be at war with each other for all eternity. Then Troy disappeared into the hallway.
“Professor Rydell,” Arnold looked up. “Your candidate is a troublemaker. A woman, at that. If she continues to attract attention, I will be forced to disqualify her from more than just the debates.”
I suppressed the urge to raise my eyebrows, especially when he looked at me, a shadow crossing his face.
“Even Monica and her moralists can't do anything about own goals.”
Davian pressed his lips together and looked at the floor, regret in his eyes.
“And now excuse me.” Arnold rose and reached for his walking stick. “I have a meeting with the other directors.”
He looked at my father.
“Joseph. We'll talk later.”
My father nodded briefly.
“Rydell.”
Davian nodded too before the director walked past him, limping out of the office and closing the doors behind him.
Secrets and Lies
Atli ?rvarsson
Never before had I stood in a room so filled with tension.
Everything in me wanted to get out of here. To leave. As quickly as possible. But I was rooted to the spot, petrified, unable to move.
Davian, get me out of here.
My father was quicker.
“With each passing day, you remind me more and more of your mother.”
He sounded calm, matter-of-fact. But he wasn't looking at me. He was looking at Davian.
Davian looked just as confused as I did.
“What are you talking about?”
His voice sounded pressed. His hands were still clenched into fists.
My father rose from his chair, deeply relaxed, and I resisted the urge to step backward, but turned to him as he walked to the window.
“The world is full of gifted orphan boys. What do you think made you special?”
He chuckled quietly, which only fueled my confusion.
With growing horror in my chest, I looked at Davian. He was staring at me too, as if he were thinking the same thing.
“Don't worry. The girl you're staring at like you want to fuck her isn't your sister.”
My head spun around. And before I could think clearly, Davian lunged toward Father. But I managed to grab his hand in time.
“Davian!”
He clutched my hand as if he needed it. His knee twitched as if he wasn’t sure whether he should listen to me.
My father knew.
I stared at the man who now turned toward us, his hands clasped behind his back, causing Davian to automatically withdraw his hand from mine, which sent the usual ache I would probably never get used to spreading through my chest.
“I was disappointed, Davian.” My father studied him with an expressionless face.
“For the first time in years, I was disappointed.” His gaze shifted to me.
“But I’ve come to realize that you’re not at all to blame.
She’s using you. Against me.” He stepped around Arnold’s desk and ran his hand over the taut leather of the chair’s back.
“That's all you are to her. An insignificant pawn on the road to her downfall.”
Contempt adorned his face.
“What did you do, hm?” He looked up, both eyebrows raised, his voice filled with curiosity, as if this were an everyday conversation. “Smile at him, like Josephine always did?”
I was thrown off track, not knowing how to react.
There was no way he could have read our body language. Not even we had dared to name it.
On top of that, he reacted differently than I would have expected once again. He wasn't loud, he wasn't angry, and he didn't go after Davian. Because he didn't care about me.
“Quill is my student,” Davian gritted out through clenched teeth, and it hurt more than it should have.
“Quill?” Father laughed quietly, then sighed and shook his head. “I’m offering you Brittany’s hand, and you?”
“Whatever you think. I’m her mentor and she’s my student, just as I was yours. No more and no less,” Davian snapped.
I knew he said those words to save us. But... was that the truth we both knew deep down, or just the one I desperately wanted to believe?
“After all these years, you should know me.”
“I know you, Davian.” Father stepped around the desk and stopped one meter in front of him. “Better than you think.” And again, his gaze wandered to me and all composure disappeared, replaced by hostility and judgment. “The problem is, I know her.”
This was too much. Too many things I didn't know how to react to. Whether he was playing with us, whether he was up to something...
A cornered man was a dangerous man.
“Davian,” I managed to get out in a shaky voice. “Let's leave.” Father stared me down. “Please.”
The stranger across from us snorted morosely, looked at the floor, then gave me a withering glare.
“You deceitful little slut. First my job, then my family, now even my heir.”
Davian tensed and I instinctively reached for his hand, betraying us once and for all, and the way Davian’s hand froze in mine felt like the brutal revelation of the most fatal truth of my life.
But what could Father possibly do? Send his golden son to the slaughter? Whatever perfidious game he was playing with Davian, ever since he had made him his protégé, he seemed attached to him. His hope seemed to depend on him.
“Davian.” My father looked up from our hands, walked past him, but hesitated beside him, both hands in his trouser pockets. “You can't swallow poison and pretend you'll survive. Nor can you wash yourself clean of it.” He hesitated. “You know where to find me.”
He looked past Davian and our eyes met.
“I would never abandon you, son.”
Shards I didn't know were in my chest pushed mercilessly toward the throbbing muscle.
Finally, he left the room. Even though the feeling remained in my chest.
I Never Asked You
Atli ?rvarsson
I didn't dare move, letting it wash over me how Davian's hand lay petrified in mine, how tense it was, as if I wouldn't reach him for the first time, while he stared expressionlessly out the window.
“Davian...”
I wrapped my hand tighter around his, wanting to apologize, but he unexpectedly yanked his hand out of mine, turned around, and stumbled back toward the door, shaking his head.
The knot in my stomach tightened painfully.
I had ruined something. Something that should never have existed.
But everything inside me resisted accepting it.
“Everything I said to your father... I mean it.”
Please, Davian, don't do this.
“You're my student.”
He hesitated, staring at me as if I were his downfall.
And maybe he had finally realized it. Maybe he finally saw that my father was right.
That he would need help getting rid of me before I completely ruined his life, just as I had already done to the life of the man whose affection I had secretly longed for.
“I am your professor.”
I never would have thought that anything could be more painful than my father’s words. But his? They ate away at me. Mercilessly.
His words were weapons he could kill with. Did he know he was holding a knife to my chest?
“Whatever you think we could be.”
Tears found their way into my vision.
He swallowed, hesitated, stared through me as if I were a ghost. As if he weren't one.
“We never will be.”
Davian couldn't bring himself to look at me, turned his gaze to the floor, didn't notice the tears streaming down my cheeks.
He turned to leave, abandoned me. And it felt like he was burying me alive.
Trembling, I sank to my knees, sobbed as quietly as I could, and wiped away my tears with the sleeves of my sweater.
Everything inside me resisted his words, rejected them as if they were poison.
I wanted to sob his name, call out for him like a pathetic child until he came back, took me in his arms and carried me away from this campus.
A fantasy that would only come true in Wonderland.
“No...” I sobbed quietly.
I felt Vincent's hands on my shoulders, gently stroking them and holding me tight, just like he always did when no one else was around.
“You don't belong here. Let me take you to Wonderland.”
My hands automatically found the three bullets in my pants pocket.
“You know what to do.”
With more and more tears streaming down my face, I shook my head, letting panic overwhelm me.
“I can't... I mustn't...” I sobbed quietly.
Vincent's grip tightened, becoming more pleading.
“You don't belong here.”
“Please, go...”
I couldn't leave Davian on his own. But at the same time, I couldn't bear to carry these bullets around with me any longer.
“Tide...”
“No.”
With all my strength, I pushed Vincent away and forced myself to my feet.
I would stay here. For you, Davian.
Everything about this decision shattered the sky of my existence into glass dust. Deadly rain that would now drizzle down on my life. And only the devil knew how long I would be able to endure it.
It's already too late.
One may tear apart our blue thread
for all eternity.
No cut, however fatal, however brutal,
will change the fact that both parts
will remain one and the same original thread.
My thread shall always be yours.
– Blue