by Eden Beck
Rafael’s response is unexpected.
He laughs so loud that despite his earlier protestations, we both freeze and glance towards Neville’s sleeping form. It isn’t until we’re both certain he isn’t about to wake up in a tangle of confused blankets that Rafael scoots onto the edge of the bed beside me.
“Are you really complaining right now that you haven’t had the chance to get some dick? Because I could make some recommendations if—”
“Stop!” I snap at him as loudly as I still can while my voice remains a whisper. “That’s not what I mean at all.”
I stop for a second, before saying, “I just … it’s still so new, and yet … it kind of feels exactly the same?”
Rafael considers this a moment before nodding. “You want to know what the next step is, but you don’t know how to take it.”
“Not with everyone watching,” I say, “but yes, exactly.”
I feel a weight lift off of me now that I’ve said it. I didn’t exactly expect Heath and Beck to sweep me off my feet, but I guess I did expect … something.
Something more.
Something different.
“All I can suggest,” Rafael says, nodding thoughtfully, “is that you’ll know when the time is right. Don’t force something now that you might come to regret later.”
We fall back into silence, and I find that I’m so sleepy I can barely keep my eyes open. Sleep hasn’t exactly been my top priority, lately. Not with the way my thoughts have been turning over constantly with thoughts of The Brotherhood, it’s boys, and the fact that the school might be closing down soon thanks to me.
I don’t realize that I’ve actually fallen asleep, however, until I wake up in Rafael’s bed, my head on his pillow, a blanket wrapped around my sleeping form.
Rafael turns from his desk when I sit bolt upright.
“Chill,” he says easily. “You haven’t missed any gossip. Beck and Heath probably aren’t even awake.”
I rub my eyes. “When did I fall asleep?”
“About an hour and a half ago.” He hands me a water bottle and I drink it gratefully before pushing his blanket off me and sliding off the bed. Across the room, Neville is still asleep.
“I should get going, I guess,” I sigh, turning to make Rafael’s bed.
“You don’t have to do that.” He gets up and yanks his blankets away from me.
“It’s the least I can do!” I cry out in protest.
“I like to make my own bed,” he huffs, pulling his blankets close to his chest, messing his bed up even more. “You won’t do the corners right. Plus,” he adds, dropping the blankets in a lumpy pile, “if you don’t get going, that Ada woman will catch up to you, and you know it.”
I grab my backpack and sling it over my shoulder. “Thanks,” I tell him softly.
Rafael pulls me in for a hug. “Don’t be so stupid,” he says affectionately. “But don’t be a stranger, either.”
My conversation with Rafael does little to calm my nerves.
It doesn’t help that later, when I finally find myself somewhat alone with Heath and Beck, we’re not really alone at all. This time, however, it isn’t even an investigator.
“He’s lurking again,” Heath grumbles, grabbing my arm to pull me closer to his side.
I follow his gaze. Further up the hallway, Jasper lingers in a doorway. He turns away when he sees us looking. He couldn’t be more obvious.
“It’s almost every day, now,” Beck growls. He puts his hand on my elbow as I start.
I hadn’t noticed Jasper “lurking” … but then, I have been distracted. Lately, he hasn’t been the one I’m looking out for.
Not with the way Ms. Ada and the other investigators have been on my trail like a dog locked on a scent.
I watch as Jasper sneaks a glance at us and then quickly looks away. “What’s he planning?” I wonder aloud. “What’s he want?”
“He probably wants to talk about the spring competition,” Heath sighs.
Startled, I glance up at him. I’d forgotten all about the spring competition with the girls’ school. The Brotherhood is supposed to represent our school, but I wonder how that’s going to work now that they’re no longer on speaking terms.
“Is it even going to happen this year?” I ask incredulously.
Even more incredulously, I mentally count the months until the spring semester, and immediately feel panic rise up inside me. Time is passing altogether too quickly.
Before I know it, it’ll be over—all of this. Bleakwood, The Brotherhood, all of it. It’ll be a thing of the past.
Neither Heath nor Beck seems to see my momentary inner panic, thankfully.
“Kind of needs to,” Heath says, smiling apologetically at me. “Retaining normalcy, and all that.”
As one, we all look over at Jasper again, who exits the doorway and hurries off in the opposite direction.
“Why don’t you just kick him out?” I suggest.
Heath and Beck both glance at each other as if what I’ve said is the most ridiculous thing they’ve ever heard.
“Kick him out?” Beck echoes.
“You’re born into The Brotherhood,” Heath says. “You don’t just … quit.”
Of course, that would be their answer. “So, because he’s got the right genes, he’s just in for life?” I ask bitterly. “No matter what he does?”
“Sort of,” Beck says with a shrug. “Yeah. That’s how it goes.”
“It’s tradition,” Heath adds. “Besides, Jasper’s the only one who could really end it, and we all know he’s not going to do that.”
I look away grumpily, but I know he’s right. What other uncomfortable yet inevitable things will we be forced to carry on with in the name of “keeping up appearances”?
I’m already at capacity with everything else going on.
I don’t think I could handle anything else.
Chapter Ten
Fortunately, whatever that inevitable thing is … it doesn’t set upon us right away.
We’re allowed, in the following weeks, to resume some kind of new normal.
The cold grows harsher and harsher as the months press on. Jasper’s form becomes bulkier as he dons more and more layers, hovering in our orbit like an asteroid gathering more and more rock. I have nothing but oversized hoodies to keep me warm.
Just how I like it.
“Almost Christmastime,” Heath sighs as we settle in at the dining hall one afternoon. “Where are your family taking their holiday, again, Beck?”
Beck sets his tray down and pokes at his food. “Not sure yet. My mother’s family wants me to come with them to the Alps. My father’s family wants me to go with them to the Maldives. Meanwhile, my parents don’t want to go to either, and are trying to make excuses to go to Hawaii instead for something more low-key.”
Heath nods sympathetically, but my head reels.
The Alps? The Maldives? Hawaii?
I have nothing to add to this conversation, because all those places are just pictures on postcards to me—and not even postcards I’ve been sent, just ones I’ve had the privilege to see at airport gift shops.
“We’ve settled on Fiji this year,” Heath says. “But it was a close call between that and Iceland.”
“Rafael went to Fiji last year, I think,” I blurt out, finally thinking of something I can contribute to keep from sitting here stewing in awkward silence for the rest of lunch.
Heath grins. “Ah, yes—maybe I’ll see him this year. Where will your holiday be, then, Alex?”
“Here,” I reply simply.
They glance at each other. “Why?” Beck asks, his voice dripping with astonishment. “Don’t you … don’t you want to go home?”
“Sure,” I say, “I would, if I had a ticket.”
Both boys exchange a glance, but it’s Beck that slams his open palm down on the table. “Done.”
“Done … done what?” I ask, glancing between the two of them.
“We’re
gonna buy your ticket home, dummy,” Heath says. “You can’t just sit here sad and alone over break.”
I feel color rise in my cheeks, and ready myself to protest, but Beck cuts me off.
“Nope,” he says, shaking his head from side to side. “Don’t even think about turning us down. Consider it as good as done.”
He grins at me, sticking a French fry between his teeth before asking, “So where is it then, home?”
It takes me a second to regain my bearings. “Ohio.”
His brow furrows. “What the hell’s there in Ohio?”
“I’m sure it’s great,” Heath says with a reproving look at Beck. “Lots of … snow? It gets cold in Ohio, right? Skiing opportunities?”
“The Alps would be better for that,” Beck points out. “Maybe we could all cancel our plans and hole up here at school?”
It’s my turn to let out a sigh. “Sure, like that would be allowed.”
I glance over my shoulder at one of the ever-present people in suits. There are two now, lingering by the door. I swear they keep glancing over in our direction, just to make sure that not a wayward hand sneaks out of place.
“Right,” Beck says, looking down at his tray.
“Nothing like being home for Christmas,” Heath says cheerfully, in the oh-so-carefree way that’s distinctly his. “Even if it is in … Ohio.”
I want to laugh. They’re so ridiculously rich; what must they think my home looks like? Do they think it’s sad that I don’t go to the Alps or whatever?
Part of me feels a sting at their ignorance. If we hadn’t been stuck in this sort of insect-under-glass limbo for the last months, then maybe they’d actually know something about me.
Something meaningful, anyway. The sort of thing you only learn in whispered conversations after dark when there isn’t a black-clad investigator practically breathing down your neck at every moment.
We finish with our lunch and head out of the dining hall. I fall silent as they talk about past Christmases and the places they’ve gone. Beck has apparently been to the Alps several times. Heath laments that his favorite resort in Fiji closed down a few years ago.
I keep thinking about the gap between us, how my trip to Bleakwood was the first time I ever set foot outside the United States. As they talk about white-sand beaches, I think of the lake we’d visit during the summers. I’ve only been to the ocean once—the year we all piled into the car for a ten-hour drive to Atlantic City, and my father vowed he’d never do it again.
The sand there definitely wasn’t white.
Far from it.
For a moment, the gap between us grows a little wider.
“Miss Trevellian?” calls a voice from a branching corridor as we pass it, and I find myself stopping to jerk around, hoping it isn’t one of the investigators. Instead, it’s somehow worse.
It the dean.
My stomach drops as he approaches, adjusting the cuffs of his sleeves beneath his suit jacket. At least he looks as uncomfortable as I feel. Beck and Heath stop beside me a moment too late, turning back to ask what I’m doing only to spot the dean.
Dean Withers, in turn, eyes them questioningly. “No need to cower, boys, I just need to speak to Alex here for a moment.”
They blink at him, struck dumb for a moment, until he adds, “Alone.”
With almost apologetic expressions, Heath and Beck and dart away, disappearing around a corner.
Cowards.
“Come with me, please,” the dean says.
Reluctantly, I obey.
I follow him down the hallway, treading awkwardly a step behind him. He doesn’t try to make small talk. Am I in trouble for something? I’ve been keeping my head down; I haven’t even answered any of Ms. Ada’s probing questions. I can’t think of anything I’ve done to warrant a punishment.
“In here, Miss Trevellian,” the dean says as he opens his office door.
No shit, I think, but bite my tongue. At this point his office is familiar. Too familiar, if anything. I head without thinking to the two seats in front of his desk, tossing my backpack into one chair and settling myself into the other.
The dean makes another one of his disgruntled sounds, but he doesn’t actually complain.
Behind me, I hear the door shut. I slump in my seat with my hands shoved into my hoodie pockets as Dean Withers walks to his office chair. The brown leather squeaks as he settles into it.
“How are your studies going, Alex?” he asks as he scoots himself closer to his desk.
“Fine.” The word’s out of my mouth without thinking about the answer. It’s just a reflex, at this point.
I glance over my shoulder, looking to see if anyone is hiding in one of the corners. For once, we’re actually alone.
Well, that explains the sour look on his face.
He nods. “Of course.”
“I haven’t been ratting anyone out to the investigators,” I blurt out. My shoulders stiffen. “If … if that’s why you dragged me in here.”
The Dean glances up at me. “Well … thank you,” he says hesitantly. “But that’s not why I asked you here.”
“Oh,” I ask, shifting uncomfortably in my seat. “Then why did you?”
He opens one of his desk drawers and pulls out a stack of papers. He picks one off the top and slides it across his desk toward me, gesturing for me to take it. I lean forward and grab it.
I recognize what it is immediately.
It’s a ticket home. To Ohio.
Dean Withers has somehow beaten Heath and Beck to their own gift. A very thoughtful gift at that.
Once again, I glance over my shoulder and look around the room—this time, looking for hidden cameras or something.
“What … what is this?”
The dean clears his throat a moment. “We just thought you might need a break from the school. A bit of time to clear your head.”
I keep blinking at him, just as he did earlier when Heath and Beck didn’t understand this was meant to be a private conversation. When I still don’t seem to understand his meaning fast enough, the dean leans in a little closer.
“Take it as a gesture of goodwill,” he says, settling back into his seat. “And when the investigators get back after break … it wouldn’t hurt to mention it to them. You know. If they ask.”
I look back down at the ticket in my hand. First class. Not even Jasper got me that last year.
When I look back up at Dean Withers, he has a smug expression on his face. I didn’t need a first-class ticket to buy my favor. Coach—hell, a spot in the cargo—would have been enough at this point … even if Heath and Beck hadn’t already offered to do the same.
Of course, I don’t tell him that.
Let the school pay. It’s the least they can do at this point.
But it’s still not the ticket home that has me jumping up from my seat, a shit-eating grin spreading across my own face as I make an excuse to leave as fast as I can.
It’s what else Dean Withers just let slip.
Chapter Eleven
I can sense the change that’s come over Bleakwood the moment I step back out into the hall.
A silence has fallen over these halls, but not in the traditional sense. Class doesn’t let out for another week, so the halls are still filled with students and their chatter crisscrossing through the entrance hall … but that’s it.
It’s just them.
No investigators stand at the corners, at the top of the stairs, watching from the corners. For the first time all semester, it’s just us. But just to be sure …
I tug my backpack further up my shoulder as I hurry over, feet clattering across the stones, to peer out the window into the courtyard. I’m greeted with a sight that makes butterflies erupt in my stomach.
True to Dean Withers’ slip of the tongue, the investigators are leaving.
I know exactly what needs to be done next.
“Quick!” I snap, my feet nearly skittering out from underneath me as I burst into Raf
ael’s room. “Tell me, where are The Brotherhood’s rooms?”
“What the—” Rafael starts from his place seated on the floor across from Neville, but I just shake my head and point out the window.
“Just look!” I say, breathless. I keep my hand pointed to the window until the two of them scramble to their own feet to peer out as well.
“Well, I’ll be …” Rafael starts, but then his head suddenly snaps back to look at me, one eyebrow raising as a mischievous smile spreads across his face. “Where was it you wanted to go again?”
I’m still struggling to catch my breath.
“You know what I said,” I say, my own voice quivering slightly. “If you don’t know, then I’ll go find someone who does.”
Rafael glances at Neville, then back at me, and suddenly I’m being marched out into the hallway. Neville starts to try to follow, but Rafael pulls the door shut behind us.
We’re alone in the hallway for just long enough for Rafael to spin me around, unzip the front pocket of my backpack, and shove something that crinkles into it. By the time he spins me back around, I’ve barely had time to open my mouth to protest—but he’s already jabbing a finger into the middle of my chest.
“You’ll thank me later,” he snaps, then jabs that same finger down towards the end of the hall. “There’s a staircase at the end. Take it up to the top, then down the hall to the left.”
My cheeks are flushed red, but I just nod gratefully.
Part of me wants to insist his little … gift … is unnecessary, but I can’t bring myself to.
Because that would be lying.
There are three doors at the end of the hall.
One for Heath. One for Beck.
And one, of course, for Jasper.
I’m not here for Jasper, but I’m going to have to take my chances. Weeks—no, months—of pent-up frustration have me fit to bursting at the seams. We have only days until we’re set to leave for break, and the investigators will be back by the time we return. We’re not going to get another chance like this.
A chance to be alone.
A chance to be … together.
So, without waiting to be invited inside, I grip the closest doorknob to me in my hand, turn it once, and throw the door open.