Walking in the Shadows

by Giovanni, Cassandra

  “It must have been some nightmare.”

  I swallowed, shivering, cold from the sweat. Tad pulled the blanket over us.

  “Have you ever had that nightmare before?” he asked.

  I realized I was still crying and sat up, pulling my knees to my chest. Tad placed his hand on my back.

  “No. I don’t think I’ve ever been so scared in my life,” I replied.

  “What was it about?”

  I looked over my shoulder at him, and his face was painted with worry. “I could hear my parents’ voices, and I ran towards them and they were vampires…then my dad killed me.”

  His eyes widened as I said the words and tears began to fall again.

  “I just wanted to feel his arms around me again— once I heard his voice I was done for. I wanted it so bad and then they were still dead. Always dead, I just never realized how much I wanted to hear their voices again,” I explained, every part of me yearning for that sound again.

  When I had calmed down and was no longer crying and shaking Tad spoke. “I don’t know what to say other than I wish I could talk to my mother again too. It’s not possible though and then I want the next best thing…you.”

  “Sometimes that’s just as hard,” I sighed.

  “Only because we’ve decided to make it that way,” he replied with a half smile.

  “Only because it has to be that way,” I assured him, my eyes bearing into his blue ones.

  Tad stood throwing his hands up in the air. “To hell with what it has to be. It doesn’t have to be anything we don’t want it to be.”

  “You’re my teacher Tad.”

  “I consider you my equal. I feel I can learn more from you than I can teach you. I don’t want to teach you in a classroom, you already know what you need to know in British Literature by choice.”

  “So you want me to drop your class?” I couldn’t disguise the confusion in my voice.

  “No, I want you to forget I’m your teacher,” he replied as he turned to face me again.

  “Tad, come on, I see you every day in class,” I teased, signaling to his teacher apparel.

  “You need me Vera, just like I need you and it has nothing do to with what happens in the classroom,” he remarked, stepping towards me.

  I took a deep breath, staring at my hands. I wanted it so badly to be true, but it wasn’t, just like I would never hear my parents’ voices again.

  “You aren’t being logical, Tad. I don’t want you to lose your job over me. I really shouldn’t even be here now,” I stated as I looked over at his alarm clock. “I should get going; Kirsten is going to worry.”

  “Vera,” Tad’s voice was pained as he grabbed my arm. “Don’t go?”

  “There’s only a few more months until graduation. Your kiss from the winter formal will last me until then.”

  “What if I don’t want to wait? All I can think about is that night, those kisses and caresses and I want them more.” His eyes moved over my face and to my lips with longing—one that I felt as well. I desperately wanted to feel his lips against mine.

  “Goodbye, Mr. Knightley,” I replied, and I had to hold back the tears as I watched his jaw clench.

  I found myself empty to my core.

  Chapter 37

  “This next assignment is an easy A, guys. So, I expect you all to participate,” Tad explained, and his eyes darkened as they landed on me. It looked as if he was drowning and my body went numb as he continued. “We’ve studied the great poet Shakespeare and some of you struggled with his work. We also just finished the epic poem Beowulf. It’s time for you to find the great poet inside of you.” He pulled at his tie as he saw my eyes narrow. Stupid journal! “This is going to be an anonymous assignment, so as long as you hand me a piece of paper on Friday you will get an A. Write a poem about whatever you feel. Let it be anything…leave no stone unturned. Hate, guilt, passion, lust, love, fear, gratitude. Whatever you feel write it. It can be graphic, subtle, calm or angry. Lay it all out class. On Friday I’ll shuffle the papers and hand them out to each of you and we’ll all read one out loud. And I, of course, will participate as well. You can all have fun trying to guess who wrote what, but what will be more surprising, I believe, is that you won’t be able to.”

  At the end of the class I wanted to do nothing more than to throw the journal he had given me at his face.

  “This is going to be fun,” Jaz remarked when the bell rang. “I’m excited to see what Brad writes.”

  “Do you think you’ll be able to tell it’s him?” I asked, shoving my notebook in my bag so hard I could hear stitches rip.

  Jaz raised an eyebrow at me, but then shook her head and smiled. “Of course!” She stood in unison with me and linked her arm in mine. “Let’s see what crazy Jennings does today.”

  “Umm…you go on ahead of me. I have to ask Knightley about this poetry thing. You know length and such.”

  “He said it doesn’t matter, silly,” Jaz teased, but when she saw my face she unlinked her arm from mine. “Fine, but I have tons to tell you!”

  When everyone had left I walked up to Tad. He was concentrating deeply on scripting when assignments were due on the white board, on purpose I was sure.

  “Knightley—You—I’m so—“

  “Pissed?” he cut me off as he turned to face me. “You think I didn’t know that you would be? I was trying to warn you—I’m sorry, but I have to give assignments that will help my students.”

  “You said you wouldn’t let anything or anyone hurt me,” I shot and turned on my heel, seeing the injury in his eyes.

  “Vera, don’t say that.”

  I stopped and spoke with my back to him. “You might not like what you hear, Knightley.”

  Chapter 38

  Tad looked as if he might be sick Friday morning as he stood in front of the class in a vest and tie combination that Jaz had swooned over the moment she saw it, and in my head I had done the same. He did look amazing with the sleeves of the light blue dress shirt rolled to his elbows, a tight navy vest to show his strong chest, and a thin black tie that he kept yanking at uncomfortably. I was mad at him, but seeing him looking so anxious and wow, was making me feel guilty for what I had written. He had wanted the truth though, and now I couldn’t go back.

  “He doesn’t seem very excited about this,” Jaz observed as she looked over her shoulder.

  “I don’t think any of us are but you,” I joked, poking her.

  “Are you nervous?” she asked.

  “I think he’s right that most people won’t know whose is whose…with the exception of those that know each other very well.”

  “Do you think I’ll know yours?” she asked, and I could tell by her voice that she wanted to.

  “I don’t think so Jaz, but that’s not your fault.”

  “We’re supposed to be besties.” Her shoulders fell.

  “We are Jaz. I’m just a bit more silent about the way I feel,” I reassured her.

  “With everyone?”

  Tad cleared his throat and looked at us.

  “Quiet, please. Does everyone have their poetic masterpieces with them today? Good, please take them out for me to pick up, flip them over so I can’t see what is on them,” he instructed, and I saw his Adam’s apple rise and fall as he came to my desk. His eyes searched mine for forgiveness, and I could see the fear of what could be on that piece of paper.

  “Where’s yours, Mr. Knightley?” Lily cooed when he had finished collecting the papers. “I didn’t see you add it to the pile?”

  Tad opened his drawer and placed a paper on top of the pile.

  “Here it is, don’t worry Lily. I keep my promises,” he replied as he shuffled the papers with shaking hands and then began to redistribute them to the class. “Now make sure the one you have isn’t yours…Are we all set?” He held up the paper he had in his hand. “Should I start?” His eyes landed on the paper and then found mine. He swallowed before opening his mouth to speak, but thought better of it
and sat on his desk. I could see his hands shaking on the piece of paper as everyone waited for him to speak. He pulled on his tie and said, “There’s no title on this, so I’ll just begin to read.

  ‘All that guides me is fear,

  And all that finds me is loss

  Death defines which paths I cross

  It is within the shadows that I stumble

  And I am desperate without a voice

  Here I am threatened by the resolve that you are

  my soul

  But if my lies are the path that I have to wander

  because there is no choice

  Will you love me still?

  In the darkness of the night when I wish to do

  nothing more than take flight?

  Will you hold me to this plane and ease the

  suffering and pain?

  When all you know is the truth

  And all they see is the lies

  Will I be the one you find, or the one you leave

  behind?

  Alone may be the only home I shall find.’”

  When Tad finished his jaw was clenched with his eyes staring at the piece of paper and one hand holding the side of his desk so tight that his knuckles were white.

  “Are you okay, Mr. Knightley?” Jaz asked as everyone leaned back in their seats in surprise. “Mr. Knightley?”

  “Knightley,” I spoke, and his eyes looked up and found mine while the rest of the classroom stared at me in surprise for using just the surname. “They’re just words.”

  “You know that’s not true, Vera!” he hissed.

  Jaz looked at the two of us, his eyes and mine locked willfully in anger and pain.

  “I’ll go next,” she suggested, and I wondered if she realized that what was going could be like jumping off a cliff. I certainly did, yet I couldn’t take my eyes off of him.

  “Thank you, Jaz,” Tad said, turning and sitting stiffly in his chair. His eyes stared at my poem in front of him.

  The second the bell rang I ran out the door with Tad still staring at the poem as if it would light on fire. I skipped my locker and went right to the library, hiding in the last row of books and sliding to sit on the floor. I put my head on my knees and closed my eyes.

  “Vera, are you okay?” Jaz asked, making me jump.

  “Yeah, sure Jaz.”

  “So, this is where you hide when you don’t have lunch with me?”

  “Most of the time.”

  “That was intense in there, huh? Your poem really got to him,” she commented, cocking her head at me, her lips in a frown.

  “How do you know it was mine?” I demanded, grabbing a book from the shelf and pretending as if I was interested in its contents.

  She put her hand on my arm, slinking down beside me. “Come on—I do know you at least a little bit by now.”

  “Yeah, it was mine—but please don’t pass that around. I don’t want the world to know,” I whispered, pulling at the worn pages of the book.

  “I would never tell. I mean that was obviously something very personal,” she observed, and I turned to face her.

  “You think it was obvious to everyone?” I desperately tried to keep my voice level.

  “No, it just looked like you were being ballsey to Knightley…but that’s not what it was—was it?”

  “What are you suggesting?” I said, my voice a whisper.

  “Knightley pretty much came to your rescue at homecoming and with your reaction and all…Does he know a bit more about you than most of us?” she suggested, and her face was filled with fearful anticipation.

  “W—what do you mean?”

  “Like something only the teachers know?”

  I tried not to look too relieved that she had not suggested something much deeper and far closer to the truth.

  “Yeah…”

  “You can tell me, you know. I might be able to help.”

  I couldn’t help but scoff; she couldn’t raise the dead.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t mean to do that. If I tell you, will you promise on Brad’s life that you won’t tell a soul?”

  She nodded her head, and I believed her. Her face didn’t look like she was looking for idle gossip—it seemed that she genuinely cared.

  “My parents are both dead.”

  “So you live with a foster family?”

  “No, I live alone. They died when I was sixteen, and I became a legal adult and have been fending for myself since then,” I explained.

  “Oh, god…how did they…you know…die?”

  “They were found in their car.”

  “Died on impact?” she asked, filling in blanks for herself. It was easier to let her do that.

  “I can only hope they didn’t suffer, but I don’t know.”

  She nodded her head and took a deep breath. “That’s heavy.”

  “Please don’t tell anyone.” I shrugged because it was now just a part of my life, and I didn’t know what else to do.

  “I won’t…so, no Thanksgiving or Christmas or birthday? You have no one? No grandparents or aunts or uncles or anything?”

  “I have my god parents, but I decided to live on my own,” I explained. Why? I wasn’t sure anymore.

  “It must be hard to let people in, with losing everyone you love?”

  “You have no idea,” I sighed, leaning my head on her shoulder as I gave into her friendship.

  “Thank you…” she replied, resting her head on mine, “for letting me in.”

  “Jaz—you might be alright,” I whispered as I closed my eyes.

  “Besties forever?”

  “Sure,” I replied, distracted by a flash of mermaid hair through the books. “Did you see a chick with weird hair when you came in?”

  “Yeah, she was a couple rows down.”

  “What did she look like?”

  “Don’t know. I didn’t see her face. Just that hideous hair,” Jaz commented, her eyes wide.

  “Pretty awful, huh?” I laughed as I tried to shake the feeling in my stomach that she had been watching me yet again.

  “The Little Mermaid rang; she said she wants her wig back.” Jaz burst out in laughter.

  “You think she’s new here?”

  “Maybe, but maybe not…there’s about twelve hundred students that go here.”

  “I swear Lily said she didn’t go here…” I replied.

  “You talked to Lily? She hates you!”

  “Remember over winter vacation she saw me at the mall? She was with the dye disaster that day,” I explained as I looked around the book shelf but saw no one.

  “I’m sure there is more than one person with that color hair. I mean plenty of girls dye their hair that color,” Jaz reassured me as her eyes questioned my face. I could tell she believed it as much as I did.

  Chapter 39

  Somehow the whole school had managed to fit into the auditorium and while some were falling asleep, I sat erect next to Jaz as we listened to the superintendent.

  “Ashley was a wonderful girl, full of spirit and nice to everyone. Last week she was murdered at the Winter Formal. You all know this and we know it’s been hard to come to school again, but we feel it is only right to tell you the truth.”

  “Feels like he’s Dumbledore and Cedric just got killed by Voldermort,” Jaz whispered into my ear.

  “Are we going to have every novel played out at this school?” Brad commented as he rolled his eyes and sunk deeper into his chair.

  I didn’t want to be here right now, but I couldn’t think of any place I really wanted to be. Tad wasn’t looking at me, let alone speaking to me and every time someone coughed I jumped into the air as if I was strung out on drugs. Just what I needed—people thinking I was on drugs. Every part of me tingled in fear, and I wondered if eventually I would just get used to it. I wondered if eventually I just wouldn’t feel any more. My emotions were spent. I felt like there was nothing left to me but sadness and empty holes where the ones I loved had been cut out of me like paper snow
flakes.

  “You look super pale Vera,” Jaz noticed as she nudged me with her elbow.

  My phone vibrated in my pocket, and I lowered myself in the chair to avoid any of the teachers seeing the shine of the text message.

  “Trouble sleeping,” I muttered in response.

  “Dude, that’s everyone right now,” Brad said as he squeezed Jaz’s hand.

  TEXT FROM TAD

  Teachers’ bathroom 5 min, 2nd floor

  I looked at the wall where the teachers were standing and found Tad looking at me. I nodded my head in reply, and he whispered something to a fellow teacher before he exited the room.

  “I’m going to go to the bathroom—cover for me?” I asked Jaz, biting my lip innocently.

  “I can go with?” she suggested.

  “Nah, I’m fine by myself. I just need a few. This is heavy for me. I mean, I found her…”

  Jaz nodded her head, her lips sympathetic.

  “Bathroom?” I mouthed to the teacher who raised an eyebrow at me. She nodded her head, and I continued out.

  As I rushed up the stairs my heart hammered in my chest—what was going on? I looked over my shoulder before slipping into the teachers’ single bathroom. As soon as I was in the room Tad slipped his arm around me and locked the door. I leaned back against the door with his hands on either side of me.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  “Screw logical Vera,” Tad whispered, and his lips found mine. I was helpless to make it stop because I didn’t want it to stop.

  “Tad,” I gasped when I got a breath.

  “I love you, and I don’t want to wait. Can’t you just let this be my decision?” he asked as his ocean eyes begged me to understand, inches away from my own.

  I laid my hand on his cheek, “I love you too, but—”

  “But nothing—if you love me then why not be together?”

  “Because I love you, and I know you love teaching.”

  “I love you more,” he replied, and we were kissing again deeper than before. I realized I was helpless to keep us apart because I didn’t want us to be apart. It felt as though my whole body was electrified by his touch, and I pressed my body hard against his, my hands gripping his strong shoulders. He pushed back, his hands somehow soft against the skin of my face, but desperately passionate. He pulled away slowly and pressed his forehead against mine, his hand resting over my collar bone with his thumb caressing my neck. He took a deep breath. “So are we on the same page now?”