Riot Rules

by Callie Hart

  “You give me shit when I’m not paying attention. You give me shit when I’m paying too much attention. There’s just no pleasing you is there, Wesley.”

  “Well…” Fitz grins. “Since we’re being so diligent about using each other’s correct titles in this class, Doctor Fitzpatrick’s just fine, I think. It’s not really appropriate for a student to use my first name.”

  My turn to grin. “And we’d hate for there to be any impropriety between a student and teacher now, wouldn’t we?”

  Wren closes the eye he opened, throwing his arm back over his face; he’s totally unmoved by my little dig. Fitz, on the other hand, doesn’t have the same kind of poker face my friend does. His cheeks color. He sweeps a hand back through his hair in an action that might appear casual to the rest of the class but looks agitated as fuck to me.

  “Let’s just get on with our work, shall we? Since you’re so riveted by my class today, Lord Lovett, why don’t you come up here and play a little game. Give me a talking point about The Count of Monte Cristo. I think we should have ourselves a little debate.”

  Wrong choice of words. You don’t wanna play any games with me.

  Most of my classmates would argue about being charged with this task, but I don’t make a peep. I get up and head to the front of the class, giving Fitz a cold, distant smile as I position myself right next to him. With us all sitting on comfortable couches or in the moth-eaten wingback armchairs, it must be so easy for Fitz to feel like he’s in control. At six feet tall, he must feel like a giant as he towers over us all. Well, I’m standing right next to him now, and he ain’t got shit on me. I’m might be half your age, but I’m six-foot three, motherfucker, and a hell of a lot broader than you, too.

  Fitz clears his throat. He makes his way over to his desk and perches on the edge of it, folding his hands in front of him with an expectant look on his face. “Well? Do you have a debate topic in mind? Have you even read the book, Dash, or… are you just standing up here, wasting everybody’s time?”

  The claws are coming out, are they? Poor bastard does not like that I’m giving him a hard time. Likely, he’s afraid of what he thinks I know, and he’s trying to bully me into behaving myself. Well, I’m not one to be cowed. Maybe it’s about time Wesley Fitzpatrick figures that out.

  I face him down, a loose smile forming at the corners of my mouth. “You want a debate topic? How about the concept of inevitability in the book? I think that it’s inevitable that Edmond’s enemies will eventually succumb to his wrath. Edmond was scattered before he was locked away in that cell. But once he found himself trapped, he had nothing better to do than plan his revenge. His circumstances were such that he had nothing better to do but focus on that one, desperate urge. Misfortune is needed to plumb certain mysterious depths in the understanding of men,” I quote. “Pressure is needed to explode the charge. My captivity concentrated all of my faculties on a single point. They had previously been dispersed, now they clashed in a narrow space; and, as you know, the clash of clouds produces electricity. Electricity produces lightning…and lightning gives light.” I pin him down with a frosty stare. “Should I keep going?”

  Fitz massages his fingers into his temple, laughing with a little too much enthusiasm. “Well, damn. Very impressive. I should have known better than to challenge a man of your breeding over his knowledge of the classics. You had the entire works of Alexander Dumas memorized before you were six, didn’t you?” He shakes his head, still grinning like an idiot. “I actually feel bad for you. You probably didn’t have many friends when you were a kid, huh?”

  Ooh. Passive aggressive? Ill-advised, friend. Ill-advised. I flash him teeth. “Guess I didn’t. I s’pose that’s why my friends are so important to me now. I’m fiercely protective over them.”

  My threats aren’t even veiled anymore. I chose that quote from The Count of Monte Cristo for a reason; my attention wasn’t focused before. Wasn’t focused on him, but now that it is, it’ll only take the smallest nudge to spur me into action. The clash of clouds produces electricity. Electricity produces lightning…and lightning gives light. His actions will have consequences, and I am a consequence he does not want to have to deal with.

  “God, Lovett, what the hell are you doing?” Mara Bancroft, loudmouth extraordinaire, is sitting on a flower-print sofa next to Carina. “You’ve given us the topic. Sit down already. None of us signed up for a hallmark, ‘Gee golly gosh, I just love my friends so blinking much,’ moment from you.”

  The fake English accent she parrots is offensive. For starters, it’s a cockney accent, which sounds nothing at all like the BBC accent my father had drilled into me when I was a child. Going off Mara’s impression, she doesn’t know the difference between a distant member of the royal family and an extra in the cast of fucking ‘Oliver.’ I’ve never given her existence a moment’s thought before, but I do now…and I decide very quickly that I wouldn’t piss on her even if she was on fire.

  “Why don’t you go fuck yourself with a hep-infected dildo, Bancroft?” I enunciate to make sure she can understand me through my thick fucking English accent.

  All hell breaks loose. Mara’s jaw drops. She holds her hand to her chest, a scandalized look on her face, and the girls sitting on the front row all start squealing.

  “Oh my god! Fitz! You can’t let him say that! Oh my god!”

  More oh-my-gods follow. A couple of ‘that’s-sexual-harrassment!’s and ‘what a sick thing to say!’s are thrown in for good measure. The guys just laugh and elbow each other, catcalling and hurling balled up pieces of paper at Mara.

  Wren’s sitting up now, hands casually interlocked behind his head like he’s sitting on a beach recliner, waiting for the Piña Colada he ordered five minutes ago to arrive. There’s a tiny, amused smirk on his face. Pax’s glee is more overt. He’s lying flat on the ground, pointing finger guns at me like I just made his entire goddamn year. “Savage, Lovett. Fucking savage!”

  “Yeah, that was fucking savage.” Fitz sighs dramatically. “Alright, your Lordship. I’m a liberal guy most of the time but come on. That was a little much. You should apologize to Mara.”

  “Thank you for the offer, but I think I’ll decline.”

  Fitz looks surprised. “No apology?”

  I shake my head. “Nope.”

  “Alright then.” He walks around the other side of his desk and takes a bright pink pad out of the top drawer. The class mutinies as he scribbles away, tosses his pen down, rips the top sheet of paper from the pad and hands it over to me. “Congratulations. You are now the recipient of the first official detention I’ve had to issue all year. I hope you’re proud of your accomplishment.”

  I accept the piece of paper, bowing with a flourish. “I’m fucking ecstatic.”

  15

  CARRIE

  “What an asshole. Can you believe he said that to me? And what the fuck was Wren doing, anyway? He just sat there, smiling like a madman. He should have knocked him out or something. That’s what any normal guy would have done.”

  Lunch is almost over, and Mara’s still ranting about Dash telling her to go fuck herself with a hep-infected dildo. The only time she’s stopped ranting about it is when she’s jammed some of her Waldorf salad in her mouth and she can’t talk because she’s chewing.

  I sip on my O.J. wishing with all my might that she’ll change the subject but knowing for sure that she won’t. “Wren isn’t normal though, is he? That’s the point. None of them are fucking normal. Dash is rude as hell and thinks he can say whatever the hell he feels like. So, yeah.” I nod for emphasis. “Yeah, I can believe he said that to you. Because he’s a shit. And Wren is a shit. And Pax is a shit.”

  “Pax what?” Pres’s eyes are wide as she sits down next to Mara. You’d think she’d have had her fill of Pax Davis after the way he spoke to her at that party, but nope. She’s just as besotted with him now as she ever was. Even overhearing his name in the academy dining hall has her ears pricked and her pupils dila
ted.

  “Pax nothing. We’re not talking about Pax,” Mara snaps. She sounds like a child, testy and petulant. “We’re talking about Dashiell Lovett, and how absolutely detestable he was to me in this morning’s English class. Where were you, anyway?” Mara sends an accusatory glance Presley’s way, like she’s personally offended that she wasn’t in class to defend her honor.

  Presley’s cheeks color. “My mom’s in town. She took me to the doctors and…” She’s crimson. “She put me on the pill. She hacked into my email account and read some of the fanfic I’ve been sending to my friend back home.”

  I say, “Fanfic?”

  Mara says, “The pill?”

  Presley looks like she’s about to die of embarrassment. “Okay. Yeah. So what? I write fanfic. It’s not like I publish it online or anything. The only person that reads it is Sarah, and she’d never show it to anyone.”

  “You’re skipping the part where your mom put you on birth control, Pres,” Mara repeats.

  “Why’s that such a big deal? You’re both on the pill.”

  “We are, you’re right. But I have a lot of sex, and Carrie’s periods were all jacked up. Why would you need to go on the pill because of some story you wrote?”

  For all her experience and street-smarts, Mara can be a little dense sometimes. “Because the story was full of sex,” I say. “Graphic sex. And Pres’ mom doesn’t want her only daughter getting knocked up at high school. And…oh…oh no. Presley. What’s your fanfic about? Tell me it doesn’t star a guy named Pax?”

  “No,” she says haughtily. “His name, if you must know, is Dax, and the whole story is completely unrelated to my life here at Wolf Hall.” If this is how she sounded when she tried to sell this lie to her mother, it’s no wonder she’s now on birth control.

  Mara’s eyes dance with mischief. She leans closer to Pres conspiratorially. “What color is the girl’s hair in this story of yours, you little tramp?”

  “It’s red. Whatever! Stop laughing! Red hair is far more common than you think!”

  “I want to read this outrageous work of smut,” Mara declares.

  “No. No way. Absolutely not.” Pres shakes her head so violently that she nearly shakes herself right out of her seat. “Mom made me delete the emails anyway. They’re gone now.”

  “I’m not as gullible as your mom, friend. You fish that shit out of the trash folder this instant.”

  “No!”

  Poor Presley. Since freshman year, we’ve been strongarmed and coerced into giving Mara whatever Mara wants, and doing whatever Mara wants. It’s admirable that she’s sticking up for herself and saying no this time, but I’m also wondering how long it’ll last. When Mara sets her sights on something, she’s like a dog with a bone; she won’t give up.

  “Excuse me.”

  I look up and my breath saws out of me. My smile disappears. Wren Jacobi is standing next to our table with a takeaway coffee cup in his hand and he’s looking right at me. My tongue feels like it’s made of sandpaper. His eyes are an unsettling shade of green—so vivid, they don’t look real. A random feather pokes out of the breast pocket of his midnight black button-down shirt. “Carina, right?” He slants his head on an angle, like he’s an alien, still trying to figure out how human body language works.

  “Uhh…Wren?” Mara waves a hand in front of my face, trying to get his attention. He turns a look on her so blank that it sends a chill up my spine. Mara beams coquettishly, though, choosing to ignore it. “Oh, hi. Yeah, remember me? I’m the girl you’ve been texting with. Mara? We’re going on a date tonight. You invited me to hang out?”

  Wren looks confused. He takes a sip out of his coffee cup. “I know who you are.”

  “Okay. So…?” Mara shrugs, holding her hands in the air. “What are you doing? Why are you hitting on my friend right in front of me?”

  A warped bark of laughter flies out of his mouth. “Hitting on her? I’m not hitting on her. I asked her if her name was Carina.”

  “You know it is,” I say through clenched teeth. “What do you want, Wren?”

  His gaze moves back to me, suddenly more focused. “Nothing much. I just realized that we didn’t really know each other, you and I. What’s your story?”

  “What’s my story?” If I sound at all incredulous, it’s because I fucking am.

  “Yeah. Where are you from? Why are you here? Are your parents military?”

  Okay, what’s going on right now? I ask the question in my head. Mara asks it out loud. “Hey! Jacobi! What the fuck? You haven’t asked me a single question about myself. You’re giving Carrie the third degree, and you’re somehow not hitting on her?”

  “I already know everything I need to know about you.”

  She throws herself back into her chair. “Is that so? Where do I come from, then? Why am I here? Are my parents military?”

  “None of that’s relevant.”

  “Why not?” Her voice is three octaves too high; the people at the table next to us are looking.

  “Because you’ve made your intentions perfectly clear.” He points his coffee cup at her. “You want me to fuck you. You want my dick in your mouth and my fingers in your pussy. That’s all I need to know about you.”

  Her jaw hits the floor for the second time today. This time, my jaw joins hers. Pres stares down at her food, her neck and chest turning a splotchy red. “What the…?” Mara gasps.

  “Have you asked shit about me?” he asks. “Do you know one thing about me that you’ve learned through a conversation we’ve had, where you were trying to get to know me?”

  Mara flusters.

  “Because the texts you’ve sent me are borderline pornographic. Not really polite chit-chat. I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with that. I love a good picture of a cunt as much as the next guy—”

  Mara rockets up out of her seat, twin circles of humiliation staining her cheeks. Her bottom lip wobbles in a troubling way that spells tears. “What is it, pick on Mara day? You’re disgusting. I sent that to you in private!”

  Wren remains devoid of any and all emotion. He downs another mouthful of coffee. “Not smart, sending intimate photos of your body to guys you hardly know.”

  “You sent me a photo of your dick!” Mara’s officially crossed the line into hysteria: population one. “If I’m not smart for sending you a nude, then what does that make you?”

  He flashes her a wolfish smile. “That was actually Mark Wahlberg’s dick. I found it on the internet.”

  “Who the hell is Mark Wah—oh my God!” Mara storms away from the table, leaving her phone, and her bag, and her Waldorf salad behind.

  Wren watches her go with a sociopathic level of apathy. He does look disappointed when he tries to take another swig of coffee and he realizes that his takeaway cup is empty, though. He sets it down on the table and turns his attention back to me again. “So. Where are you from again?”

  Holy fucking hell. You’ve got to be kidding me. “Why on Earth would you want to know that?”

  “Dash has been pretty pally with you recently. I figured it’d be nice if I got to know a little more about you, too. Since one of my best friends has taken an interest in you, y’know?”

  This has to be some sort of joke. “Dash has not been pally with me, believe me. And the way you just spoke to Mara was fucking hideous. You see that, right? Go away!”

  He just smiles.

  Smiles, and walks away.

  Presley clears her throat. “This might not be the best time to bring this up…but I gotta say, I always feel so invisible when this kind of shit goes down.”

  ‘On edge’ doesn’t come close to describing my mood for the rest of the afternoon. I’m agitated. Antsy. Neurotic. Panicked. And not because Wren Jacobi was kind of rude to me. I have way more important things to be worried about.

  I suffer my way through History and Spanish. Dash isn’t in either of those classes, which is great and also really inconvenient at the same time, because I dread seeing
him but I also really need to speak to him more and more with every passing second. Luckily, I know where he’s going to be once my final class of the day lets out. While all of my fellow classmates surge for the exits, thrilled that it’s a Friday and they’re allowed off academy grounds, I am the only fool trying to make their way to the library.

  Mrs. Lambeth is closing up when I arrive. In the process of trying to finesse the lock on the door, the elderly librarian jumps when I appear on the other side of the glass. “Lord in Heaven above, child. I damn near screamed. What on Earth are you doing, leaping out on a person like that?”

  “I’m sorry, Mrs. Lambeth. I wanted to get a head-start on my assignments. If I get them all done now, I’ll be free to enjoy my weekend.” Technically, the library’s supposed to stay open until six p.m. during the week, but it’s rare that any of us use it once the bell goes. We have online access to most of the material we need for our homework, and desks to study at in the privacy of our own rooms. Plus, the library is supposedly super freaking haunted, and I’ll admit to being highly creeped out here once it gets dark.

  Mrs. Lambeth is not impressed. “I’m cataloguing new additions, Miss Mendoza. You come in and it’ll be midnight before I get around to it.”

  “You can catalogue! I’ll be reading and researching, I swear. It’s just me. I don’t need a babysitter. What trouble could I possibly get myself in?”

  She harumphs. “Funny you should ask. Joseph Quentin used academy computers to pay for methamphetamine on the dark web last month.”

  For fuck’s sake. If she doesn’t let me into the library, it won’t be the end of the world, but it will mean that I’ll have to wait an extra hour and a half to get answers. I don’t think I can wait that long. My head will explode, and the custodians will be mopping up brain matter from the floor if I’m forced to tolerate this level of anxiety for much longer.