Warm air smolders my skin doing poorly to stave off the chill clinging to the entirety of my being freezing me in shock.
"Study Session concluded."
"Privacy Shield going down."
Cyra's voice resounds tearing at the heated silence like a serrated blade. Saying things, I was too dazed to register, the clink of glass follows the smooth unwinding of the shield. The chill air pumping from the air conditioners swarm my booth in a strong gush erasing all traces of warmth.
I shiver at the sudden change in the temperature and raise my gaze to the scene outside my not so safe bubble.
Whispers and murmurs, I register only now permeate every corner of the hall, a few gazes still locked in my direction. I blink slowly to steady myself, the hushed voices falling into a pint drop of silence as everyone looks back in my direction without the barrier of the glass shielding.
I stiffen under the hatred and malice swimming in their eyes. For a moment, I expect them to lunge at me. Tear me into thousands of pieces. Pour all that hostility into my brittle bones. Crush me into smithereens and blow the dust away.
But, they don't. They just stare at me, the silence heavy with numerous unspoken things I really wish was never voiced.
The hatred, hostility and malice in their eyes does not lessen, does not disappear. It shifts with every second that passes. Shifts into something that mirrors hesistation, relutance….
No, no, no….
They can't believe that. It's not true, none of it is….
"She's not my mother…" Fighting the knot in my throat, I speak up my voice only a trembling whisper that barely reaches my ears.
I don't wait for a response or a reaction, I move. Tremors coursing through me as I stand to my feet, my fingers shaking with horror to tighten my grasp around my bag. Ducking under their gazes, I run.
The sneers and cold chuckles ring about the hall at my actions. But, I don't care. It does matter. None of it does under the shadowy fingers of fear squeezing at my lungs, leaving me breathless with tears burning in my eyes.
I run. I don't look back. Through the grand stairs, the lobby and into the warmth of the sunny afternoon wind.
That woman. There's no way she's my mum.
Mum was warm, sweet, kind and everything the woman in the picture wasn't.
The wind whip at my hair throwing it into my eyes but my legs don't register the obstruction. I cut into the alley behind the library and in the distance students laze around.
The air was charged and just like in the library everyone stared into their phones, face tight with tension. The current sharpens the moment they catch sight of me.
"My, oh my…. what do we have here?" Cruel laughter blares through the silence and every head whips in my direction. Their gazes surround me, scrutinizing, dissecting and unravelling in seconds.
I flinch.
My legs rooted under the predatory calm in their eyes as they stalked toward me. Not restraining, not obstructing my way. Just everywhere.
Left.
Right.
Front.
Behind.
A wave of dizziness crashes into me and I stagger several feets backward
"Tsk tsk tsk.." A red-haired tsks softly in amusement.
"The rumours were true…she's …delicate…." A male student eyes me with interest. Particularly careful with his words.
"Oh please, fuck the bullshit." Someone mocks loudly.
"She's pathetic." A voice concludes firmly in dismissal.
I look between them, their features hazy from the constant throbbing in my head. Mustering everything in me, I walk in amidst their scrutiny eyes forward, fighting the urge to fall to the ground in panic that threatens to claw it way out of my chest.
"Oh, she's running."
"She better."
"I still can believe she SK's"
"Expected some grit, this is just so…."
"We haven't done anything and she's barely standing."
"This session will truly be interesting."
Their voices ring endlessly in my ears like crashing tides. I stumble blindly toward the outdoor reading stalls behind the library. Collapsing into the cold marble of the very last stall, I slam the door shut with the very little strength left in my trembling fingers.
"NO. NO. NO!!" I shriek but the voices only echoes louder in the silence.
I back further into the dimly lit space, crawling deeper until I'm pressed into the solid gravelstone. There is nowhere left to run
HAAAAAA
Tears well up, stinging my red, puffy eyes and a ragged, choking cry of anguish tears from my throat breaking me into a thousand tiny pieces.
NO NO NO
I clutch my head, my nails digging sharply into my scalp.
"It's all a lie…"
"It can't be..
"Lies. They are all lies…"
Mumbles of fragmented thoughts slip from my lips.
The pictures, the whispers and those words clashing into a chaotic whirlpool in my head.
She is not MUM.
She is not MY Mum.
She is NOT my Mum
The broken, fervent chant of my hiccuping voice fills the small space curling around me in tendrils of fear that traps me deeper into the abyss I was sinking into.
'It can't be, Mum is nice, sweet, soft, kind….and human. Something the people here will never be. That …lady she may look like her but she's nothing like her.' I wipe away my tears, nodding in resolute affirmation.
"Yes. That's it. They are just look-a-likes. It's all merely a concidence." I whisper, my voice firm with conviction, the frantic thumping and heaving of in my chest dissolving into a distant memory.
"Where's the fun if I tell you."
"Save your breath, Lil.
That little, brilliant mind of yours will never be able to figure out why.
It's way beyond you, so why don't you just go with flow?
It's futile.
As even your scariest nightmares will never prepare you for it."
Eave's playful voice replays in my head with ear-piercing clarity than I thought possible, the beating of my heart, my steadying breaths, the persistent sniffles escaping my mouth, the soundlessness of the silence all fades into an icy stillness freezing me in place, my clenched fists falling lifelessly beside me.
"Eave…" I call out weakly, my voice a shattered whisper in the sudden, odd quiet in my head. All the thoughts, denial, emotions, and belief retreat into the recessed corners of my mind leaving a quiet I've never experienced.
She knew.
She doesn't respond but I know.
She heard me.
The tears continue down my cheek but this time I don't try to stop them. I let them fall as I stare wordlessly at nothing.
It all made sense.
Perfect Sense.
Mum trusting Jack.
Trusting all this.
Ignoring my concerns.
Sending me away whether I liked it or not.
We weren't deceived.
"I was deceived." I whisper, my eyes dead and slumping weakly into the cold, marble floor.
In that moment, all the frustration, tension, anxiety, denial, fear and longing dissipates, leaving behind a single, terrifying truth.
She lied to me.
Mum lied to me.
HAA
A low, agonizing sob breaks past my lips and like a dam broken bit by bit– tiny, incomprehensible sounds of agony fills the quiet room before it all comes crashing. Waves and waves of emotions threaten to drown me from the inside out even as I lay in a pool of my tears.
"Why..."
She could have said something.
A hint.
A letter.
A Riddle.
Anything but she let me walk in here with nothing.
Why?
'There must be a reason. She must have had one. Mum will never do anything to hurt me. She loves me the most in this world…' The tiny, optimistic part of me that survived the wreck that was left of me spoke.
Alive and hopeful as always.
'Yes, you can't just jump to conclusions Lil.' She scolds and I nod weakly, holding tightly to the strands of hope in the ocean of betrayal I was drowning in.
I can't jump into conclusions. Mum must have her reasons. It not necessary the lady in the picture is Mum. There are myriad of possibilities.
A doppelganger
A twin
An older sibling.
But, definitely not Mum.
She's nothing like them.
Nodding to reassure myself, I wipe away the tears and snot coating my cheeks with the back of my hands.
Sniffles escape the depth of my throat no matter how hard I try to swallow them down. Fingers still trembling with fear, I reach for the depths of my pocket. The bright glare of my phone light makes me squint.
I gulp in terror at the blog post on my current tab. I hadn't closed it.
I hadn't finished it.
My eyes grow misty at the headlines, views skyrocketing with every breath I take. Tingles scald my scalp, a shudder of trepidation raking through me as I scroll down
….
Yes, you guessed right. It's the Role Model, darlings!!!
It's her. The one and only…. Sylvia Kestrel.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah..
Shocking, I know. But right now, it is picture-perfect. SK going completely MIA from the public eye 17 years ago? It totally makes sense now.
Real question is; Will our lil Miss. Misfit lives up to the legacy.
Side Remarks: Not so promising…
The little viral videos of her are nothing to write home about!
Ha!
How do the great Kestrels and Halecrests feel about that…
Honestly, I would be spitting blood if I were in their place of both Patriarchs.
What a waste of genes, Indeed!!
Let's not forget. Missy is in over her head about 'escaping'.
My horror at her naivety..
Completely clueless, isn't she?
So ol' good me decided to spill the tea everyone's been gushing about
(Hope you like the official intro, young missy. Don't be shy, share your thoughts.)
The sarcastic message at the end makes me boil in rage. Whoever the hell she was, she just unveiled something so pers… scandalous about me and she expects me to thank her.
The audacity. I grit my teeth in anger, a surge of fury settling in the quiet void of my mind.
How dare they say such things about my mother.
Compare her to that she-devil…
For all I know, anyone held in high regard by these monsters-in-training could be the devil himself.
In this case, herself
How could I be so stupid to believe their words for moment. A stab of guilt pricks my heart, tears streaming down my cheeks once again for thinking such of Mum.
She's nothing like them.
Not like that lady. I gasp for air, aggrieved by my own accusations. How could I think for a second that Mum abandoned me to these monsters…
Or even concoct something as unimaginable that she 'could' be one herself.
Stronger than all I have ever felt, the extreme chokehold of guilt holds me by the throat leaving me breathless in a haze of disbelief, disappointment, and disdain at myself.
How could I….
The memories of Mum, tending to me when I was ill, smiling so gently and loving at me, putting me before herself..
Every single time.
Every moment she stood by me
Every ache she hid for my sake
Every sacrifice she thought I had no idea of…
Memories of our time together comes swarming up at me. Drowning me in a pool of guilt and self-hatred.
THUD
I fall into the messy mix of my snot and tears, the overwhelming grasps of my own guilt strangling me. The world around me glazes into fragmented cracks of memories that wounds me tighter in the webs of my horror.
My vision darkens with every passing second, my body convulsing weakly at the upheaval of emotions overriding everything in me. My consciousness wobbles before my eyes, the sudden weakness paralyzing my attempts to suck in air to my strangled lungs.
But, I don't fight it.
Too guilty to .
So, I succumb to the encroaching darkness.
'Maybe, I won't feel so bad when I wake up..'
Resigning to my weakness, my eye lids flutter close weakly in defeat,
BANG
The loud banging of the door snaps me out of my haze, rays of sunlight flooding the stall
"LILLIANA!" A familiar voice yells, a blurry figure standing by the door obstructing the light. In a moment of a breathe, a firm hand pulls me off the granite, supporting my weight against a sturdy frame..
The glare of the bright light finally dissipates and I look up to those golden eyes filled with worry.
"You!" I choke out through a parched throat.