Page 62 of A Dead Man's B-Side
I knew I was taking a risk, but after finding my book on the library bookshelf and listening to Thaddeus speak, I knew it was worth the caution.
Thaddeus knew more than he let on, but despite his impeccable poker face, I was almost sure he didn’t know this.
By the time I was finished, cleaning my blood off the sink and slipping the vial into my bag, the classroom door opened up.
I blinked away the whiplash I’d gotten from how fast I’d turned to look at the intruder and found Wolf staring back at me. I sagged at the relief of not finding Mr Browne standing at the entrance.
“What are you doing? Why do you look like a deer caught in headlights?” He narrowed his eyes suspiciously and moved closer, slowly.
I shrugged, giving him a half-truth to nibble on, “Just finished up with my task. Have you got your vial done yet?”
Wolf paused and looked around, as if he would find anything, as if I would make the rookie mistake of leaving anything behind. “No… no, I haven’t.”
I shrugged with both hands now in my pocket, choosing to leave him my parting gift of antagonizing him. “Keep procrastinating. That’ll do you good.”
He scrunched his face. “Why are you so… you?”
I rolled my eyes and threw my bag over my shoulder. “Like I’d be anyone else.” I followed quickly with, “You’re so dimwitted.”
“See!” He threw his arm out. “You’re so aggravating. Always picking a fight with me.”
I shrugged and leaned against the counter, a sense of amusement making me smile. “You get angry too quickly, it’s fun to watch.”
He huffed and threw off his uniform jacket, discarding it carelessly on a chair nearby. He thought it best to ignore me, so he did.
It took me a moment to realize that I’d blown off Mr Browne just to see him tomorrow morning. I didn’t bother with goodbyes as I hurried towards the door, but for reasons unknown to me, I looked back, and found Wolf bent down to the bottom drawers along the far wall, pulling out all sorts of material I hadn’t seen before; filters, tubes, and beakers that he placed on the counter above him.
Chapter Eleven
Alexandr Miroslav
1982
The tragedy of this story isn’t that from this point forward, there could have been another path to how it all ended. The tragedy is that it was always going to end the way it did.
The room was silent again, oddly enough.
I pulled the backwards cap I was wearing tighter over my head, as though someone would run over and try ripping it off.
Marigold seemed to be none the wiser that I’d used her secret to keep my own, and Rain didn’t seem to be keen on exposing our deal.
In exchange, I got to worry about one less person digging into things they shouldn’t.
Only a moment later, Thaddeus entered in a flurry of black, seconds after Ajax rushed in all red-faced and sweaty.
“Practice,” He mumbled his excuse like the six students facing him would demand an explanation for his apparent tardiness.
Thaddeus threw himself onto the seat facing us and stretched out his long legs with a deep sigh. Nobody spoke as he got comfortable, pulled out a cigar, and attended to lighting it.
When he was finished with his first puff, he focused on his bandof unconnectable puzzle pieces. “Has anyone heard of moral disarmament?”
I didn’t always feel left out when I didn’t understand something others did, but I’d known the feeling was there when relief washed over me at the sight of no hands raised.
I wasn’t particularly invested in academia like August or Rain, but I also wasn’t roaming in the lowest percentiles.
That had to count for something, I hoped.
Only recently did I find myself with enough free time and incentive to invest in completing readings and homework. But I was sure that if I applied myself, taking the advice of my old teachers I had thus far ignored, I could really make something of myself.
