Before I knew it, seven months passed, and I barely thought of the trial at all.
Well. That’s a lie.
But I didn’tspiral outabout the trial, which was, I suspect, Thio’s actual reason for encouraging this rivalry: distraction.
And that makes it all the more important that I propose to himfirst.
Not in Paris, or a portal dimension, or on an elaborate trip; too expensive. Not via pixie skywriting or over a romantic dinner; too cheesy.
As I stand in front of the component supply cabinet at work, vacantly staring at the jars of chalk dust, I beat my fingers on the shelf and go over all my plans. Again.
I know, after today, this competitive back-and-forth will come to a head, so I need to execute my proposal before he does. As far as I know, everything’s ready. Just waiting for my go-ahead.
But is it too obvious? Too simple?
I thump my forehead to the shelf.
Nothing’s worthy of him.
Nothing’s good enough for him.
My phone vibrates on my desk.
I jolt upright, cold sweat doing nothing to douse the frenetic energy that’s been humming through me all day. I could complain about the call breaking my concentration, but my concentration’sbeen nonexistent, and it’s a spreading virus; a fact proven by the way my two lab techs simultaneously leap away from the data they were supposed to have been entering and break into action like they’ve been rehearsing for this moment.
“Everyone,SHUT IT!” Olayra screeches, and the half dozen sectioned-off research areas in this long lab immediately go silent.
Skogrin snatches my vibrating phone, wheels my desk chair over, and thrusts both at me.
Heads pop out of the partitions separating our lab spaces. In the middle of the room, the department lead, Dr. Zuarashi, comes to the door of her office with a tentative smile.
The whole of Clawstar Lab’s attention is fixed on me.
And I’m staring at my phone in Skogrin’s hand, my anxiety so potent it’ll screw with whatever experiments are being run around me.
The screen saysDAD.
Thio wanted us both to take today off. But I’d nixed that real hard, nauseated by the thought of spending all day pacing our small apartment. Turns out that’s what I did anyway, only I swapped pacing our small apartment for pacing my small lab area, and now the phone’s buzzing and Thio isn’t with me.
No, that’s good. I don’t want him here. I told Dad to call me, not Thio.
I want the news first.
That shovels aside enough anxiety that I shudder in a breath and take my phone.
The pin-drop silence of the lab is suffocating. I want to glare at my colleagues for being nosy fuckers, but can I blame them? They’ve ridden this lawsuit with me practically my whole time at Clawstar, whether getting updates from me directly or through the clickbait news articles it generated.
FORMER CAMP MERETHYL STUDENTS SUING OVER ALLEGED MISTREATMENT
I don’t know which word I hated more when that first headline popped up years ago.Allegedormistreatment. But it’s been four years ofheadlines way harsher than that, four years of public opinion shifting back and forth—Are they telling the truth? Are they lying for attention?Four years of waiting for the trial, then the actual trial itself, rehashing every detail of the summers that tried to break me, but I survived.
Isurvived.
And I’ll survive this phone call, too.
Heart in my throat, I answer and shove it to my ear.
Skogrin and Olayra grumble, clearly upset I didn’t put it on speaker, but I bat them away—they ignore me—and sink into my desk chair.
