Rowan
24
I ended the call and set my phone down harder than necessary. It hit the kitchen table with a dull thud, the screen going dark as I leaned back in the chair.
It was a short conversation. Polite, professional, kind enough. Pastoral Care calls always were. But the message underneath all the careful phrasing was clear. I wasn't ready. My sick leave was being extended until the start of the next term, and they'd check in again after the new year to see if I was in a better headspace.
Until then, I was on a mental health break, with averystrong suggestion that I see a therapist.
I knew they were right. Hell, I could barely force myself to open the door whenever Eli popped in. I'd never survive standing in front of a classroom full of teenagers. The idea of stepping outside felt impossible again. Whatever ground I'd gained had been stripped away in a heartbeat.
Frustration and guilt knotted my stomach. I'd let myself slip. One bad night had spiralled into another stretch of silence and avoidance and flickering panic. I was right back where I started, and now someone else had to step in and tell me I wasn't fit to do my job.
I pushed up from the chair with a huff and made my way to the stove. My hands needed something to do, so I filled thekettle and flicked the switch. Tea wouldn't fix anything, but it gave me a few minutes of distraction. I grabbed a mug from the shelf and pulled out a bag of Earl Grey, trying to focus on the small motions – unwrapping the tea bag, dropping it in the cup, adjusting the handle so it faced outward. As ifthatmattered.
Now that I didn't have any lesson plans or schoolwork to keep me busy, my mind would wander into places I didn't like. I couldn't even get out of my head for five damn minutes.
What were my students thinking? I hadn't been in class at all this year. Stories had to be circling, and some of those kids weren't exactly known for discretion. They'd probably come up with a hundred outlandish versions of what happened.
And the staffroom... God, I could imagine the looks. The awkward silence when my name came up. The pity. The discomfort.
If I ever did manage to crawl my way out of this, even if I could get a handle on the panic and Marcus finally pissed off for good, how was I supposed to walk back into that school? How was I supposed to stand in front of a class and pretend nothing happened when half the room had to be wondering what broke me?
Even Eli was starting to show the strain. I noticed it a few days ago when he dropped by with the shopping. He moved slower, didn't crack a single joke, and the usual warmth in his voice was thinner. And when he smiled, it looked forced now.
I didn't need to ask him about it. I already knew I was the reason.
That thought gnawed at me as the kettle started to boil. He was trying so hard to hold this together, to holdmetogether, and now it was starting to wear him down. I hated that. I hated knowing I was the weight dragging him under. I was supposed to get my own shit sorted, but instead, he was shouldering the fallout.
A spark of worry caught in my chest and twisted intosomething else. Guilt, frustration, anger. At myself. I should've had a handle on this by now. It shouldn't take this much out of him just to keep me from falling apart.
The kettle started to beep. I poured the water and let the tea steep, watching the dark bloom spread through the cup like it might spell out a solution if I stared at it long enough.
It didn't, of course. I wasn't a fucking witch.
I wrapped my hands around the mug and tried to centre myself. I couldn't keep letting Eli carry this. I didn't know how the hell to fix it, but I couldn't keep staggering around waiting for him to hold me up.
Marcus wouldn't disappear if I ignored him. That much was obvious now. But pushing back would make him lash out again, so I had to find a way to stand my ground without starting a fire I couldn't put out. Because if I didn't, Eli would burn himself out trying to hold the line for both of us. I couldn't live with that.
I took a sip of the tea. It burned a little on the way down, but at least the heat gave me something to focus on that wasn't the jumbled mess in my head.
I heard a faint noise at that moment. Just loud enough to catch my attention. I paused and tilted my head to listen. It wasn't a knock. It was too soft and inconsistent. There was a ... a quiet scrape? Then a click... And another click.
I set the mug down and moved slowly into the sitting room, trying to keep my breathing steady. The closer I got to the front door, the clearer the sound became. The lock was jiggling.
Someone was trying to make it open.
I froze. For a second, all I could hear was the thud of my own pulse in my ears. I forced out a breath and tried to rationalise it. There was an old bloke who lived upstairs who mostly kept to himself and had a few episodes now and again. He once wandered into the stairwell with no trousers on. Maybe hewas confused again. Maybe he thought this was his flat.
That made sense. That was reasonable. It was better than the alternative that my brain wanted to latch onto.
I grabbed my phone from the table and fumbled with the screen. I managed to find the camera app Eli had set up for me, but before I could open it, the noise stopped.
I waited.
Nothing.
My shoulders started to relax. It was just a mix-up. No need to panic over it. I could let it go.
