Eva folded her arms across her chest and tilted her jaw. “Have you been stalking me?”
Lily snorted, but her amusement faded as she watched a sculpted brow inch toward Eva’s hairline. “Of course not. Is this because I saw you over the weekend?” Seeing Eva while running errands with Daisy hadn’t been how Lily had expected her Saturday to go, although she felt like she knew Eva better. Mei had said Eva was notoriously private, but Lily had learned three things in a single week.
One: Eva liked strong, bitter coffee with enough caffeine in it to incapacitate a small child, which Lily didn’t find too surprising. Two: when she wasn’t at work, she still dressed like she worked for a fashion magazine. The pantsuit she’d been wearing at the grocery store wouldn’t have looked out of place in a photoshoot, as did today’s black and white patterned dress. Three: she wasn’t completely soulless, bantering with the woman she’d been with, a fond look in her eye. Lily assumed it was her mother, and she wondered if she had anything to do with the reason Eva had swapped Georgetown for Greenfield.
Not that she’d ever dare to ask, considering Eva was giving Lily daggers over a beverage.
“Yes. And you’re offering me weirdly specific coffee.”
“I didn’t realize it was weirdly specific to notice things about other people,” Lily said. “Of course I’m not stalking you. I thought it would be a nice gesture—”
Eva cut her off. “It’s not. It’s weird.”
“Right. I’ll take this coffee and be on my way, then.”
“By all means.”
“Have fun spending another lunch alone.” Lily spoke more viciously than intended and had to bite back the apology that threatened when Eva blinked at her in surprise. Turning on her heel, Lily retreated to the safety of the other side of the cafeteria. Not wanting to let the coffee go to waste, she drank from both cups as she watched the kids, washing the bitter taste of Eva’s away with a sip of her own.
Lily wasn’t alone for long, soon approached by two members of the English faculty she’d briefly spoken to the previous week. If she remembered correctly, Steph was the older of the two white women, her hair streaked with gray and large square-framed glasses perched on her nose, and Paige was the blonde with a shy smile.
“You’re a braver woman than I am,” Steph said, coming to stand at Lily’s shoulder. “No one else would dare approach her.”
Lily followed the path of Steph’s gaze to Eva. She was pacing the opposite wall of the cafeteria, arms still folded across her chest and her jaw clenched, and Lily felt sorry for the next person to cross her path. Her gaze was drawn to Eva’s legs, long and shapely beneath the black pantyhose, and Lily hated herself for noticing.
How could someone with such an acidic personality look so good? It wasn’t fair.
“She’s not so bad.” Lily tore her gaze away and was met with disbelief from her companions.
“Are you ser—” Paige paused when they heard a commotion from across the hall, the cafeteria falling silent as everyone turned toward the noise. A few feet away from Eva, a student was on the floor, another two standing nearby sneering.
The quiet meant the whole room heard the words that followed.
“Watch where you’re going, dyke.”
The student who had fallen scrambled to their feet, cheeks pink and their eyes glossy with tears, and Lily recognized Macie from her sophomore class.
As the closest member of staff, Eva sprang into action, a chill in her voice that could freeze blood in a vein. “What did you say?” Eva stepped toward the two sneering students, her face white with fury and her eyes stormy. When no reply came, she snapped her fingers in front of their faces. “I asked you a question.”
Macie used the opportunity to hurry from the room, her gaze fixed on her shoes, and Lily didn’t think before following her.
“Macie!”
Macie paused at the end of the hall, swiping at her wet cheeks with the back of her hand.
“I was going to ask if you were okay, but that’s a dumb question. Do you want to sit in my room for a while? Get yourself together?”
“I…”
Behind them, they heard Eva’s voice through the closed doors. “Both of you outside now.”
“Okay,” Macie said, sniffling as Lily reached her, escorting her toward science with a gentle hand on her elbow. “Thank you.”
“Has this kind of thing happened before?” Lily was hesitant to ask in case Macie didn’t want to talk about it, but if it was a recurring issue it needed to be reported.
Lily opened her classroom door and ushered Macie inside when she nodded. She sat in her usual seat on the front row, and Lily offered her a tissue from the box she had on her desk. “How often?”
Macie shrugged. “Every once in a while. I wasn’t…I wasn’t ready to come out, but I got caught kissing a girl at a party last year. I was stupid.”
