For a moment, she just flicks and flicks and flicks her hands, until there are no more droplets to spring free.
I rinse the soapy suds from between my fingers.
Finally, she speaks—and it isn’t at all what I expected, “I thought Landon was with you.” Her delicate voice glides like silk, and I want nothing more than to grab a pair of scissors and hack at it.
The look I throw at her is unimpressed, but the snap of my voice is utterly annoyed, “What?”
The gloss of her nails shimmers as she reaches for the dispenser, and she slides out a paper towel. “He isn’t in the mess hall.”
I blink at her, then turn my cheek with a slight shake of my head. “And that’s my business, why?”
The dullness of my gaze matches my tone, my sagged shoulders, the overall aura of energy vampire I’m wearing today.
But that doesn’t deter Asta.
“Aren’t you two the best of friends now?”
There it is.
The reason she stalled and loitered. To wait until she had me trapped, then launch her attack.
Thankfully, Asta’s attacks are words.
Vicious, but words, and in the face of the true threat, the unavoidable consequences of the interview, Asta isn’t all that intimidating anymore.
“Or is that you and Serena?” she adds, and there it is, the shift from silk to a sword.
A sigh deflates me.
I finish rinsing my hands, then turn off the tap. “I don’t spend much time with them, actually.”
It’s true.
Not a peace offering, not an excuse, just a fact.
Landon and Serena might be trying their best to fit into my shadow, but I’m quick moving, and I’ve learned in my time at the academy to be as evasive as possible within these walls.
Avoiding is my specialty.
I hit the slopes with Landon over the weekend.
Mildred’s attack on me gave me the excuse to stick to my dorm. It has only been a couple of days, but in those days I’ve made sure to hide out from the Snakes and the dangers that come with them.
As far as I’m concerned, I haven’t stolen any of Asta’s friends.
Her scoff is as delicate as a chime. “If she isn’t with Oliver, she is with you nowadays. How things change over a single winter.”
My face contorts, and I lift the look to the mirror.
The fright of my reflection should startle me.
I’m certain I ran a brush through my hair this morning before running off to Star Theory, but my hair has apparently forgotten that.
Strands are pilled and pulled from the ponytail, wisps around my face, and not in the cute way, and—is that a crumb?
I lean over the sink and, with wet fingers, pick out a small piece of white burrowed into the thickness of my limp ponytail.
My mouth downturns.
