by Sara Wolf
“Sure. Thanks.” I ooze past the groups of students leaning against the gold-etched walls talking, whispering, looking at their phones. No one’s sitting down, though. The roundtable is completely empty, except every chair has a backpack in it already. Like the seats are claimed. I awkwardly slide into the only free chair.
The chime-bell rings, and the teacher claps his hands with a smile. “Bonjour á tous.”
“Bonjour, Professor.” I jump out of my nerve endings as the entire class echoes him, accompanied by a cacophony of shuffling as everyone finally sits down. I open my notebook way past the creepy pages drawn by the little girl on the plane and write;
Note #1: Do not sit before the teacher greets the class, you steaming dingleberry.
Professor Guillard introduces me with the barest of sentences (Lilith Pierce from America, everyone, please treat her well) before barreling into a lecture. It’s weird not seeing the back of heads like in a normal classroom - I feel exposed. Everybody can see me, and I can see them. Equality? In my high school? It’s more likely than you think. Except then I see a bag on the table emblazoned on every inch with the tacky Chanel symbol, the diamond earrings dripping from a girl’s ears. Don’t let the roundtable and gum-free water fountains fool you, Lilith; this is a place where dreams of equality go to die. Or get put in a nursing home, at the very least.
I decide keeping my eyes on my own paper is my best bet. Everyone else takes quiet notes on their laptops or pads. Some doodle and some check Insta or Snapchat - but Professor Guillard doesn’t bat an eyelash. He sees them doing it - I know he does, because he walks slow circles around the table as he lectures. I expect him to bark a reprimand, to assign detention, but…nothing. Not so much as a ‘please pay attention’. There’s no blackboard, no whiteboard, no powerpoint. He just talks, mostly about the economic system of the Qing dynasty, drawing in Silk Road anecdotes and the maritime technology of the era. Suddenly he clicks a remote, and the lights dim and from the donut hole in the middle of the table a lightshow straight out of a club starts. A hologram, laser-painted in flickering green. It rotates in perfect 3D - a picture of a stone slab of some kind, with kanji on it. Nobody but me even blinks at it.
“Ooookay,” I breathe. “Ya’ll do this Star Wars stuff all the time, then?”
The neighboring brunette girl answers me by snapping the gum in her mouth softly and cleaning her nails with a file. Gum? Nail files? These rich kids get away with anything, don’t they?
“Miss Trevino,” Professor Guillard clears his throat. “Who was the longest reigning emperor in the Qing dynasty?”
The girl next to me barely looks up from her nail file as she says; “The Kangxi Emperor, Xuanye.”
“And how long did he reign?”
“1661 to 1722 A.D,” She says without missing a beat. “He’s the longest reigning emperor in all of Chinese history - famous for quelling the Revolt of the Three Feudatories and blocking Russia on the Amur River.”
I shove my eyes back into my sockets. Okay. So. Gum and nail files are clearly working for her. I get a better look at her; she’s gorgeous, with the same amazing bone structure and bright clear eyes everyone else here seems to have, but her prominent chin and graceful posture puts her a cut above the rest. She holds herself like a ballerina - a ballerina who knows a shit-ton about Qing China, apparently.
“Correct.” Professor Guillard smiles at her and goes back to the lecture seamlessly. The students don’t look like they’re paying attention, but they are. They know the answers to almost every question he asks, and they offer them freely. They laugh at his jokes instead of groaning at them. It’s like learning is actually…fun for them.
“Can’t relate,” I mutter to the spotless tabletop.
“Miss Pierce,” Professor Guillard says, and I instantly bolt upright in my chair.
“Yes? Uh, sir?”
Giggling goes around the room. Is ‘sir’ not the right word?
“Do you know the year the Qing dynasty fell?” The professor asks. “I’ll give you a hint - it was fairly recently, and there’s a war named after it.”
“Um,” I swallow, watching as dozens of hands shoot up at my hesitation. They all know the answer. “I’d love to, Professor, but the part of my brain that would usually hold history has been replaced by the lyrics to every Destiny’s Child song.”
The professor blinks. Rapidly. A quiet snicker ripples around the room, and my face heats. Abort, abort!
“Uhh,” I smile to hide the sheer pants-wetting fear. “1940?”
“Close,” He nods. “1912.”
“So, not close at all,” I deflate.
“It’s the attempt that counts, Miss Pierce. It’s a very brave thing, to answer a question you don’t know. Thank you.”
Guillard smiles, which makes me feel a hair better. I sit there staring at my aimless doodles for what feels like the rest of the class. Is this real life? A teacher…thanking me instead of getting disappointed with me? The ballerina girl next to me - Trevino was her last name? - scoffs audibly as we’re packing up after the bell.
“The American education system is as ineffective as I’ve heard it is, then.”
“Sorry?”
She looks at me like I’m a toddler to be pitied before she gets up and leaves. “Nothing.”
I’m sure she knows French - everyone here seems to. Yet she chose to say that under her breath in English, so I could understand it. Big yikes.
“Ah, the homework!” Professor Guillard calls after us, handing out papers to everyone making for the door. “Do all the essay questions, and I’ll be collecting them on Friday!”
I look down at the homework assignment in the bustling hallway - can’t read any of it. It’s all in…French? Swiss? God, I am an idiot; I don’t even know the difference. If there is any.
“Uh, Professor?” I call, but my robust frame is swept away by the jostling crowd and into the main hall. I heave a sigh - maybe I can bribe Ana into translating it? I should be grateful; at least the freakin’ lecture was in English.
“Damn you and all your moneybags, Will,” I clench my fist dramatically. “I could be skating by with C’s and eating shitty chili-dogs right now, but you had to come along and force-feed me linzer cookies and child prodigies.”
Everyone knows where they’re going. They stream around me, easy and knowing exactly what to do. Exactly what to answer. Exactly how to speak French-Swiss-whatever.
And then there’s me.
I wander off to the side of the hallway, the sound of clicking shoes and soft laughter echoing in the high ceilings. I blink back tears.
This shit sucks.
This shit fuckin’ sucks.
I wanna be home. I wanna be in a place where I understand things.
My teary eyes catch on the huge window on my right. Sanctuary. Or at least a break. I stare at the glass, forehead pressed on the coolness. Breathe, Lilith. Seven months. For Mom.
It’s the least you can do after all the pain you’ve caused her.
My knee feels heavy, but I ignore it.
I stare outside, trying to get lost in something other than my own head. The school’s Olympic-sized sapphire pool stands out like a gem embedded in the lawn. There’s a fenced-in pasture for riding class - the horses no bigger than toys with how far away they are. I try to pinch one between my fingers as a student in stuffy breeches and a helmet makes it jump over a railing, and it makes me feel a little better. The rose-maze is just over the hill, the gardeners standing on ladders and carefully trimming hedges kissed with little blossoms of color. Black roses, orange roses, and even a gorgeous white rose with a red center.
Sometimes, I begrudgingly guess, the color red can be pretty enough not to remind me of blood.
It’s not a phobia. Technically. Or at least that’s what the psychologist would’ve said if we could’ve afforded one after. After™. My life is, and has always been, divided by Before™ and After™ the incident. ‘Incident’. I scoff. Even after all t
hese years I still don’t know what to call it. Mom and I never do. It just exists between us, between the gaps in the conversation, between the pauses before we smile at each other.
Anyway.
It’s not a phobia. I just don’t like it. People say blood is one color but it’s three, actually. Dark red when it pools, bright red when it smears, and brown-red when it dries. It’s not a phobia of the color red. It’s just that certain reds remind me of how much I don’t like seeing blood. I’ve tried, in that way everybody tries to overcome their weaknesses by pretending they don’t exist. Blood’s under my skin. It’s on my pads when I have my period. Mom gets stress-nosebleeds. She comes home bloody after a car accident comes into the ER. I can’t be afraid of it. So I hold my breath and pretend I’m not.
And it’s worked. Thus far.
Beyond campus, the velvety green valleys of Switzerland roll for miles and miles, the stately fir trees and yellowing oak trees and perfect blue sky with its perfect white clouds sit pristine and untouched, like a postcard or a painting. It feels like a prison, but I gotta admit; it’s a gorgeous prison. It’s a whole other world. It’s nothing like any of the prep schools in LA. The students here aren’t anything like the trust fund party animals I’m used to seeing in their BMWs back home, who care about coke and getting laid and Insta and only coke and getting laid and Insta. These people at Silvere…they aren’t just rich. They speak languages. Multiple. They’re beautiful and worldly. They’re whip-smart. They don’t make stupid jokes during class, or answer things wrong. They’ve got Families™ who are princes and UN ambassadors. It’s like a whole different mindset. I feel like everyone’s thirty years old here and I’m twelve; the daughter of a nurse and a deadbeat, who only speaks one language and is used to instant ramen and beans and doesn’t know diddly-shit about Qing dynasty China.
This place isn’t for me, with its gorgeous white chateaus.
Well, four of them are white.
From this height, and this particular window, I can see the whole damn campus. The four chateaus grouped tight together in the center, and then one far off, peeking out from between pine trees. It’s smaller than even Knight Augustin, and half-hidden in the forest. Compared to its pristine kin it looks practically dilapidated - part of the roof’s collapsed in, the beveling and roman columns edged with moss like green rust. Some of the windows are boarded up, too. That’s gotta be Knight Durand, right? The one Von Arx said was being refurbished. The one Lionel asked her if they should have a meeting in. And that was weird. Who’d wanna have a meeting in that dump when there are four other chateaus way prettier and with, you know. Ceilings.
“Why are you here?”
I jump at the disdainful voice. Ballerina girl Trevino slides in opposite me, tucking herself against the windowsill. Her sheet of ash-brown hair shimmers in the sunlight, and even though she’s an inch or so shorter than me, the graceful way she carries herself makes her seem a lot taller. Her uniform is crisp, and she doesn’t tug her skirt down every two steps - she looks perfectly comfortable in it. I was too nervous to look at her face-on before, but now her deep indigo eyes focus on me - a blue so dark they almost look purple. Where was I when God was handing out the Sick-Ass Eyes? Not at this school, apparently.
“S-Sorry?” I blurt.
“Why are you here?” Trevino asks again, soft and slow, as if she has all the time in the world. Her accent sounds slightly British, too, like the beautiful sun-guy and Alistair - makes sense if you grew up with that as your closest English-speaking neighbor.
When I don’t say anything, she moves her eyes from me to the window, rosebud lips curling.
“I know you Americans like to make inappropriate jokes, but there are actual people here who want to learn.”
I blink. “Oh! You’re talking about the Destiny’s Child thing-”
“I’ll make this simple for you -” She cuts me off ruthlessly. “- There’s no place at Silvere for people like you. It’s a place for learning, for growth. It’s a special place, not some playground for wannabe class clowns trying to stand out. Start taking it seriously, or don’t waste our time.”
And with that, she brushes past me - not touching, but enough that her perfume lingers in my nose long after she’s gone. How can I take it seriously if I’m not really one of them? If I don’t really belong here?
Suddenly, I feel totally alone. Alone in the whole wide world. The whole universe.
This isn’t my universe.
The time difference means Ruby’s still fast asleep - it’s like two in the morning on the west coast. Can’t call her. I wonder where Mom is? Probably Italy, by now. Her last text said she was at the airport. My fingers fly as I text her;
hey, it’s your spawn. Just got out of my first class. The people here are -
My finger hovers. The snickering. Alistair’s waiting-fox eyes. Trevino’s lip curl.
really nice! I’ve made one semi-friend. Her name’s Ana.
What else do I say? ‘I miss you’? ‘I wanna go home already?’ ‘Hey, can we wake up from this dream and go back to real life? The way things used to be? Just me and you?’
But this isn’t about me.
Mom’s been through so much. She put up with Dad for six years. She’s put up with detention-regular me for sixteen years. She worked her ass off in school to become a nurse. She’s been a single mom breaking her back to keep me fed and happy and safe for a long time, now. She deserves this fairytale ending more than anyone.
I inhale huge.
Sometimes you can’t just grin and bear it. Sometimes you have to smile real big and bear it.
Eat some good-ass spaghetti for me. Love you.
I put my phone away and look back out the window. There’s still a smear of blood on the grass where Alistair beat up Gabe, and I shudder. Where was the security Von Arx talked about for that whole thing, anyway? The only people I see outside are professors in sensible shades of brown, and white-and-blue clad students. There’s no hulking dudes with shaved heads, no batons, no repurposed golf carts buzzing around the campus.
“You should start walking if you don’t want to be late.”
My nerves frazzle as the soft voice resonates over my shoulder. I whip around - silky golden hair and a pair of silver eyes look down at me coolly. Sun-guy. Pure anxiety gets stuck in my throat.
“Y-You’re the guy from yesterday!”
“I would hope so,” Sun-guy agrees mildly. “Otherwise that would mean someone’s cloned me.”
I blink. Was…was that a joke?
“Right,” I laugh nervously. “That’d be ridiculous.”
A big, awkward pause. Fuck. Say something funny, Lilith. You might be too tall, and too wide, and too annoying, but you’re good at making people laugh, if nothing else.
“I-I’m glad I found you again,” I manage. “I can finally thank you properly for saving my cranium yesterday. I’ve got culinary class tomorrow, and not to brag, but I’m a pretty much a professional baker. Of microwave mug cakes. I can make you one if you want, as like, a thank you -”
“You have Applied Calculus next, right?” He turns to walk. Did I say something wrong? Did I say too many things? Is cake a no-go subject? God - even his long stride is dreamy. Wait a second, dreamy? Me, saying a dude is dreamy? Unironically? In this economy?
I consider dipping my entire brain in bleach and tag behind him breathlessly. “Yeah! How’d you know that?”
“It’s in the opposite wing.” He smiles back at me, the sunlight turning his gray eyes molten silver. “You need to hurry, or you’ll be late on your first day.”
He’s nothing like Alistair - the complete opposite, actually. Nothing about his eyes are dangerous, nothing about him is wildly sloppy. His uniform is perfect; his tie expertly knotted and his pants pressed. He wears snappy suede shoes. It’s not just his clothes, or how spotless they are. It’s the way he wears them, the way he moves. I feel like I could look at him eternally and never get bored. Beauty has always just been th
is thing people talk about abstractly but now I really get it. It feels like I’ve been in a museum my whole life, looking at the same paintings people gush about, and just now I’ve come across the one that actually makes me feel something; the one painting that makes me finally ‘get’ art.
“Have you ever seen Lord of the Things?” I blurt.
“What?” A quizzical golden brow.
“Rings. Lord of the Rings.” I correct. “It’s got these magic people with pointy ears and, uh, you look like kinda them.”
Like an elf god. But I don’t say that because that’d be gross. Even if my entire being is vibrating with the words YOU’RE HOT, reducing people to their physical appearance out loud feels really grody, actually? Also, pointing out to hot people that they’re hot is like telling a giraffe it’s tall - big whoop, Sherlock, it’s not like anybody can choose the bodies they’re born in. Sun-guy doesn’t even blink - staring at me like I’m an idiot. Because I am one.
“Okay, so yeah,” I hold my hands up in quick defense. “J.R.R Tolkien wasn’t the chillest. He constantly harped about the orcs being dark-skinned as like, a bad thing, so he was maybe-probably racist like Lovecraft - who was mega racist by the way, you can google it - and it’s like, what’s with all these old dead white dude writers and being shitty people, am I right?” I laugh nervously. “That’s my new standup comedy bit.”
Silence. And then; “You mean I look like an elf?”
“Yeah! Um.”
Sun-guy’s eyes crinkle on the corners, and then he bursts into melodious laughter. Swear to the G-man it sounds like a brand new harp being plucked. I smile faintly.
“Did I…say something funny?”
“No, I just -” He wipes a tear from his eye. “I know what elves are. We have books and movies in Europe too, you know.”
“Oh,” My cheeks burn. “Yeah. My bad.”
Sun-guy lifts one long, graceful finger towards the ceiling, where a little gold-painted orb sits.
“You wouldn’t know this, because you’re new. But being on time is sort of a thing around here.”
