The Other Side of Envy: The Ghost Bird Series: #8 (The Academy)

by C. L. Stone

  Dr. Green reached out, taking my hand as he drove. He kept it on his leg, the back of my hand resting on his thigh as his palm covered mine. He slowed during traffic so he had a better chance of hitting red lights. “I don’t think it’ll happen to us. We are pre-destined lost babies. That’s like fate. You don’t mess with fate.”

  I smiled, remembering his thoughts on how he’d been abandoned at the hospital when he was young and considered us to be so similar because of it. “Did you ever belong to another team?”

  “Sure,” he said. “Lots of them.”

  “What happened?” I asked.

  He laughed, rolling his eyes and shaking his head. “To make the longest of long stories short, I wasn’t very compliant with the Academy at first. Too much practice at being disobedient. I always ran off to do things my own way. I was too independent. Too much trouble. Not trusting anyone to work with me.”

  Maybe I should have been more surprised to hear about him being disobedient, but Mr. Blackbourne once told me about how Dr. Green once wore ripped jeans and had cigarette behind his ear at an early age: the picture of a troublemaker. “Were they going to kick you out?”

  “They could have, but they were willing to try me out. Given that I’d graduated from school at a very young age and was already in an accelerated education program, they thought me too valuable to let go without putting in an effort.” He sighed and nodded. “And then one day they introduced me to Mr. Blackbourne. Owen. He was this kid with every hair in place, shoes polished. I mean, just looking at him, I wanted to untuck his shirt and throw him in the mud. Not to hurt him, but he looked like he needed it.”

  I smashed my lips together, trying not to laugh at the idea of Dr. Green pushing Mr. Blackbourne into mud. It was such a wrong thought. “But you’re still together.”

  “Right,” Dr. Green said. “It was an odd thing. Owen was a loner, or tried to be. He didn’t fit in well with other groups, either. So the Academy teamed us up. If we could manage to get through an assignment in one piece and stick it out together, they promised they’d give us a chance to pick whatever team we really wanted in the future. Even if it meant we had to recruit from the outside. We just couldn’t be alone. It’s not part of the Academy way to act independently.” He turned his head and grinned at me. “They did that on purpose. Tempted us with something we wanted: to be in charge of our own team. Joke’s on them. We took their bait, but then we kept them to their promises.”

  “How?”

  Dr. Green’s grin grew, and he turned the car onto another street, checking out the rearview mirror. “We picked one of the hardest assignments we could get our hands on. Owen’s a stickler, I could tell that from before. All we had to do was talk to each other, and we knew we’d take their toughest challenge, get the most out of it. It was tough, especially with Owen being all ‘we’ve got to follow the rules’ about it, but we won. And in the end, we not only graduated from the Academy, but we were permitted to bring in anyone we wanted to create a team of our own design. And then one day Owen found Kota and the others...the rest is history.”

  “So you stuck together?”

  “We were perfect,” he said. “He was annoyed with me for the longest time, but he never gave up on me. I think that was the issue before. He’s damn loyal, but no one understood that when he was harsh with his criticism. He was just showing he cared. He’s got the biggest heart ever, though. Maybe I understood, because I had a tiger mom and grew up with it. I could handle it. We had a few issues to work out in the beginning. He made me quit smoking. I made him eat a candy bar. We traded off, but it worked out. The point is, you absolutely can choose your team, and sometimes it just clicks when you’re together. You feel it. You can always choose.”

  It never occurred to me that an Academy member could work with different teams and eventually pick one they wanted to belong to. I mean, I knew it, but it sounded like shopping around for the right pair of shoes. You tried on a few styles until you found a set that matched. “But girls are usually teamed up with other girls?” I asked.

  “Those are mostly friend groups. There’s a small handful of sibling groups or relatives that work together, but it’s rare for family members to join. Kids eventually want to move on from parents, and siblings aren’t always willing to stick together. There are a few couple teams, and some multiple couple teams, meaning a quad of two girls and two boys, or three boys and three girls. Usually those work out only if the girls are lesbians and the boys are gay. It prevents jealousy when you know the other partner isn’t going to be attracted to anyone else in the group. It’s just easier. You spend so much time with your team that you have to really trust each other. Anyone you date outside the group has a hard enough life when you have to keep them in secrecy about what you do. Even under normal circumstances, our team was never looking at an easy road.”

  That sounded like the opposite of what they would want. “So...it would be easier for me to join the group if none of the guys were interested?” I wasn’t sure what I was suggesting, I was simply trying to get a better picture as to what I was dealing with.”

  “It’s never easy,” Dr. Green said. “But the easy way doesn’t mean it’s the right thing to do. Owen and I put together a large team, and now we’re looking to include you. We were already sort of misfits in our own right even before you got here.”

  “The Academy wouldn’t like it if I joined with you, though. Because they’ll ask me to try out other teams.”

  “They might, unless you tell them you don’t want to.” He squeezed my hand, and then picked it up to kiss the palm. He glanced at me, his light green eyes sparking. “You’ve got the choice. Be honest with how you feel about it.”

  I squeezed his hand gently in return. I settled in, checking out the mirror to see who might be following us while absorbing the information.

  I dazed out, lost in my own head. I’d just have to tell the Academy that I wanted to be with the team.

  But Kota didn’t want me to join.

  And I wasn’t sure where the others were on this. Gabriel had flipped out this morning. Would the others?

  If I couldn’t join with their team, would I still want to be involved? If I’d met another team instead of Kota’s, would it have been the same?

  Could I ever join a girl team?

  I tried to picture it, but couldn’t. A girl team? My gut tightened. If I had to join a girl team, I wasn’t so sure I would join at all.

  Maybe it was because meeting new people, strangers, made me uncomfortable. I held that thought. The unknown was scary.

  Still, I cared about my team. I’d prefer to stay with Kota and the others. I just had to convince them it could work out.

  Maybe, in the end, I’d have to sacrifice. Maybe it meant never joining the Academy at all. Join the Academy or stay with my team. Even then, we might come across new rules that might restrict the team.

  Slowly, I focused on a car behind us, a dingy old brown car. I recognized it at first, and wasn’t sure why. Didn’t... didn’t Mr. McCoy have a blue car? That must not be him. Maybe just another car that had drifted in...

  But when Dr. Green turned, that car followed.

  I sat up, studying it. “Isn’t...isn’t that Mr. Morris’s car?”

  Dr. Green checked his rearview. “Yeah.”

  “Is he driving?”

  “No, it’s McCoy.”

  I let out a slow breath. “So he talks to Mr. Morris. Or somehow he borrowed his car.”

  Dr. Green kept his eyes on the rearview. He released my hand, sitting up. “Hendricks has a lot of teachers working for him. He could have ordered Mr. Morris to give up his car.”

  “Mr. Morris might know more about Mr. McCoy and what he’s up to.”

  “You should stay away from him,” Dr. Green said.

  “But he’s my teacher at school. And he’s talked to me before.”

  “I know,” Dr. Green said. He pursed his lips, staying quiet and thinking for a moment. “Something bu
gs me about him, though.”

  “Kota said the same thing once,” I said.

  “Then he’s probably right,” Dr. Green said. “Kota’s not one to be judgmental. If something’s off about a person, he’s usually spot on. I get the same feeling about Morris, too. I don’t know if he’s dangerous, but there’s something not right about him either. In any case, any information you give to him, McCoy might get as well.”

  I realized it was probably true that Mr. Morris would give information to Mr. Hendricks or Mr. McCoy if they asked. Somehow I felt we could use this to our advantage, giving false information, and in exchange, learning something. Even if they fed us lies, they’d be talking to us. Isn’t that what they wanted?

  I curled up in the seat, watching the neighborhood go by, and the sun starting to rise, giving the sky a nice shade of blue and pink stripes across low clouds. It was a beautiful, albeit chilly morning.

  I watched the brown car. Despite me wanting to gain traction with the boys, other things stood in our way. The urgency to get McCoy out of the way intensified.

  FAST AND FASTER

  Soon, Mr. McCoy turned off from following us. Presumably, he’d run out of gas and had to refuel, or had found it pointless.

  “This is good,” Dr. Green said. “We’ll see if he follows us later. Tonight after school, you should randomly go with someone, though probably not home. Maybe not even home with the boys.”

  “Maybe the hospital?” I asked. “Or even a hotel?”

  “Let’s try...I don’t know. Don’t talk about it now.” He reached out to my hand again, squeezing it, and then sighed happily. “Now I get you to myself.”

  I smiled, glad that Mr. McCoy was gone. Even if he might not be able to see into the car, having him right behind us made me feel like he was watching our every move.

  “Are you hungry yet?” he asked.

  “A little.”

  He drove toward Summerville, toward school, but stopped at a small corner shop, getting a cold bottle of Mocha Frappuccino coffee for me, a vanilla Frappuccino for himself, and a couple of breakfast burritos.

  We remained parked in the lot and he opened his coffee, taking a sip. “I have to admit,” he said, licking his lips. “These are growing on me.”

  “You’ve been drinking them?” I asked.

  “I never was fond of hot coffee. It’s too bitter for me, and I needed lots of sugar and cream in it to be able to drink it fast. Long nights at the hospital can require coffee, though. Kota mentioned you liked these, so I’ve been trying them myself. Now I’ve got a mini-fridge at the hospital full of them.” He held out his bottle to me. “Have you had the vanilla?”

  I shook my head. I took a sip. The flavor was creamy, drinkable, but mocha was still my favorite. “It’s not bad. I like the chocolate.”

  “Of course you do.” He grinned, taking his bottle back and taking a long drink. He licked his lips again after. “I hear you prefer chocolate.”

  “I like other flavors.”

  “Like what?”

  It seemed he wanted to learn something more than coffee flavors. “I like banana strawberry smoothies.”

  “What about chocolate banana smoothies?”

  “I haven’t tried one.”

  He beamed. “Save that for our next date.”

  I hid my smile by drinking another sip of coffee.

  We ate quickly, but still we sat in the parked car. There was still time before school opened.

  “It’d look odd if we got to school early and sat in the parking lot,” he said.

  I had to agree. I kept my eyes peeled for Mr. McCoy just in case, but now I was sure that if he got close, the Academy members following him would let us know. I sat back, closing my eyes for a moment. The coffee kept me awake, but I needed a minute to catch my breath.

  “Don’t close those pretty eyes for so long,” Dr. Green said. I opened them. He was sitting back, his head on the headrest, but looking at me.

  I blushed. I glanced out the window to avoid the intensity in his eyes. I sought out something to talk about. “I’m sorry I couldn’t go with you to the hospital yesterday.”

  “You miss the babies, don’t you?” he asked, grinning. “We’ve got a new crop. The little things keep popping up, with no consideration for timing, either. I think last week we ran out of baby beds in our section. We had to go borrow a few from another hospital.”

  I giggled. “Are you going to be a baby doctor?”

  “No,” he said. “An admirable career, but I’ve got other interests. Babies just de-stress me when I’m at work. And girls love them.”

  The remark was odd to me. I found myself asking a silly question. “Is that where...you take girls...” I wasn’t even sure what I was asking. In a weird way, I was trying to find out his interest in other girls.

  “Old Mrs. Rose loves them,” he said, smiling happily. “And a few of the older nurses. I walk by sometimes and a gaggle of them will be standing there looking in on them, talking about grandkids, bugging me about when I’ll find my wife and give them a kid to dress up. No doubt they will crochet enough blankets and socks and hats for fifty kids.”

  I laughed, relieved a little.

  His eyes lit up. He reached out, poking me on the nose. “I missed you,” he said quietly.

  The comment was a surprise and I brightened. “I...” I stumbled, wanting to say I missed him, too. I was breathless, though.

  He grinned bigger and then tugged slightly at my arm. Before I could move, he was leaning over.

  Our lips touched before I realized what he was doing. He seemed to like to surprise me like that. His lips were cool, soft, with a hint of ChapStick mixed with his Frappuccino.

  I stilled at first, nervous, since the last time I’d been inexperienced. It felt strange to do what Silas had taught me.

  When Dr. Green opened his mouth a bit more, sinking into the kiss, I returned it like Silas had taught me. It seemed more natural.

  At first, we were kissing, just our lips touching. As I moved more, responded more, something changed. I wasn’t just reacting. I wasn’t chasing him like before, trying to keep up. I was enjoying it. I wanted more.

  He did, too. His hand drifted to my face, cupping behind my head, pulling me into him. He pressed his lips harder to mine. This was new. My heart was in my chest, beating fiercely. I was compelled to put my hands on his chest, and my fingertips reached for his shoulders, touching the skin of his neck.

  He stopped the kiss only long enough to suck in a breath close to my lips. There was something of a grunt, an agonizing moan, and then he was kissing me again, harder this time.

  I couldn’t stop and didn’t want to. The world slipped away and it was Sean Green. He smelled fresh, with that familiar ginger scent. His lips tasted like vanilla. The cool touch of his lips warmed, drawing me in.

  A soothing sensation washed over my heart. That small bit of jealousy I’d felt when he mentioned girls at work swept away. Like he could prove to me with a kiss that, in this moment, I was the only one he wanted.

  He backed up a bit more. My eyes fluttered open. He had his forehead near mine, staring at me. He breathed heavily and his eyes widened, his pupils large as he gazed at me, his hands holding my face.

  He dropped his lips to mine again, almost harshly, eager and as desperate as before. I responded, and this time, my tongue reached out, just brushing against his mouth.

  He caught on immediately, his tongue darting out, finding mine, playing with it. He drew it out with his lips, sucking on it once, and then pushed it back with his tongue, darting it into my mouth.

  I did as he did, sucking back, gently, not wanting to do it too hard.

  He moaned into my mouth, and held me tightly, kissing me hard on the mouth several times.

  Then he groaned, pulled himself off and backed up, pressing himself against the driver’s door. He closed his eyes and put a hand on his chest. “Ugh. Sang. You can’t do that to me.”

  My hand touched my mouth
as I rested against the seat, breathing hard. The coolness outside was seeping in, but I was trying to retain the warmth he’d shared with me. I couldn’t think of what to say, breathless and unable to respond.

  Dr. Green roughed his fingers through his sandy hair and pulled at it gently, licking his lips. “I can’t stop myself. I need to. You and I. We’re moving too fast.” He pulled his hand from his head and placed it over his heart. “If it wasn’t for this school...Owen warned me.”

  “We can’t get caught at school,” I said softly, trying to understand his meaning. “I know you’re only nineteen but being a teacher…”

  “It’s crazy,” he said. He rolled his eyes, and continued to look up at the roof of the car above us. “I’m not a real teacher. Once we’re out of school, it wouldn’t matter. The age of consent is sixteen here, but…But it isn’t just that. I mean you and I, we don’t get much time together. I’m sorry, I rush into things and then it’s just a whirlwind. I feel like I’m pushing you too fast.”

  I understood. Every time I was with Dr. Green, I was rushed here and there. When did we actually have a day together like I’d just spent with Gabriel? The only times we got to see each other was at his work or school, so if he didn’t have school issues anymore… Again, school was getting in the way.

  It made my heart speed up thinking how I’d jumped so quickly into kissing him. “I like it,” I said. I didn’t want him to feel he was forcing me to do anything. “We just don’t get much of a chance, like you said.”

  He nodded. “We need to slow things down.”

  I looked at him, puzzled. “Why?”

  “I don’t think straight,” he said. “I’ve always been impulsive. And I’m crazy about you.”

  My heart was lifting from my chest. I was ready to burst at his words.

  He shook his head, smiling. “I’m going to end up kissing you at the school one day, and then it’s over. Someone will see.

  “It doesn’t have to happen like that.”

  “You’re distracting in class,” he said. He brushed his palms at his face, and then smoothed out his tie. “I try not to look at you too much. It doesn’t help that most of the class sleeps during the lectures and you’re one of the few that actually pays attention.”