The Other Side of Envy

by C. L. Stone

  I couldn’t blame him for that. “No one notices.”

  “Soon, it won’t matter,” he said. “Like I said, I’m not a real teacher anyway. You know that.” He pursed his lips, staring at me. “This isn’t weirding you out, is it?”

  I shook my head. “You’re right,” I said. “We should spend more time together.” This was like Gabriel needing more time, and the others… I really did need Mr. Blackbourne’s help with a schedule. I’d have to be flexible around Dr. Green’s work time, too. “You’ll have to make more time, though. Take a day off once in a while.”

  “I don’t have much time to spare.”

  “You work too much.”

  “Not that again,” he pointed a finger lazily in my direction. “Don’t you start trying to change my ways.”

  “If you don’t have a day off, how am I supposed to spend time with you?”

  His lips parted and he stared but he paused, like he was thinking up with smart answer but couldn’t find one. “You…you…you just have to invent the eight day week, is what you need to do.”

  I smiled at him. “It means we have to find time somewhere. If we didn’t have to finish out the year here at school…”

  Dr. Green smiled back, settling a little in his seat. “We don’t have to wait so long,” he said. “We don’t even have to wait. Not to do things we should be doing. Going on dates. Making out on the couch. Snuggling up with a movie.” He tugged me closer and I shifted to lean in. He kissed my forehead and then looked down at me. “We just need to be careful where and when. Watch how we talk at school.”

  “Okay,” I said, genuinely meaning it.

  “Well, don’t agree so easily,” he said, winking. He leaned in, kissed my lips briefly and then backed up, smiling. “I can’t be the only one who wants to drag you off into the storage closet at school for a kiss or two.”

  I grinned at that. I hadn’t thought about that, but I liked knowing he thought of it. “So no storage closets?” I asked.

  He beamed. “Don’t tempt me.”

  ♥♥♥

  We talked more about school, gossiped about teachers and students. Mostly he talked, as he was much more observant of other students. I usually kept my head down and tried not to be noticed.

  Later, when the school started to open, he drove onto the lot, parked, and asked if I’d go in alone. He said he’d follow in a few minutes.

  “Call me paranoid,” he said. “I feel like if we separate, we’re less likely to be noticed.”

  I said goodbye, wishing we didn’t have to go into school. I would have rather gone to the hospital to look at the babies.

  Without a book bag, I simply stuffed my hands into Gabriel’s hoodie pockets and headed inside. It was strange to be entering the school wearing it. I was usually dressed more formally, like how kids at my other school would dress. Blouses, skirts, and khakis or jeans during the winter, but always nice.

  Inside Gabriel’s hoodie, I blended in with the other students. I didn’t want to stand out by wearing anything different than I normally did. Still, I wanted to curl up and just make it through the day.

  In the hallway, I stopped, unsure. My fingertips traced the cracks on the surface of the phone inside my pocket. Would Lily be awake right now? I delayed going to find the boys. I wasn’t sure I was ready to face the group, to look into their eyes and know all the deep secrets, about Lily, about everything in my head.

  I scouted the hallway and sought out a restroom, a busy one with other girls just so I wasn’t totally alone somewhere. I needed to use a stall anyway.

  The bathroom was busy, but just as I walked in, a stall opened up. I entered it, starting a text to Lily.

  Only I didn’t know where to begin. I was still wrapping my head around it. Lily got all of her guys to agree to stay with her. It wasn’t normal. All the girls in this bathroom would probably think horrible things about me if they knew. One boyfriend, fine. Two? And we weren’t even just talking two. There were nine of them.

  Nine? Wait, was I considering Mr. Blackbourne for this? He was part of the group…

  I tucked that thought away. The concepts were hard enough to deal with.

  I needed something. Confirmation? Hope? Proof?

  I did my best to convey my feelings in quick text message.

  Sang: I hope I don’t wake you. I don’t need an answer back immediately, but I have a lot of questions.

  Sang: Your suggestion that I should try for what your team has is a bit overwhelming. I’m concerned about the guys on my team, and their happiness.

  Sang: I don’t want to upset them, or cause the team to splinter because of me trying to be a part of the team.

  Those weren’t really questions. I put the phone in my pocket after having sent those messages. I tried to formulate how to put into words what I was thinking without hurting her feelings, either. It wasn’t that I didn’t believe she’d made it happen for her team, but in the end, was it what they all really wanted?

  From what I’d always read, a girl and a boy meet, fall in love, get married. Sometimes they split up, and fall in love with other people. Affairs happened, but wasn’t it usually that the person who fell out of love was too embarrassed to tell the person, and fell in love with someone else?

  So I typed in the first question I needed answers to.

  Sang: How can you love more than one person at a time?

  I sent the question. I hoped she understood.

  I waited for an answer, but when one didn’t come in a reasonable amount of time, I had to get out of the stall and move on.

  I had to wait for answers. It was excruciating.

  MIXED FEELINGS

  I kept my head down and walked into the courtyard. I spotted Kota and Nathan right away. Then I noticed Gabriel and Victor were with them.

  Gabriel, however, sat off on his own. He had a pad of paper out, sketching. His hair was a mess on one side, like he’d taken a nap in the time since I’d seen him. Still, it was out of place. Had he been concentrating so much, he hadn’t checked his hair? He was usually the first one to consult a mirror in the morning.

  As I approached, Kota lifted his head first. His gaze moved from my face down to my clothes and back up before he smiled pleasantly. “Good morning. We’ve been waiting on you.”

  Nathan and Victor picked up their heads and said good morning. Gabriel remained absorbed in his drawing. I didn’t want to interrupt and Kota was directing me to the bench next to him and Victor.

  I sat between them. Kota pulled out my book bag, now filled with books. “Thank you,” I said, shifting the bag to rest at my feet. “How did you get my bag back?”

  “I stopped by on the way to school,” Victor said. “I needed to get Gabriel’s phone and saw your bag. Pam was asleep.”

  I remembered Victor and the others had keys to each other’s homes. It was nice of him to fetch it and I thanked him.

  “We did finish homework, didn’t we?” Kota asked. “I checked, but I wasn’t sure. You don’t write down things like I do.”

  “We caught up on Friday,” I said. “Remember? Oh, wait, you weren’t there...”

  He smiled softly and shrugged. “Sorry.”

  “No,” I said, looking at the others. “It’s just we do it so often, one day blends into the next.” I sighed. “Homework has become such a chore. There’s so much of it.”

  Victor laughed. “It wasn’t before this? I thought it was always a pain.”

  I blushed at the memory of prior school years. I understood in the Academy, they may not be used to it. I should be, but this year was different. “I didn’t have much else to do before.” Too true. I finished homework quickly before and then I’d move on to reading or taking a walk outside. Without friends, or a cell phone, or much else, homework didn’t get in the way of much. “There wasn’t much else I was allowed to do.”

  Their smiles faltered. “You can look forward to less homework later,” Kota said.

  “By the time we’re done her
e, we’ll have lots of free time,” Victor said.

  “Well, we won’t have tests and class time and reports,” Kota said. He pressed at the corner of his glasses, adjusting them. “I imagine we’ll still have plenty to do. Life doesn’t exactly stop to give you a break. It just keeps going.”

  I opened my mouth to say something, but Gabriel shifted and distracted me. He turned, sat on the ground and used the bench as support to draw. His back was to us, though.

  It was hard to tell if he was getting more comfortable so he could draw, or if he was deliberately turning his back on us. Was he angry?

  I checked with the others, my eyes wide, asking quietly if Gabriel was okay. Kota and Nathan shrugged dismissively. Victor, however, didn’t look at me. He was focused on Gabriel, as if trying to figure out the same thing.

  Silas, North and Luke arrived. They all looked tired. In fact, we all carried heavy shadows under our eyes. Had no one slept last night?

  Silas sat across from me and did a short wave with his hand. I did a finger wave and then realized I was his girlfriend at school, so I got up, and moved over to sit next to him, smiling apologetically to Kota and the others for the ruse.

  The others shifted, but Gabriel was still aloof, remaining distant and unresponsive. Even Luke seemed to keep his distance. Maybe when Gabriel was drawing, he kept at a distance to concentrate. I didn’t want to assume, though, especially with how he’d left this morning.

  I couldn’t say anything now. I didn’t want to embarrass him.

  “You look tired,” Silas said to me once I’d settled beside him. The others talked amongst themselves, everyone except Gabriel.

  “I’m fine,” I said. “Got woken up a few times, and then was up super early.”

  “Do we need naps?” Silas asked. “Do we go to the nurse’s office and take over a few cots?”

  I smiled at the memory of that, but since we’d been in the nurse’s office, the nurse had returned and Dr. Green no longer monitored it. I didn’t think I’d qualify as sick to a nurse. Being tired wasn’t really an excuse to take up a cot. “Not today,” I said. “I’m just hoping to get to bed early tonight.” Which reminded me... I spoke louder to draw the attention of the others. “I need to go somewhere random tonight. Dr. Green said if McCoy was following us...”

  “That’s right,” Kota said. “Not even to each other’s homes. It’d be better if it were a hotel, or...”

  “I’ll take her,” several of them said at the same time, and so quickly, I wasn’t exactly sure who’d said it. All of them?

  I grimaced. “What about the diner?” I asked. It felt strange to be going to a hotel. “The diner would be a random place. Can’t I just sleep there?” There was an office in the back. North slept on the couch sometimes to be available overnight if things picked up. At least it’d be close to home.

  They all seem to consider this, but then ultimately North shook his head. “No,” he said. “She’d be safe, that’s not a problem, but we won’t know for sure if he’s looking for her there, or stalking one of us. We need to end this. She can’t stay away from home forever.”

  Kota nodded. “It should be a hotel. I’d say the hospital, but Dr. Green works there, so it’s still somewhere we’d be. A hotel would be very random. Somewhere unexpected. I’ve got an idea.” He pointed to me. “Your phone...”

  I blinked, waiting for him to say something, and then realized he was asking for it. I pulled it out slowly, holding it. I showed him the back, as I didn’t want anyone to notice the cracked screen right now. We had enough to deal with. “This?”

  “I know you need it,” he said. “But can you switch it with someone else’s for a while? I want to see if he’s checking in on you via your number.”

  “He shouldn’t be able to,” Victor said. “I’ve got everyone’s locators bouncing, so it should show her somewhere else instead of here.”

  “Still,” Kota said. “I’ve just got a feeling. So trade with someone for a little while. We’ll see what happens.”

  I had a mini heart attack right there thinking about the messages on my phone. I tried to recall what I’d said. There was also the possibility of Lily sending messages. Would they read the phone? Even if they didn’t mean to, they could open it up and come across the messages. They might need to use it. If Lily sent a message, they’d read and would know.

  I panicked. Only Luke and Gabriel knew I’d gone to see Lily, plus Victor. Still, the message was terribly embarrassing for even them to read.

  Luke and Victor were sitting on the other side of Kota. Kota, for sure, shouldn’t hang on to it, because I wasn’t totally convinced how he’d feel. It would be the worst way to find out. I didn’t know where the others stood, either. Silas, North...North might have known about Lily, but he didn’t know I’d been to see her and might start a fight about it.

  As Kota held out his phone, I turned to Gabriel. “Meanie,” I called. “Swap phones with me?” He was the closest, and passing it to Luke meant it would float by Kota first. It would be weird to bypass Kota.

  It was the first time Gabriel looked at me since I’d arrived. His eyebrows scrunched together, confused. Then he spotted his hoodie. His lips parted, like he was going to comment, but he promptly closed his mouth again. He shook his head and then seemed to realize I’d asked him a question. “Huh?”

  I held my phone toward him. My eyes were wide and I was quietly urging him to agree before Kota thought something was wrong. “Kota wants me to swap phones with someone. Can we trade?”

  He reached back, pulling his phone from his pocket. He held on to it, looking at the phone with the screen turned off, considering. “I don’t know…”

  “Please,” I asked, a bit more of a whisper, as it was a desperate moment. Any real hesitation from him, and the others would wonder, and Kota would ask why I didn’t switch with him instead. I couldn’t resist without a good reason if that happened. For emphasis, I glanced over at Kota, trying to signal to Gabriel my dilemma.

  Gabriel checked over his shoulder at Kota, who had retracted his hand and was waiting. Gabriel shifted and held his phone out for me.

  I traded with him. Before he pulled his hand away, though, I touched his wrist, trying to smile even while my heart was racing, fearing one of the others would catch on. “Thanks,” I said.

  “No problem,” he said and quietly put my phone in his pocket before he resumed his sketching.

  I breathed out slowly and tucked his phone into my bra, mostly out of habit. I promised myself I’d only use it for emergencies and wouldn’t pry.

  Still, I was on edge. What if Lily wrote back while Gabriel had my phone? “How long do we have to do this?” I asked.

  “Just until we figure out how he seems to know which one of us has you and where,” Kota said. He glanced once over at Gabriel and then seemed to dismiss the exchange. “As for tonight, perhaps Silas and...”

  “I’ll go,” Gabriel said, without turning around.

  “You shouldn’t, if you’re holding onto her phone,” Kota said. “That’s the point.”

  “Oh,” Gabriel said. He looked up, turning those crystal eyes on me, looking confused.

  I gritted my teeth, sympathizing. I hadn’t realized that would be the case.

  In my heart, I wanted to change it. Somehow, I needed to talk to Gabriel, I knew. The sooner the better. With the way he was looking at me, it was like he thought I’d planned this so he couldn’t spend the night in the hotel room with me.

  But I didn’t want to risk changing phones again, and specifically asking Luke and not Kota or Silas or the others, and everyone asking why.

  I needed to explain to Gabriel why I trusted him with my phone. I’d have to wait until I could text him sometime in or between classes. I couldn’t do it here.

  Kota and North talked the plan, but nothing was conclusive by the time the bell rang. They said they’d reconvene at lunch to figure it out.

  I walked with my head down through the hallways, moving thr
ough homeroom without much thought. We sat in our usual seats. North had his head down. Luke played with his hair. I watched as he aimlessly twisted a thin lock of hair, winding it so tight that it curled up on itself. When he released it, it made a tiny loop and hung there.

  My mind was on the cell phone in my bra. I wanted to use it, to explain to Gabriel what had gone on, but Mr. Ferguson was monitoring us and he had a keen eye for cell phones. I didn’t want to get caught, and get it confiscated.

  Homeroom ended and Luke and North walked with me to class. They stood so close. While Luke I trusted, I wasn’t sure North would approve of using Gabriel’s cell phone or of what I had to say.

  Luke and I hurried into class. Ms. Johnson stood at the door and handed us essay questions. She told the class to remain quiet, as the questions would probably take the entire class time. Ms. Johnson and Fate seemed to be working together to not allow me the luxury of a single text message.

  I settled in, hoping Gabriel would show up and I could at least monitor how he was. Maybe he hadn’t had a chance to look at my cell phone either.

  When the bell rang and Gabriel wasn’t in his seat, tension built up in my chest. The room was quiet. I fiddled with my pen. Kota was in front of me. I longed to reach out to him. Silently, I was asking him to tell me what was going on. Gabriel wasn’t here. Where was he? Did he hate me now after all this?

  I thought about asking to be excused to the bathroom, but I couldn’t do that without Kota making a fuss about me going alone when it was unlikely other girls would be around in the bathrooms. He’d want to escort me and we couldn’t do that. Could I maybe between classes?

  Maybe it wasn’t worth trying to be in the group together if Gabriel’s heart was broken about it. Misery settled in, making it difficult to do my schoolwork. I couldn’t get Gabriel off my mind. He might be too upset to come in. He skipped class, something we all avoided doing unless it was necessary. There was a possibility he was doing something Mr. Blackbourne told him to do, or breaking up a fight, but I wasn’t totally convinced about it.