...
❝He was the poison I was dying to taste on my lips.❞
...
I was a coward.
The coward who wanted to leave behind the wreckage of her life for the man who had tormented her for as long as she could remember. The boy who had spit venom at me gro...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
"JUST FOR THE record," I started, swallowing the last bite of my food. "I didn't cry when you took my ribbon."
"No?" River asked, lifting an eyebrow.
"No." I shook my head. "I cried because you'd been so evil to me. No one had so much as looked at me wrong before but it was my first day here and you'd called me nothing. You'd been able to dehumanise me so easily and there was nothing I could do. I hated you in that second and I hated the fact that I was less than you even more."
I wasn't sure what I'd been expecting but not the slightest inch of remorse was present on his face. Good. That was good for my heart.
Instead, he just slowly gave me a single nod. "I see."
"You see? That's it?"
"What? Do you want me to apologise?" He looked at me like the idea was blasphemous. "Well, I don't appreciate that you cried but I won't say sorry for calling you that."
"And why exactly is that?"
"Because, Ribbon," he leaned forward in his seat, "that would firstly be blatantly disregarding the deal we just made twenty minutes ago. And secondly, you know that you're not nothing. Your family is just as wealthy as mine, so I won't apologise when you know your own worth. I spoke words, Ribbon. Plain, empty words. They don't define you unless you let them."
"So worth is solely dependent on one's wealth?" I asked, frowning. "Not who they are as a person but only what their last name and status is? Is that what you mean, River?"
His eyes glittered with amusement. "It's what I mean for a world that isn't idealistic, Ribbon. Worth isn't solely dependent on money, I agree, but the society we're a part of and the world we see every day? Money is the only thing that gets you anywhere; it's the currency that buys you respect and builds your worth."
My frown deepened as frustration crawled up my body. "Maybe so, but that doesn't give you the right to be so cruel or to judge others for their social standing."
"I may judge people, but they make the choice to be fazed, Ribbon. Why allow themselves to be affected when words are just that? Mere words; random letters strung together to mean something you interpret and embody yourself into by reacting."
I shook my head vehemently. "It's not just about your words, River. It's about the way you treat people, how you act in their presence. You're arrogant and narcissistic. Simply having money doesn't make you better than anyone else."
"I never claimed it did. But that doesn't mean people shouldn't know their place and respond accordingly either," he retorted, tone icy.
"And what place is that, exactly? The hierarchy that the upper class create to keep others in order?"
He merely shrugged a shoulder.
I heaved out a frustrated sigh. "You are insufferable, River. I don't know how anyone puts up with you."
