HEART OF GOLD | CORIOLANUS SNOW

𝘾𝙃𝘼𝙋𝙏𝙀𝙍 73

When Lilith first got wind of her father dating Criseida, it had been at the Academy. Whispers shadowed her as she passed through hallways and entered classrooms, and she wondered initially if word of Solaris St. Clair kissing her at the pictures had been leaked. A careless Calliope Tattlesmith proved that false: Lilith was inside a bathroom stall when she overheard the gossip—a certain CEO spotted at a restaurant, accompanied by an employee half his age, apparently behaving too intimately for colleagues.

If she had been alone, Lilith might have hidden it out, waited for them to leave, and tried to pretend like nothing had happened. But the door to the neighboring cubicle was flung back with a bang. Calliope's gang fell silent at once, and in less than two seconds had been driven from the bathroom presumably under Olympia's death glare. According to them, half an hour passed before Athena and Olympia could coax Lilith out.

She had been visibly shaken. Like bodyguards, they shepherded her to the clinic and concocted some excuse for the nurse that made her return with packs of nutritional crackers and Athena's favourite fizzy lemon drink Lilith didn't touch. It was the only time she'd ever reported sick in all her six years at the Academy.

Usually, everything that came out of Calliope's mouth should be taken with a grain of salt; she was always embellishing her stories to get people listening. Where she had obtained those stories, however, had been the crux: Her parents worked at one of the juiciest tabloid magazines in the Capitol, Whistleup; her father a content creator and her mother a photojournalist. If anyone were privy to a scoop before it hit the stands, it would be this family. Besides, how else could Calliope have known that a sizeable sum had been paid to hush up the piece?

For the rest of last period, Lilith curled up on the narrow, uncomfortable examination table, struggling to sort out her feelings. The hurt was unmistakable; the cause not so much.

Was it because her father had kept it a secret from her? Was it because he was with someone else? Did this mean he had stopped loving her mother? Did it sting so badly because it had barely been four years since they'd laid her mother to rest? Or because the lilies they'd left at her niche just that weekend for her birthday had hardly begun to wilt when he was out cozying with another woman?

The bell rang and still Lilith was just as shocked and confused. Collecting her was Athena and Olympia—and an anxious-looking Mae. The nurse must have tried her father, reached his secretary instead, who called her pseudo-nanny. They all rode back to the Gold Residence, Lilith slumped in Olympia's arms while Athena apprised Mae of what really ailed her. The girls stayed, made her shower, and tucked her into bed. Unconvinced a nap was going to change anything, Lilith hadn't the energy to fight it, however. Utterly drained, she dozed off to them stroking her hair and doling out consolations and advice, the gist of which had been to confront her father.

But Lilith wasn't the confrontational type. She never even talked back to her father, not that there was anyone to talk back to. He wasn't present at dinner that night, and she realized she couldn't recall the last time they shared a meal that wasn't on the weekend.

"Where's Daddy?" she asked, as Mae served up her salad.

Held up at the office, replied Mae in sign language.

Of course, he is, thought Lilith, and was swallowed up whole by contemplation once more.

If she hadn't been in such a daze, she might have noticed how Mae had gestured a little higher than normal, as if to shroud her face, to shroud the guilt in her eyes, the same guilt she had let slip in the car at Athena's recount amidst the put-on surprise. But no. Her mind was fixated on an image of her father behind his impressive rosewood desk, a mysterious woman on his lap, the two of them splitting a plate of spaghetti—a strand of spaghetti...