𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐧, young royals

14: Liminal

14: Liminal

I couldn't help it.  I was ashamed.

I was ashamed I'd been found out.  I was stripped down to my naked soul with Mikael's accusation.  He'd made public my deepest, most shameful thoughts.  And it made me very anxious that other people might figure me out as well.  How long would it take for the entire school to realize I was a con? Days?  Weeks?  Months?

My phone buzzed in my pocket.

I was still uptightly pacing around school, avoiding teachers and the headmistress.  When I glanced at my phone and saw my mother's contact pop up on the screen, I hastily declined her call. The last thing I needed right now was another cyclic lecture.

And then my feet carried me to the music room.

I knew no one was there at this hour; in fact, scarcely anyone was ever in there outside of classes.  Except Simon.  I'd caught him a few times sitting at the piano or strumming a guitar in this room in-between class hours. But it was well past 5pm now, and he was likely already headed home.

Curling my fists against my scalp, I doubled over in the middle of the room and contained a cry.

My knuckles were bruising and swelling, and my leg throbbed. What would Erik have said if he'd seen me now?  I could practically hear his voice hissing in my head, telling me to pull my shit together.

You must understand that every little thing you do now reflects on me and the family.

I winced at the memory, sinking my fingernails into my palms.

You can't keep fucking up anymore.

My phone buzzed in my pocket again.  I groaned.

You sound just like Mom.

I cried and pulled my phone out of my pocket to hurl it across the room.  It flopped face-down next to the piano, still buzzing. I didn't care to pick it back up.

Outside, it was that very special hour, that brisk fold between night and day.  For a winter day, the sky was oddly clear.  The wilting sun rays crashed yellow onto the snow and pried through the window's glass.  With every plier of the oaks outside the window, the sun's sleepy fingers bent and leapt around my feet, suspended in the liminality of daylight and dusk.

I was filled with a complex sense of fathoming as twilight clawed its way through the horizon and bled into the last minutes of daytime, neither yellow nor blue, neither plunged into the shadows nor enlightened into existence.

That is where I stood now, too, shifting in-between states and spaces. I only waited for the wind to sway me one way or the other.

Gentle feet thumped on the floorboards behind me.  I half-expected to be met by the headmistress or Mr. Englund as I looked over my shoulder, but it was Simon who appeared in the threshold.  He folded his arms and pressed his shoulder against the doorframe.  Chewing on the inside of his cheek, he surveyed me from across the room.

The last bit of sunlight cast golden rose on his flawless skin, pooling in his irises.  Even with his stupid flannel and worn-out jeans, Simon still looked ethereal.  I wanted to punch him in the jaw.

I slitted my eyes at him, clenching my teeth together. He inhaled thoroughly, and I thought I heard a ticking bomb set off inside me.

"Shouldn't you be in detention?" he piped up calmly.

"Shouldn't you be on your merry way to the slums?" I snapped.

At that, Simon's composed gaze hardened into a glare.