CECE, DISRESPECTFULLY | ✓

59: SELF-FULFILLED PROPHECY

            Cobham stares at us over his desk. His interlocked fingers look ready to snap. But he doesn't speak. He hasn't said a word since we entered the office five minutes ago.

By now, my body has registered the damage, grated flesh and burst muscles. Where my rings have shredded Sakda's skin, they've also punched my own bones. Fractured phalanges; it'll be no surprise if my fingers fall off at the next hint of pressure.

Cobham has given us nowt for the wounds other than tissue to stop the bleeding. No ice, nowt to relieve the pain—"your mistakes, you can live with the consequences".

I struggle to keep my expression neutral, but no matter how much it takes from me, I am not going to crumble in front of Sakda.

'I don't understand why you two are constantly at each other's throats.' Cobham's stare jerks back and forth between us. 'Given your backgrounds, I'd expect you two to have some sort of solidarity.'

Sakda scoffs through the wad of toilet roll he presses to his bleeding nose. 'We ain't got nowt in common. My parents are dead. Theirs just didn't want him.'

This, out of all of them, is the blow that hurts the most.

'Your guardians are on their way and I'm sure they'll try to change my mind, but unless they can prove you've been possessed and can't be held responsible for your actions, you're expelled. The both of you.'

Sakda snaps upright. 'I didn't even do shit! He fucking attacked me out–!'

'You "didn't do shit"?' Cobham repeats, too exhausted with us to maintain professionalism. 'You're going to say that to my face? Like you don't take every opportunity to press their buttons–'

'It's not what I were doing!'

'You do plenty of fighting of your own, besides.'

Cobham has granted us enough warnings, there's no more rope to extend.

Sakda hurls a glare at me but his blades might as well be silicone. There's nowt left on me to bite. It's over. Everyone can see me for what I am now.

I'll be locked in forever.

Did I think I could have friends? That Noah and Meira would've ever spoken to me again now that maths olympiad is over? That Diwa had any interest in me other than figuring out the mystery of Death to Beewolf? Did I think someone could want me around beyond whatever use I had for them?

Did I think I could be capable? I'm evil. I can't care about people. I can't... love people. Not romantically and not any other way either.

And Nicolás... Is there any chance I can salvage things with Nicolás?

It always answers when summoned—Beewolf crawls from its nest behind my eye.

Don't you remember anything your parents taught you? it asks. Life is moral in harmony: you take and you give back. That's how Pachamama intended. But you're an abomination. All you do is destroy.

You take, and you take, and you take. And you give... nothing.

It's right. I could physically suck his blood and Nicolás will keep offering me more. I have to be the one to end it.

            You're a parasite. You spread evil everywhere you go. Forget your brother, forget your friends, forget your parents—not even Pachamama wants you.

'Cobham quite literally told us to wait in the staff room.'

I glance at Sakda as the toilet door swings shut behind him. Why is he following me? Has this been his plan all along? Isolate me so he can kill me without witnesses?

But rather than strike, Sakda leans against the nearest cubicle, arms crossed over his chest, and watches me. He can see it, can't he? What waits for me in the mirror.

My reflection is warped—well... it's finally candid. Eyes shining from black holes, skin rippled with pustules bubbling up the surface, face pulled taut against my skull.

This is you. Destroyer.

'I just need to be alone right now,' I state.

I lean so close to the mirror that I can see every pore in my skin. I wait for larvae to crawl out of them, dozens of minuscule insects chewing themselves free from their gel eggs to scamper and scuttle down my face. But they don't. They stay tucked in my eye sockets and my sinuses. I'll have to squeeze them out like blackheads.

'It don't look that bad,' Sakda says from where he leans. 'I mean, you've looked worse.'

Beewolf drums against the enamel of the sink. It oozes pheromones, stuffs the bathroom with chlorine.

We're alone in here. It's the middle of lessons. And nobody uses the toilets by the staff room. He can kill me if he wants to. He should.

He should. Before it's too late.

'Didn't think you'd take expulsion so hard,' Sakda continues. 'You've got plenty of practice.'

It moves. I feel it before I see it, the squirm in the back of my hand. The parasite worms from between my knuckles. I slap my left hand over it like squashing a mosquito. When it still wriggles, I press down harder. It'll burst beneath my skin, a stain of blood on my carpal bones.

'I didn't mean it a bad way, you know. About people finding out. You've always been good at art. You deserve your credit.'

One. Two. Three.

I lift my hand. There's nowt there, not even a bump to indicate the corpse. It escaped again...

It's too late anyway. It has already infected me. Time's up. Three things I'll never have: home, safety, sanity. I didn't burn enough, I didn't cut enough. I can't even feel the pain from Sakda's hits. Time is up.

I'm evil, truly and thoroughly.

An itch in my throat, I cough. The dust particle moves up but not out so I try again. A lump. A lump that's got nowt to do with the fact that I may be crying or at least on the verge. I clear my throat again and the foreign object moves upwards.

I keep coughing, coughing until I gag.

'You alright?'

The thing finally dislodges, flings up, and gets caught behind my tonsils. Shivering from the frost growing over my skin, I reach a hand into my mouth. It's definitely hard, covered in mucus. I pull it out.

Flinch and drop it into the basin.

Against the white porcelain that makes calcium look yellow, there's no room for doubt.

Even as I'm encased in ice, I can't stop the coughing fit that grips me. More pearls burst from my throat and I spit them into the sink along with blood. Ringing erupts in my ears: an evolutionary defence mechanism warning me not to look.

But I can't look away.

It were Finley Jenkins, one of my early foster brothers, who taught me to skate. I were only six and he were seventeen. It took me a year of begging until he let me onto his skateboard. It didn't take me more than ten minutes to come flying off it.

It resulted in a bloodied knee that gushed crimson all over my right leg. The syrup seeped into my sock until every other step home was accompanied by a squelch. Each time I glanced at the wound, it threatened to make me sick.

And yet, until Mr Jenkins had it hidden behind plasters, I kept looking, kept staring to sate an urge to dig my fingers in and find the white glint of my kneecap. I've always been captivated by the things that should stay within the skin.

And I've just coughed up someone's bones.