Agreements With Mr Rich Boy | ✓

27 | Secure The Bag

FOR THE ONLY TIME, Mr Snape Wannabe ran, more like sprinted, over the homework. The entirety of the lesson had been used up by his slow, painfully so, talking, yet when it came to the thing he would punish you for not doing well enough let alone at all, he flew through it like there was no tomorrow.

I began packing up my things along with everyone else once the lesson did finally end. Most people had already fled from the classroom by the time I flung my bag over my back and was making my way towards the door.

"Ms Dubois," he said, voice as slimy as his hair. "You need to be engaged in lessons."

"Yes, I know, Sir. It's just that I-"

"No excuses," he cut in, and then gestured around him. "Attwood is the most prestigious school in the country, as you well know. People work their entire lives to get in if they do not have the pocket otherwise. Don't waste your opportunity."

He was staring so intently that I found it difficult to maintain eye contact. His beetle-like eyes were so slicing that I found it difficult to not feel like squirming, not to mention that with every time the light caught them, it seemed as if the beetles were truly moving about.

"I- Yes, I know, Sir. I'll be back to normal next lesson, promise."

He took a moment, but seemed bored within seconds. "Quite right."

He turned back to his desk, actively telling me that the conversation was indeed over. Taking my cue, I ran (well, paced because running was forbidden and would warrant at least triple the fore mentioned homework), almost launching myself through the door.

I collided with something hard.

Fuck, I've run into a wall again. Such an idiot.

But, as I began to fall, like in slow motion, two hands caught me. It took me far longer than it should have to clock that most walls didn't have arms, so the probability of this wall having arms was... slim.

"Mr Jawl, hey?" Archer asked when I pulled away to look up at him, nodding his head to where I'd just been. I stepped back to give our bodies some distance and dusted myself off.

He was wearing his renowned trench coat, but that was to be expected. It was suited well to the harsh cold, but I wondered if he wore it all year round. You know,for the aesthetic. It seemed like something he would do. Pretentious asshole.

"Yeah, you've had him?"

"No," he laughed, eyes alight. "Thank god. But I've heard the rumours."

"Okay, well the rumours, ten times worse."

"Really that bad?"

"Really."

Strange though it was to have a normal conversation with Archer Redwood or as Jack so expertly named him and what I shall call him from this point forward, Mr Rich Boy, it didn't feel all that abnormal. Like for a moment, only a split second, everything felt like it did prior to Attwood and the carnage that ensued after getting here.

I'm not quite sure if I was glad that Miles came up to us at that moment or whether I would have liked to be able to just cling to that normality a tiny bit longer.