Page 156 of A Heart of Bluestone

I ignore her.

Got to get this uniform off. That’s my priority. Even the snowjacket, while not damp, is cold to the touch.

I’m freezing, even after stripping down to my underwear, by the roaring hearth, and cooking my flesh on the heat. I rotate like a rotisserie chicken, until my skin is scalded red.

Only then do I rush for my bed and the dry, warm clothes I laid out.

Courtney’s gaze follows me, as searing as the hearth.

She stays sat on her own mattress, basket-legged and sour-faced.

I tug on thermal tights before I step into grey sweatpants. The t-shirt I clammer into is lined with wool, but the real warmth comes when I fight my way into the corduroy sweater.

There’s a scoff that comes from the bed over. Courtney huffing away again, luring in my stubbornly avoidant gaze.

I don’t look at her. Instead, I close the curtains and fall back on my bed.

I can’t be mad at her for being mad at me.

Courtney and James are my friends. If I’m a target, they might be collateral. Maybe even targeted to spite me.

Still, I can’t bring myself to face her.

She will only ask why I did what I did.

And honestly, I have no answer beyondI snapped. The resentment outweighed the consequence. The hatred outwitted the smarts. Self-preservation caved under a glaring opportunity, one that I might never get again, to justget him.

With a snowball, a fist, whatever it is—I just needed to get him, even if only once.

Now, sprawled on my back, hearing the clock of my watch tick by, I know two things:

1. I’ll pay for that, more than I ever have before

2. It was fucking worth it.

I glance at the golden face of my dainty watch. It isn’t lost on me, the irony that Dray himself gifted me this very watch just two New Years’ ago.

Now, it’s time to face him.

The hands are nearing their encounter at the12.

Almost midnight.

Same-night detentions aren’t the kind I got for punching Oliver. That was five evenings in a row of writing down lines on a notebook, copied from a chalkboard, and Master Novak overseeing in the study hall.

This one will be brutal.

It will be physical labour.

The dread is cold in my gut.

I peel myself off the bed and slip out of the curtains. At the foot of my bed, black rubber boots are sat, waiting. I snatch them.

Courtney says nothing as I leave the dorm room.

I close the door softly behind me.

On the other side, I step into the rubber boots.

---