Page 167 of Skalterra By Nightmare
“Yes.”
“I don’t know what that means.” His eyebrows fell back into a scowl.
“Yes, you do,” I insisted. He was lying. He had to be. “It’s the reality that runs parallel to this one, where all the Magicians were banished four hundred years ago. Maybe you don’t know it by its name, but—”
He put up a hand to stop me.
“I haven’t read your mother’s books.” His words oozed disdain, as if the idea of picking up something written by Mom was making him physically ill.
“It’s not—”
“I told Eliza almost two decades ago,” he said, cutting me off, “and I’ve told her over and over again.”
“Told her what?” Something inside me broke, and I felt like I was floating above the conversation, watching it happen to someone else. A numb buzz crept at the back of my head.
“I don’t want this.” He moved his hand in a circle in the air, palm facing me. “It’s not fair. She made her choice, and I made mine. I respected her decision, so why does this keep coming up? When she called in June—”
“June?” I wasn’t floating above the conversation anymore. I was watching from the base of a tree, curled up in the dark, alone and lost after being tricked by Linsey, wondering when the night would pass.
“She told me you were graduating and wanted to know if I would come.” He looked so much like me. I’d never hated myself more. “You seem like a smart kid, and I’m sure you’re great. Eliza says so anyways, when she reaches out. But this, this isn’t for me, and quite frankly, I don’t owe you anything. You’re notmine.I mean, you are, but— well. You know.”
“I know.” My constricted throat made my voice hoarse, and I had to force the words out.
“Don’t do that. That’s not fair. Don’t—” He took a steadying breath and looked around again. “Look, I’ll talk to the dean and see what I can do. Okay? Just don’t look at me like that.”
I dropped my eyes to his tie clip, unable to continue looking him in the face.
“I wrote my admissions essay about you.” The clip swam in my vision, and swallowing the lump in my throat felt like gargling glass.
“You shouldn’t have done that,” he sighed. “I’m not as great as my research would have you think.”
“No, I know.” I wanted nothing more than to raise my gaze to his, to tell him to keep his recommendation, that I didn’t need shit from him. But I couldn’t look away from his tie clip.
“This isn’t my fault,” he said. “Okay? I- I have people waiting for me, alright? I can’t do this right now.”
My jaw was clenched too tight to say anything more. I couldn’t even raise my eyes to his before he walked away. I didn’t want to see myself staring back.
His footsteps receded up the auditorium steps behind me, and I continued to stare at the spot in space where his tie clip had been.
He was a dead end for information on Skalterra, but worse than that, he didn’t want me.
Not in any capacity. Not as a daughter, obviously. I’d always known that. But he couldn’t even stand to talk to me.
I knew he’d abandoned me before I’d been born, but to learn that Mom had reached out over and over as I grew up, as recently as a month ago, and he had turned me down every time?
We weren’t allowed to talk about him at home, not because she hated him, but because he hated me.
“I just passed the professor guy at the door. What’re you still doing in here?” Liam came up behind me, and I kept my eyes forward. If I looked directly at him, he’d see the tears swimming in my vision. He came around to face me, and his shoulders fell, and his eyes widened. “Wren, what’s wrong?”
I shook my head. If I opened my mouth, I wasn’t sure I could hold back the sobs burning in my throat.
“Did he talk to you? What did he say?”
“He doesn’t want me.” The words were a soft, painful croak.
“Oh. That’s okay, though. He’s not the admissions officer. It’s not his decision.”
“No. He doesn’t wantme.”
