Page 34 of Waves
"I have another confession to make. Another reason I’m here this morning.”
“Yes?” Immediately, I stiffened, felt too tight in my own skin as expectations swelled inside.
Dithering, he picked at the comforter and my spine tingled with negative intuition.
“Do you know something?” I asked softly, visions of another attack tumbling through my mind.
“No. No!” His reassurance was hasty, but his expression fell all the same. “I feel like…you’re fighting a losing battle. And everyone around you, Keelan and his mother, Felipe, all these people keep telling you that you can win over Okeanos.”
“You think it’s impossible?”
A reluctant expression pinched his face. “Yesterday I might have said differently. But after last night…they aren’t just accusing you of being an air lover now. People are whispering that you killed that girl.”
All the joy that had been blooming in my chest from our interactions was crushed like a ship smashed by the waves.
“What?”
His eyes avoided mine as he recited, “They think you yanked the sea from her lungs. Used your ocean power to kill her.”
A murderer.
People thought I was cold-blooded enough to murder a scared girl in public? They thought I was evil enough to kill for no reason? With no remorse?
“You don’t think I did it?” The phrase came out as a question. A plea.
“I won’t lie and say it didn’t cross my mind.”
Bile rose in my throat, sour and burning. Watkins was being honest, but it just proved that our trust was merely a string. A single thread, so small it might as well be invisible. My fingers dug into the sides of my seat because I had to hold onto something.
This couldn’t be real.
But it was.
The dark truth sat between us, an anchor. A reality that was unyielding. Cold as metal. Heavy. Digging in deep.
“I don’t think you did it though,” he amended, too late. “Not really. I—for a second, I wanted my old accusations to be justified.”
“You are definitely not good at sugar-coating,” I critiqued as tears blurred my vision. Pursing my lips, I struggled to gain enough control to speak. “Isn't there anything I can do?” I asked, the question a soft plea. “To make them believe I didn’t do it?”
His eyes dropped to the floor as he said, "Changing people’s minds once they’re made…that’s something I’ve never been good at. I mean, I did. But the rest of them? I'm not sure."
Not sure.
Not sure.
That phrase seemed to define every aspect of my life. Including whether I'd get to keep this crown.
“It’s about belief. Who they think you are inside their heads.”
A sick churning filled my gut. "What else can I possibly do to convince people that I'm innocent? That I care? That all I want is to prove myself to them?" A whirlpool swirled inside my stomach as the amount of hatred I was facing seemed to double and triple. People had already hated me for being raised as a foreigner. Now? They’d use this girl’s death as an excuse to justify their opinion of me. To avoid giving me a chance.
Breakfast arrived then, but as the maids uncovered steaming dishes of eel, I found I’d completely lost my appetite.
How could I convince people who believed Iwasa monster that I wasn’t? Particularly when I wasn’t certain myself.
Chapter 14
Avia
