Hello, and happy Pride! I did intend to post this during pride month but, to be entirely honest, it didn't feel finished. I'm incredibly nervous about this chapter for reasons that will be clear by the end. I hope you enjoy it.
Oh, and dps tumblr found out that Gale Hansen has hazel eyes. Well, I'm an absolute simp for dark brown eyes so facts aren't going to stop me.
'But now, thy youngest, dearest one, has perish'd,
The nursling of thy widowhood, who grew,
Like a pale flower by some sad maiden cherish'd,
And fed with true-love tears, instead of dew;
Most musical of mourners, weep anew!
Thy extreme hope, the loveliest and the last,
The bloom, whose petals nipp'd before they blew
Died on the promise of the fruit, is waste;
The broken lily lies—the storm is overpast.'
~ Adonais: An elegy on the death of John Keats, IV, Percy Bysshe Shelley (1821)
Chapter fifty-five – 'most musical of mourners'
Kat watched the sunlight as it wandered aimlessly through the crack in the paltry curtains; its rays illuminated the pyjama-clad bodies in a surreal sheen as they dropped one by one, sliding silently to the ground beside Todd's bed. Each rounded face appeared haggard beyond the sleep deprivation expected from their nights of youthful freedom.
She shuddered. They knew.
"Are you-"
"-okay?" Nuwanda's voice was harsh. He looked away guiltily as the bite echoed around the room.
"-holding on," Knox finished, his frown flattening into a sympathetic line.
Todd burrowed further into his cocoon of blankets, the movement jostling Kat as he buried his face beneath the textile. He resembled the shy and frantic creature she had first met, not the flourishing poet who had crept his way into her esteem.
"We brought breakfast," Cameron interrupted, nodding at Meeks to close the door as he crouched low, placing a large tray on the floor. Several cups, spoons, and a steaming coffee pot took up the majority of its surface. Squeezed into the corner were crisp, rolled-up napkins with golden pastries peeking out of the sides. The scent of melting butter and cinnamon enveloped the room and loosened something wound tight inside of her.
"Oh," the air left Kat's lungs. "Thank you."
He nodded; his face troubled as he pulled at his rumpled clothing.
She watched as Cameron and Meeks distributed the refreshments with the familiar rattle of the breakfast hall. Every raised arm or flick of a wrist was doubled in the dark shadows painted across the cream walls. Steam from the poured coffee rose in spirals and dissipated into a silvery haze, yet the ritual remained aggressively normal. Everything was the same, it seemed, except themselves - shaken and one push from falling.
'Unreal city, under the brown fog of a winter noon.'* The unbidden lyric tasted sour on her tongue. This was a fragment of Eliot she had never wished to truly understand.
"They're making an official announcement after breakfast," Meeks said quietly as he shakily handed Todd and herself a mug. "A whole school assembly."
"Official?"
Cameron's spoon clattered against the porcelain. "It's Welton," he ground out, "no one here knows how to keep their mouths shut."
"They will if they know what's good for them," Charlie said. His hands brushed unseeingly over the pastry in his lap as if it were a mislaid object. They grazed the buttery flakes, once, twice, and then settled in fists on the bedcovers.
Knox looked on, the line of his shoulders tense. Kat could hardly blame him; Charlie's actions were languid to the same measure that his tone was combative.
"Let's get out of here," she said suddenly. Her eyes widened as the strength of the impulse grew. "I don't think I can face the apologies."
Her head turned instinctively towards the bed opposite, jerking away at the last moment.
Pitts' stare flicked up from the empty space. His answer was hesitant as it filled the pause, "we could go to the woods?"
"The lake," Todd's voice was firm from beneath the blanket. "Back to our spot," he added as he swung his legs out of bed. His socked feet hit the floor with a dull thud as the command carried – unmuffled by bedcovers – and propelled the remaining dead poets into action.
Food and crockery alike were promptly shoved aside. Doors banged open and closed with the succession of falling dominoes as the boys hurried in and out of their respective dorms. They hopped through the corridor as they shoved their feet into supple leather shoes, their eyes tracking Todd as he disappeared around the corner.
Kat grabbed a pair of navy tennis shoes from under his bed and cursed as she looped the laces into tight bows before dashing after the ragtag group.
The well-worn path down to the grounds felt like a hundred miles to the students as they ambled through the deserted halls. Todd led the charge, his hands pulling at the neck of his t-shirt as if it were choking him.
Cameron hovered behind, throwing concerned glances at Kat which bounced between his own roommate and Todd, whose footsteps were as quick as Charlie's were slow. The swap in pace was certainly bizarre, but Kat couldn't find the energy to think much of it. Instead, she turned her eyes to Knox as he ran ahead to the cloakroom.
He returned with an armful of coats. The crease in his brow deepened as Todd ignored him, leaving the outerwear to hang limply from Knox's extended arm as he threw himself forward, the momentum of his body wrenching open the side door with a bang.
Pitts snatched the forgotten item and took advantage of the shock to wrestle the coat onto Todd. He stood there for a moment, barely noticing the manipulation of his limbs, before dazedly stepping out into the frigid air.
The sun had dropped beneath a veil of clouds, its presence a faint sphere of yellow beneath the rolling specks of snow.
Kat let herself slump against the rough stone which arched over the doorway, her eyes tracing the delicate vee of birds flittering through the muted skyline. The tiny creatures dove beneath ivory whisps in blurs of grey and lilac as they fled the wintery grounds. How lucky, she thought grimly, envisioning the satisfying whistle of wind left in the wake of their speedy escape.
Something flashed in her periphery.
"Todd," Charlie hissed. Her eyes leapt to his grasping fingers left crooked and empty as the target bolted down the steps.
The poets tumbled after him, their cheeks flushed and stinging as they struggled to button up their coats. Each step sunk deep, imprinting the powdered lawn as they gave chase to the drifting figure ahead.
Todd slowed as he approached the knotted treeline by the lakeside dock. His coat billowed under the caress of the breeze.
"It's so beautiful." The wonder in his expression faded as a wounded lyric unfurled from his tongue,
'...drooping star with the countenance full of woe,
With the holders holding my hand nearing the call of the bird,
Comrades mine and I in the midst, and their memory ever to keep, for the dead I loved so well,
For the sweetest, wisest soul of all my days and lands—and this for his dear sake,
Lilac and star and bird twined with the chant of my soul,'*
Todd's gloveless hands were raw and red as he clutched at his chest, the shivers wracking his body shook Pitts' worried hands from his shoulders.
"And-" his eyes watered as he circled back to the first stanza, the singular line breaking the last of his control, "And thought of him I love."
The last of his wonderment collapsed into agony, his body crumpling like sodden paper into a tight ball as he retched over the glistening ground.
"Hey," a chorus of deep voices accompanied the hands rubbing his back, "it's alright."
"You're okay," a higher voice chimed in over the cacophony, "just take a second to breathe."
Todd shook his head, his blonde hair whipped into a frenzy by the wind. "He wouldn't-" he choked on the words as Charlie used a handful of snow to wipe the remnants of vomit from his mouth, "he wouldn't have done it."
"You can't explain it," Meeks soothed, "there are so many reasons."
"No, no," he groped for Charlie's hand, "it was his father! He wouldn't have left us. It's because he- But he wouldn't have. His father was- his, his father did it."
"Todd," Kat tried, tears stifling her voice.
"His father killed him," he clawed at the ground. His breathing squeezed as if the words pulled the last of the air from his lungs. "He made him do it!"
Charlie pulled Todd roughly into his chest. His arms wound tight around the fractured boy. "Breathe, Todd." He pulled away from the hug but kept a hand pressed to his chest. "Feel that? Now, breathe with me."
Kat fell into the snow and adjusted the scarf that had fallen loose around Todd's neck. The others appeared around the pair; their postures curved into a shielding circle.
Pitts wrapped a stabilising arm around Meeks. "You can't explain it," Meeks repeated in a daze, "so many reasons."
"It's not our fault," Cameron said quietly. His voice wavered, but his eyes fixed firmly on the splintered society. "We couldn't have known."
Knox nodded. Flecks of snow clung to his eyelashes as he surveyed the wreckage. He turned to Kat; his limbs weary as he tugged at her sleeve. "What do we do?"
"Learn to live with this," she replied, flinching at the note of bitterness in her voice.
Todd raised his eyes to meet hers. His chin tilted with defiance, but his tone rang desperate. "That day in the courtyard...he liked that one. Are there more? Winter and-and fitting."
She nodded, her knees numb as she settled her weight. Kat pressed them further into the frozen ground until the slush soaked through the pyjamas she hadn't bothered to change. Reaching out, Kat folded his bloodless hands into her own and let the passionate verse thaw her parted lips,
'Oh, weep for Adonais! though our tears
Thaw not the frost which binds so dear a head!
And thou, sad Hour, selected from all years
To mourn our loss, rouse thy obscure compeers,
And teach them thine own sorrow, say: "With me
Died Adonais; till the Future dares
Forget the Past, his fate and fame shall be
An echo and a light unto eternity!"*
Todd's grip tightened as Shelley's syllables flew free, ripping it from hers as she released the final consonants.
Her left hand lay limp in the snow, its pale skin reddening until Charlie's warm hand enclosed it in his own. A sob wrenched from Kat's trembling lips as Todd stumbled towards the dock.
Neil's name rebounded from the trees as his roommate – his everything – chased a ghostly memory across the colourless bank.
Cameron made a high-pitched sound as he and Pitts stood.
"Leave him be," Charlie instructed. The strength of the command startled their pursuit and brought it to a sudden halt.
They watched as Todd fell to his knees, fists pounding at the ice as if the thick casing concealed the river Acheron.* Slowly, he rose to stand at the edge of the sleeping lake, his silhouette framed by the denuded trees. Their skeletal hands etched a border around the solitary figure who gazed across the landscape like one of the romantic heroes depicted in Keating's books – a man poised on the howling precipice of a prospect view.*
Charlie dusted the snow from the folds of his woollen coat. "Come on. He needs to be alone."
XXXX
They assembled once again in the English classroom. The blinds were drawn, allowing the expanse to retain the golden hue of the overhead light as it spilled across the familiar grains of the wooden furniture. Kat leaned into each dip and ridge of her usual seat, comforted by its steady embrace.
The door shuddered against its frame as Pitts slipped into the room. "The halls are clear," he reported, folding all his angles into the tight space between the bookshelf and Meeks' limbs. He pressed his elbow against his friend's, lending his strength to the boy who had barely spoken since the episode by the lake. "We shouldn't be bothered as long as we avoid the dorms and common room."
"Even walls aren't strong enough to keep the misery of Welton out," snorted Knox as he slumped against the window. His tone wavered somewhere between laughter and tears, "the stone probably feeds on it."
Cameron frowned. "It's a building, Knox. A building can't harm you."
"It's not the building, it's what it represents!"
Kat's lips quirked, "spoken like a true literature student."
"I don't understand-"
"You wouldn't," Charlie bit back. The words were as empty of venom as his gentle grip on her hand. He had not let go since the trek in from the wintery wonderland, his thumbs stroking across her knuckles every now and then as if he were confirming that the tether between them was still in existence.
Cameron's glare faltered as their glazed eyes connected. The choreographed steps came to halt with a barely perceptible dip of his chin.
An armistice, Kat realised. Neil would've created a public holiday in its honour.
His roommate's eyes slid to the open desk in the centre of the room. Five Centuries of Verse had been removed from the scattered belongings which lined the rectangular hollow. It cut a familiar figure across Keating's desk, its fraying, dark edges laid out with the gold lettering winking from inside of its decorative wreath.
"Guys?" A low rasp sounded from the doorway. Todd stepped into the classroom, water pooling beneath his feet and trailing across the floorboards until he took the seat at Neil's desk. His blue eyes sought Kat's and stuttered at her hand clasped in Charlie's. A flicker of a smile appeared on his purpling lips.
"Annest of Annes," Todd mouthed.*
Kat shrugged one shoulder, stubbornly ignoring Charlie who watched the exchange with thinly veiled confusion. "He was right, it is more than white knights."
"Unless the knight can throw a desk set."
Nuwanda's laugh spluttered, rough, and spasmodic like a broken engine. "He re-enacted that throw twice after you went to bed. It was almost as bad as your little trick with the bathroom request."
"Shut up," Todd stifled a grin. "You stormed into our room more than once in a crisis-"
"-which Neil found irrationally funny."
"After talking you down."
"Oh, I was down alright. Having Shakespeare thrown at you for advice does tend to have that effect on a person."
"That was one time."
"It hit me in the head!"
Knox ducked behind Cameron's back. "No damage done, then."
"Slander!"
Meeks took a crumpled sheet of paper from his pocket and launched it towards Nuwanda's outstretched arm. It bounced off his index finger, allowing Knox to back further away from the danger zone. "Do you remember when he forced his parents to take us trick or treating in first year?"
"No, not the Wizard of Oz costumes," Pitts groaned. "The green paint stained my face for a week."*
Nuwanda's shoulders shook, the movement vibrated across their entwined hands, and Kat bit back her own grin at the mixture of amusement and horror painted on the poets' faces.
"I still can't believe he convinced his mom to be Dorothy," Knox said, "the poor woman was run ragged by hyperactive eleven-year-olds."
"Plural?" Camron's eyes narrowed. "I was so tightly wrapped in aluminium foil that I could hardly move. The running was all you, Toto."
"I think that night was the first time you vomited in public," Nuwanda's delighted smile caused Knox to shudder. "I was a magnificent lion until you spewed toffee apples over my shoes."
"Ugh, don't remind me." He sighed wearily, "Neil was the only one willing to stand next to me for the rest of the night."
"That was nothing compared to the Great Gertie incident of '56," Pitts flung his arms wide, almost smacking Meeks in the face. "Who on earth tries to adopt a wild goose?"
Charlie shot him an affronted look, "Gertie was tame!"
"She was a goose you and Neil tempted from the lake with leftovers," Meeks clarified. His eyes were full of exasperation as he turned to Kat, "those fools kept a giant, honking bird in their wardrobe for over a week."
"I told Hager that I didn't like vegetables," Nuwanda said with a hint of a smirk. "It's not my fault that Neil wanted my Friday nights free of detention."
Cameron let out a wild cry, "I knew it was his idea!"
"And yet," he tutted mockingly, "you couldn't prove it."
Knox snickered as Meeks inhaled sharply, "the proof was my shredded bedding." His arms folded across his chest as he glared at Nuwanda. "I will never babysit any of your kids again."
Kathleen and Todd shared a look of morbid fascination as the tale unfolded. How Neil had even come up with this irrational solution to his ruined Friday game night was both completely incomprehensible, and so wholly Neil that it made her chest hurt.
"Gertie was the reason Neil and I became close," Pitts grinned. "She was really quite sweet after she got that attack on Chet Danbury out of her system."
Knox scoffed, "attack? All she did was hiss."
"And the wet blanket went running to Hager," Charlie muttered. He caught the expression on Kat's face and raised an eyebrow, daring her to contradict the epithet
She rolled her eyes, but the action did little to hide the glimmer of mischief in their depths. "Someone should tell Ginny. She'd never let him live it down."
Todd dropped his head until it rested on his palms, elbows braced on the edges of Neil's desk. "He never told me any of this."
"He never saw it as special," Charlie replied. His voice softened at Todd's crestfallen look, "Neil's always had big ideas, jumping from one to the next without paying attention to the lasting impact."
"And the simple things," Kat added. Her lips pressed into a thoughtful line, "do you remember our first night as students? It was just the three of us - You, Neil, and I – waiting for the others before we sat down for dinner."
The poets fell silent as Todd nodded.
"At first, I thought Neil was just being friendly," she admitted, "but when Fraser quite rudely introduced himself, he-" the silken glide of a thumb provided gentle pressure on her hand as a sniffle escaped. "Neil shut him down and got me out of the situation. He didn't make a big deal of it, he just did it like it was nothing. That was when I knew how special his small kindnesses were, and that Welton could, perhaps, be home."
Frosty pink twilight descended in a gradual wave over their tearful joy until it faded into a drowsy, navy sea across Welton's skies.
"We should head up to bed," Todd suggested, yawning into his sleeve.
The poets shuffled into action; their footsteps lethargic as they ascended the staircase up to the blue-washed dormitories.
Kathleen took the alternate fork. Fingers slipped from her own like rushing water, allowing the cool night air to trickle down her palms.
Inside, she let her back rest for a moment against the closed door. With a deep breath, she tugged the blanket from her bedcovers and draped it over her shoulders like a medieval cloak.
Each step across the floorboards was an answer to the beckoning call of burning starlight. She sank down on the cushioned window seat; her forehead pressed to the glass.
Once upon a time, Kat would have thought the stars shone in mockery of such undeserving despair, but something inside of her knew better. Only Neil could shine so intensely, only he could lessen their anguish with his presence. He was there, watching until his true family expelled their final breaths and joined him in eternal freedom.
But for now, Kat thought, she would muddle through the earthly equivalent. They all would.
'I am borne darkly, fearfully, afar;
Whilst, burning through the inmost veil of Heaven,
The soul of Adonais, like a star,
Beacons from the abode where the Eternal are'*
The murmured lyric fell thickly from her tongue as she surrendered to sleep, afflicted with a different illness to the last time she had slept here beneath the peaceful watch of stars.
XXXX
"I'm sorry."
Kat jumped, spinning to face the open door on her left.
"This stalking thing is getting old," she squinted through the midday glare pouring through the high windows behind the shadowed boy. Kat held one hand above her eyes as she watched him look left to right down the empty halls like a criminal mid-heist. "Anyone observant enough to realise that we're friends is also smart enough not to gossip."
Fraser ushered her into the classroom, simply closing the door in response to her comment.
Her eyes moved from the hand clasping her bicep to its owner. He let go, but his glare remained. For some reason, it was an odd comfort that he could still look at her with the same odd mix of jealousy, reluctant admiration, and somewhat false contempt. "What do you-"
"-there aren't many people I can stand," Fraser said sharply, his mouth falling into a flat line, "but he was different. The best of us."
"He is-was," she corrected.
The pity in Fraser's eyes made her skin crawl.
He shrugged. The floorboards creaked as he shifted to support his weight against the doorframe, "there's a blonde girl tearing through the entrance hall." Weak amusement flashed across his face, "she's quite insistent about seeing you."
Kat jolted, one hand flying up to clutch at the pendant on her necklace. "Oh, God."
"Hopkins is distracting Hager for now, but you should probably receive your guest in the true, Welton manner," he said as a familiar smirk began to sculpt his lips, "in secret."
She rolled her eyes, pausing as she reached for the door handle. "Hopkins? Why?"
Fraser looked at her for a moment, "he owes me."
"Thank you."
"For Neil, alright?"
She nodded, her throat closing around an itch.
"Great," he held the door open, "now deal with her before the younger boys collapse in shock."
"Just the younger ones?" She asked sweetly. A bubble of laughter escaped when his smirk faltered.
"Out," he scowled.
Kat nodded, her grin stretching as she noticed the amusement beneath his guise of irritation. He rolled his eyes, merely pointing at the door until she left.
She breezed down the halls, passing an increasing number of slack-jawed teenage boys whose faces were each a perfect picture of stunned awe. They half-resembled Knox, Kat thought wryly as she glimpsed a small crowd through the gaps in the banister. She could hardly imagine the state of him during his juvenile years.
Kat skirted around the staircase and walked straight into the heart of chaos. Pechman and Russell were stationed by the passage towards the staff room, whilst Francis seemed to be impersonating a shepherd harassed by lambs in his attempt to befriend the excitable twelve-year-olds.
A familiar figure cut through the mayhem. Cream skirts blurred as she turned, her blue eyes fixing on Kat as she stalked across the entrance hall. A handful of boys at the front looked cowed. One by one they shuffled back, their bodies penning Francis amid the horde.
"Tell me it's not true," Nancy's stern expression wavered, "Kat-"
The words drowned in her answering silence. Her best friend paled. Nancy held one palm flat against her stomach, staunching the emotional wound as she read the events of last night from the mascara dotted above the brunette's splotchy cheeks.
"Come with me," Kat grabbed onto her hand tightly. They wove quickly across the hall, ducking around Kat's classmates – who let them pass with a solemn nod – and straight towards the old, uneven doors to the Chapel.
They shut with a resounding bang. Kat leaned against the vibrating wood, "does Ginny-"
"No," Nancy fell heavily into a back pew. "They left for school before I got your letter."
"I'm sorry I didn't call," Kat said, blinking up at the pulpit where her grandfather had made his welcoming speech. "I couldn't- I can't say it, not yet."
"Speaking it would make it real," Nancy replied softly, beckoning for the girl to sit.
Kat slipped into the pew. It was the same pew, she realised faintly, that she had occupied on her first day. She looked down at their joined hands, then over to the bench where she had first seen Todd with his parents, and back to Nancy.
Her bitten lips parted, tears shimmering on her powdered cheeks, "how is everyone doing."
"Charlie can't decide if he's angry or empty, Todd's broken," she exhaled shakily, "while Knox disappears and then acts like hasn't been crying, Meeks tries to take of care of us but he looks pained, Pitts is so restless it hurts to watch, and Cameron won't give himself a break." Kat's wide eyes met hers, "and I just feel so useless."
"You're not here to be useful," Nancy said sharply. "You're here because Neil means something to you. That means you understand them, and they understand you."
Kat bumped her arm appreciatively into Nancy's, "we did take a group trip to the library this morning." Her tone grew lighter, a watery smile brushing her lips, "for the right poetry."
"See," her best friend unbuttoned her coat – shivering in the chill – and dipped a manicured hand into the pocket hidden in its silk lining to retrieve a ripped note, "you know what to do for one another."
Twirling it through her fingers, Nancy deftly folded the fragment into an origami envelope. With a hoarse but satisfied sigh, she dropped it into Kat's lap.
The yellowed page crinkled as she smoothed out its folds. Dust and a trace of woodsy vanilla filled the air, the scent diffused into her blood and pumped a sensory comfort through her taught muscles. Kat inhaled deeply before glancing at the ink. She didn't know what she had expected, but it wasn't this.
'If the past year were offered me again,
And choice of good and ill before me set
Would I accept the pleasure with the pain
Or dare to wish that we had never met? '
~ 'If the Past Year Were Offered Me Again,' Augusta, Lady Gregory
Underneath the print two short words looped together in Nancy's neat cursive.
Kat bit her lip, chin tilted towards her inquirer, "I would." The admission unravelled a thread pulled taut in her spine. "I don't want a life without knowing him."
"Then don't," there was a pause as Nancy dabbed at her eyes. Streaks of eyeliner stained her fingertips. "When my grandma died, I wanted the whole world to stop, and when I refused to get out of bed in that first week, it was you who coaxed me outside."
She pulled a pressed forget-me-not from her inside pocket. Its vibrant blue petals drew a smile from Kat as she recalled that bittersweet afternoon.
"Getting hopelessly lost in the countryside stopped my spiralling thoughts," she admitted, "and stumbling onto a golf course gave me something to laugh about, especially when you nearly got hit by a rogue ball."
"I know," Kat's pout trembled until it broke into a pleased grin. "You often humble me with that story."
Nancy handed her the crinkled stem. "And those giggles turned to tears when we found the forget-me-nots, her favourite flowers. It was like a reward for finding happiness, a sign from her that things would be different - even worse for a while - but eventually, they would be okay."
The greenery lay in Kat's palm with its petals soft against her fingertips. "Loving remembrance," she recalled, gently laying it on the bench before folding Nancy into a grateful hug.
"Tributes are better than wallowing," she whispered as Kat pulled away, "but you have to sit with the sadness first."
Kat nodded, letting her friend stand up.
"Walk me out?"
"The scenic route?"
Nancy looked proud as she gestured for Kat to lead the way, "after you."
The pair linked arms as they glided up the aisle. Their heels clicked across the hard floors and the sound - foreign to Welton's history - reverberated around the high walls, its echo lingering as the doors slammed shut behind their skirts.
In solitude, they crept across the silvery grounds. Their footsteps left a trail into the tangle of bare birch and pine trees, their trunks thick and ridged with age. Kat wove between them with ease, keeping her pace steady yet slow enough for the comfort of her companion and their penchant for gorgeous yet impractical shoes.
Hidden deep among the copse was a bike, its tires pointed toward the path which sprawled out onto the gritted drive. Kat let her arms rest across the handlebar as Nancy swung a leg over its metal frame.
"The funeral…" Nancy looked up, chewing the inside of her bottom lip as the word sat heavily between them. "Let me know, alright?"
Kat nodded, "he'd want you there. All of you – Gin, Chris, and the entire theatre crowd."
"We'll make it happen," Nancy's eyes were solemn as she held Kat's gaze. "I swear it."
"Whether Welton will allow it or not," she said heatedly, releasing her grip on Nancy's bike. "See you soon?"
She paused; one foot poised over the pedal. "Soon," Nancy said, a promise in her voice as she looked back at Kat. "Don't get into too much trouble in the meantime."
"Liar," she murmured, recalling several times when the girl had knowingly pulled her into the worst of their mischief.
Shaking her head, Kat watched her best friend sail down the road in a blur of cream and yellow. As the bright dot faded from view, she backed into the treeline, tugging at the sleeves of her black jumper until it concealed her half-numbed hands from the cold.
Treading deeper into the woods, Kat wandered aimlessly, dipping in and out of the black hollows far from the old, meeting cave. Here, the world remained cold and bare. Even the densest thicket quivered under the touch of frost.
She scanned the autumnal grave for traces of rich maple, or wisps of lacy yarrow spread beneath the frozen gauze. In vain she searched this delicate, shimmering world for something more than blank, eternal beauty, and its overwhelming sense of death.
XXXX
"I thought I'd find you here," Kat's voice was loud in the empty music room. The curtains were drawn and only a slice of bluish light streamed through the thin glass. The light disseminated into streaks of white which illuminated the dust in the disused space like a gossamer film.
Nuwanda sat at the piano: his shirt sleeves rolled up and his hair mussed so haphazardly that it would raise Hager's blood pressure. The sight made her own blood pulse a little faster, she thought dismissively, shifting her focus to the deconstructed clarinet cradled in his lap.
"I hate to be predictable," he said lightly, running a cloth over the mouthpiece before setting it down in the velvet hollow of its case.
Kat ignored the comment, merely poking at his ankle with her foot, "move over."
He complied, raising an eyebrow as she slid onto the red, upholstered bench. Unlike the ghostly shapes of music stands and cellos draped in white sheets, his presence felt material and real beside her. His arm brushed against her own as he continued to pack the segmented instrument.
Idly, she let her fingers trail over the pearly keys. Their airy sound lilted and twirled into a lazy melody beneath her touch. Deeper, richer tones began to emanate through the tune. Startled, Kat fumbled the next note.
"Inattentive? Or just an amateur?" Nuwanda teased, finishing their rendition of Greensleeves* with a flourish.
"Both," she admitted, her gaze catching his for a moment. The redness around his eyes still shocked her. "I didn't know you could play."
He looked at her pointedly, "ditto." His eyes flicked back to the instrument, staring at the mass of carved mahogany as if it had offended him.
"I learned in the summer of second year." He plucked the keys in a torrent of beginner's scales. "It was Mrs Perry, and Neil, who taught me."
He swiped a hand across his face, tears still blurring the brown of his eyes once it dropped back into his lap.
"What was it like?" Kat asked, thinking of her own adventures playing trolls under the bridge or performing Shakespeare with broken branches wielded as swords in the Scottish woodland with her brothers, "being at the Perry house for the holiday?"
"Kind of like Welton," Charlie said, amusement battling the sorrow in his voice. "We ran wild in the day while his father was at work. One minute we were swimming in the lake, and the next we were building a blanket fort across the dining room. Mrs Perry would bake in the morning and let us smuggle cake into the movies after lunch. And in the evenings," he sighed, "we would suffer through dinner with bets on how soon or how many times I could make his father laugh."
"Did you?"
He nodded; a bitterness seeped into his smile. "Never more than twice in one sitting."
Kat took Nancy's note from where she had tucked it into her sleeve. The ink had smudged slightly as her re-readings wore through the paper. She read it again, thumbs pressed to the corners as if it were a lifeline, a safety net she could wrap herself inside.
"What's that?"
She tilted the words towards him. "Nancy stormed the school this morning."
A short, breathless laugh was forced from his throat.
"I think she frightened the poor youngsters hoping to catch a glimpse of the rumoured girl trespassing onto Welton property." The minuscule quirk of his lips strengthened her resolve, erasing the shakiness from her voice. "We hid in the chapel, and she gave me this."
"She really does have a gift for reading people," he mused quietly.
"Truly," Kat agreed, her mind on the cave lit by campfire embers and the horoscopes Nancy had brandished like a promise beneath their glow. "With or without a synastry chart."
He froze. Kat felt the weight of his gaze on her skin.
"So, you've seen the bigger picture?" The familiar words strained against the heavy silence between them. The purposeful levity of the implication made her ache. "Has that Sagittarian sense of adventure finally prevailed?"
"If the past year were offered me again," she quoted, re-working the words with an honesty that made her hands shake, "I would not dare wish we had never met." His arm moved to encircle her waist, each poetic line emboldening his touch until Kat's words brushed the wool of his sweater.
Her hands crept up the soft fabric, interlacing themselves behind his neck as she met his hopeful gaze. Abandoning the words of greats, Kat fused their own words, past and present, with all the tenderness and desire she had spent so long pushing away. "I think it's time for our selfish joy."
She felt him inhale.
"Kat," he said. His voice held a dangerous edge.
She nodded.
Charlie's hands slid into her hair, winding the dark strands between his fingers as they pressed gently to the underside of her jaw, tracing its slope until her chin tilted upwards.
"I love you," the half-whisper ghosted across her lips.
The knowledge sparked something deep inside her chest, and suddenly, nothing in the dizzying school mattered anymore – not her grandfather, the haze of pain, or the dwindling sands of time - and the thought bloomed in her mind until all its delicate petals spelt love, love, love.
For the first time in her life, Kat was sickened by prose, tired of the language that had always been her retreat, her escape, her cloak. Sick of stagnation, she made a choice.
Kat pulled away, her senses all music and smoke and deep brown eyes - and kissed him.
His mouth was soft, each brush of his lips was deliberate as the kiss grew deeper. His fingers trailed down her throat, her spine, and her waist as he drew her closer, his palm flattening against the small of her back.
Despite the lingering salt of grief, there was a taste of hope that intoxicated her. His lips lingered, pressing short, hot kisses to her skin before pulling away. Kathleen made a high, breathless sound as she leaned back. Keeping her hands on him, she ran them along his arms and up to his shoulders where she rested them.
He leaned into it, and she bathed in the feeling of home in his embrace.
"I love you too," she whispered, "my heart belonged to you before I even knew it was gone. Every stupid American book hero had your smile, and every boy at Chris' party was dull compared to your voice in the back of my mind." She took a shaky breath, her eyes never leaving his. "God, it made me furious when I realised that every day I fall further for you is one day closer to the end. But even with Nolan chastising me, all I could think about was youin the gleam of a telephone or in the tang of smoke from the fire. I can't pretend anymore," she admitted with a laugh as free as birdsong, "I've been obsessed with you for so long that the consequences won't make much of a difference. All I want is you."
"Obsessed?" His face lit up in equal fondness and amusement.
"Yes," she huffed with exaggerated frustration. Her hand slid down to poke at his chest, "you keep invading my reading. It's quite rude."
"Sorry," he grinned. Her palm flattened, skin thrumming with the quickening beat of his heart. Her blush deepened, causing his grin to widen. "I'll try and dial back my raw magnetism."
"I should've known you'd be you insufferable," she shot him a mock glare that melted beneath his touch.
"Too late, I like that we're not ignoring this thing between us," he moved to cup her cheek," because I've been obsessed with you since the moment we met." The pad of his thumb traced her lower lip. "You haunted every book and line of poetry in Keating's classes, and suddenly I was looking for you around every corner of this damn school, at your face after every joke, or hint of trouble. I may have known what I felt, but I didn't know what to do." His glazed eyes darkened as he held her gaze, "you have a singular talent for making me speechless."
Kathleen bit her lip, the movement catching his attention with an openness she craved. "Keep talking like that," she murmured, "and you'll have me forever."
"I'll take that risk," he said, the lightness fading from his tone as a distant clock chimed. His hold tightened at the reminder, and a challenge settled on his tongue. "Together?"
"Together," she said, hardly daring to move as he ducked his head. The move brought his mouth to hers as he closed the inches between them. The kiss was shorter but impossibly sweeter, making her head spin with the same madness igniting in her veins.
His bright smile tugged at her edges, blunting the jagged lines of half-truths, and wasted time as their eyes searched one other's desperately for a solution, but unlike the lovers depicted on the Grecian urn, forever was unattainable.*The tender moment which tethered them to the sonnets they had written about in the past months was severed by a faint voice in the doorway.
The pair let their arms fall until only their fingers were left intertwined. They turned away from the piano to see Todd gripping the doorframe.
"I thought it would happen more dramatically than this," Todd said, his voice constricted. "I guess Neil's theory won."
"They always do," Charlie rose from the piano and took a step forward. Kat moved in synchronicity, their shadows merging as they crossed over to the middle of the abandoned music room. "And he knew it, no matter how gracious his victory."
He held an arm out to Todd, who accepted the invitation with a faint smile as he stepped into their space.
"Out of interest," Kat tilted her chin, "what was your theory?"
"A moment. One unplanned and undeniable moment," he said simply. "Maybe in a meeting or hanging out in the grounds-"
"Or the library," Charlie cut in, "sneaking around in the stacks." A heavy undertone marked his words. Whipping around to face him, Kat caught the devastation in slow motion.
"Or th-that." Todd's shoulders drooped; his eyes squeezed shut as images slipped through his mind like distorted watercolours. He stumbled back, "I-I can't-"
"I shouldn't have said that." Charlie winced, his dark eyes pleading with Todd to stay, "sorry. I just-" He shook his head, "I miss him too."
The boy nodded slowly, trembling as Kathleen wrapped her other arm around him. Her eyes watered as Todd reciprocated, pulling Charlie into his other side, and linking the three of them together.
"I swear that no one else is leaving, not like that." Charlie whispered determinedly, "not while I live."
The trio stayed coalesced until the sun went down, arms keeping one another close. The three shattered teens tried to mend their broken puzzle, but no matter how hard they tried, the central piece remained missing. It would remain that way until the poets could join their very own mischievous Puck, lighting up a theatre a world away from their own.
* 'Unreal city...' The Wasteland, T.S Eliot (1922)
* 'drooping star...' When Lilac Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd, Walt Whitman (1865)
* 'Oh weep for Adonais...' Adonais (I), Percy Bysshe Shelley (1821)
* Acheron – the river of pain or woe which acted as a physical barrier between the mortal world and the underworld in Greek mythology. Souls were said to be transported across by the ferryman, Charon. The most famous myth about the river is that of Orpheus who attempted to retrieve his wife from the underworld and return her to life.
* The Prospect View – Used in many works from the male Romantic canon and then appropriated by women writers. Symbolised by Wanderer above the Sea of Fog, Caspar David Friedrich, (1818) an oil painting often used to represent the romantic movement and its literary use of the prospect view.
* 'Annest of Anne's,' a reference to the Anne of Green Gables books by L.M. Montgomery
* The Wizard of Oz, L. Frank Baum (1900) and released as a movie (1939) and first shown on television (1956)
* 'I am borne darkly…' Adonais (LV), Percy Bysshe Shelley (1821)
* Greensleeves, a traditional English folk song (1580)
* 'the lovers depicted on the Grecian Urn,' refers to Ode on a Grecian Urn, John Keats (1820)
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akina speranza - It HURT me too. I shamelessly shed a tear while writing
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