That Saturday morning, I woke with a start at exactly 4:45 AM. I shivered as I crept out of bed and put my warm fuzzy socks on underneath my robe. It was far too cold for October, although maybe I was just this cold because it was a while since I had woken up this early. I crept quietly down the corridor and went to fish out my keys, realizing immediately that I didn't have them. Did I pick up my keys from Professor Grabiner yesterday? I hesitate for a moment. No, no I did not. Crap! I try the door, but of course it's locked. Nervously, I began to pace outside the door. I could try to unlock it using magic, but would he know? Would he be mad?
I slump back against the opposite wall. Great way to start off the year, with Grabby breathing down my neck about irresponsibility. Suddenly I hear footsteps approaching and turn to see him walking down the hall, a sly smile playing on his lips. "Forget something?" he asks, holding up the keyring in front of him.
"I am so sorry," I start, but he waves his hand dismissively as he unlocks the door.
"The fault is mine, Ms. Brown," he says. "I departed early for my quarters yesterday afternoon and forgot to make sure you had the keys."
"I-" Is he really admitting fault? I blush and take the keys from him. "Thank you, sir, but really, I should have been more responsible and made sure I got them before you left."
He shifts. "Well, I trust I don't need to remind you to do your duties." He sets about to do something in a far corner while I get out the envelopes and start to put the five dollar allowance in each one. It feels strange to me, like I'm simply moving in response to muscle memory while my mind is somewhere far off. For some reason I turn around and realize that Grabiner is watching me. Intently.
"Am I doing something wrong?" I ask immediately, looking at the envelopes. I was literally putting a five dollar bill in each envelope, how difficult could it be?
"Are you feeling all right?" he asks after a moment. His voice is quiet, and comes out as no more than a whisper in the thick morning air.
"Yeah, just tired." I shrug and go back to sorting through the allowances. Over my shoulder, I am aware that he is still watching me. I put down the envelope I'm holding and turn to face him. "Is there something wrong, sir?"
He hesitates, as if he's not sure how to answer the question. "Do you like working as treasurer, Tori?"
My forehead creases in confusion. "I…" I shrug. "I mean, getting up so early isn't exactly what I would call fun, but it's not bad."
He doesn't say anything as he turns around to go back to doing whatever it is that he's doing, so I go back to my work. I place money in a few more envelopes but his odd behavior, combined with my suspicions from yesterday, push a question to my lips. "Sir, I did win this position fairly, right?"
He raises his eyebrows at me. "Is there something you wish to confess?"
"No," I say immediately. "You were there. But I just, I thought I would lose, is all. A lot of people said they were voting for Jacob and I know Minnie wanted him to win."
"It was very close," he says. "You won by a single vote."
My jaw drops in shock, but I can't think of anything to say to that. I quickly finish the allowances and get up to sort the mail. It doesn't take me a long time, and I'm soon ready to deliver it through the sophomore halls. "Good day, sir," I say quickly, and I'm out the door before he can answer.
Once the mail is all delivered, I slip back to my dorm. Ellen is already up, reading a book over a bowl of cereal. I give her a nod of acknowledgement and plop down on the bed, resting my forehead in my knees.
"Hey," Ellen says quietly, so as not to wake the sleeping Virginia. "You okay?"
"Yeah," I shrug.
"Grabby give you a hard time?"
"No." I pull my knees away from my face. "No he was actually nice to me, I guess. It's just something he said."
"What did he say?" Virginia yawns sleepily. "Yeah, you woke me up when you came in. Go figure. What did he say?"
"I, okay," I shrug. "He said that I only won by a single vote."
"A single vote?" Ellen repeats.
Virginia grunts as she pushes herself up in bed. "So? A vote's a vote. Doesn't matter if you won by one vote or fifty votes or a thousand votes, you still won."
"Yeah, but you don't know by whose vote," Ellen says. I tilt my head to the side, waiting for her to go on. "Well, why else would he tell you?"
"I mean, he was acting weird around me, like…nice, I guess," I stammer, trying to recall. "So I asked if I won it fairly since I thought Jacob was going to win it, and he told me that I won by a single vote."
Ellen puts her hand over her mouth as she stares at me. Both Virginia and I exchange unimpressed glances. "Okay, you're going to have to explain that one to us," Virginia urges while I nod in agreement.
"Don't you get it?" Ellen asks. "What if he's hinting that he's the final vote?"
"What?" Virginia and I ask at the same time. She sounds a lot more excited than I am, though.
"Well, he's the supervisor for the treasurer and class president," she says. "If there happened to be a tie, isn't he the tie-breaker? He would cast the final vote to decide who won. Meaning you won by one vote."
"By his vote?" I brush my hair out of my face. "No way." For some reason, I just can't believe it. He was acting nice to me today, but that was probably because he had a good night's sleep or because it took too much effort to be so miserable this morning. "He wouldn't vote for me."
"He would vote for you over Jacob," Virginia countered, and I had to give her that.
"I really don't want to think about this," I say in an attempt to change the subject. "How about we go to the mall today? The three of us?"
"Well-" Ellen hesitated.
"Please?" I ask. "Help take my mind off of it?"
"Come on," Virginia said as she turned to Ellen. "You know I'm in."
Ellen sighs. "Well, I guess I don't really have a choice then, do I?"
"Nope," Virginia replied happily as she rushed into the bathroom to get ready.
A few hours later, we arrive at the mall; however, there is a bit of confusion as where to go next. "I want to go to the book store," Ellen says.
"Food court," Virginia counters.
"We could go to the magic store?" I offer as a compromise, but neither of them are receptive to the idea.
"Hello ladies." We spin around to see Donald and Thomas walking towards us. "What are you three doing here?"
"And what are you two up to?" Virginia asks, placing her hands on her hips. "Come to buy some more water balloons? Cream pies? Rubber ducks?"
"Just going to the arcade," Thomas says, holding up his hands innocently.
"Nothing like a friendly pinball tournament on a rainy Saturday afternoon," Donald adds.
"Oh, mind if I come with you?" I ask quickly. Virginia and Ellen both glance sideways at me, but I can't help it. I don't really want to go to the book store, and I don't want to go to the food court. I do, however, want to go to the arcade, but I would have a hard time dragging Virginia or Ellen in there with me.
"Of course," Donald says. "Any other takers?"
"Nah, I got stuff to do," Virginia says.
"Same," Ellen echoes.
"Well, then, we'll, uh, see you later," Donald says as they walk past. I shrug at my roommates in quick apology as we head off to the arcade.
"So have you been playing pinball lately?" Donald asks me as we enter the arcade.
"Nah, I haven't been in the arcade much since Big Steve won me that cute stuffed rabbit from the claw machine."
"Wait, the one he carried around all year?" Donald asks.
"Yeah, I sort of gave it to him after he told me that he was having dreams that Mr. Hoppity was calling to him," I shrug. "Doesn't matter. He's probably better off with Big Steve anyway."
So they set about taking turns playing pinball from the machine while I played on the dance machine, working on my footwork. After a while, Donald either got bored or hungry and gave up to go to the food court. Thomas turned to me. "So do you want to play?"
"Nah," I shrugged. "Never been much for pinball."
Thomas pulled himself up onto the foosball table in the middle of the room and sat on it, dangling his legs off the edge. "Hey, how come we don't hang out as much as we used to?"
"Just busy, I guess," I shrug. "Professor Grabiner didn't want me tutoring you anymore either. Said I wasn't smart enough, or something like that."
"He's a jerk," Thomas said irritably, and I turn away from the machine to look at him.
"No, come on, he's not that bad," I shrug. "He can be nice when he wants to be."
Thomas looked around, as though someone might be listening. "Can I tell you a secret?"
"Of course. I won't tell." I wait patiently for him to tell me what's on his mind.
"I think I was really elected as freshman treasurer and he rigged the vote somehow." I try to disguise the look of shock that swept across my face, but he noticed it. "What is it?"
"I don't think that he would do something like that," I say quickly, trying to push the conversation I had with my roommates this morning out of my mind. "I mean, he doesn't really care who gets elected, right?"
"I'm not sure," Thomas answers. "He's always giving me a hard time on exams, even though other people I've talked to say that I'm going above and beyond what's expected of us at this level. Plus Jason won't let me study with him anymore either, something about Grabiner saying that it was 'inappropriate' since he was my real teacher or something."
"That stinks," I shrug. "At least you only need to wait one more year until you get Jason as your teacher. Then you won't have to worry about Grabby anymore."
"Have you been taking a lot of his classes?" Thomas asks.
"Jason's?" I ask. "Yeah, he's, uh, pretty popular, but I tend to go often enough."
"You should go more and tell me what you learn." Thomas smiles at me. "Jason would be cool with it. It's a good way to practice some extra magic. And Grabby doesn't have to know. It's not his class, not his problem."
"I guess," I shrug as I check my watch. "I mean, he seems to have a way of knowing everything, but it doesn't matter. Jason did encourage me to study with you, and he's my teacher for that class now, so I guess it doesn't really matter what Grabby says."
"Cool," Thomas says, hopping off the table. "Time to get back now, huh?"
"Yeah, the bus is coming soon, we should probably join the others," I say as we get ready to leave the arcade. "By the way, I wouldn't worry too much about missing out on the treasury position. Getting up at 5 AM really isn't as much fun as it sounds."
He shrugs. "Yeah, well, if he did fix the polls, I can see why."
"Why?" I ask quickly, listening more intently than I should be.
"To surround himself with pretty girls, of course." He smiles up at me, but I just shake my head as we walk to join the others by the food court.
"There you two are," Virginia says as we approach. "I thought you two were going to miss the bus."
"Nah," I shrug. "Just not looking forward to getting back to school so soon. I got too much studying to do."
"Red magic?" Thomas asks.
"Yeah," I say. "Honestly at first I thought that blue magic was my favorite, but I think I seriously underestimated red magic and the potential of what you can do with it."
"Now you're joining my side," Virginia says as she throws an arm around my neck and forcibly leads me into the bus. We sit together side by side in the back making small talk about going to the gym and sports club when she suddenly lowers her voice. "So is he your boyfriend now?"
"What?" I ask. "Virginia, no."
"What?" She glances behind her, but Thomas is too busy wrapped up in his conversation with Donald to notice us. "I see the way he looks at you. And he's kinda cute-"
"-in a little brother way," I say.
"He's not that young."
"Too young for me," I respond.
"Oh right?" Virginia rolls her eyes. "I forgot you prefer older guys. Like Jason."
"I haven't even talked to him recently," I say, but I feel heat rising to my cheeks.
"Oh, uh-huh, sure," Virginia teases. "If knowing the correct answer to every question he asks isn't flirting then I don't know what is."
"Psh, I am not dating one of my teachers," I say resolutely. "Although Tommy seems to think that Grabby-pants has a thing for rigging the elections to pick pretty girls."
Virginia looks me up and down out of the corner of her eye. "Well, there you go. Now you know why you were picked to be treasurer. Mystery solved. Case closed."
"I guess," I say, rolling my eyes. I feel like there's more to it than that, but I can't exactly ask him. I doubt he would tell me anyway. Virginia sees the hesitant expression on my face and starts to sing.
"Tori and Grabby sittin' in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-…ow," Virginia teases until I smack her in the arm, a bit harder than I intended to. "Meanie. I was just teasing."
"Sorry," I say quickly. "Would you forgive me if I gave you the rest of the chocolates I have hidden under my desk when we get back?"
"So that's where you've been hiding them." She cracks a grin at me, and leans over the bus seat to thump Donald gently on the top of the head.
As they argue, I sit back and look out the rainy bus window. It's weird. For some reason, I just can't stop thinking about Professor Grabiner. He has shown that he can be nice, on occasion, and incredibly cruel on others…I just can't decide which person he really is.