17 Missed Calls

↠72↞ The promise

↠72↞

The promise

The clock's ticking but its sound froze in the air and never reached my ears, drowned out by the loud pounding in my chest. The birds are soaring in the sky, visible through one of the windows in our lecture hall, but the flutter of their wings cannot compare to the one of my own heart. Dozens of eyes are directed at me, curious and shocked, watching me closely, as if I was an enthralling movie, whilst Will is standing there, in front of everyone, his chest falling up and down — the only movement of his body.

I can't believe what's just happened. I can't process how great his poem was. Somehow he managed to turn all these: the night of Beverly's suicide, his father's unfaithfulness and his own disability to stop running from his problems into a love poem.

He confessed that he fell for me.

My subconscious grins like crazy, mascara streams down her cheeks along with tears of pure joy as she fixes a tiara on her head, feeling like the winner of Miss Universe.

"It was a great poem, William," the professor says, observing him from under her glasses. "It deserves a B."

I stiffen in my chair, noticing his sudden, disgruntled expression.

"To me it deserves an A, but what do I know?" he scoffs, crumpling the sheet in his hand.

"I beg you pardon?" The teacher gapes at him, displeased.

"To you, Mrs. Cohen, it might mean nothing because you simply don't get the words I've just recited, but I do–"

"Enough, William," she silences him, using her coldest tone. "I'm giving you a B. Period."

"I don't care about your stupid grade!" His voice lifts. "You expect everyone to put their hearts and minds into their work so you can just sit there and hear us out, but you don't really listen. You give grades to the words, words that appeal to you, not the stories that cause them to appear on our papers," he growls, making his way up to his desk, emerging beside me. He then collects his backpack. "Poetry should be understood, not rated," he grumbles, and on that note, he storms out of the lecture hall.

Alike everyone else in the class, I remain silent, unable to process what's just happened. Nevertheless, I quickly gather up my things and run after him, the professor doesn't even bother to stop me.

"Will!" I shout, seeing him stride down the hall.

"Go away, Davina!" he yells back, his voice seeths with annoyance.

"Is this why you were acting so odd? Because you understood how you feel about me!?" I gush, dashing towards him.

At the sound of my words he stops, and when he turns around, his eyes are harder and darker than usual. "Yeah, so what?" he mutters, his tone is dry.

"You promised me, Will. You promised that if it happens, you'd talk to me."

"We are talking. Right now," he points out, no mercy withheld in his eyes.

"Oh, so you're going to run away, yeah?" I snort, unable to believe him. "Do the thing that you always do," I growl, exasperated.

"I'm not ready to be in love, don't you understand!?" he shouts, and his loud voice makes me shudder.

"But you already are!" I snap back, not letting him win this ridiculous argument. "Why don't you give us a chance!?"

"Because I don't want it," he spits angrily, his stare is colder than the waters of Antarctica.

"So you're just going to treat me like a problem now?" I retort, feeling beyond infuriated.

"You are a problem!" he bellows, and once he realizes what he's just said, he presses his mouth into a hard line at a sudden loss for words.

"Yeah." I chuckle humourlessly. "Go fix it then just like you did it with the other ones you had," I growl, staring intensively into his eyes. "Without me," I spit, and turn on my heel, my chest feels heavy as I start running in the direction of the dorms, wanting nothing else but for the world to stop spinning and put an end to my misery.

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