Inhale

Chapter 14 - Jealousy and Despair

Silence, sweet silence: our table was full of it. Alas, if only the atmosphere was as comforting as the sound. The table was at a rejuvenating silence because the only female at the table was in a horrible mood, which greatly damaged the atmosphere surrounding the table. Why she's like this, who knows -all I know is that I should enjoy it. However, suddenly, the silence was broken by a single cough from a particular individual.

"So, Esmae," Phillip said, gaining our attention. He was trying to break the mood; this will only lead to disaster. "What are you having for lunch?"

"Why don't you ask Alastair?" she snarled, stabbing one of her eggs. Its yoke bleed a stale yellow, displaying the cruelty it had went through. "He's having the same thing, so I don't get why you don't ask him."

"Well then," he said, turning to me, "Al, what are you having for lunch?"

"Under-cooked eggs with burnt toast and apple juice," I responded.

"Ew. Apple juice," she commented, crinkling her nose in disgust.

"What's wrong with apple juice?" I asked, furrowing my eyebrows.

"I dunno, it's just something that only opportunists drink," she sassily said as she took a sip of her orange juice. "If not opportunists, then attention-whores." Attention whores? Did she just call me an attention whore?

"Why are you in such an awful mood?" I inquired, fed up with her pouty, childlike behavior.

"No reason. It's definitely got nothing to do with you, Alastair," she sarcastically spat, throwing darts at me.

"Listen, Esmae," I muttered, furrowing my eyebrows as I looked at my current annoyance. "If you have something to say, say it. I'm not the type to get offended easily."

"There you go, again!" she complained. See pounded her fists on the table, causing the utensils and plates to leap from their positions and a loud, cacophonous ring to sound. "You're always pretending that you don't know what you did wrong! You're a genius! You can't be dense!"

"Alastair's a genius?" He questioned, peering at me. "You always prove to impress me, Al!" he exclaimed, eyes twinkling. Of course, he couldn't read the atmosphere and of course, she directed all her anger at me. Once she noticed that she had successfully obtained my attention once more, she scoffed, and abruptly turned her head away.

"Phillip, shut up," I hissed, pushing away his compliment. He was obviously hurt, but honestly, I didn't care. After all, I'm almost certain that he's the culprit for this spat.

"Why can't we all just get along?" he whined, sniffling. "What happened to our group? We were so happy..."

There was a moment of reticence and sullenness, until she replied. "Who knows," she muttered in response, twisting her straw with a sunken expression. Great. Now, everyone is more somber than aggravated: this is so much better.

"Esmae-"

"Soldiers!" Sergeant Smith belted, cutting me off. Everyone fixed their attention on him, expecting to hear the usual news. "Breakfast is over! Report to your stations!"

We stood up together, yet refused to make eye contact. Or rather, the other two-I could care less. We cleaned our region, and then set out. Individually. The lack of company and speech irritated me more than expected, yet, I didn't mutter a complaint to the unusually taciturn duo. I fixated my gaze elsewhere.

Perhaps it's better this way.

-

Something's off: that was my first thought once I strolled into the training room. Not due to the fact that there was a velvet curtain in the middle of the training ground that bisected it, but because Sergeant Smith was smiling. Yes, that heinous, devious devil that is supposedly out to get Phillip was smiling-in fact, his grin stretched from cheek to cheek, which was more than a bit creepy and suspicious. This could mean one thing: whatever is behind that curtain was going to be something that would torture him. That, or it's going to torture all of us... hopefully, it's not going to be the ladder.