"I thought you said you weren't coming to class today," Dominic said from his usual seat in the ASL classroom.
Of course, he wasn't there when I almost tried to catch up on all the material I had missed, and that was several courses' worth of signs. And I was glad he didn't see that. He would probably convince himself that the effort was meant for him like the egotistical jerk he was.
I smiled and took my seat. "I changed my mind, if that's okay with you."
He didn't respond to that. He just went back to his notes.
Although I didn't carry it with me the same way I always had the gold one, I still hadn't given the silver talisman to Sierra like I said I would. I most likely would eventually, but I was too tired for that after getting yelled at by Harvey for no good reason.
There was a reason for Dominic not to like me. There were a couple of reasons for Sierra not to like me. There were a million reasons for Jack not to like me. But I hadn't given one to Harvey except that I thought he sucked, but I never even told him that.
"So what's been going on in this class? Anything exciting?" I asked Dominic.
He didn't even look up from his work. "Nothing that would excite you, I'm sure."
Smartass. "Then how about anything boring?"
"Well, we're a few weeks behind, so we're supposed to start working with a conversation partner to make up for the lost time."
"Conversation partner? Does that mean we have to work together again?"
He shook his head. "It's supposed to be with someone farther along in their ASL classes. And I already did mine."
"Kiss-ass," I muttered.
"What?"
I was pretty sure he heard me, and if he didn't, he could probably figure it out.
Before Dominic could ask me to repeat myself again, Dr. Rainier (if I remembered the new professor's name correctly) walked into the classroom with a briefcase in one hand and a stack of papers in the other. Busy man. He wrote signing only! on the board, wiped the chalk dust on his pant leg, and turned back around.
How did I always manage to pick the worst days to come to class?
The one thing I liked better about our ASL class now that Dr. Roberts was gone was that he and Dominic couldn't team up and make fun of me anymore. I knew Dominic would say just about anything to get the chance to make himself look good for authority, but why did it have to be at my expense? But with Dr. Rainier, that wasn't a problem. He had bigger things to worry about as the head of the languages department.
I took out my book from my backpack. I was pretty sure we were somewhere around chapter four, but after I spent a whole three minutes trying to commit chapter one to memory, I wasn't sure how well this was going to go.
Before he sat down at the desk at the front of the room, Dr. Rainier dropped the papers in his hand, and since Dominic always took the seat right in front, one of them feathered to a rest at his feet. Dominic picked it up and handed it back.
"Thank you, Dominic," Dr. Rainier said.
Dominic looked over at me and didn't reply with "no problem" or anything along those lines. Either he didn't hear him, or there was something on that paper that Dominic didn't like to see.
Maybe he failed a quiz.
I kept my smile to myself with that thought. As pleasant as the idea of his failure was, what were the odds that Dominic wouldn't just kill himself right there if he scored that low?
***
As soon as class ended, Dominic didn't linger and chat with the professor like I imagined he always did. Instead, he packed up all of his papers and pens and waved for me to catch up to him.
My one sparkly pen and half a sheet of notebook paper had been through enough emotionally, and now he wanted me to just throw them into my bag without a color-coordinated folder? The disrespect.
"How the hell did he get that?" Dominic asked as we walked out of the classroom together.
"How did who get what?"
"That paper had a black-and-white photograph of the talisman, Lindsay." He shook his head. "I knew it. I knew Dr. Reed was going to screw us over one way or another."
"Stop. You don't know that she did anything," I said. "And even if she did, it's not her fault. Her nephew just died, and grieving people do things they don't mean."
"Since when are you the queen of forgiveness?"
I stopped walking. "Honestly, Dominic, do you really think she would throw herself under the bus like that? She's not an idiot."
"I never said that it was because she's an idiot. I've never trusted her, and I think it's pretty clear why."
"She has more on the line than I do. Any time I want to stop, all I have to do is throw this damn talisman back into the pond where it came from. But her? She's the one who could lose her job over this."
"Her job that she doesn't even want."
I crossed my arms. Why was he always looking to throw her under the bus? She certainly wasn't a saint, but who else would try to help me as much as she did?
Well, she didn't actually care about his asthma and made sure he knew. That would probably irritate me if I were him.
"Then let's go ask her about this. If she lies to us, then she lies, but at least we're being rational people about this," I said.
He nodded. "Let's do that."
I wasn't sure if she was going to be in her office, especially since I figured the funeral would be some time soon, but we headed in that direction down the hall. The anthropology building was not too far, but I wished I brought a jacket.
"I'm sure you're not planning on doing your conversation for this class, but just in case the mood ever strikes you, it's in that office back there," Dominic said and pointed out a small hallway on our way out the front doors.
"I'll keep that in mind," I said, but it wasn't sarcastic. At least I didn't think it was.
The day was a little breezy, and there were plenty of leaves that took that as their chance to fall through the air that smelled like earth. Halloween was not far away, and even though I was expecting every problem we had to get much, much worse by the end of the month, at least it would make for a good holiday.
Dr. Reed's office door was opened slightly, but I knocked anyway before I peeked inside. She sat with a Starbucks at her computer, and she took off her glasses as I stepped into the room.
"What's going on now, Lindsay?" she asked.
"Nothing really. Dominic and I just wanted to check in with you, see how you're holding up, and all of that," I said.
"Oh my god," Dominic muttered to himself, but it was loud enough for all three of us to hear.
"Well, it's been a rough few days, but it's nice to distract myself with grading." She looked back down at her screen. "Thank you. I really appreciate that."
"Yeah." How was I supposed to respond to that? But Dominic and I decided that we were going to ask her about Rainier, so I took the seat on the opposite side of her desk. "How many other professors know anything about the talisman?"
"One," she said.
Well, at least she didn't try to lie to us.
"And who is it?" Dominic asked from the doorway.
"You can come in. I haven't smoked in here all morning," Dr. Reed said.
He shook his head. "I'm not even risking it. I had an asthma attack last night after—" He trailed off, but since the information was definitely irrelevant, I changed the subject back to our question.
"Who is the other professor who knows about the talisman?"
"James Rainier. He's incredibly knowledgeable about historical languages, and I've worked with him before with local artifacts and," she smiled, "a few other occasions, as well."
I blinked a couple of times. "Um, okay."
Maybe I was just young and stupid, but what was the appeal of oldish men who dedicated their lives to one small academic area that no one outside of their circle cared about?
I looked back at Dominic, who had his arms crossed as he leaned against the door frame. Whether or not that answer was satisfying was up to him, but clearly, Dr. Reed was actually trying to help more than we gave her credit for.
"So what's he doing? I'm not sure if I missed something, but there weren't any words on the talisman," Dominic said. "And I got that second one made, so I think I have the details of it down."
"What second one?" Dr. Reed asked.
I held up my hand and shook my head. "That's not important. What's important is that we know who's doing what so we don't screw ourselves over in this little operation."
Of course, the fact that we were never on the same page was how the fake talisman got made, but that wasn't the point.
"Well, we don't know how old it is or where it came from exactly, so if anyone has the knowledge and resources to figure it out based on texts, it's him," Dr. Reed said.
That checked out for me. I glanced back at Dominic again, who nodded.
"That makes sense, I guess," he said.
It wasn't like it was some stranger who was involved with the talisman. Just like Dr. Reed, he obviously knew what he was talking about, or he wouldn't have a Ph.D. in smart people languages or whatever. Dominic and I both knew Dr. Rainier and had somewhat of a connection with him, and that was a bit of extra motivation to do a little better in his class.
***
Before I headed back to my dorm, I headed back to the language building. If Dr. Rainier was going to be involved with our talisman project, I was going to need to be on his good side, and as much as it disgusted me to kiss ass like Dominic, what else could I do?
The room for the conversation partner activity was just by the main entrance, and I walked inside. Only half of the lights were on, and muted music played through someone's headphones.
Whoever this upper-level ASL student was was going to have serious hearing damage if they didn't already.
"Um, hello? I'm supposed to be doing a conversation with another student since my class is super behind on material." I flicked on the other half of the lights, and there sat my favorite person in the entire world.
"Lindsay?" Harvey said. "You're in Intermediate ASL?"
I nodded and tried to keep a fake smile on my face. "Look, we don't actually have to conversate if you don't want to talk to me. I know you blame me for the fact that your band sucks, except for Jack, who's perfect."
"I'm pretty sure that conversate isn't actually a word." He gestured at the seat across the table from him. "Take a seat. You know, from what Jack has mentioned, I didn't think outside-of-class participation was going to be on your to-do list."
"He talks about me?"
"Not much. Just enough to convince us that you two were dating," he said.
I took in a breath and shook my head. "Well, this isn't where I want to be, but I have to, so here I am."
Harvey let out a fake as hell chuckle. "Well, the only other person who has come in is this guy named Dominic, so I'm not sure how required it is."
"Yeah, that's Dominic. He's such an overachiever that it makes me sick." I paused with a smile. "Just don't expect that kind of conversation with me. I barely know how to sign my name."
"That's kind of pathetic."
"You think I don't know that? But I'm here, I'm going to try, it's going to suck, and we're both just going to have to deal with it. I really don't care what you think of me. I'm only doing this to impress Dr. Rainier and so Dominic likes me."
My eyes widened and my stomach leaped into my throat. Although Dominic wasn't there to hear that, it felt like he could. After all, he always seemed to know where I was, which was invasive enough. The last thing I wanted was for him to know where my heart was too.
I wanted him to like me. But it wasn't only that. Every once in a while, he told me that there was something inside of me that I was just too lazy to find, and there was a part of me that wanted to believe that. Laziness could be fixed with a little effort, even if effort sucked.
Maybe that was why the talisman kept forcing him my way. I wanted him there to remind me that I was more than a failure.
I paused. Did I really have that much control over what the talisman did? Did it actually give me what I wanted, even if I hated the thought of it?
If that was the case, then that changed everything.
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Hello, and thank you so much for reading! I really, really appreciate it. It honestly is what keeps me moving forward with this story, even if I don't always feel like writing it.
Quite a bit has happened this chapter, so let's get some thoughts! Is there something to Lindsay's idea that there may be a chance, however small, that the talisman is actually giving her what she wants?