"Are you actually dating Elliot?" Ester asked, as we stood at the Chemistry lab, carefully examining a pipette at eye level.
She asked the question as calmly as she'd offered me the protective goggles earlier, that for a few seconds, the words didn't register in my head.
When the meaning of her utterance was fully internalized, I looked at Ester, who was carefully wiping the surface of a test tube.
Actually. That was the keyword.
I swallowed hard, a jumble of tangled thoughts squirming in my brain. What exactly was her motive of asking this question? She'd seemed like a pretty decent person, judging from her allergic-like reaction to the simple appearance of Reneé and her friends.
"What do you mean?" I said as casually as possible, slowly upturning the test tube into the sink at the teacher's instructions.
"Sorry if I was a bit intrusive," she mumbled, a hint of sheepishness on her face as she glanced at me sideways, before taking the test tube from my hand and rinsing it with hers. "It was just a bit surprising."
Surprise would be an understatement. At this point there wouldn't be a single individual in the school population that didn't know I was dating Elliot Lockwood.
The girl whose father tried to frame the innocent, philanthropic, selfless Lockwoods with crimes he committed. The girl who's shamelessly dating that very Elliot Lockwood.
"You mean because of what happened between our fathers?" I couldn't help but blurt out, taking one test tube from her hand and gently wiping it with a towel.
"Not really. It's just that the news broke on the first day you came to this school." Ester said, foaming her hands at the sink.
Then, she added without even looking at me, "What happened between your fathers, is what happened between them. That's all."
She wasn't accusing me of being shameless. She was genuinely surprised, that we started dating so fast.
This was like any other ordinary talk between two girls at school.
When did you guys start dating so fast? Where did you meet? Are you two dating, for real?
The kind of utterly useless talk that formed the foundation of any normal friendship between two girls in high school. The kind of a talk I hadn't had for a long time.
A part of my chest seemed to ache. Like any other ordinary school girl.
"I know, I don't exactly fondle him with love," I said drily with a grin I hoped didn't look like a grimace.
"F-fondle-" Ester blinked. "Ah, yes, that too," she said with a low chuckle, as we started recording the measurements on the paper.
The Chemistry teacher with a difficult long name gave instructions for us to finish cleaning up in three minutes. We removed our goggles and tucked them away in the drawers at our table.
"I'm not sure if it's something I should say... But I think it's nice," Ester remarked, surveying the rest of our classmates in the lab. "That he looks comfortable with you."
"C...comfortable?" Seemed like Ester wasn't exactly the most insightful girl around. I laughed awkwardly, shoving my hands into my pockets. "Ah, yeah." What else could I say?
"You're going to stay, right? To watch the tennis practice match after school?"
"Hey Elli, it's tennis club practice day, right?" Reneé said, not sparing the rest of us a glance. "There's this friend of mine- freshman, just joined- she's interested in joining the tennis club. I was wondering if you don't mind if we go to watch your practice matches?"
It was the first time I was anticipating a delivery to my house. Hopefully something worse than a chopped up Barbie doll.
"Sure, of course. Hey, new earrings, right?"
Scarcely two hours after seeing what she'd put into my locker, to say that to her face with that smile of his- to comment on her earrings. Hoop earrings just like bus handles, perfect for grabbing-
"I don't think so," I said, cramming as much ruefulness as possible into my voice. "I'm not exactly a sports person."
I wasn't sure if I could stomach seeing Reneé's face for longer.
"It's a chill match today, and freshmen are coming over to for a trial session. You can just sit back and spectate," Ester said reassuringly. "I'm sure Elli would-"
"You should, Clare." Reneé, her lab coat draped over her arms, came over to our table with the sickly sweet smile. "There're spectator seats protected from the sun, and they're air-conditioned, too. You don't have to worry about getting tanned."
She wanted to emphasize she'd been in the courts- and I hadn't.
An innocent child compared to the girls at the high school I'd spent my freshman and sophomore years in.
I returned the smile. "Yeah, sounds like it'll be fun. Reneé, do you mind helping us save the best seats? The ones most protected from the sun. You'll know better than me."
Her smile slipped.
"By the way, the chocolate you gave Elli was really nice. From the shop across the hotel that you stayed in. I heard from him you guys went to France for a school trip last year. In a class of...about forty, right?" I added off-handedly, hardly able to keep the grin off my face.
"Yeah, about forty," responded Ester instead, zipping up her pencil case. "Twenty kids from the class next door and the other twenty from ours."
"Everyone," the Chemistry teacher clapped, surveying everyone in the lab with the vague look of dissatisfaction she'd had on since the beginning of class. "We'll be having a debrief on the experiment. Please return to your seats."
Clamping her mouth shut with a pink flush of her ears, Reneé returned to her seat without another word.
"You're very different from Elli." Ester commented quietly, as the teacher started writing on the whiteboard.
"Yeah. The saint and the sinner, right?" I deadpanned. "The prince and the beast."
"I wouldn't phrase it that way, but something along those lines." Her eyes fixed on the writings of the teacher, Ester's mouth curved into an amused smile. "He doesn't exactly express his feelings very openly."
No shit. "Hm."
As soon as the teacher announced class was dismissed, students eagerly emptied the laboratory, heading to the direction of the cafeteria.
"I envy those who can." Ester pursed her lips. "It's courage."
"We're using acrylic paint today. Angela's going to distribute the newspapers- make sure you put at least two pieces on your desk, and you wear the old shirts you brought from home," the art teacher repeated, wincing as if recalling the nightmare of acrylic paint on her former students' desks.
"Please, let's do this properly to make clean up easier afterwards, all right?"
Angela, holding a stack of newspaper under her arm, went around class, offering two pieces to each student.
Finally, she came over to my table, and gently put down two pieces on my desk.
"I saved these just for you," she said softly, removing the bottle of paint on my desk, before putting down two pieces of newspaper and putting down the bottle again.
'Actress Jessica Lee and ex-CEO of Horan Holdings Michael Horan finalize divorce proceedings.'
My parents' faces, on the front page.
My mum's pulled into a scowl in an instant capture by a paparazzi, as she stood against her car, on the phone.
My dad with disheveled hair from days of police investigation, his lawyer and secretary flanking him, his face blank and worn-out.
"Did your mum tell you? Who's going to be your next dad?" she mumbled under her breath, smoothening the wrinkles on my newspaper.
"Definitely someone with higher net worth than Michael Horan, right? You can do a shortlist based on net worth- the guy's age doesn't matter to her."
My knuckles whitened around my paintbrush. All the blood in my body seemed to cascade to my cheeks.
The pounding in my temples was so loud, that Angela's words seemed unreal, like white noise in the backdrop.
"My guess is...maybe someone like Alan Rossi? He's sixty-eight, but his family's been rich for three generations. So he's a lot more stable."
The tip of the paintbrush dug into my palm.
"And remember what we learnt during the finance budgeting talk last week, Clare. Diversification of portfolio for risk. Alan Rossi's in the finance sector so...you should go for someone in the....ah. Entertainment sector. Maybe someone like Jack-"
All of a sudden, her words became clearer, as if she was talking to my ear.
Everything else- the smell of paint, the buzz of voices and chuckles, even the stolen and overt glances, faded into nothingness.
Was this what they meant by being in a zen state? Extremely calm, like I was the only human remaining on Earth, like I was just floating on the surface of the deep ocean-
A scream shattered my state.
I looked down, to see Angela on the floor, her lustrous straight hair plastered to her scalp like seaweed, thick dark blue paint on her face, shirt and arms. In my hand was the empty paint bottle.
Angela Carter. My best friend.
Hearing the teacher shout something, seeing the dazed, stunned Angela Carter on the floor, I grabbed my bag and walked out of class, wondering if this was a dream.
"Courage," I mused.
After some time, I did remember what Angela, sprawled on the floor, said quietly, looking up at me. Not with anger, not with shock, not with shame. It was the face of someone looking at a monkey gone nuts, locked up behind bars.
"You're fucking crazy."
Ester picked up her bag. "C'mon, let's go for lunch. Oh. Elli's here."
Elliot Lockwood stood at the entrance of the laboratory, chatting merrily with the Chemistry teacher, whom I was seeing smiling and laughing for the first time. Holding her books to her chest and with the remnants of a smile still on her face, she walked away from the lab.
He opened the door of the lab wider, and leaning against the threshold of the lab, gestured to the corridor.
"Let's go."
"I got a call from the school. Heard you poured paint on Angela." Jessica passed me a hamburger, and took a bite into hers.
Angela's last sentence wasn't leaving my head. "I'm fucking crazy," I muttered.
"...That's not a bad defense strategy to have, Clare." She looked at me calmly, chewing her mouthful. "Being a bit crazy sometimes. I did think you're too soft to survive in that school of yours. Full of vipers."
"Too soft? After what I did today? You're my mum. You should be telling me off." Tears sprang in my eyes.
"...You know that what you did today, was wrong. I know that. So I'm not going to tell you off. Next time, be crazy but in ways that won't get you transferred to another school."
I was starting to understand why Elliot Lockwood made me so uncomfortable.
"You're very different from Elli." Ester commented quietly, as the teacher started writing on the whiteboard.
Ester was for sure, wrong about that one thing.
Elliot Lockwood made me uncomfortable because we were so alike. Hypocrites, albeit in different ways.
"You're going for my practice match today, right?" Elliot asked, taking my bag and slinging it over his shoulder as the three of us made our way down to the cafeteria.
"Yeah. To cheer Ester on," I said flashing a beam at Ester, taking back my bag.