CHAPTER NINE
NEUROMODULATOR
( — any substance that modifies or modulates the activities of the postsynaptic neuron. )
— ♡ —
BY THE TIME JUDE IS DONE WITH HIS INTERVIEW, RHIANNON IS SEEING A LIGHT AT THE END OF THE TUNNEL. Even though they're all swamped with work and Isla has decided she doesn't need to sign up for that interview and potentially participate in the experiment, everything is slowly falling into place.
She didn't want to accept the Sargents' help once more, already feeling like she has asked for too much of them, but they insisted on taking care of everything just this once; the problem is that 'just this once', for them, means repeating it systematically and make her grow used to their kindness. Luckily, they won't use it against her, as her own parents probably would, but she still feels a bit . . . uneasy.
They insisted on helping her pay for her apartment's rent, even though she barely spends any time there, and, after plenty of convincing, they won. They let her spend the holidays with them just so she shouldn't be alone, and shrugged off her inability to offer everyone an expensive gift, arguing she was being pretty helpful by helping them prepare the meals and decorate the house. They gave her a home and a family.
They are helping her pay for her education now, replacing her parents. She couldn't accept it—they had already done too much for her, sacrificing their own comfort just to grant her half of what they were used to, and that's not something she'll ever be able to repay them for. Feeling welcome in their house is worth so much more than any apartment or her tuition.
"Mrs. Sargent," she blabbers, rubbing her cheek with her free hand, "you know I can't accept that. It makes me feel like a leech."
"Nonsense," Mrs. Sargent scolds, flicking her tongue against the back of her teeth. Jude, spinning around on the chair by Rhiannon's desk, throws her a curious look as she paces around the room. "There's absolutely no shame in admitting you need help, you hear me? No shame whatsoever. We want to help you—all of us."
"I—look, I'm really thankful for all you've done for me during the past couple of years, but I've been trying to regain control of my life." She inhales and it feels as though her ribs have started to shatter, the shards of bone spreading through her bloodstream. Mrs. Sargent huffs. "It's my penultimate semester and I've signed up for an interview for the Social Psychology experiment, which means I—"
"You did what?" Her voice turns so strident Rhiannon has to move her phone away from her ear and Jude sighs, lips pursed together in a thin line as he discreetly shakes his head. Everything about their reaction tells her Mrs. Sargent didn't know they had given their interviews and she wasn't supposed to know about it either, so everything is quickly being flushed down the drain as if it had never had any consistency. "Rhiannon, darling, what were you thinking? You don't even like Psychology. Is Jude a part of it too?"
"I—"
"Can you get him on the phone, please?" Rhiannon nods, even though the woman cannot see the gesture. "And this isn't open for discussion; your parents might feel like it's a chore to help their own daughter live her life like she's supposed to, but Sean and I certainly don't share their beliefs. We'll transfer the money to your account later today."
Knowing pretty darn well arguing with Samantha Sargent is fighting a battle she decidedly can't win, Rhiannon simply thanks her one final time before handing Jude her phone. He winces as soon as he leans the electronic device against his ear and Rhiannon feels a quick slash of guilt go straight through her heart, remembering she's the one who brought this upon themselves.
He didn't have to sign up for the damn thing. She's the one who can barely pay for her daily cup of coffee in the morning, and the one who spends the last two days of the month trying to come up with new ways of saving the misery still left in her bank account. She's the one who doesn't give a flying damn about Project Oxygen or whatever its name is.
She's as immobile as an ice statue as Jude tries to talk his mother out of calling the university to get that experiment cancelled, insisting it isn't dangerous (even though Rhiannon doesn't know why Samantha thought it was or what kind of information people are spreading, but it most likely isn't positive information) and no one is running any risks, especially since they can drop out whenever they want without any negative consequences.
Sighing, Rhiannon stares out of the window, wishing Isla was around instead of having disappeared to do God knows what. She's still pissed at Rowan for having yelled at her in front of all those people in the cafeteria a few days ago and Rhiannon understands that, but she doesn't dare to say anything about it; if she did, she'd tell Isla they should talk things through, as he'll be here for a while and they'll inevitably, run into each other or even be in the same room for a relatively long period of time, but that would only make her a hypocrite.
She's the one who never deals with her problems headfirst—Isla isn't. Therefore, it's best if Rhiannon continues to keep her mouth shut and let Isla solve everything, as she's the one who usually figures things out, knowing exactly what she wants and where she wants to go.
Isla Guerreiro wants to change the world. She certainly has the brains, the skills and the ambition to do it.
When Jude finally hangs up, he announces he wants to stop by the library, throwing Rhiannon her phone. She misses it and it slips from her hands to her bed, bouncing twice before finally resting on the mattress, and her muscles feel too heavy to pick it up.
She doesn't like the library, even though most people talk wonders about it, because some shelves are always so dusty she spends most of her time there sneezing her lungs out; once, the sneezing was so violent she coated an entire paragraph of a textbook with blood.
They say that's the place where Taylor Morris was seen for the last time before having gone missing, which might mean someone from Crowcrest might be involved in her disappearance, and Rhiannon can't exactly be blamed for wanting to avoid that place as much as possible. Jude tries to convince her there's nothing wrong with the library per se, much like he wanted to tell Samantha the experiment is completely safe, but she's not like his mother.
Thankfully. Though the woman can be lovely sometimes, it would be mortifying if Jude hung around Rhiannon because she reminds him of his mother.
"We'll be there along with plenty of other people," Jude reminds her, walking backward, hands shoved in his pockets. Rhiannon truly envies him, noticing how seemingly cool-headed he almost always appears to be; a girl has just gone missing and he has barely said anything about it, but, when he does, something changes in him. Everything becomes so much darker and Rhiannon knows him well enough he's scared too. How wouldn't anyone be, really? "It'll be okay."
"I don't know," she argues, when he spins around on his heels to walk properly. "I still want to figure out what happened to her. I know it's none of my business," she adds, when Jude opens his mouth and kicks a pebble, "but . . . it could have been Isla or Matteo. It could have been you. I would want to figure out what had happened, and I'm sure her family and friends are desperate."
"Well." He exhales, hiding his mouth behind his knit scarf. With the weather growing colder by the day, they've been pulling out the heavy clothes from the back of their closets, but there are days when it's not nearly enough. Today, Rhiannon can't feel her toes, even while wearing knee-high boots and equally as tall socks over her jeans. "You do know there's one person who has defeated the system . . . or the urban legend. Whatever. I still don't know whether to believe it or not."
Rhiannon wrinkles her nose as he holds the library door open for her, letting her step inside first. Brooklyn Bach, a musical theater major at Crowcrest, is the only known Vofield resident who has come back after having been reported missing, but she had disappeared by choice; after all, she ran away back when she was seventeen, her face plastered on the side of milk cartons, flyers and billboards. Big, red, bold letters asked if anyone had seen her.
The police thought it was a lost cause at some point. Some people thought the urban legend had, once again, come true. Until the day she returned and everyone found out she had simply joined a theater program in the US against her parents' wishes and had earned a full scholarship to Crowcrest.
"Do you want to talk to Brooklyn?" she questions, craning her neck as they cross the wide aisles of the library to find a vacant table . . . without much luck. Most of them are full and the empty ones are, coincidentally, right next to the damn shelves. The archways tower over them and their footsteps echo in the silent building, with Rhiannon running her fingers over the wooden rail, glancing down at the ground floor. "You know she doesn't want to talk about it. Besides, nothing happened to her, while Taylor . . . I don't know. My gut tells me it's something completely different."
"It's worth a shot," Jude tries. "Look, there's a table."
"Good," she sighs.
The table they occupy is on the opposite side as the one where Rowan Underwood is sitting and Rhiannon isn't surprised to see him slumped over his laptop, typing furiously. According to Isla, the guy knows what he's doing and has quite an impressive resume, despite being only twenty-five, and people really aren't supposed to spread the word about what he's doing here.
Ghostwriters creep her out. Pun intended.
"You know they're revealing the list in, like, two weeks or so," Jude continues, setting his backpack over the table, and she falls to one of the chairs, taking off her gloves. "What do you think? Do you think we've gotten through to the next stage?"
"You make it sound like a video game," Rhiannon retorts, and he grins. "I don't know. Part of me really wants to know the results, but, on the other hand, I'm not particularly confident. I think I blew it when I said I was only in it for the money, but I thought she'd value my honesty, or something. I'm tired of being noble. It has gotten me nowhere."
"Wow," he murmurs, mimicking Owen Wilson's voice, and she flips through a random textbook, knowing she won't be able to focus. "You totally sounded like Connor just now."
"Ha-ha."
"No, I'm serious. Nobility is a good thing, Rhea; it goes hand in hand with your—"
She throws him a deadpan glare. "If you tell me it has anything to do with my damn humanity, we're done."
Jude pretends to zip up his lips and throws away a fictional key. "Fair enough, but still. I've always thought you were a lot better than that guy, even if my opinion doesn't do much in this situation; quite frankly, I have no idea what you saw in him, besides that pretty face of his."
He slouches on his seat, with an arm wrapped around the back of her chair. As soon as he does it, a bird flies against the window next to Rowan's table, the dry thud of the impact of its tiny body hitting the glass echoing softly in the aisle, but Rowan doesn't even flinch, returning the incredulous look Rhiannon and Jude throw him.
"Well," Rhiannon eventually says, breaking the silence. "That was something you don't see every day." Jude giggles and she finally looks back at him, setting an elbow on the table and supporting her head on her hand to admire the highlights and shadows the lights in the library cast upon his face. "What were you saying about Connor's face? Do you really think he's that pretty for a snake or is it just your . . . humanity speaking? Or jealousy?"
"Rhea." He shakes his head, with a mischievous smile dancing on his lips, and Rhiannon fails to be startled by Rowan's angry muttering coming from across the aisle. "I'm not jealous. I'm just stating a fact."
"I was just kidding."
He inches closer to her, almost imperceptibly, and it's enough to make her breath get caught in her throat when she tries to exhale. He's close enough for the scent of his cologne to get woven into her hair and clothes, along with that of his aftershave, and it's a pleasant change from the fruity scents she's covered in, mostly thanks to her shampoo.
"I'm not . . . jealous," he mutters, and tilts his head down. His hot breath fans against her cheek and she knows all she has to do is slide half an inch forward—it's that simple. "I'm really not."
"Because you really think that highly of yourself?"
"Because."
Jude leans forward, his nose nuzzling hers, and she doesn't move until the electricity sparks between them. It's a quick brushing of the lips at first, but it's long enough to trigger the release of dopamine and oxytocin into her bloodstream; the endorphins buzz like bumblebees in her ears as she timidly raises a hand to cup the side of his neck, his stubble tickling her skin.
Adrenaline kicks in when his free hand reaches out to hold the back of her head, as this is still technically a public place and there are plenty of people here, not to mention surveillance cameras, programmed to watch their every move . . .
"The cameras," she chokes out, moving back first, still trying to catch her breath. This is the last thing she wants to be thinking about at the moment, when everything should be about her and Jude and his fingers brushing against her cheek, but there's something feral inside her that doesn't let her rest. "They catch everything that goes down in this place. Maybe they—"
"—saw Taylor and whatever happened to her the day she went missing?" he questions, and Rhiannon hesitantly nods, her pulse racing like a marathon runner when his hazel eyes meet hers. "God. We can never catch a break around here, can we?"