Resonant

Chapter 3

Zale

I had thought that maybe discovering my brother and trying to connect with him would pull me out of the awful numbing fog that had taken over my life and my mind when Harlow died. That's not what happened, though.

It was still hard to get out of bed in the morning and whenever I woke up from a nap, and I napped whenever I had the opportunity. I couldn't even pinpoint when I started sleeping so much. It happened slowly, I think, over time. The waking world didn't hold my interest, so I slept. And sleeping so much made me tired, so I slept some more. The times when I had to stay awake longer than usual were almost unbearable. I knew I needed to break out of this cycle before life lost what little meaning it had left, but I had no idea how to do it.

Astrea's presence on campus might not have been a magical solution to the depression that had sunk its claws into me, but he did help. And anyway, some days were just better than others.

Nearly a month after Astrea came to Ashen Oak, I had a particularly bad day of class. Every period, my students were chatty and energetic. They were completely unfocused on the lesson about cell structure, and this was an unusually fun class, I thought. We were making cells out of Jell-o and using all edible components to represent the different parts of a cell. Class would end with students getting to eat their creations. It was a damn good lesson, one I had created in the time before. My class should be excited about this, not distracted. They shouldn't be so energetic until after they had eaten their treats and I set them loose on the unsuspecting teachers of the campus.

I was starting to feel really irritated by the time my final class period was over. Most students had placed maybe half their components. Candies were strewn across their desks and they haphazardly scooped them up, leaving sticky messes behind, before blithely leaving the room, chattering as they went.

One person lingered.

"People suck," Astrea said as he surveyed the carnage with delicately lifted brows that were mostly obscured by the hair that flopped onto his forehead.

He pulled a few paper towels off the roll by the sink and started wiping down desks for me while I watched him in utter puzzlement.

"I'm not sure I'm supposed to agree with you when you're talking about my students, but yeah. People suck," I agreed. He snorted and ripped off another handful of paper towels, which he passed to me.

"I'm helping, not doing all the work," he said.

I frowned, but started helping him clean up the classroom. "Thanks for staying," I said after we worked in silence for too long.

"No problem. I don't get why everyone's so worked up about a new teacher anyway," Astrea said while he scrubbed at a green spot left behind by Everlasting Gobstoppers that must have gotten wet.

These kids didn't deserve candy biology lessons, I thought caustically as I encountered a similar stain on the desk in front of me. I briefly considered just letting the desk stain, but I really didn't want to deal with the lecture I'd get from our janitor, Stan. He was a mean bastard even on a good day.

I was almost done with the stain when Astrea's words registered. "A new teacher?" I asked. How had I not heard about this? And why were we bringing on a new teacher partway into the spring semester?

"You should check your e-mail. I guess he's fae? It's weird, I kind of always thought they were made up. I bet Mrs. Morris got mixed up and meant to say he's a pixie. But everyone's pretty excited."

"Oh, fae are real," I corrected. I had never met one, but I had been schooled in many different supernatural species. Fae were just one of them. Shouldn't Astrea, who also had a royal upbringing, know this?