A Fate So Cruel

Chapter 2 - Boston

The lines of the painting were all wrong.

Although I couldn't tell exactly why they were all wrong. Something just felt...off.

I pursed my lips, trying to figure out what exactly was wrong with the picture. It was an acrylic painting I had started a few days prior of two hands grasped together, fingers intertwined.

In theory, everything about it was perfect. The proportions were right, the colors blended together beautifully, the lights and shadows balanced...but something still didn't feel right.

Something was missing.

Years ago, when my Grandad was still alive, I'd painted him a portrait as a birthday present. For days I fixated over every detail. But when I finished, something about it felt wrong. I studied every inch looking for a mistake but when I couldn't find anything, I chalked it up to nerves. It wasn't until I gave him the portrait that I realized that I'd forgotten to paint his ears.

We'd laughed about it until we cried.

My heart ached sweetly at the memory. I felt that same itch when I looked at this painting. Like something monumental was missing from it. Some key detail that I'd somehow forgotten. No matter how much I tried, I couldn't place what that thing was.

I needed to let it go. The red lines on the university-issued alarm clock let me know it was rapidly approaching 2 am which meant I was supposed to be in bed hours ago.

Despite the many other privileges we had as students we still expected to observe the same strict 11 pm curfew that every other citizen in the Hillshire Territory was required to follow. But unlike the average resident of the Hillshire Territory, who could stay up as late as they want once inside their homes, the University also demanded that students have all lights turned off by 12 am. That is unless they had "adequate reasoning for why this should be extended, such as illness or for academic activities for which extended study hours are needed."

The first two months of university I had been so terrified of doing anything that might get me expelled that even when I had unfinished school work I made sure to be in bed with all lights turned off by 11:50 pm. It wasn't until I'd woken up one morning after fallen asleep studying for a midterm and realized I'd left my desk lamp on all night and no one had so much as blinked an eye, let alone kicked me out onto the street, did I start slowly start to take advantage of the after-hours-study-policy. After months of staying up into the early morning hours crunching over books, I built up my courage to use that time to do other things—namely, paint.

I figured that through the curtains there was no way to tell from outside whether I was painting or studying. Besides, if any of the Enforcers who kept watch over the campus at night did decide to check in on what I was doing and questioned the newly painted canvas in my room, I could argue that my art was part of my education. No one ever did, though.

I doubted that university students were a top concern for anyone anyway. Most of us had fought hard for our place at the school. It was unlikely that anyone would risk their future over some truly nefarious activity. We simply had too much to lose.

I loaded my brush with a deep, dusty blue before adding gentle strokes to the hands. A few more details and I was going to wash my hands of the painting (pun intended) no matter how much the mysterious-unknown-missing-detail bothered me. I could stick this painting in the back of one of the stacks of completed pieces I had on the floor leaning against the wall.

I was fortunate that my dorm had once been a double since the extra space provided me with enough room to paint and store my art. No one had a roommate at Emerlane–at least, to my knowledge. There was no need, dorms outnumbered students 10 to 1. Before the War, the university had hosted a student body of over 4,000. Today, it wasn't even a tenth of that size. That not only meant that I had my own room but that only three of the twenty dorms on my floor were occupied. Plus, the other two girls were both from the same Burrow and had chosen to room across the hall from one another, which was all the way at the other end of the hall.