Banish Me

Shoot Across The Sky

“Where do you want to study?” I asked.

Peter shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. Where do you want to study?”

We still had that dreamy look from our kiss outside and I wasn’t really ready for it to go away yet. Gwen made a fake gagging noise.

“Just go study in your room like you always do.”

Peter shot her a hateful look and I could just imagine the silent conversation they were having.

“My room?” he asked, finally looking at me.

“Sure.” I couldn’t help but chuckle.

“No funny business,” Alma said.

“Yes ma’am,” we both said at the same time.

We headed upstairs, Peter carrying both his messenger bag and my pack. We were joking about something random when I heard yelling coming from the study.

“…she can’t stay here!” a shrill voice said.

“Well she doesn’t want to come to the City with me. What do you supposed I do?” a low gruff voice said.

“Make her! You’re spoiling her just because you think it will make things better between the two of you. She doesn’t respect you, Fitz. She never will so stop trying. Make her go.”

“An adjustment period is to be expected. This is normal. She’ll come around eventually. I know it.”

“You have no idea what you’re doing and it’s showing. Take her to the City, she can’t stay here. She will rot my boy from the inside out just like her mother did to you. I don’t want her in my house!”

I could feel ice running through my veins and a lump formed in my throat. I squeezed Peter’s hand tightly but I couldn’t look at him. I couldn’t really look anywhere other than the cracked door in front of me. I imagined, by the time they were done, I’d have the grain of the wood and the shine of the doorknob memorized.

“Carter said she was welcome to stay.”

“Carter? Carter! He hasn’t even met the girl. He couldn’t tear himself away from New Orleans long enough to check on his daughter when…”

“Carter is a good man,” my father said carefully.

“Carter is a good man for the poor of the United States. Not for his family.”

“You watch your tongue,” my father said dangerously. “If it wasn’t for Carter you would still be homeless, begging on the streets of New Orleans where he found you. Watch what you say.”

I heard footsteps towards the door of the study. Peter placed his hand over my mouth gently and directed me to the room next door. We ran inside and he cracked the door so we could still hear and see out. His mother and my father were walking down the hall, towards the kitchen I presumed.

Peter held a finger over his mouth, directing me to be quiet. I was completely freaking out on the inside but he was right. He peeked out the door and when it was all clear, he took my hand and led me out of the room. We walked quickly down the hall and to his room.

When he closed the door, I took a deep breath, not even realizing I was holding it in the first place.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

“I don’t know.”

Peter put his bag down in his desk chair along with mine and I started to pace. It was worse than I thought. I knew she hated me but I didn’t know she loathed me with a passion. I’d never dreamed that my father could talk like that, not in defense of Peter’s father but the tone he used. In that second I could see him as the protective father he told me about, the one that would stop at nothing to keep his daughter safe.