Sins On The Skin

XV.

The next morning as Gwen stepped inside the stuffy classroom, she felt the air around her shift.

The oxygen filling her lungs was thick as smoke, surrounded by a hoard of carbon dioxide. It was strange how a subtle change in the air could affect her.

Perhaps, she resembled her mother more than she thought.

Shaking her head slightly to get rid of the ice that had settled in the pit of her stomach, the young woman looked around the room. Strangely enough, everything seemed to be in its rightful place. Everyone was just eerily quiet. There was no chatter, at least not since she had crossed the threshold.

Looking around Gwen saw that most seats were already taken but there were a couple of unoccupied desks left.

Gwen stalked towards one of them, her ears finally picking up shadows of voices from all around her. And, as all shadows, there was nothing light and kind about them.

A few girls, excluding Katrina who was focused on reading her novel, gave her dirty looks and dismissive glances and proceeded to murmur secrets in each other's ears as she walked to take a seat.

Secrets that concerned her, no doubt.

They kept whispering as she stepped past them, kept acting like she had a scarlet letter stitched on her clothes. And her painted on her forehead, for that matter.

Gwen had barely taken a seat when she overheard someone mutter the word 'whore' and her breath was cut short.

It was such a terrible thing to say, especially about someone they knew nothing of.

The word was repeated with a laugh and that's when her brain caught up.

Someone must have noticed, she thought grimly before another thought popped up, what if the Dean finds out? What then?

When she caught another whisper, her uncertainty over her future grew.

'Screwing him for a grade, how pathetic' The young woman acted as if she had not heard a thing and calmly reached inside her backpack before pulling out her phone and checking her messages.

But she had heard and it disturbed her, more than she could put into words.

Someone had noticed that when she finally escaped from the classroom, looking dazed and starry-eyed, the professor was right behind her, a sinuous grin on his face, causing him to look like one of Da Vinci's demonic figures.

Someone had noticed and someone had told.

Then, someone else had shared the rumour.

Even though she wanted to stay and face every single one of them, show them that their words didn't affect her, a small piece of happiness still lingered inside her and there was not a bone in her body willing to sacrifice such a blissful feeling.

So, the Queen, graceful as ever, sat up, swung her backpack over one of her shoulders and walked away.

But not before letting a small piece of frustration escape from its cell.

"You know, if you have something to say, you can say it to my face." She said, giving the girls a mocking smile. The girls stopped snickering. In fact, they stopped talking all together, most likely confused by Guinevere's calm demeanour. "You're being rude."

With that, she walked out of the room seconds before Nathan entered it, catching him in the hallway as she let her mask fall and her little piece of happiness withered and disappeared like a rose in the midst of Winter.