Cracks

027 | magnolia leaf green

M A G N O L I A   L E A V E S
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Avery didn't think. Couldn't think, otherwise despondency would stop him. He was vaguely aware of leaving the plane and of shuffling through the crowd, not even realizing it had thinned into the dark of night, or that he had made his way back towards the dorms.
He felt empty, completely and utterly empty. When did these people come to mean so much? He'd known a long time that few humans would accept him once they knew the truth. That was a given. At least he had Yu Na and Rachel. His lips pressed together and he stilled, pausing a small distance from the entrance to his building.

Or what was his building.

Avery couldn't go in there anymore.
Devon was his roomate.

He glanced around the sparsely populated lawn, swallowing a lump in his throat as he tried to come up with a solution. He could climb the wall and go home. But that would require some sort of leverage and a buss pass. Avery had none of those right now. He then looked across the lawn, catching the top of the greenhouse and let out a sigh. All he wanted to do was close his eyes, spend a few hours away from all of this. Maybe he could go there, find a bench behind a banana tree or something. Yeah, that would be nice. Sure he'd probably sleep weird but—something tightly grabbed his upper arm, squeezing it in warning.

"Try anything, and I alert every agent on this campus." The words spit low and harsh in his ear. Avery exhaled a shakey breath and nodded. Despondently, he let Klaire take him away from the lawn. Her long nails dug through the rough fabric and into his skin but he said nothing. She didn't stop until they reached a deserted one-person bathroom in Aurora Hall, one of the liberal arts buildings across from the dorm wing. Klaire yanked the heavy door open and glared cooly at him.

"In." 

"But–" She gritted her teeth, impatient and seeming to read Avery's mind.

"The walls and doors are thick enough." Avery reluctantly slipped inside, not wanting to piss her off any more. Klaire quickly followed suit. She slammed the door and made him jump. Then she locked it, folding her arms, eyeing him cautiously. Avery opened his mouth and closed it, not sure where to start not sure if he even should.

"Skip the bullshit." The harshness surprised him so much that it made him take a step back, half expecting to be hit. He realized that just like that, the girl he knew was gone. She was the armed Inquisitor again, backing a witch into a corner. Once again, the pain of grief struck him and he looked downward to try to hide it. She smiled, unhumored, and glanced towards the wall, like she couldn't even look at him.

"I'm the daughter of an Inquisition VP and a highly decorated agent. You better start talking." Avery kept his mouth shut; he still didn't know what to say. At this, Klaire turned to the other side and scoffed. A pang bloomed in his chest. One that ebbed and didn't go away.

"That nullifier didn't stop that spell." She chided, bringing her arm up and making a fist then dropping it down harshly. She stepped forwards, until there was no more than a foot or two between them.

        "Who are you working with?" Avery felt himself shift back, dumbfounded, and surprised. This girl, whose face was unfriendly and placid, whose movement was carefully utilized and whose attention was carefully trained—he didn't know this girl. He didn't know her at all.

"What?"  Avery had almost forgotten her words, his brain becoming eight pounds of mush.

"You have access to technology beyond the breadth of what's offered to us, so I'll say it again. Who are you working with?" She stepped closer till they were almost chest-to-chest, almost eye-to-eye—if not for the three or four inches he had on her.

His stomach sunk. He tried to start slowly, and carefully held her gaze.

"I'm not working, with anyone." It was silent. A serene, heavy silence. One that pressed down on his shoulders and only lasted for a few more seconds, as his words seemed to finish registering in her head.

        Klaire exploded. She moved her hands about maniacally in a flurry of motion, inches from him.

"Wha...how? How the fuck did you deflect that?"

"It was a lucky aim!" She shook her head, chuckling, as if it was that unbelievable, and Avery felt like a fucking dumbass. He'd had the entirety of the flight back to beef up his argument, why hadn't he? Her eyebrows furrowed and she gave him an incredulous look.

        "What, did you use fucking magic." She jeered. "A little deflection spell?"

She said it all tauntingly, and it relived him. Like it was the last thing she'd expect. This, this was probably the best scenario Avery could've asked for, really.

But the sheer closeness to the truth had shaken him and, she caught on too fast for him to say anything in deflection. The angry smile removed itself entirely from her face, her features morphing into apprehension, then, disillusion, and then, disbelief.

His mouth felt like cotton; his brain, like melted ice cream. He was terrified, like a deer in headlights not knowing in the slightest what to do. It was happening now, for real this time. He was entirely exposed.

"Avery..." Klaire Dareson's voice warbled upwards, sounding strangled, disturbed. A blip of unfettered, self-patronizing laughter almost ripped past his lips. Avery caught it just in time, grimacing to cover it up. He had to hand it to himself. Only he could hold the ladder and still fail to climb out of the hole.

        Avery could bullshit himself all day long if he wanted to—that was what he did everyday anyway, wasn't it? But deep down, he knew. And he'd always known. That the moment someone found out what he really was, he became an other.

        He was a witch, and in a predominantly-human country, he was a dangerous, threatening and magic-possessing alien. That was just the reality. Not awful not shitty just, it.

He inspected the new scuff marks on his combat boots, vaguely aware of something sliding down a straight surface. Stealing a wary glance up, he found Klaire crouching, hands covering her face.

There it was.

The sight left him lightheaded. He more fell than plopped onto the hard floor, wishing he hadn't looked at her in the first place. Klaire sucked in a breath loudly, spreading her fingers to stare unfocused at the somewhat-cream tiles below.

"Oh my god." It seemed to hit her more and her eyes stayed on the tile, as if she was physically unable to glance up. At him. To acknowledge that...

"Oh my god." Avery dropped his face down between folded arms, closing his eyes and attempting to even his breath. Nothing. Nothing else on this planet, made him feel as worthless, as repulsive, as this moment.

They just sat there for a while, her with her face in her hands and him with his in his arms.

"Yes or no." Her quiet words made Avery jolt upright and hit his spine against the wall. Watching him grimace, she closed her eyes and exhaled again, trying to keep her tone even and the extent of her internal tornado undetectable.

"I—I need to hear it. From you."

Avery took a shaky breath, a nauseating weight settling down onto his shoulders. What else could he say at this point?

He felt delirious.

"Yes."

***

*cherries—a term popularized by the marines in the Vietnam war for fresh boots on the ground (a term that here in this book, is 130 years old)