Victoria Schwab: The Unbound

Tick. Tick. Tick.

I notice the sound in the lull between two of Bradshaw’s explanations. It’s a clock on the back wall, and once I start to notice it, I can’t stop. Even with Bradshaw’s expert projection (I wonder if he took a speech class or used to act, and how he ended up teaching precalc instead), there it is: low and constant and clear. Da used to say you could isolate the sounds in the Narrows if you tried, pluck out notes and pull them forward, letting the rest sink back. I tug on the tick tick tick , and soon the teacher’s voice fades and the clock is all I can hear, quiet and constant as a pulse.

Tick. Tick. Tick.

Tick. Tick.

Tick…

And then, between one tick and the next, the lights go off.

All at once the whole set of soft fluorescents on the ceiling flickers and goes out, plunging the classroom into darkness. When the lights come back on, the room is empty . Sixteen students and a teacher all gone in a blink, leaving only vacant desks and the ticking clock and a knife resting, gentle as a kiss, against my throat.

“O WEN.”

It comes out barely a whisper, my voice tight with fear. Not here. Not now.

He lets out a low breath behind me, and then I feel his lips brush against my ear. “Hello, M.”

“Don’t—” I start, but the words die as the knife presses into my throat.

“Look at you,” he says, using the metal to lift my chin. “Putting on a show. Smiling and nodding and trying to pass for normal.”

The knife falls away, and a moment later he’s there—rounding my chair, clucking his tongue as he perches on top of the desk in front of mine, hunched forward, resting his elbows on his knees. His silvery hair is swept back, and his eyes hang on me, wild and wolfish and blue.

“Do they know you’re broken?” he asks, twirling the blade between his fingers. “They will, soon enough. Should we show them?”

I grip the desk. “You don’t exist.”

“And yet I could break you,” he says softly, “in front of all of them. Crack you open, let them see all the monsters you’re made of. I could set them free. Set you free.” He sits up straight. “You don’t belong here.”

“Where do I belong?”

In a blink he’s gone from the other desk and standing next to mine. He rests the knife against my desk, its tip inches from my ribs. His other hand comes down on my shoulder, holding me in my chair as he leans close and whispers, “With me.”

He drives the knife forward and I gasp and jerk upright in my seat, catching my rib cage on the edge of my desk as the bell rings. Owen is gone, and the room is full of students scraping their chairs back and hoisting their bags onto their shoulders. I sag back again, rubbing my ribs, then haul myself to my feet and slide my too-blank notebook into my bag, trying to shake off the dregs of the nightmare. I’m almost to the door when Mr. Bradshaw stops me.

“Miss Bishop?” he says, straightening his desk.

I turn back to him. “Yes, sir?”

“Did I bore you?”

I cringe. “No, sir.”

“Well, that’s a relief,” he says, adjusting his glasses. “I do so worry about boring my students.”

“Oh, you shouldn’t,” I say. “You’re a very good speaker. Drama training?”

I curse myself before the words have even left my lips. Mouthing off in the Archive is one thing, but Mr. Bradshaw’s not a Librarian, he’s a teacher. Luckily, he smiles.

“I’ll assume then that, despite outward appearances, you were listening to my lecture with rapt attention. Still, perhaps in the future you could listen with your eyes open. Just so I know for sure.”

I manage a weak smile, a nod, and another “Yes, sir” before heading into the hall in search of Literary Theory and Analysis—I don’t see why they can’t just call it English. But before I can orient myself, someone clears his throat loudly. I turn to see Cash leaning against the door, waiting. He’s got a coffee in each hand, and he holds one out to me.

“Still trying to play the knight?” I ask, reaching reflexively for the cup.

“Your English class with Wellson is on the other side of the quad,” he says. “Five minutes isn’t enough time, unless you know the way.”

As soon as I take the coffee, he sets off down the hall. It’s all I can do to keep up and not spill the drink all over myself as I swerve to avoid being hit by shoulders and the noise that comes with them.

“Before you ask how I knew about Wellson,” he says, “I don’t have a thing for preying on new students.” He taps the side of his head. “Just a photographic memory.”

“That has to come in handy in a school like this.”

His smile widens. “It does.”

As he leads me through the building, I try to commit the route to memory.

“You’ll learn it backward and forward in no time.”

I’ll have to. One of the “innovative learning tactics” mentioned in the brochure is the scheduling. Semesters at Hyde are made up of five classes: three before lunch, two after. Every other day the schedule is reversed, so whatever class came first goes last, last first, etc., etc. So Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays look like this: Precalc, Literary Theory, Wellness, (lunch), Physiology, Government. Tuesdays and Thursdays look like this: Government, Physiology, Wellness, (lunch), Literary Theory, Precalc.

The brochure contained a lengthy, case study–supported explanation of why it works; right now it feels like just another hoop to jump through.

Cash leads the way through a set of doors, out onto an inner quad that’s ringed with buildings. Then he veers down a path to the right. Along the way, he drinks his coffee and cheerfully tosses out fun facts about Hyde: It’s been around since 1832; it used to be two schools (one for guys and one for girls), but they consolidated; one of the founders was a sculptor, and the campus is studded with statues, fourteen in all, though the number is always up for debate. Cash rambles on, waving whenever someone shouts his way (which is surprisingly often) without so much as a pause in his speech.

Luckily he doesn’t stop to chat with anyone this time, and we reach my class right as the second bell rings. He smiles triumphantly, turning away—but not before I can say thanks this time. He offers a salute that sweeps into a bow, and then he’s gone. I finish my coffee, trash the cup, and push the door open. Students are still taking their seats, and I snag one two rows back as a middle-aged woman with strikingly good posture—I assume she’s Ms. Wellson—writes in perfect print across the board. When she steps aside and I see the words, I can’t help but smile.

DANTE’S INFERNO.

It is summer, and I’m searching for a coffee shop beneath layers of dust, while Wesley Ayers sits backward on a metal chair. I can see the outline of a key beneath his shirt. The shared secret of our second lives hangs between us, not like a weight, but like a lifeline. I clean, and he rescues a book from a pile of sheets beside the chair.

“What have we here?” he asks, holding up the text.

Dante’s Inferno .

“Required reading,” I tell him.

“It’s a shame they do that,” he says, flipping through the unread pages. There’s a reverence in the way he handles it, his eyes skimming the words as if he knows them all by heart. “Requirement ruins even the best of books.”

I ask him if he’s read it, and he says he has, and I admit I haven’t, and he smiles and tells me that books like this are meant to be heard.

“I’ll prove it to you,” he says, flashing me a crooked smile. “You clean, I’ll read.”