Chapter Text
Nine Weeks Ago
The bell above the door needed to be fixed.
It barely made a noise as the man stepped inside, only emitting a pathetic, tinny sound as it swung shut behind him as he walked further into the store.
His eyes were sharp, the kind that made you feel like you needed to curl in on yourself, to duck your head down and pray it wasn’t you he was staring into. The store only had a few aisles; prepackaged snacks and a long row of merchandising refrigerators stocked with energy drinks and sodas, the lights inside flickering in and out with what seemed like the changing of the wind.
The man scanned up and down the aisles, grabbing a select few items as he made his way towards the back. He paused, there, in front of the glass doors. He looked over the shelves, taking in every option available. He seemingly disregarded the cold brews and the like, instead purusing over the canned lemonades and teas.
The clerk watched him with the only attention that precious, knowable boredom could bring. Chin in hand, elbow atop the countertop, most of her mind a few feet to the left where the small television was fixed to the wall, protected by a metal cage around it. Her gum was spearmint flavored, making her breath sharp and slightly sweet.
The man, a handful of snacks in his hand and two drinks under his arm, walked up to the register.
The clerk popped her gum. “Crazy, ain’t it?”
He looked up at her from under the brim of his hat, eyebrows raised ever so slightly. His steel eyes flicked upwards to the television, then back down to her. “Sure is.” He replied gruffly as she scanned his items. He paid in cash.
“Whole country’s goin’ to shit.” She remarked as the receipt chugged its way out of the machine. She ripped it off cleanly, handing it to him. Her statement could be taken in a million ways, but the man just nodded.
“You have a nice day.”
She watched as he walked past the pumps outside, to a large SUV parked out front of the convenience store. There was another man waiting in the passenger seat, dark hair and a green sweatshirt, a bored look on his face as he fiddled with the radio.
The man from the store hopped into the driver’s seat, dropping the grocery bag in his companion’s lap. They drove off, and the clerk returned her attention to the television screen.
On it, a young Commander faced away from the camera, telling the President something that only the two of them fully understood the implications of, something the rest of the people assembled in the chamber and the entire world watching at home would never know.
That was the only thing on the clerk’s mind as the SUV drove out of the gas station and merged onto the highway, as a storm prepared to roll into a town a long way from there.
Seven Weeks Ago
Miles away from that gas station on the highway, a young Colombian woman stood in line, large, chunky headphones around her neck. She was dragging a high-quality suitcase behind her, a neck pillow secured around the handle.
She regarded her fellow travelers waiting around her with a detached interest, alternating between people watching and checking her wristwatch impatiently, resisting the urge to tap her foot against the floor.
When the line finally started moving once more, she strode up to the booth and purchased her ticket, pulling a few bills out of her finely made wallet.
Everything about her seemed neat, organized. Her hair was up in a perfectly even bun, blouse and slacks pressed, nails neatly manicured. If one looked closely, they would be able to pick out small bits of color—her jewelry, the bright pink pen sticking out of her breast pocket, the colored wire frames of her glasses.
It was all consistent. Professional, sleek, but with accents of a pigmented personality that shone through.
Save for one thing.
Her headphones, something one would assume, based on her choice of outfit and the accompanying accessories, were something that should be brightly colored, like her wallet and suitcase and neck pillow.
Oddly enough, though, they were just a plain, dark gray.
Six Weeks Ago
Elsewhere, two people walked in the direction of the baggage claim of the airport.
Not together, mind you. Somewhere, a Chinese cybercrime expert had gotten off a plane thirty minutes ago, and had taken time to stop in the bathroom, a vending machine, then look around in one of the small stores, selecting a postcard, buying it and then carefully sliding it into his carry-on.
Meanwhile, an Inuk engineer had touched down not even five minutes ago, on a different flight from a different city, and had pushed her way through the crowds to disembark. She had promptly checked a clock mounted on the wall, gaining a pinched look on her face.
She walked brusquely across the airport, strides long and purposeful.
The two got to baggage claim, at staggered times and at two different carousels. The woman, in a loose sweatshirt and jeans, dark hair pulled into a long, elaborate braid, hefted her duffel bag up off the belt and quickly walked off with it slung over her shoulder. The man, in casual sweats and a tee, carrying nothing on his bag but a laptop, waited a few minutes for the crowd to dissipate as their bags first began spitting out onto the conveyer, stepping up and grabbing his own suitcase once a path was cleared.
At a leisurely pace, he got into an elevator, taking it down to the garage level. From there, he walked across the parking lot to the curb, across the street and out of the airport.
The woman was sitting in the back of a taxi.
He slid in next to her.
Five Weeks Ago
Out on the open water, a Thai psychology major leaned on the railing, watching as the approaching land got larger and larger on the horizon. It was a frigid, icy day, and most of the other passengers were waiting inside the ferry. Not him, though.
The sea spray that reached his face was jarring, unpleasant, stinging as it made contact. Despite it, though, he stayed where he was as they crossed the channel. There was a backpack, deep purple and held together with safety pins, patches ironed onto the front, at his feet.
His jacket, clearly worn dark leather, was pulled tight against his body, offering any and all protection from the wind that whipped against the boat.
It was a dark, dreary day, one that foretold of rain and more gloom than usual. Not a single ray of sun could force its way through the oppressive layer of clouds, casting an all-consuming shadow on everyone down below.
The man rested his chin on the railing, watching as the docks came into view.
He ran a hand through his choppily cut hair, then sighed, reaching down and scooping up his bag, slinging it over his shoulder.
Four Weeks Ago
In a very different situation from the man on the ferry, two people sat in the cab of a truck in complete silence.
A Norwegian pathologist was at the wheel with a stony, hard face, staring ahead at the road and nothing else. Her short hair, a feathy, ashy blonde, was left out of its usual slicked back style, loose, free stands framing her face. Despite that, she didn’t resemble any synonym of soft.
The man next to her was hunched in on himself, looking for all the world like he was trying to pull himself into his sweater, like a turtle with a shell. His hair; fine, coppery strands, hung in front of his face and eyes.
A blizzard raged outside the vehicle, the windshield wipers working overtime to clear the view as they drove, a single dark blue swatch against an all-white painting. It was desolate, frozen roads and iced over windows. Regardless, the woman kept driving.
She wore nothing protective besides a graphic tee and an unbuttoned shirt overtop, but seemed perfectly comfortable in the freezing temperature that had invaded the car. Slowly, the man leaned forward and turned on the heated air.
The woman didn’t move, but her eyes slowly swept towards him at the movement.
He swallowed and pulled back into his seat.
Thursday, February 28th, 2018
12:41 PM
International School of Lyon, France
Charlotte Allard should not be sitting anywhere near her.
Like, anywhere near her. Not next to her, not in front of her, not behind her, and most certainly not a space diagonally ahead of her, where Louise could stare at her for far too long without anybody noticing.
Today, Charlotte’s long, auburn hair was pulled into two low buns, decorated with little clips with fabric daisies on them. God, Louise wished she could do that with her own hair. Maybe Charlotte could teach her—
No, that was ridiculous. She’d have to ask, which meant walking up to Charlotte, which meant speaking to her. Which, was…no. Just, no. Instead, Louise, chin on her palm, watched as the girl took notes in a sparkling gel pen, her handwriting bunched up and neat, her brightly-mascaraed lashes almost brushing her cheeks when she looked down.
Charlotte Allard was perfect.
She was smart, and kind, and absolutely beautiful. She had a laugh like tinkling bells, and a smile like the first ray of sunshine after a long, cloudy winter. Charlotte was the type of girl that people wrote sonnets and ballads about, the kind of girl that you could only just observe from a distance.
Well, if you were someone like Louise, that was.
She tore her eyes away, looking down at her school uniform. Her white button up, neatly ironed by her father that morning. Both the tie and skirt were a rich evergreen, soft and silky material that was cool to the touch. There were even small pockets sewn into the sides, where she could keep her phone and her keys when she walked across the parking lot in the morning.
Her hands, fingers bitten down to blunt, uneven edges, pressed into her palms as she risked another glance.
Louise; awkward, ill-proportioned Louise, knobby elbows sticking out of her sleeves, gangly legs that fit awkwardly into a pair of sneakers, a band-aid covering her knee from where she scraped it on the concrete outside of her house.
She couldn’t help the comparison.
Charlotte wore sheer black tights, ripped at the knees and around the thighs, paired with platform Mary Janes, looking effortless and perfectly put together all at once, like it was unintentional how intentionally perfect she was.
The bell rang shrilly, violently jolting her out of her reverie. Louise’s eyes flew up to the clock; an old, grand thing that was written in Roman numerals rather than modern numbers. She leaned over to grab the strap of her backpack, heaving it up and onto her lap. Hurriedly, she shoved all her papers into the folder she’d marked for the class, covered in stickers and marker doodles, taking care to not crease any of them despite her rush. She snapped her binder shut and crammed it into her bag, yanking on the zipper to shut it.
Unfortunately for her, everyone else seemed to have been paying attention to the time, and had been packed up long before the bell. Her fellow students flooded out of the classroom, shouting their farewells to the teacher in clumsy, accented English, lunches or ID cards in hand as they turned down the hallways.
Louise watched as Charlotte tucked her pen behind her ear, gracefully swept her bag over her shoulder, and smoothed out her skirt before leaving, not looking back. Not looking back to see Louise, wide-eyed behind her too-small glasses, staring.
She let out a sigh as she watched Charlotte go, then averting her gaze to the ground as she stood up, chair screeching against the floor as she pushed it back. It was loud and grating, and it only seemed to happen to Louise. She slid her arms into the straps of her backpack, white-knuckling them as it sat against her spine.
Not even the first step she took, someone cleared their throat behind her. Frozen to the spot, Louise pivoted, eyes wide. She grasped for the English they were supposed to try and use in class, something that usually came so easily to her, only to find her throat wouldn’t work, that no sounds came out of her mouth.
From his spot leaning against his desk, Charlie raised a dark brow over his tinted lenses. His arms were crossed, head inclined towards her. “Are you honestly going to tell me that there’s something written in that notebook of yours?” Her teacher asked in smooth, perfect English.
She swallowed thickly, ducking her head down, mind instantly flashing to the empty pages that had been laid out in front of her, mechanical pencil abandoned on the desktop next to it as her attention had been yanked elsewhere.
“No,” She whispered, ashamed. “Sorry, Monsieur.”
Louise didn’t have to look up to know that her teacher was frowning, the type that pulled at the corners of his mouth and knitted his brow. She’d always hated when he made that face at her—it was a disheartening combination of disappointment and concern, like he knew they could do better and was worried as to why they weren’t. It was gut-wrenchingly effective.
She liked all her teachers, really. Music, precalc, physics—they were all fantastic professors, good to the students and knowledgeable about their subjects. Every teacher was somebody’s favorite, but the widely held opinion among them was that Charlie was the best of the best. Even some of the kids that weren’t in his class or in one of the clubs he advised liked him best.
He was the youngest of the faculty, enough to understand their jokes and to seem to actually care about their problems, genuine in his advice and concern, young enough to scrunch up his nose when they called him by his last name and the accompanying title at the beginning of the quarter.
None of the students liked to disappoint him, and Louise was no exception. “I was just…” She trailed off, cheeks flaming, gripping for words in the secondary language. Her English was nowhere near as good as her native French.
Charlie’s lips curled up into a faint smile, switching to French easily. “Charlotte Allard, I know.” He said. “Staring at the girl won’t get you anywhere, Louise. And you won’t get anywhere at all if you don’t pay attention in school.” He tapped the top of her desk, giving her a significant expression.
Louise gaped. “How—how did—” She fumbled. Alright, maybe it wasn’t her unfamiliarity in English that was turning her into a mess.
His face softened. “You’re my students. I always know.”
And that seemed to be accurate. How he did it, Louise was unsure, but he always seemed aware when there was something wrong in his classroom.
True to form, he cocked his head to the side. “Are you alright, Louise?” He asked.
Her face twitched, eyes traveling back down to the floor, staring at her scuffed shoes. Was everything alright? She’d been happier than she’d been in a long while, but a bleak miasma seemed to trail after her wherever she went. It seemed to be a consistent theme in her life; grasping for words and none of them fitting right.
Charlotte Allard was the type of girl who got poems and songs, and Louise would never be the person able to write them.
“I’m,” She started weakly. “I’m…”
Charlie blinked. “Working on it?” He offered.
She took that in, getting a feel for how it rolled around in her mouth. “Working on it.” She repeated. “I suppose.”
He nodded. “I’m glad to hear it.”
That was the thing about Charlie. When he said something, it sounded like he meant it. It was a rare quality in a teacher, in Louise’s experience. Everything about him, the deep green sweater that all the faculty got, the dark slacks and the crisp button-up, that he always paired with a pair of battered sneakers that were definitely against the staff dress code, seemed open.
His classroom was dotted with blooming plants, leafy ferns, and vines that hung over the edges of their terracotta pots. It lacked most of the eye-catching posters the other rooms had, instead decorated only with wall-to-ceiling shelves stuffed with books in more than just the handful of languages he taught. Old, weathered paperbacks, heavy hardcovers, and even a few magazines laying on the bottom shelves.
Other than that, there were the windows. The typical blinds had been removed, soft, pale curtains taking their place, letting natural light spill into the room. It made the entire place glow in the afternoons, and provided a view of the late sunrises in the winter mornings. The entire room, like their teacher, seemed warm and inviting.
Louise found herself smiling. “Thanks, sir.”
He nodded, seemingly satisfied. “Any time, Ms. Bonnet. I don’t want to hold you for too long—go enjoy your lunch.” He dismissed, pushing himself off the desk. “And remember what I said.”
He wasn’t just talking about paying attention in class.
It took her a second to start moving, frozen under the light scrutiny of her teacher. “Right, right. Um, thanks, sir. It won’t happen again.” She rushed out in English, grabbing her things in her arms and hurrying out of the classroom. Behind her, her teacher shook his head, still smiling.
As she made her way down the hall, his words echoed in her mind. I’m working on it, she repeated. Louise dropped her stuff at her locker, smoothed down her newly grown out hair, and walked outside to the courtyard where her friends were waiting, sitting in a loose semicircle at one of the stone picnic tables.
A round of greetings came up as she sat down, dropping her lunch on the table. She’d forgotten to pack one the night before, and was forced to randomly grab whatever meager offerings her kitchen held, which seemed to include a slightly stale muffin, an orange, and a pudding cup with no spoon.
“Did you get in trouble?” Ines immediately asked, peering over at her. To her left, Theo scoffed, his dark curls bouncing as he shook his head. “From Trejo? Unlikely. He’s way too nice.”
Elias frowned at the other boy, pushing up his glasses with his shoulder. “He’s not too nice.” He defended, taking a bite of his sandwich. “Remember Louis Vernier?” He prodded, giving his boyfriend a look.
Louise, along with Ines and Colette, winced.
The tragic tale of Louis Vernier was a short one. It was the first day of quarter, and they had all been waiting in the classroom, a mix of nerves and excitement filling the air. The new language professor hadn’t yet been spotted, by anybody, but they had all heard about him. Apparently, he was handling the French classes for the non-natives, along with the English class, Spanish class, and the class where all the oddball-language kids did their work online if none of the options at school interested them.
(Later that day, Louise would find out from Manon Bassett, who was learning Arabic, for some reason, that the teacher was perfectly capable of assisting her in her courses, speaking it fluently. Along with what sounded like a few other languages, not including English, French, and Spanish.)
And then Louis, whom Louise tragically shared five miserable letters with, was sitting right in the front against the wall, chatting loudly with the boy sitting next to him, who quite honestly looked like he’d rather be anywhere else.
Long story short, Louis said some…rather unsavory, unkind things about a girl in their grade, how she wasn’t really a girl, and their new teacher had chosen that exact moment to walk into class for the first time.
The verbal slaughter that had followed immediately after was Oscar-worthy. The entire class watched with slack jaws, eyes flickering back and forth like it was a tennis match and not a complete and utter decimation. Louis Vernier was, after being reduced to near tears, sent to the office and told not to come back until he felt like he could be a better person.
He hadn’t come back. Whether that was because he didn’t have the guts to show his face again, or because Charlie refused to let him back into his class, was unclear. Either way, Louise didn’t really care. The further he was from her, the better.
She, who had been sinking into her seat as Louis talked, hiding behind her curtain of hair and praying he wouldn’t look at her. Praying he wouldn’t note the defined lump in her throat and the lack of softness in her jaw, her flat chest and low voice.
She’d only been at this school since the beginning of the year—a precious two months—and nobody yet had said anything about her not being a her. One of the many positives about transitioning before she started a new school, she’d told herself. But when Louis talked, all that contentment had faded away into the wind.
Watching his stupid little face turn red and splotchy as the new teacher ripped him a new one quickly soothed her, though.
After that, their new teacher had walked to the center of the room, introduced himself using his first name, and began to outline the syllabus like nothing had happened.
Some students—people rather like Louis whom she’d always tried to avoid—hated him. They all transferred out within the next two weeks, weeded out one by one.
The class became a safe haven for Louise, and all the other students like her. Charlie was nice, but most definitely not too nice, as Theo was implying.
“He just told me I needed to focus in class more.” Louise mumbled, the flush on her face not yet faded. Elias, who knew just exactly what had gotten her so distracted, cackled. After a second, Colette caught on. “How does she always know?” The girl demanded, eyes wide. “It’s unbelievable!”
Another thing about their teacher; nothing got past him. And when Louise said nothing, she meant nothing. Normally, he didn’t care much when they had quick, whispered conversations during class. But, occasionally, mostly at the beginning of the semester, when somebody said something that made his face twist, he was unafraid to call them out and promptly have them leave the classroom.
And he heard. He always heard.
“I think he’s like a bat.” Ines said solemnly to Colette. “Sonar ears or something.”
“Echolocation.” Louise corrected automatically. She rolled her eyes as she unzipped her lunch pail. “And our teacher isn’t Batman, Ines, Jesus.”