A game most foul, p.4
A Game Most Foul, page 4
“Are you kidding?” I whispered, looking down at the books.
They would be put to better use as a doorstop.
Brick-like as they were, I was able to heft the things up into my arms and cart them over to the desk where the shop’s cash register sat. Adele was making polite chitchat with William, who hardly glanced over when I dumped them onto the table.
“Thank you, Jules,” Adele said, busying herself ringing up the manuals. “William here was just telling me he’s going to see about reproducing some of the experiments in these manuals.”
“That’s . . . cool.”
“Cool indeed,” William said, sounding a little miffed. “I look forward to the results.”
He said something else about chemistry, but his voice started to become background noise the more I watched him. It seemed like he was touching everything, picking up little trinkets on a nearby shelf, flipping open one of the chemistry manuals to read off some equation.
The man didn’t seem to be able to stop moving and it was making it difficult to understand much of what he or my aunt were saying.
“Jules?”
“Sorry, what?” I said, startled. “What did you need?”
Adele was staring at me somewhat in concern. “I asked if you wouldn’t mind helping William carry the—”
“Oh, no need for that, Ms. Duncan,” William said, and promptly picked up the two books as though they were as light as a feather. “I look forward to seeing that microscope you mentioned earlier. As always, you have my eternal gratitude for allowing me access to your marvelous inventory. Take care.”
Somehow he’d gotten the shop door open despite his full hands and that was it.
I was left standing there with my mouth hanging open as Adele went to shut and lock the door again.
That had to be, without a doubt, one of the strangest interactions I’d had to date.
“Are you alright, Jules?” Adele asked when she’d turned to face me.
“Yeah, but—okay, who was that?” I said, my words coming out in a rush. “That was—was a little odd.”
“Oh, really? William?” Adele laughed, flicking the curtains closed over the front window. “Don’t be silly, dear. William is harmless. Been coming in here for ages, like I said, and not afraid to spend a pretty penny either.”
“Okay, sure, that’s great, but it kinda seemed like he was trying to break down the door,” I pointed out.
Adele was apparently so used to this William’s behavior that she didn’t find it odd in the slightest and just laughed again. “He does get a little impatient from time to time, yes, but who doesn’t? I promise you, dear, he’s a gentle thing. Not to worry.”
I opted not to push the matter any further and followed Adele upstairs to her flat as she directed the conversation toward what we were going to eat.
Adele probably did know her regular customers pretty well after running the business for so long, but that wasn’t going to stop me from going back downstairs later to double-check the locks.
Chapter 5
400 Milligrams is the Recommended Daily Intake of Caffeine
Hey, Jules.”
I half expected to see Suruthi barreling her way into the coffee shop across the street from Chatham Hall, but it was Ashley who had said my name, my fellow aspiring writer from “across the pond.”
Ashley was a lot shorter than I’d realized, standing behind me in line, one earbud in. Despite the giant yawn, she still had a smile and a wave for me.
“Hi, Ashley,” I said, grinning. “Fancy running into you here.”
“Oh, I suspect we’ll all be spending a lot of time here during the next eight weeks,” she said humorously. “At least those of us who drink multiple cups of coffee a day.”
“Guilty as charged,” I agreed.
We made polite chitchat as we stood in line waiting to order our drinks. Between the steadily growing noise inside the coffee shop and the soft tone of Ashley’s voice, trying to understand a word she was saying was becoming increasingly harder. I snuck a hand up and tried to surreptitiously turn the volume up on my hearing aids, and if Ashley noticed, she kept quiet.
“. . . and, okay, I have this one story I’ve been working on for years now, but when I think about creating an outline for it and all that, I’m a little intimidated,” Ashley was saying, pulling a grimace.
“Me too,” I said. I almost felt relief hearing her say that. I wasn’t the only one terrified of our manuscripts. “We came here to write, yeah, but the whole concept of deadlines kind of freaks me out.”
Five minutes of conversation standing in line at a coffee shop had told me that I’d found another kindred spirit. Not bad.
“Yeah, deadlines aren’t my thing either.” Ashley grinned, tucking a strand of her dark hair behind her ear. “I have it on good authority that I have a problem being told what and when to write.”
“Hey, that’s a cute bumblebee,” I said as Ashley rummaged around in her bag for her wallet to pay for her drink and I saw the little bronze pin nestled into the strap of her bag.
“Thanks!” Ashley said cheerily without looking up. “From my grandma. She’s always called me her “little honeybee.” Embarrassing, but you know, she’s my grandma.”
“Sounds like a grandma, yeah.”
We left the coffee shop a short while later, drinks in hand, along with a slice of lemon pound cake that looked too good to pass up. There was still a bit of time left before today’s session began, but I turned to ask Ashley if she wanted to head up to the classroom anyway. I heard my name being shouted before I’d even opened my mouth.
Suruthi was sprinting her way down the sidewalk toward us in another neon-colored skirt and band T-shirt, waving madly.
“Good morning, darlings!” she sang when she reached us, then threw her arms around me and Ashley.
Ashley shot me a startled look when Suruthi let us go and I shrugged in return. Twenty-four hours since we’d met and somewhere during that time, I’d already come to accept the fact that this was simply how Suruthi was.
“I dunno about you two, but I stayed up way too late last night trying to work on that outline. I’m going to need three of those,” Suruthi said, pointing to my coffee. “And I’ve already had two cups of tea.”
“Then I hope you enjoy standing in that queue,” another voice chimed in.
Percy joined us on the sidewalk, two large coffees in hand. Judging by the even messier hair and sleepy look in his eyes, he’d been up late working on Professor Watson’s outline too.
“Whatever do you mean?” Suruthi said, batting her eyelashes at him. “I see a coffee for me right there in your hand.”
“That’s where you’re wrong, I’m afraid,” Percy said, taking a long slurp of coffee. “These are both mine.”
I had to respect a person who could drink two large coffees in one sitting.
I hid a smile behind my hand as Suruthi gasped in mock outrage. She spun on her heel and swept into the coffee shop without another word.
“Suruthi’s always been like that,” Percy said to Ashley, who had watched the whole exchange with a stunned look. “You get used to it.”
Suruthi came breezing out of the shop in what seemed like a minute with coffee and a scone in hand. “I may or may not have just bribed my way to the head of the queue. Now we may proceed to class,” she announced, gesturing grandly with her coffee. “After you.”
The four of us zipped across the street, through the courtyard, and went inside Chatham Hall, the last ones to reach the classroom upstairs. Thierry and Willem had taken the same seats as yesterday, so Ashley made herself comfortable in the paisley armchair she’d chosen previously, and the rest of us wound up squished on the couch.
Unlike yesterday, Professor Watson was already seated at his desk, head down, and it looked like he was writing in his journal again. He didn’t join us in the circle until the clock hit nine on the dot exactly.
“Judging by the amount of coffee cups and energy drinks I see here, I take it there was quite a bit of writing going on late yesterday?” the professor said, settling into his winged armchair.
There was a smattering of laughter from the rest of the group, but my laughter felt forced.
I watched with some interest as Percy flipped open the journal in his lap and started thumbing through the pages. My jaw dropped when I counted at least a dozen pages packed full of neat, precise handwriting. This, along with the two giant cups of coffee, had me thinking Percy hadn’t actually gotten a lick of sleep last night.
“Do you always write by hand?” I asked in awe.
“Usually, unless it’s a final manuscript,” Percy answered quietly. He gestured with the same fountain pen he’d been using yesterday. “I think it adds something to the creative process this way.”
And hand cramps, I thought.
“That is . . . seriously impressive, Percy,” I told him.
He looked mildly embarrassed as he mumbled out a thanks. I wondered if it was possible he had a few tips he’d be willing to share.
Professor Watson took the class through a lecture about outlining that ended up lasting most of the morning. It was still a whirlwind of information even if I’d covered similar topics in other creative writing classes; when we took a midday break, I had a few good pages or so in my notebook filled with blocks of notes and plot diagrams.
A few others got up to head to the restroom or dash across the street for another coffee, but I stayed put. I tucked my legs up underneath me on the couch and pulled my bag toward me, digging for some colored pens.
“Yoo-hoo!”
I looked up from my mess of notes at the singsong voice floating somewhere above my head and saw Suruthi perched on the arm of the couch beside me. The classroom was empty, save for the two of us. Apparently spacing out and missing important announcements, like we were going on a break, was becoming a new habit of mine.
“You really get into it when you write, don’t you?” Suruthi said, nodding toward the notebook open in my lap.
“I try to,” I said, flipping my notebook shut. “Lunch?”
“That it is,” Suruthi said, straightening up. “Percy went to get in the queue for a fish and chips stand and I’ve been craving chips for ages now.”
I opened my mouth to tell Suruthi that she was going to have to remind me what chips were, but nothing came out when a cheery little tune suddenly filled my ears, and the world became remarkably quiet.
Well, sort of.
The audiologist I’d become very familiar with over the last year had informed me multiple times that I wasn’t deaf—my hearing loss was just severe. I was still able to mostly hear people with lower voices when they spoke and loud noises like someone playing the drums or slamming doors . . . or a garbage truck. Sometimes it took me a little longer to figure out what was being said, but I could do it.
Higher frequencies, on the other hand, were now pretty much lost on me—like Suruthi’s voice, for example.
She was still talking rather animatedly as she played with the strap of her bag, her lips moving way too fast for me to even attempt to lip-read—something I wasn’t that good at to begin with.
Okay, I told myself. Don’t panic. Do not panic.
This was easier said than done, but my mom had reminded Adele to always keep a pack of hearing aid batteries on me for a reason. This was hardly the first time my hearing aids had died in a public place, and it wasn’t going to be the last.
I could fib my way out of this, no problem.
“Uh, you go on,” I said as Suruthi stood there in the doorway, waiting expectantly. So far she didn’t seem like she suspected anything, but feeling my own voice reverberating inside my head when I couldn’t hear much of it was just bizarre. “I’m pretty sure my mom called earlier, and I need to check my voicemail.”
I quickly turned around and busied myself with rummaging through my bag, pretending to be looking for my phone. I snuck a peek over my shoulder as my hand closed around the little plastic case holding my hearing aid batteries just to make sure Suruthi really had gone.
But the coast was clear, so I carefully popped open the plastic case with one hand and reached up to pull out my left hearing aid. The thing was dark brown in color to match my hair, something I’d picked in the hope that they would be unnoticeable. Most of the time I was pretty sure they were.
It was beyond annoying trying to pop open the thing’s battery compartment while making sure the miniscule battery didn’t go flying, but I somehow managed to successfully change the battery in one hearing aid before moving on to the next.
I popped the battery compartment open on my right hearing aid next, shook out the dead battery, and had just gotten a new battery out of the case before my stupid butterfingers dropped the thing. As I watched the new battery hit the floor and start rolling, I thought about just leaving it there and getting a new one, but hearing aid batteries were expensive. Besides, the battery would still work even if it was a bit dirty.
“Crap.”
I made sure the case of batteries was carefully shut before I set my bag on the couch and got to my knees, on the hunt for the rogue battery.
There didn’t seem to be anything underneath the coffee table besides a whole lot of dust, and the same went for the couch. I grabbed at the arm of the chair beside me to get to my feet, only to let loose with a squeak of shock at the sight of Professor Watson standing before me, hand outstretched. The tiny hearing aid battery I’d dropped sat perfectly in the middle of his palm.
With the one hearing aid on, Professor Watson’s voice was only a little muffled as I heard him say, “I believe you dropped this.”
“Yes,” I said, holding in a defeated sigh. “Thanks.”
I accepted the battery with another quiet thanks. I did my best to ignore Professor Watson as I swapped the batteries out in my right hearing aid and got it safely back on, but without much success.
Professor Watson had an intensity to his gaze that was almost unnerving. I didn’t care for the way it made me feel as if I were being examined under a microscope; I was bracing myself for an onslaught of questions given the almost analytical expression that had taken over the professor’s face as he watched me work. Hadn’t his short bio on Ashford’s website said he’d been a medical doctor at one point?
Several beats of awkward silence had passed before the professor spoke again, and it was just a simple: “How’s that outline coming along, Miss Montgomery?”
It’s an absolute mess.
“It’s . . . coming along fine,” I answered. I hoped I sounded more confident than I felt. “I think I’ve got something good going so far.”
That part was mostly truthful. I did think my outline had potential to turn into a real nail-biting thriller—mostly. It just needed a little fine tuning.
“Excellent,” Professor Watson said. “I did rather enjoy your submission piece about the detective working in the paranormal division of the New York City Police Department. I suspect we will have a rousing discussion over your outline at our individual conference next week.”
“Uh, right.” I cleared my throat, squeezing the strap of my bag tightly between my fingers. “Thanks, Professor.”
Professor Watson gave me a polite nod and strolled over to his desk, humming that same tune he’d been yesterday.
It took more effort than it should have to put one foot in front of the other and leave the classroom. I felt somehow trapped in a strange daze.
On the one hand, I’d managed to change the batteries in my hearing aids in public without the world coming to a complete stop just because someone saw me. That was a good thing. On the other hand, Professor Watson just said he’d rather enjoyed my submission piece and was very much looking forward to reading more of my work.
Because that wasn’t an insane amount of pressure or anything.
Chapter 6
Hemingway and Faulkner
I think this is it, you lot. I think I’ve finally got it.”
Percy sighed, shoving his glasses up into his hair so he could rub at his eyes with the heels of his hands. “Suruthi. You’ve told us this at least a dozen times already.”
“Yes, well, this time I mean it.” Suruthi slammed her laptop shut and threw a triumphant fist into the air. “It’s probably three pages too long and some of it might not be in English, but my outline is done, I tell you.”
“Good for you,” I muttered around the pen between my teeth, flipping to a fresh page in my notebook.
A few hours’ worth of trying to make some headway with our outlines in a study room on the first floor of Chatham Hall that Wednesday night had left us all feeling exhausted and crabby.
I was ready to call it a night before I started getting any weepier at the sight of my half-blank Word document, and Percy and Suruthi seemed to be of the same mind. We started clearing our things off the table, packing up, but the congenial silence was broken when Suruthi spoke suddenly, her voice low and austere.
“Percy Bysshe Byers. Is that a tattoo there on your arm?”
Percy’s arms fell to his sides from where he’d been leaning back in his chair to stretch. I could see the tips of his ears going red through his mess of hair as Suruthi stared him down from across the table.
“Ah, well . . .” He cleared his throat, his gaze moving to the ceiling. “It might be.”
“And what, pray tell, is it of?” Suruthi demanded at once. “It’s all black and gray, I can’t make much out.”
Percy refused to answer, his lips a thin line as he finished packing up. I only ended up with a glimpse of the tattoo that was clearly on his inner bicep as he moved, but it looked strangely rectangular.
“When did you get a tattoo?” Suruthi insisted. “And more importantly, Percy Bysshe, what did you get a tattoo of?”
There was really no excuse for it on my part. The perfect opportunity came as Percy scooted back from the table and bent down to grab a fallen pad of sticky notes off the floor. There was one split second where I was able to get a good peek at the black and gray ink on his right arm, and I went for it.
