Returning to no applause, p.45
RETURNING TO NO APPLAUSE, page 45
She glanced over at the clock. It wasn’t all that late. Biking to Undulat Park and back again would leave her with ample time before her mother got home. It would set her mind at ease. Maybe the groundskeeper had left some stupid gift there, or a dead body, or …
Jay shook her head.
It wouldn’t be anything. It would be empty, and she would go home empty-handed, and in the evening she could tell her readers all about the strange groundskeeper who called himself Agent Jung and wanted her to go chase rainbows in a park.
That was what would happen, Jay decided.
But that wasn’t what happened. Not exactly.
The cold air of autumn rushed past her as she biked without thinking about much of anything. Normally, in a situation as unusual and incomprehensible as this one, her mind would be bustling with thoughts and ideas and possible explanations of what was happening. But not there. Not now. She had already considered all the possibilities.
Thinking any more about it would make her feel dizzy.
She was well outside the city now, cycling on a little path lined with red and yellow leaves.
Undulat Park was a rather large park on the outskirts of the city, usually seen as more of a contained forest than anything you would actually walk your dog in. Jay had only been there as a kid when her mother would take her there to jump in the leaf piles and climb the trees.
A tree unlike all the other trees … Jay could only think of one such tree.
Most of the park was made up of birches, standing white and tall and pretty. But there was one tree of a different kind.
Jay could see it even from this great distance.
An oak.
It was massive and stood above all the other trees, easily dwarfing them in raw might. Since its lower trunk was bereft of branches, only the most stalwart and determined of kids could climb it. Jay had never climbed it herself, so she was happy knowing that the “prize” was supposedly among the roots.
A little hole … Jay couldn’t remember ever seeing anything like that.
The small path she was on quickly broadened into a larger one, and she entered the park. The setting sun, now hidden behind red leaves, only flitted in intermittently, blinding Jay every now and then. The path led straight to the oak, so she felt no need to think much about it.
The path began to twist and wind, but Jay had played this game before. She barely had to think at all as she flew through the bends, swiftly dodging stray roots and stones.
Before she knew it, she stood before that massive, looming oak. The entire forest floor was covered in a layer of red and yellow, giving the impression that the whole forest, including the treetops and even the sky, was on fire.
She parked her bike a few paces off and approached the oak, both of her hands in her pockets. She could feel the key coldly touch her fingers. She gripped it tightly.
This was so stupid. She was being a total idiot, just going ahead and following whatever directions some lunatic groundskeeper wanted to give her. At least this would make for a good post.
Cursing in her mind, she went down on her knees and began fumbling and groping around the thick roots of the tree. This would never work. The ground and the roots were completely covered in leaves. After only a few minutes of shoveling wet leaves, her gloves had turned totally wet and her fingers felt stiff and cold. She’d be lucky if she didn’t wake up with a cold or something.
Roots, roots, and more roots. No matter how many rounds she took around the tree, she neither felt nor saw anything.
Yeah, a complete waste of time.
Jay stood up and shook her hands, shaking the water from her gloves. She looked down at her gloved hands.
… Maybe if she did one round without her gloves, she might actually feel something? Either that or she wouldn’t have to go to school tomorrow.
“Fuck it,” she mumbled to herself, and removed the completely soaked gloves. Back to her knees.
She touched every root as carefully as she could, feeling them with her hands without relying on her eyes in the least. But even after going halfway around, there was nothing. Not a single thing. No hole.
But right as she was about to give up and just head home for the night before the sun set completely, she felt something. A little groove. Something completely invisible and strange. If she looked at the groove, it seemed like a bump at most. But her fingers felt a little more. Carefully, still holding one hand on the groove, she removed the key from her pocket.
It slid inside the groove perfectly.
There was a click.
At first, Jay thought she was hallucinating when a fingerprint-sized piece of the bark on the root slid away to reveal a small, metallic surface. She stared at it with wild eyes before shaking her head. It was still there. Hunching down, she swung her head about, scanning for anybody else. There was nobody. She turned back to the metallic thing.
Without knowing exactly what to do, she placed her right finger over the flap. There was a prick and her hand jerked back. A little droplet of blood formed at the tip of her finger.
Turning back to the root, she found that the flap had closed again.
A hallucination? No, she could still feel the sting in her finger. Then …
There was another click.
Jay whipped her head around and bore witness to how a hatch opened in the ground. She crawled over to it on her hands and knees. The hatch apparently opened into a small compartment, where she saw files upon files and tapes and letters. She felt numb as she carefully removed them.
Some were dated from six months before, detailing the appearance of a powerful otherworlder. Others described the detainment of that same otherworlder. A few were more recent, going over the mundane experiences of his everyday life or describing the life of a seemingly unrelated young otherworlder. The letters were dated a little less than five months ago, inviting someone to meet their brother.
Somehow, Jay felt strange. Wrong.
Who had done this? Who would have the resources needed to do this? It couldn’t have been a single person. There was too much. The words of the groundskeeper echoed hollowly in her head.
This had to be the work of some sort of faction. It might be a single government, or a group of truth-seekers, or … or something. But why in the world would they give this to her, of all people?
She didn’t have all that many readers on the internet, which would leave her with the simple possibility that she couldn’t be traced back to them. Or maybe that she had a direct connection with Wiedermann. Or maybe they just wanted someone disposable to handle this. Maybe having a young girl doing all this was somehow more believable than if they were to make a move.
… It didn’t make any sense. This whole situation felt unreal and odd, but wasn’t this what she had always wanted?
She had the proof now. She had this, and she had Annie’s letter. Did she really need anything else?
Who cares if she was being used as the witting pawn of some corporation? That didn’t matter.
The only thing that truly mattered was that the truth was brought to light.
That was all.
For hours, she just sat there in the middle of the clearing, reading the files and documents until it got dark. Then she had to use her phone as a flashlight, but when its battery ran out, she was left in the dark. By that point, the moon stood high above the half-bare treetops, but she didn’t want to leave.
She could no longer read them, but she had to continue. She couldn’t stop there.
Her hands trembled in fear as she bundled the files. She had to continue reading. What if she went home and he was there? She had to know how to counter him. Among the files, there was a record of his status. It contained a few of his skills and his level and his race and his jobs. It was enough to tell her that he was beyond anything this world had seen before. For one, she got her answer to what his level actually was.
999+.
Higher than any recorded level. According to the reports, it was unsure whether it had capped out at 999 or if there was a higher number hidden behind it. The skills were similar. Unknown was a word passed around ad nauseum.
There were even reports on an event where Kreig actually showed his power and effortlessly slew a creature that threatened to destroy an entire city. Jay could even remember seeing such an event unfold on the television. She had assumed they would go in with a nuke or something, but it “sorted itself out.” If he could kill such a creature as easily as one kills a fly, then what kind of destruction could he bring?
Worst of all was that it was entirely possible. The man was in therapy and constantly under surveillance.
He clearly had psychological problems, and yet they let him roam freely.
Jay gritted her teeth and placed the files back inside the compartment. Then, fumbling with her fingers over the nooks and crannies of the roots, she locked it again, leaving the files—both read and unread—behind. She had to come back. She couldn’t bring them with her.
If she did, and someone else found out she had them …
A shiver scuttled across her shoulders and she shook her head.
But nobody knew. Yet. One day, they would know. She was sure of it. The people who had given her this information—whoever they were— must have known that she would be ready to sacrifice herself for this. Outside of journalism, her life didn’t mean much of anything. It wasn’t as though anybody would miss her. She was prepared to die if it meant that the truth came out.
The only problem was Erica.
During the following two weeks, whenever she had time, Jay immersed herself in the files, trying to put every scrap of information to mind just in case she had a confrontation of some sort. The more she knew, the more dangerous she was. If she could describe in immense detail the line of events that lead to Falk in particular taking over treatment of “inmate” Kreig Wiedermann, then even if she was apprehended, she would still have many cards to play.
But that wasn’t the only thing that she did.
Somewhere in the back of her mind, she wanted Erica to deserve what was coming to her. Jay wanted it to be that Erica was the kind of person who deserved having their lover be a cold-hearted murderous beast, because otherwise, she could hardly be justified in bringing all this on her.
But she couldn’t. Every day, she would talk to Erica and ask her things and make conversation and try her very best to find some flaw or mistake worthy of the pain she would have to endure. But there was nothing.
Erica was a young adult who had grown to enjoy teaching as of late. In her spare time, she liked drawing, bicycling, and collecting action figures. She preferred grading essays to straight answers, which was why she enjoyed teaching English.
And, worst of all, she liked Jay. It was a weird realization to have for Jay, but Erica seemed to genuinely enjoy talking to her. A little before and after and even during class. In the hallways between classes. Jay wouldn’t even have considered it if Erica didn’t state straight out, “I love talking to you; you always have some funny question to ask!” which was of course followed by another encouragement for her to pursue a career as a journalist.
It was wrong. Why couldn’t she just be a bad person like Wiedermann?
So, she shifted her perspective. Erica was a good woman. She didn’t deserve the pain, but it was necessary in order for her to realize the truth.
Then she might leave Wiedermann, and … Well, whatever happened past that point was useless, since Jay would most likely be dead by that point. Whether IOCRO or Wiedermann himself did it was irrelevant. The important thing was that it was an unavoidable truth, just like the fact that Wiedermann was a danger to the world.
According to the files, according to the letter, according to everything …
He could destroy the entire country, should he wish to. Not to mention the world as a whole.
The deadline for the article was growing near, yet Jay only felt more and more nervous over turning it in. But she had steeled her heart. On that same day that she turned it in, she would also send it in to as many major publications and news outlets as she could find over the world. Ordinarily, this would probably have no effect, but if that strange organization was truly intent on using her as a pawn, then they might as well try to actually help her.
There were three days left.
Some people were already turning their stories in, but Jay had decided to leave it for the very deadline. Not because she had anything left to write. No, she had documented everything she knew in detail, going so far as to contain little anecdotes of her personal experiences. Things she knew Erica would approve of.
No, the reason she was waiting to turn it in was just that, well … it gave her a few more days to be on good terms with Erica.
But as always happens, the day eventually arrived.
It was a Friday, but Erica felt no great relief because the workweek was over. She enjoyed her work, whether it was with the school or with Kreig, and she had many reasons to do so. The main one was her students.
Her classes could be a little loud at times, but she could usually quiet them pretty easily. Some students were quicker to understand than others, a few questioned her with genuinely good insights, and others simply needed a little guidance to grow better with each week. She enjoyed each of their contributions, and after only a few weeks of this arrangement, she had already grown to love a few students in particular.
Of these, she quite liked the moody contrarian, Jay. Kreig seemed to think she was a bit peculiar, but the both of them had come to agree that her strength was in her tenacity despite the difficulties she faced. For Kreig, that meant she would always try to compete with the rest of the class, regardless of her physical weakness. For Erica, that meant she worked hard, even though her assignment had been radically changed to fit her needs. It was impressive, and Erica had no doubt in mind that Jay could become a fantastic journalist one day, even if it meant that she might have to put her grudges aside.
Yes, as much as Erica enjoyed Jay’s presence, it was clear that she had a lot of issues. The other teachers shared the same belief, with one even mentioning that Jay had an immensely troubled home life.
That was why Erica was so delighted to see Jay interested in socializing with her. Hadn’t she become a teacher specifically to be the person she had needed when she was young like Jay?
A good teacher can do so much to help, and Erica was convinced that she could be that help. And for a while, it did help. Jay slowly became more and more soft-spoken, eventually even ceasing to ask strange, vaguely condescending questions. They talked about things unrelated to school and all that. Apparently, Jay had once had a cat, though she had to let it go once her mother admitted that they couldn’t afford to keep it.
It was a bit sad, and Jay had tried to make a point about how she wouldn’t miss it, but when Erica gently pushed her, Jay just broke down and admitted that she still wished she’d kept it, even if it meant giving up her computer or phone. To console her, Erica suggested that once Jay was an adult and was making big bucks off her journalism, she could keep as many cats as she might want. In response, Jay had smiled and turned away.
Such conversations had happened a few times, giving Erica a little glimpse into the person Jay actually was beneath all the anger and presumption.
They were so alike.
The lesson was about to end. About half of the class had yet to turn in their stories, Jay being one of them. Patiently, Erica moved about the classroom, giving final advice and suggestions and making sure that people were happy with the stories that had taken so much time and effort. She moved to stand behind Jay, getting only a quick glimpse at the words on the computer screen before the laptop was slammed shut and Jay whirled around to face her.
Erica smiled and Jay visibly relaxed. Not once had Jay let Erica read what she had written, but that was all right. Jay as a person was quite secretive, which included her notes and written work. But, by the looks of it, Jay had quite a few pages to turn in. Reading them all would be a daunting task, but Erica was excited to do so.
Breaking the silence, Jay said, “I’m done.”
Erica’s smile grew slightly broader. “All done? Completely done? Nothing to change or fix or anything?”
Jay turned away, unusually solemn. “Yeah, it’s done. I’ll give it to you once the lesson ends.”
Erica’s face faltered slightly. Something was amiss. Was the article Jay had spent so long writing not up to her expectations? Had something happened? Did she reach an unusual conclusion? Concerned, Erica bent down next to Jay, going down to her level. She looked Jay straight in the eye. Jay turned away, her face tight. “Is everything all right?”
“Yeah,” Jay croaked. “Of course. With this … Everything is all right.”
Erica scratched her head, but she didn’t say anything. She just kept looking at Jay until she was forced to turn back to Erica. Their eyes met, and Jay wasn’t able to keep the pain out of her eyes. Again, Erica said nothing. “It …” Jay began, but turned away. Erica kept quiet. Jay’s lips tightened into a thin line and her face darkened. “After you read this …” Her eyes returned to face Erica. There was ill-hidden fear in them. “You won’t resent me, will you?”
With this, Erica smiled again. “Nope!” She grinned broadly even though Jay seemed far from comforted. “No matter what, as long as you’re happy and proud of this, I’ll support it.” Jay stared at her blankly. “You put your heart into this, didn’t you?”
Jay nodded stiffly. “Yeah.”
Erica stood back up and placed a hand on Jay’s head. “Then you’ve got nothing to be afraid of! I’ll have your back for sure, even if you publish government secrets and stuff!”
Jay looked down at her lap and curled her hands into fists. When she then lifted her head again, bearing a face brimming with determination, she had a smile on her lips. “Yeah!”
Erica couldn’t possibly know it, but she had just sealed her own fate.
CHAPTER 34
LAUGHTER
Another lesson gone off without a hitch. As the bell rang, the students began milling out of the classroom, the last few papers being handed in as they went. Erica cheerfully said goodbye to each of them.
Jay shook her head.
It wouldn’t be anything. It would be empty, and she would go home empty-handed, and in the evening she could tell her readers all about the strange groundskeeper who called himself Agent Jung and wanted her to go chase rainbows in a park.
That was what would happen, Jay decided.
But that wasn’t what happened. Not exactly.
The cold air of autumn rushed past her as she biked without thinking about much of anything. Normally, in a situation as unusual and incomprehensible as this one, her mind would be bustling with thoughts and ideas and possible explanations of what was happening. But not there. Not now. She had already considered all the possibilities.
Thinking any more about it would make her feel dizzy.
She was well outside the city now, cycling on a little path lined with red and yellow leaves.
Undulat Park was a rather large park on the outskirts of the city, usually seen as more of a contained forest than anything you would actually walk your dog in. Jay had only been there as a kid when her mother would take her there to jump in the leaf piles and climb the trees.
A tree unlike all the other trees … Jay could only think of one such tree.
Most of the park was made up of birches, standing white and tall and pretty. But there was one tree of a different kind.
Jay could see it even from this great distance.
An oak.
It was massive and stood above all the other trees, easily dwarfing them in raw might. Since its lower trunk was bereft of branches, only the most stalwart and determined of kids could climb it. Jay had never climbed it herself, so she was happy knowing that the “prize” was supposedly among the roots.
A little hole … Jay couldn’t remember ever seeing anything like that.
The small path she was on quickly broadened into a larger one, and she entered the park. The setting sun, now hidden behind red leaves, only flitted in intermittently, blinding Jay every now and then. The path led straight to the oak, so she felt no need to think much about it.
The path began to twist and wind, but Jay had played this game before. She barely had to think at all as she flew through the bends, swiftly dodging stray roots and stones.
Before she knew it, she stood before that massive, looming oak. The entire forest floor was covered in a layer of red and yellow, giving the impression that the whole forest, including the treetops and even the sky, was on fire.
She parked her bike a few paces off and approached the oak, both of her hands in her pockets. She could feel the key coldly touch her fingers. She gripped it tightly.
This was so stupid. She was being a total idiot, just going ahead and following whatever directions some lunatic groundskeeper wanted to give her. At least this would make for a good post.
Cursing in her mind, she went down on her knees and began fumbling and groping around the thick roots of the tree. This would never work. The ground and the roots were completely covered in leaves. After only a few minutes of shoveling wet leaves, her gloves had turned totally wet and her fingers felt stiff and cold. She’d be lucky if she didn’t wake up with a cold or something.
Roots, roots, and more roots. No matter how many rounds she took around the tree, she neither felt nor saw anything.
Yeah, a complete waste of time.
Jay stood up and shook her hands, shaking the water from her gloves. She looked down at her gloved hands.
… Maybe if she did one round without her gloves, she might actually feel something? Either that or she wouldn’t have to go to school tomorrow.
“Fuck it,” she mumbled to herself, and removed the completely soaked gloves. Back to her knees.
She touched every root as carefully as she could, feeling them with her hands without relying on her eyes in the least. But even after going halfway around, there was nothing. Not a single thing. No hole.
But right as she was about to give up and just head home for the night before the sun set completely, she felt something. A little groove. Something completely invisible and strange. If she looked at the groove, it seemed like a bump at most. But her fingers felt a little more. Carefully, still holding one hand on the groove, she removed the key from her pocket.
It slid inside the groove perfectly.
There was a click.
At first, Jay thought she was hallucinating when a fingerprint-sized piece of the bark on the root slid away to reveal a small, metallic surface. She stared at it with wild eyes before shaking her head. It was still there. Hunching down, she swung her head about, scanning for anybody else. There was nobody. She turned back to the metallic thing.
Without knowing exactly what to do, she placed her right finger over the flap. There was a prick and her hand jerked back. A little droplet of blood formed at the tip of her finger.
Turning back to the root, she found that the flap had closed again.
A hallucination? No, she could still feel the sting in her finger. Then …
There was another click.
Jay whipped her head around and bore witness to how a hatch opened in the ground. She crawled over to it on her hands and knees. The hatch apparently opened into a small compartment, where she saw files upon files and tapes and letters. She felt numb as she carefully removed them.
Some were dated from six months before, detailing the appearance of a powerful otherworlder. Others described the detainment of that same otherworlder. A few were more recent, going over the mundane experiences of his everyday life or describing the life of a seemingly unrelated young otherworlder. The letters were dated a little less than five months ago, inviting someone to meet their brother.
Somehow, Jay felt strange. Wrong.
Who had done this? Who would have the resources needed to do this? It couldn’t have been a single person. There was too much. The words of the groundskeeper echoed hollowly in her head.
This had to be the work of some sort of faction. It might be a single government, or a group of truth-seekers, or … or something. But why in the world would they give this to her, of all people?
She didn’t have all that many readers on the internet, which would leave her with the simple possibility that she couldn’t be traced back to them. Or maybe that she had a direct connection with Wiedermann. Or maybe they just wanted someone disposable to handle this. Maybe having a young girl doing all this was somehow more believable than if they were to make a move.
… It didn’t make any sense. This whole situation felt unreal and odd, but wasn’t this what she had always wanted?
She had the proof now. She had this, and she had Annie’s letter. Did she really need anything else?
Who cares if she was being used as the witting pawn of some corporation? That didn’t matter.
The only thing that truly mattered was that the truth was brought to light.
That was all.
For hours, she just sat there in the middle of the clearing, reading the files and documents until it got dark. Then she had to use her phone as a flashlight, but when its battery ran out, she was left in the dark. By that point, the moon stood high above the half-bare treetops, but she didn’t want to leave.
She could no longer read them, but she had to continue. She couldn’t stop there.
Her hands trembled in fear as she bundled the files. She had to continue reading. What if she went home and he was there? She had to know how to counter him. Among the files, there was a record of his status. It contained a few of his skills and his level and his race and his jobs. It was enough to tell her that he was beyond anything this world had seen before. For one, she got her answer to what his level actually was.
999+.
Higher than any recorded level. According to the reports, it was unsure whether it had capped out at 999 or if there was a higher number hidden behind it. The skills were similar. Unknown was a word passed around ad nauseum.
There were even reports on an event where Kreig actually showed his power and effortlessly slew a creature that threatened to destroy an entire city. Jay could even remember seeing such an event unfold on the television. She had assumed they would go in with a nuke or something, but it “sorted itself out.” If he could kill such a creature as easily as one kills a fly, then what kind of destruction could he bring?
Worst of all was that it was entirely possible. The man was in therapy and constantly under surveillance.
He clearly had psychological problems, and yet they let him roam freely.
Jay gritted her teeth and placed the files back inside the compartment. Then, fumbling with her fingers over the nooks and crannies of the roots, she locked it again, leaving the files—both read and unread—behind. She had to come back. She couldn’t bring them with her.
If she did, and someone else found out she had them …
A shiver scuttled across her shoulders and she shook her head.
But nobody knew. Yet. One day, they would know. She was sure of it. The people who had given her this information—whoever they were— must have known that she would be ready to sacrifice herself for this. Outside of journalism, her life didn’t mean much of anything. It wasn’t as though anybody would miss her. She was prepared to die if it meant that the truth came out.
The only problem was Erica.
During the following two weeks, whenever she had time, Jay immersed herself in the files, trying to put every scrap of information to mind just in case she had a confrontation of some sort. The more she knew, the more dangerous she was. If she could describe in immense detail the line of events that lead to Falk in particular taking over treatment of “inmate” Kreig Wiedermann, then even if she was apprehended, she would still have many cards to play.
But that wasn’t the only thing that she did.
Somewhere in the back of her mind, she wanted Erica to deserve what was coming to her. Jay wanted it to be that Erica was the kind of person who deserved having their lover be a cold-hearted murderous beast, because otherwise, she could hardly be justified in bringing all this on her.
But she couldn’t. Every day, she would talk to Erica and ask her things and make conversation and try her very best to find some flaw or mistake worthy of the pain she would have to endure. But there was nothing.
Erica was a young adult who had grown to enjoy teaching as of late. In her spare time, she liked drawing, bicycling, and collecting action figures. She preferred grading essays to straight answers, which was why she enjoyed teaching English.
And, worst of all, she liked Jay. It was a weird realization to have for Jay, but Erica seemed to genuinely enjoy talking to her. A little before and after and even during class. In the hallways between classes. Jay wouldn’t even have considered it if Erica didn’t state straight out, “I love talking to you; you always have some funny question to ask!” which was of course followed by another encouragement for her to pursue a career as a journalist.
It was wrong. Why couldn’t she just be a bad person like Wiedermann?
So, she shifted her perspective. Erica was a good woman. She didn’t deserve the pain, but it was necessary in order for her to realize the truth.
Then she might leave Wiedermann, and … Well, whatever happened past that point was useless, since Jay would most likely be dead by that point. Whether IOCRO or Wiedermann himself did it was irrelevant. The important thing was that it was an unavoidable truth, just like the fact that Wiedermann was a danger to the world.
According to the files, according to the letter, according to everything …
He could destroy the entire country, should he wish to. Not to mention the world as a whole.
The deadline for the article was growing near, yet Jay only felt more and more nervous over turning it in. But she had steeled her heart. On that same day that she turned it in, she would also send it in to as many major publications and news outlets as she could find over the world. Ordinarily, this would probably have no effect, but if that strange organization was truly intent on using her as a pawn, then they might as well try to actually help her.
There were three days left.
Some people were already turning their stories in, but Jay had decided to leave it for the very deadline. Not because she had anything left to write. No, she had documented everything she knew in detail, going so far as to contain little anecdotes of her personal experiences. Things she knew Erica would approve of.
No, the reason she was waiting to turn it in was just that, well … it gave her a few more days to be on good terms with Erica.
But as always happens, the day eventually arrived.
It was a Friday, but Erica felt no great relief because the workweek was over. She enjoyed her work, whether it was with the school or with Kreig, and she had many reasons to do so. The main one was her students.
Her classes could be a little loud at times, but she could usually quiet them pretty easily. Some students were quicker to understand than others, a few questioned her with genuinely good insights, and others simply needed a little guidance to grow better with each week. She enjoyed each of their contributions, and after only a few weeks of this arrangement, she had already grown to love a few students in particular.
Of these, she quite liked the moody contrarian, Jay. Kreig seemed to think she was a bit peculiar, but the both of them had come to agree that her strength was in her tenacity despite the difficulties she faced. For Kreig, that meant she would always try to compete with the rest of the class, regardless of her physical weakness. For Erica, that meant she worked hard, even though her assignment had been radically changed to fit her needs. It was impressive, and Erica had no doubt in mind that Jay could become a fantastic journalist one day, even if it meant that she might have to put her grudges aside.
Yes, as much as Erica enjoyed Jay’s presence, it was clear that she had a lot of issues. The other teachers shared the same belief, with one even mentioning that Jay had an immensely troubled home life.
That was why Erica was so delighted to see Jay interested in socializing with her. Hadn’t she become a teacher specifically to be the person she had needed when she was young like Jay?
A good teacher can do so much to help, and Erica was convinced that she could be that help. And for a while, it did help. Jay slowly became more and more soft-spoken, eventually even ceasing to ask strange, vaguely condescending questions. They talked about things unrelated to school and all that. Apparently, Jay had once had a cat, though she had to let it go once her mother admitted that they couldn’t afford to keep it.
It was a bit sad, and Jay had tried to make a point about how she wouldn’t miss it, but when Erica gently pushed her, Jay just broke down and admitted that she still wished she’d kept it, even if it meant giving up her computer or phone. To console her, Erica suggested that once Jay was an adult and was making big bucks off her journalism, she could keep as many cats as she might want. In response, Jay had smiled and turned away.
Such conversations had happened a few times, giving Erica a little glimpse into the person Jay actually was beneath all the anger and presumption.
They were so alike.
The lesson was about to end. About half of the class had yet to turn in their stories, Jay being one of them. Patiently, Erica moved about the classroom, giving final advice and suggestions and making sure that people were happy with the stories that had taken so much time and effort. She moved to stand behind Jay, getting only a quick glimpse at the words on the computer screen before the laptop was slammed shut and Jay whirled around to face her.
Erica smiled and Jay visibly relaxed. Not once had Jay let Erica read what she had written, but that was all right. Jay as a person was quite secretive, which included her notes and written work. But, by the looks of it, Jay had quite a few pages to turn in. Reading them all would be a daunting task, but Erica was excited to do so.
Breaking the silence, Jay said, “I’m done.”
Erica’s smile grew slightly broader. “All done? Completely done? Nothing to change or fix or anything?”
Jay turned away, unusually solemn. “Yeah, it’s done. I’ll give it to you once the lesson ends.”
Erica’s face faltered slightly. Something was amiss. Was the article Jay had spent so long writing not up to her expectations? Had something happened? Did she reach an unusual conclusion? Concerned, Erica bent down next to Jay, going down to her level. She looked Jay straight in the eye. Jay turned away, her face tight. “Is everything all right?”
“Yeah,” Jay croaked. “Of course. With this … Everything is all right.”
Erica scratched her head, but she didn’t say anything. She just kept looking at Jay until she was forced to turn back to Erica. Their eyes met, and Jay wasn’t able to keep the pain out of her eyes. Again, Erica said nothing. “It …” Jay began, but turned away. Erica kept quiet. Jay’s lips tightened into a thin line and her face darkened. “After you read this …” Her eyes returned to face Erica. There was ill-hidden fear in them. “You won’t resent me, will you?”
With this, Erica smiled again. “Nope!” She grinned broadly even though Jay seemed far from comforted. “No matter what, as long as you’re happy and proud of this, I’ll support it.” Jay stared at her blankly. “You put your heart into this, didn’t you?”
Jay nodded stiffly. “Yeah.”
Erica stood back up and placed a hand on Jay’s head. “Then you’ve got nothing to be afraid of! I’ll have your back for sure, even if you publish government secrets and stuff!”
Jay looked down at her lap and curled her hands into fists. When she then lifted her head again, bearing a face brimming with determination, she had a smile on her lips. “Yeah!”
Erica couldn’t possibly know it, but she had just sealed her own fate.
CHAPTER 34
LAUGHTER
Another lesson gone off without a hitch. As the bell rang, the students began milling out of the classroom, the last few papers being handed in as they went. Erica cheerfully said goodbye to each of them.
