20: Jailbird
1175 Words
No way I’m really in a cell. I had been telling myself that for the past fifteen minutes but the iron bars, minibed and the single iron table and chair kept bringing me back to reality.
Oh my God! I am really in a cell.
I was in my ‘understanding the elements’ class when two guys, whom I had never met before, came to drag me in a none too friendly manner to that godforsaken place. Oh, the things I’ll do to whoever put me in this dilemma. They’re going to regret the day they crossed Troy Sanders.
I was still thinking and plotting my revenge against whoever got me into trouble when Victoria entered.
“Look Vic, whatever it is they’re accusing me of, I didn’t do it,” I said as soon as she took her seat; it was better to get that out of the way upfront, don’t you agree?
“There’s nothing to explain,” she replied, “Mr. Garvin already told us everything.”
Oh-Oh! That was definitely something I wasn’t expecting. What the hell did Mr. Garvin say? “What exactly did he say?” I asked.
Victoria looked extremely confused by my question. “He said you’ve been seeing him because this whole Trichloris situation has really gotten you stressed out,” she replied.
Okay, that was starting to become confusing for me too; and not just because I didn’t remember any of the discussions I had with Mr. Garvin involving me being ‘stressed out’. Also, if it was just a ‘check you up’ thing, then what the hell was I doing in a cell?
Vic seemed to understand my thoughts as she said, “It’s the only place that we could think of that would keep you rooted until we could figure out what to do.”
“Which is what exactly?”
“Getting you off the case.”
“No!” I shouted as I stood up. It was only because the table was pinned to the floor that it didn’t upturn at that moment.
“It’s for your own good,” she explained as she stood up with me and tried to comfort me- a task that I didn’t make easy by changing position anytime she got near.
“How exactly is that for my own good?” I asked, resting against the wall in the far corner of the cell.
“It’s no secret that Trichloris has gotten everyone on the edge, especially you,” she replied. “This way you’ll be away from all the pressure.”
Unfortunately, I didn’t think for one second that staying off the case was going to stop me from having to face Trichloris; but I couldn’t exactly tell Vic that without having to explain to her the things he told me in the pass. So, I settled for agreeing with her, at least for the moment.
“I’ve got to get to my next class, Troy,” said Vic when we began to hear the alarm bells ring. “Francesca will come to see you but I must warn you that she isn’t taking this as well as the rest of us.” Before I could ask what I should expect, she was already gone. Well, it was Francesca Firewalt, wasn’t it? I mean, how bad could she be?
Francesca did eventually come but it was late in the evening. I was at my patience limit because I had nothing to do all day long; a limit she was now pushing by just sitting and staring deeply at me.
“Is it just me or do you allow every other person to start a conversation for you?” I asked when I became bored of trying to figure out how the mind of the woman sitting in front of me worked.
“Just you, Troy,” she replied as she sat up straighter to begin the long-awaited conversation. She was putting on a cream suit, a color that didn’t seem to fit in anywhere in the cell; and she let down her hair instead of tying it up in her usual bun. She had bags under her eyes and I could swear she looked a lot ‘stressed out’ than I am- wonder why someone didn’t put her in the cell to de-stress.
“Have you been sleeping at all?” I asked. I knew that I ask that question almost every time but she was a friend of my dad’s; mine too. And so, I was obliged to know how well she was doing.
“I sleep okay,” she replied although her face was telling another story. I didn’t think the sleep was the only thing with her though. “It’s just that everything’s not going according to plan.”
“The trackers are not coming?” I asked.
“They’re not,” she replied and I almost smiled. “But only because I told them not to.”
“But we need their help,” I pointed out even though I was thinking the exact opposite.
She stood up and began pacing; I could tell that she was really struggling with something. She finally took a seat when she was bored from pacing and my head was spinning from watching her pace.
“The thing is, I’ve been given only a month to stop Trichloris or I’ll have to resign my post as head of the school,” she said.
“A month?” I repeated. “Did they happen to know the fact that he’s an all-powerful, thousand year-old wizard who is on a ‘destroy magic’ mission?” Sometimes, people were so indifferent to things that it infuriated me. People should be helping Francesca stop Trichloris, not condemning her.
“Well, they’re not seeing things that way,” she replied. “Plus the two murders Abigail committed last year were more than the family can handle.”
“That’s why you need me to remain on the team,” I pointed out. “We both know that Trichloris have some kind of fixation on me.”
“I know,” she replied and looked like she was about to add something but changed her mind at the last second, choosing instead to say, “Your father will come to see you later.” And with that, she took her leave.
The words really weighed on my mind as I watched Francesca’s shadow disappear from the cell corridor. I had less than I did before to make a decision. Do I save Francesca? Or myself?
- Writer
