Felix Ever After(25)

I pause. There’s too much emotion in my voice, and everyone’s staring at me now, people turned in their seats to watch me over their shoulders. Ezra’s waking up, glancing between me and Declan. I sit straighter in my seat. “There needs to be moral judgment in creation.”

It could’ve ended there. Should’ve ended there. But Declan Keane—he never knows when to just fucking stop. “I guess this is in reference to that gallery of you,” he says.

The room goes still. Silent.

Ezra gets tense beside me. “Shut up, Declan.”

Declan shrugs. “If that’s what you’re talking about, you should just say it.”

“I said shut up, Declan.”

“It’s hard to say who the artist is, or what their motive was, but—”

My foot swings out before my brain even registers what I’ve done. I kick Declan’s stool, and he falls backward, crashing to the ground. There’s a scream from our table—Leah—and Jill rushes forward as Declan sits himself up, hand to the back of his head. He checks his palm. There’s no blood, but that doesn’t stop him from looking up at me with full-on rage.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” he shouts.

“Okay, all right.” Jill tries to help him up, but he pushes her hands away, jumping to his feet.

Shit. Shit, shit, shit. “Accident.”

“Bullshit!” Declan tries to get in my face, but Ezra’s between the two of us in a heartbeat, hands out.

“It was an accident!”

Jill’s shaking her head. Fuck.

Declan points at me, still trying to get around Ezra. “You kicked my stool. I could’ve gotten hurt. I could’ve died.”

“Don’t be so melodramatic.”

“Fuck you, Felix—”

“Enough!”

Jill’s voice echoes across the classroom, all hints of her earlier enthusiasm gone. Everyone’s eyes are wide. Austin’s hand is to his mouth, and Hazel has her phone out, filming the whole thing from across the room. My heart drops. St. Cat’s has a zero-tolerance policy for violence, and Declan is just about the worst person I could’ve fucked with. His dad could have me kicked out in about three seconds flat—especially if me getting kicked out means Declan won’t have any more competition for a spot at Brown. I can kiss both Brown and that scholarship goodbye.

“I’m sorry,” I say, my voice hoarse—a whisper in the otherwise silent room. “I swear, it was an accident.”

Declan’s jaw and fists clench, unclench, clench.

“Dean’s office,” Jill says. “Both of you. Now.”

“I said I was sorry—”

“Why me? He’s the one who—”

“Now,” she says again.

Ezra looks the way I feel—terrified—as I grab my backpack and walk out of the room, Declan trailing behind. Fuck. I wasn’t thinking when I kicked. I didn’t mean to do it—it’d barely been a thought. He just wouldn’t shut up about the gallery, and he was talking about it so smugly, like he was rubbing it in my face, the fact that he’d been the one to post my photos and my birthname in the first place, had sent me that message on Instagram— The halls have brick walls, dark wood floors. There aren’t any elevators, so we have to stomp down about three airless staircases, my shirt sticking to my back in the heat. Declan follows, but not closely behind, as if he can’t trust himself not to shove me down the steps if he gets too close. We make it to the first floor where there are a bunch of offices, including the dean’s. The secretary listens to our oversimplified story—“we were sent by Jill”—and she tells us to wait on the metal bench outside the dean’s office.

She leaves us there. I close my eyes and take in a deep breath. I need to have a level head when I walk into the office. I need to get my story straight. It was an accident. I kicked out without meaning to. My foot slipped. Anything.

Declan sits at the edge of the bench, knee bouncing up and down. He checks the back of his head again, as if he thinks he’ll have magically produced blood this time around. He won’t look at me. I’m having a hard time looking at him myself.

“You’re such a prick,” Declan mutters, arms crossed.

“Kettle. Black. Et cetera.”

“I’m a prick because I disagreed with you about the place of morality in art?”

He watches me, and I hesitate. It’s weird, but—right here, right now, I remember the conversation we’d had last night. Remember that the guy in front of me had been the one typing those messages into his phone. I bite my lip, look away.

“No,” I say, “you’re a prick because you always treat me like shit.”

“How’s that?”

The gallery. That Instagram message. I almost say the words. He waits, staring at me, and I could say it—could reveal that I know it was him—but then I’d also be giving up on my payback plan. If I tell him, he’d probably figure out that I’m the one he’s been talking with online. I could go to the dean as a last resort, but the most he’d get is a slap on the wrist. He wouldn’t get any of the shit he deserves, not until I manage to find out his darkest secret, something I can use to destroy him. I can’t tell him that I know it was him—not yet.