Anya stabs her lasagna violently with her fork and it makes me wince as she rambles heatedly, "A person actually died this time. Yun says we should leave everything to the officials, yet we all know they won't do anything. Not if it means their pockets will get any heavier."
She scoffs, dragging her glare from her plate to me. "Have you noticed? Francisco hasn't even made headlines yet."
I only watch her dully, unmoving, pondering over it doesn't make the pain go away. But even though I didn't give a response, she continues anyway. "It just shows they're being paid off!"
Picking around my plate, it jumps and clatters when Anya slams her fists down on the table with a huff of frustration. "Are you even listening?! Do you even care?"
I look up at her tiredly, shrugging lazily, "We don't really have any room to talk."
Her nose flares and I look back down at my plate, we really aren't any better than them. "They let it happen, and so did we."
"Ladies," Arun Khatri teased. "You have everyone's eyes on you two."
Glancing up, I peered around the canteen, feeling sour when I saw he wasn't lying, "We all could hear your conversation. Plus, why Francisco getting more attention than me? I have more money than him."
His pout irritates me, almost makes me slap him, but Anya beats me to it. Gasps echo around the room, mixing with one another. Arun stands, stunned and confused, not yet seeming to process it.
Then we both see it, everyone sees it. His playful, light-hearted demeanor changes to a dark stare, "What made you do that?"
Anya flinches, but squares her shoulders in a feigned confidence. "Your wretched existence."
He pauses for a second, thinks a bit and then chuckles darkly. "I might wear a bright smile, more so than the rest of the student board. But that's only to hide the thoughts in my head."
Everyone watches, listens with all their attention as he mutters, "And you've only made me want to inflict them on you."
As he leans over the table, I abruptly rise from my chair, placing a hand between them. "That's enough. She didn't mean to offend you."
His glare shoots to me, and he observes my face for a few seconds. But exhales harshly, marching away. Anya stares at him as he walks away and then turns to me. Smiling, "I didn't know you had it in you."
"Yeah," I look back down. "I didn't know I could either," And I didn't think to try when Francisco was being assaulted .
She takes my hands in hers and whispers. "We can't keep letting them get away with this."
I don't say anything since a shrug would offend her, and yet, it's all I have to offer. Is it, maybe she doesn't understand our positions? We're just as the student board, if not worse.
Or rather, maybe it isn't her; just me. "It's hypocritical."
Her attention whips to me incredulously, "What's hypocritical?"
I mutter, "To pretend we aren't like them."
Anya scoffs, "Well- we didn't assault Francisc-"
"But we didn't help him," I interrupt her angrily, "We looked the other way when the board was around, but talked about them when they weren't. It's cowardly; that's what it is."
"Yeah, but you didn't have a choice," She corrects, "We didn't have a choice."
But that doesn't give us a right to talk as if we did something, because, "We did nothing."
Anya averts her eyes at the cold bitter truth, "Like I said, we had no choice."
"Keep telling yourself that," I mumble. "Won't make you any better than them."
"And you are?" She nearly shouts, grimacing as she realizes her volume and words. "S-sorry, that… was uncalled for."
"You know, thinking about it only makes you get angry and anxious like you are."
"And following your mom's wishes doesn't make you happy. Yet you keep trying to please a dying woman," Anya mutters softly. "We're both trying to heal… and cope. So we should figure it out together, like friends."
Her statemaent sounds more like a question, almost as if she's unsure if we're still friends. I move my hands away from hers, taking a deep inhale. "Yeah, we probably should."
Walking away, I place my tray into the waste bucket, feeling Anya follow behind me.
"I think." She pants lightly. "I think we should get revenge for Francisco."
I whip around at her, making her halt. "We aren't the police. What right would we ha-"
"So what?!" Anya snarls. "They won't do anything. Only cover it up with some stupid story. This is a chance, an opportunity, an open door."
She breathes deeply. "And you want to let it slip away," Her eyes watch me warily, "I don't know about you, but I want to do the least I can. Since I, as you put it, 'didn't do anything' when he was being bullied."
And she's right, but would he even want to see u-"God, Claudette. Stop over-thinking it! If you don't do it with me, I'll just do it on my own."
"Fine," I agree softly.
She touches my arms which are folded over themselves to hug me. "Personally, I don't think you deserve to suffer with that guilt. And this might be the only way to get rid of it."
I nod my head along, maybe this is a chance. "But- what if we get caught? What if we don't succeed? What if they find ou-"
"Claude, you're over-thinking again. If it happens, we'll get there. But why did you agree to doing this with me?"
"Because, Francisco might forgive me."
"Right, and even with the possibility that he won't, you still agreed to try. That's all it takes to do this."
There's a stagnant pause as we stand in the dorm hallway, "So… how do we do it?"
"Pay the board back?" Her question receives my affirmation. "Well, that's something we'll figure out in your or my dorm. We can't discuss it out here; the walls can see and hear."
Eventually, I lead her to my room and Anya cautiously closes the door behind her, giving a soft murmur. "I need a piece of paper."
Rushing across the room toward my desk, I beckon her with a sheet.
"Okay," She grabs a pen on the desk, writing letters in the top corner. After a while, it gradually begins to resemble a list, my brows furrowing in curiosity. Then my eyes widen when I see a name I recognize- a name everyone would recognize. "There," Anya sighs in satisfaction.
"What…" I gaze over the names warily, "What is this?"
"A list," She states obviously. "Of who we owe?"
Glancing at her incredulously, my face screws up in dismay. "We don't owe anything to them!"
But she only exhales deeply, "No. We owe them… there's a balance they've upset. And we have to pay them back, exactly what they gave Francisco."
Her theory, it marinates in my mind. Rolls around as I imagine how it could pan out. Maybe this will be a chance to pay them back what's owed. Pay our dues, pay off debts. Eventually, I breathe, "You think we can do this?"
"And actually succeed," She adds. "Yeah."
"Yeah?"
Her face relaxes into an easy smile, "Yeah."
⚖️
Sweat beads from my forehead, a droplet rolling down my face. It joins in a race with tears, down my cheek and past my chin. I notice my death grip on the sheets, easing it slightly. But I still pant laboredly, frantically looking around for my medication. "Everyth-ing was f-fine. Wh-why no-w?"
That helpless feeling chased me out of the dream realm, and I still felt like I couldn't escape. Felt that I was trapped, with nobody to help me - that I was abandoned. The whispers from my nightmare morph into howling of the wind, loud laughs transform to still silence. I'd been taking my medicine properly, listening to my mother as a good daughter should. And yet, those dreams still pay me visits? What am I missing?
Am I not good enough? "You need to do better. This only happens because you deserve it," My whispers slice through the silent volume of my dorm room. Then, almost on cue, the room's telephone rings - loudly. It tears a scream from me, one similar to the kind that echoed in my nightmare. And cautiously, I bound toward it. "H-hello?"
"Claudette?" My little brother's voice pours out of the speaker, and relief trickls into my chest.
Inhaling, collecting myself. "Venice, why are you calling at this hour?" A quick glance at the clock makes me worry, 3:19 am.
He laughs nervously and my heart jumps in my throat, "You know, mom's getting worse. The doctor, uh… he, um-"
"Spit it out, Venice!" My heart pounds in my chest, and suddenly my body feels too small to contain it.
"He gave her nine months." And then, the line goes quiet. So does the room. Everything is silent. Nothing can be heard, nothing but my shallow breaths and panicking heart.
"What do you mean?" I question calmly.
He hesitates, not saying anything. So quiet that I almost wonder if he hung up. "Answer me!"
"It's exactly what I said," Venice murmurs sadly as a cold chill sweeps through me. We can't be thinking about the same woman, the one who pulled through. Raised two kids alone? Didn't need her husband, started a business on her own? That woman was invincible. She would never go down. Sitting at the desk, I peered out of the window. Watching as the clouds politely passed by the full moon, unaware of the tragedy happening below them.
Will she even last long enough to see me graduate? Watch her dream come true? I… I can't 'avenge' Francisco, not while mother is alive. She should be my top priority. That means graduating, and they could ruin that. "I have to graduate," I mutter.
"You don't have to do anything if you don't want to. This is your future on the line."
"It would be selfish, to send her out of this world with her single wish not granted," I counter.
But then Francisco… he could also be dying and, but mother wants me to graduate-
"I can hear your over-thinking from here. Just remember what you want to do,"
It's not about what I want, but maybe that's not something he'd understand. I hang up, without warning and no parting words. Staring up at the moon, I watch with resentment. How lucky, to be a bystander and yet not be wrong. How fortunate to avoid drama, and just… be.
Some of us will never be that fortunate. My glare drags down as I catch our uniform on a walking figure, heading into the dorms. Her face shimmers as the moonlight directs itself to soften her features, Relm Nowakowski. But too wrapped up in my own life and turmoil, I don't question it.
Worrying about others has only screwed me over, I think bitterly. And yet, I still do it.