Page 60 of Prey It By Ear

I exit the history classroom, exhaling a full-body sigh as the silence in the hall surrounds me. The nasally, spiteful-toned professor was grating on my last nerve, and I can’t imagine why the admin has her teaching something she hates so much. Bisonette pretty much scoffs at everything she has to teach except really old theater shit from the classical era, and by the time you get into the higher classes, that’s long since been covered. It’s obvious in the way she snarks about all the various other types of plays, especially musicals, and it makes the class interminable.

Looking around, I see the second of the quokka triplets, Bowser. I smile as he waves because if you lined them up, they’d look like a time-lapse of the same creature evolving from sweet cherub to badass. Bowser’s got a faux hawk in his fur and a band-aid over one eyebrow that makes me wonder who the hell he’s been fighting with. However, his smile is guileless, and he’s rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet like a small, caffeinated bouncer.

“Ready, Queen D?” he asks, and I can tell he’s rehearsed the line—probably in the mirror, possibly while flexing. Quokkas aren’t very threatening, but Bowser has been working to bulk up since the attacks at Cappie and here last year. Raina is the one who tipped me off that he might be picking fights with smaller preds who piss him off, and while I want to burst into giggles, I also don’t want one of her men to get hurt.

Except he’s strapped with a criss-cross chest belt of small, sharp as fuck knives under his uniform jacket, and I’m pretty sure he’s willing to use them now.

I grin. “Lead the way. We’re headed right back across the damn green again for my writing class, and then finally, I get to go home for dinner and relaxation.”

The quokka falls in step beside me, and as we traverse the lawn, he keeps up a running commentary about the relative merits of the current cafeteria lineup Raina has planned and the drama in the Prey Staff Consortium. I let him talk, occasionally tossing in a sarcastic reply or a laugh, and by the time we reach the main academic building, the sense of ambient anxiety that’s lived under my skin since this morning is nearly gone.

My creative writing classroom is on the second floor, right above the admin offices. I don’t have a great feeling about this, but I don’t want to freak Bowser out. I’m sure he has duties to attend to, and despite this being a new-to-me professor, I’d prefer not to piss them off by bringing a protector without need.

Bowser gives me a gentle nudge as he looks at me. “You got this, Queen D. Unless you want me to come in and glare at anyone?”

I shake my head. “I’ll be fine. You go get those pumpkin waffles Raina has leftover. This is just a writing class; it will be fine.”

He nods, giving me one of those salutes before he disappears down the hall. What I see when I open the door is like a slap in the face that transports me back to my freshman year in an instant. In the second row, dead center, are the two remaining Heathers—Barrington and Erickson, Pink and Gold—sitting like twin sphinxes guarding a lesser pyramid. Barrington’s chin is tilted up just enough to suggest disdain for anyone not in her circle, and Heather E.’s hair is perfectly coiled into a bun, every strand in place except for one that’s been artfully teased loose. They don’t look at me directly, but I feel it in the prickle at the back of my neck that says they know I’m here.

Motherfucker. I just did not need this at the end of my no good, terrible, very long day.

My assigned seat is two rows behind them, diagonally, and I make a show of getting out my notebook and uncapping my pen without reacting to their presence. I label the first page with today’s date, a defense mechanism I started back in Apex—if you’re already writing before the mean girls turn, they’re less likely to bother you. The silence that follows is oppressive as the room fills slowly. No one speaks above a whisper, as if they’re all waiting for a storm that hasn’t started yet.

Letting my eyes settle on the backs of the Heathers’ heads for a second, I’m tempted to doodle devil horns on them in my notes. Instead, I watch the way they move in perfect synchronization. The identical tilt of their hands as they rest on the table, their ridiculous matching clothes with ribbons in their hair that flutter, and even the way their shoulders square. There’s a dark choreography to it—art built not on expression but on the suppression of everything that makes you unique.

In the reflection in the window, I see myself. Dance hair no longer tamed, makeup that needs a little refreshing, and the nose that Lucille always said was the ‘Drew family curse’. Yet none of it makes me unattractive, nor does it make me lesser. They didn’t have a reason to turn on me, but for the prey thing, which turned out to be incorrect. Even after Apex went boom, they didn’t stop their campaign of terror. Suddenly, I understand with diamond clarity that none of this was ever about me, or them, or even the petty cruelties of pred society.

It’s about the patriarchal rules that get passed down from older generations like shitty heirlooms—who you’re supposed to hate, who you’re allowed to like, and who’s worth chasing for a ring.

These girls were trained for that, and so was I, but after I emerged as a bunny and they abandoned me, I grew tired of pretending that any of that bullshit matters. While the rest of the class trickles in, I keep the Heathers in my peripheral vision. I catalog every microaggression they commit against the other women in the room. I watch the sidelong glances, the murmurs behind a hand, and the tiny flare of nostrils when a new student dares to sit near them. It’s a masterclass in how to rule a kingdom with nothing but a look. I wonder for a moment if they know how obvious it is—or if they’ve convinced themselves they’re so far above everyone else that it doesn’t matter.

I drop my gaze back to the page, waiting for the professor to enter. I know it’s a Faust, and we’ve had issues with that family in the past. Roswitha and I have gotten ugly on the Pred Games field, and I know her mother is a famous mystery writer. I don’t need someone nursing a grudge over sports punishing me this year, so I hope to shit it’s just another talented family member.

The door at the front of the room swings open, and the professor enters, all six feet five of her. Even in human form, grizzly shifters are intimidating, and this one is no different. The effect of her arrival is immediate; every conversation dies, and the students all snap to attention as she lumbers to the front of the room. She clears her throat, and the sound alone is enough to make the first three rows flinch.

“Good afternoon,” she says, her voice flat and final as a judge’s gavel. “This is Creative Writing, but for this semester, you may also consider it a crash course in suffering. I don’t do hand-holding, and I don’t tolerate melodrama unless it’s on the syllabus. If you’re not prepared to write an entire novel this year, leave now. Otherwise, open your notebooks—never a tablet or laptop—and get ready to show me what you’ve got.”

There’s a muted shuffle as everyone tries not to panic as they get their supplies out. Faust paces the front of the room, her steps echoing off the tile, as she launches into a lecture about the three-act structure. I take notes because it’s impossible not to, especially if this woman isn’t handing out a syllabus or even telling us more than her last name on the schedule. This feels both serious and possibly a great class to learn in, and also one that might kill me by the end of the year.

As the hours pass, the Heathers occasionally exchange glances, but their focus is locked on the professor. The power struggle with me they probably expected never materializes, and by the end of the class, it’s clear Faust will not put up with anyone but her droning on about their opinions.

When it’s finally over, I pack up slowly, waiting for the room to empty. I catch Barrington and Erickson whispering furiously, their faces flushed with annoyance as I walk into the hallway to see triplet number three, Kirby. I can tell they’re not happy with being ignored, not by professors and certainly not by me. But I don’t give them the satisfaction of a reaction—I just walk past with my friend, chin up, as I get as far from them as fast as I can.

It makes me think about something Bisonette told us earlier when she was on a tangent about ‘new theater’ and its harm to the entire art form: “Real power is not in the performance, but in who decides when the curtain rises.”

As Kirby and I walk out into the impending nightfall, I realize that it’s less about hating nouveau directors and more about who is controlling the stage. Since my first year at Apex, I’ve slowly regained control of my life, and this brief scene showed me that some of my past trauma has become just that… the past.

And now I know for sure that I get to write my own script from here.

I Want To Break Free

Aubrey

My library is not a library today—it’s more a revolving door ward for inconvenience. Books are stacked six deep on every surface, magically appearing from last semester despite their proclaimed status as ‘missing or lost’. The Captain’s midday delivery of new acquisitions is crowding my desk in five bulging, stale-smelling crates. The combined bouquet of random scents emanating from everything hits like a punch to the sinuses.

Oh, how I wish for a facility like I had at Apex where I had space to decontaminate returns and inspect the donations in vacuum-sealed heaven.

The desk is elm, and I spent all last year oiling it to a luster that mocks the fake wood in other parts of the school. Or I had, until today, when some idiot dropped a crate on its corner and left a new, white slash in the grain. I run my palm over it, hoping maybe a tactile ritual will banish my rising urge to hunt down the culprit and set them on fire until they’re ashes. But I can’t, alas; Midori is much less forgiving of our antics than Henny was and I don’t need to put that stress on the rest of my family.