Galaxy Of Hope

I plopped down next to Olive and Dexar in the cafeteria with a full tray of delicious comfort food. The food police, aka Andrew Ko, was nowhere to be seen so I took my chances today. We were early for lunch, since my previous class had been dismissed quicker than usual. Olive and I were the only ones of our friend group that took Herbology, so no one else could quite understand the torture of listening to Mr. Twilittle’s monologues about plants. Today he was harvesting the moonlight rose. He had to skip out early and all of us were praising all moonlight roses to the high heavens right now.

‘Now THAT had cost me another month of my life.’ Sighed Olive dramatically. After every Herbology class she made the same joke. Dexar snorted at that, already delving into his lasagne with a vengeance.

‘Don’t inhale the thing Dex, take a second to breathe.’ I chipped while raising the hamburger to my lips.

‘Ha ha ha…’ he scuffed, but a patch of tomato sauce dangled on his chin anyway.

I had scoffed down an entire delicious burger and was enjoying my last bite when my bodyguard showed up, all dark and glooming. He didn’t say a single word but that look eyeing my burger and fries, next to a milkshake and a muffin, was saying all the words in the world right now. I quickly finished my last bite, nearly swallowing it whole and scowled back at him, not backing down at all.

He scraped the chair in front of me back and sat down solemnly, dark eyes burning up a storm. Still not speaking.

Olive and Dexar had both halted midway in their meals, forks still lifted as if Andrew’s gaze had told them to stop eating that shit as well.

‘Who died?’ Skylark asked before sitting her ass down next to me. She grabbed a French fry and dipped it in my mayonnaise.

‘I think Lux is about to.’ Dexar exhaled before getting hit in the head by Olive’s hand.

My eyes met Andrew’s. A challenge was in them. I glanced at my muffin and he glanced at it too before making eye contact again. It was a standoff. If I ate that thing he would be beyond pissed and we still had training together in the afternoon. That would be made into a brutal gladiator match. Would that be worth it?

Heck yeah.

I reached for the thing and took a long delicious bite, accompanied by some heady moans to amplify the pleasure it gave me. ’Soooo good.’

Sky, Olive and Dex just stared at me as if I had grown three heads. They also had read the energy in the room and knew how dangerous a game I was playing. They had been witness to many of our greasy food debates and fights and knew how strongly Andrew felt about ‘keeping me alive by nutrition’.

‘Did you enjoy that?’ he rasped deeply. As if he hadn’t heard my moans of pleasure.

‘Better than sex.’ I replied.

‘Than you are doing it wrong.’ He replied more darkly and Sky released a soft squeal. I raised an eyebrow at her and Olive and Dex decided to search for safer grounds and were now scuffling towards the trash bin. I was about to give him another sassy reply but I found my muffin being crushed out of my hands and pulverised in his big fist. He smacked the residue off on the plate of Dexar’s half-eaten lasagne and I felt fury boiling up in me.

‘You owe me a muffin.’

‘Like fuck I do.’

‘Okay, this was fun. See you guys later!’ the last one left at our table, Sky the traitor, had also decided to skip the fight that was about to ensue.

I still had a milkshake though. He saw my gears spinning as he saw me reaching for the drink. ‘Don’t you fucking dare.’ He said through clenched teeth. A few of our fights had ended up with me throwing drinks at the fucker. He had all of them coming and they had been well deserved, but no. I was not wasting this shake on this pain in my ass. This was coming down in my own throat.

I swirled the straw and started sucking the strawberry liquid into my mouth. Again I made sure to moan. Loudly.

His eyes flicked to my lips, his nostrils flared. He looked away for a second, readjusting his pants before he reached for my shake with a growl of anger. But I had seen that coming and had the glass in a deadlock. ‘Try me, Ko.’ I growled.

‘You turn into a fucking grease monster every damn time, princess!’ He spat back. ‘You never, ever listen. It’s fucking insane!’ when he curses more than usual, you know you’re in trouble.

I was already at the last bit and was now slurping it obnoxiously. ‘Ha, now that was some good shake.’ I sighed. I scraped the glass back and we continued to scowl at each other without words for a few more minutes.

‘You done?’ he barked.

‘Are you?’ I bit back.

Again a silent scowl from both of us. His jaw was so clenched it was pulsating.

‘You need to get to your next class.’ He said after a while. Dropping the anger a little bit.

‘I can find it myself.’

‘Like fuck you can! I’m coming!’ He yelled, so he was not over his anger yet.

I was still very angry though. He was such an asshole. ‘You are not.’ I said with an ice cold deadliness to my voice and scraped my chair back, grabbed my bag and started walking. Leaving him behind. I knew he would follow, but still it felt good to pretend for a few second that I had bested him.

He grabbed my arm and I protested loudly. ‘Don’t touch me!’ trying to wiggle myself from out of his grip.

‘Is everything alright here?’ it was Oak’s voice and the both of us turned around. He was staring at Andrew’s vice grip on my upper arm as if Andrew was about to kill me in the janitor’s closet.

My bodyguard let me go as if I was on fire and ran a hand through his hair. Shame covering his features now. I felt bad for provoking him into this.

‘Yeah, it’s fine.’ I quickly added. I didn’t want Oak to know about our little petty fights and I figured Andrew would also be more embarrassed about Oak knowing about them. I hated him right now but I still did not want to risk another bodyguard being put on my detail. I kind of liked fighting with Andrew.

Oak glanced Andrew’s way with a cold disdain. ‘I would suggest, Mister Ko, to not ever let me find you in this position again. You will not like the consequences.’ Oak touched my cheek briefly before he walked on to teach his next class. Andrew watched him walk away and then turned my way as if it was all my fault. I shrugged. ‘He’s just looking out for me.’

‘And what do you think I’m doing!’ he yelled. Suddenly really losing his temper. ‘Now he thinks…he thinks-’ he pulled on his hair. ‘Fuck!’

‘No he doesn’t.’ I lied sheepishly, staring at the tip of my shoes. Because Oak totally would. ‘Calm down okay, you are getting way too worked up about a fucking muffin, Andrew.’

He opened his mouth with a fury of a thousand suns, but he didn’t say anything. He just sighed deeply, closed his eyes to compose himself and grunted. ‘Let’s just go to the class.’ He motioned for me to walk in front of him, like he always did. I rolled my eyes and moved. There was no point in poking the bear further at this stage. He was going to be pissed all day. I could just tell and it was my own damn fault.

At class, I was seated in the largest aula of all of my classes. I was always by myself and knew no one, besides the creepy guy who had this weird interest in me. That’s why Andrew was always in this class too. Of course he had spotted me, I think his name was Mike, and was now walking over to me. Andrew was in the farthest seat to the left of the room, always keeping his eye on me, so I was safe.

Mike sat down next to me and he smelled like stale sweat and beer. He probably went out last night and hadn’t showered yet. I crinkled my nose and scooted a little farther away from him. Off all seats in this gigantic room, he chose the one next to me. Because of course he would. Magical science was interesting to me, so that’s the only reason I’m still showing up to this class at all.

‘Hey Lux.’ He said. I sheepishly waved back. ‘Hey Mike.’

The class was about to start so I gazed back to the front of the room; where professor Whitestead was lining up the screen.

‘Hey, I was wondering.’ He leaned in closer and his breath also stank. ‘This weekend there is this thing at the Dunnager. Would you like to go?’

I was not really understanding what he was asking. He knew about my mates and my relationships. ‘I’m sorry? What do you mean?’

‘Go with me?’

‘I don’t think that’s appropriate.’

‘Why not?’

I have about five reason why not. Where was Sebastian when I needed him right about now? I refused to glance back at Andrew for help. I was still pissed at him.

‘I’m in a relationship.’ I took a sip from my water bottle and corrected myself. ‘Relationships.’ It still felt unnatural to say out loud.

‘So?’ he laughed. ‘We could have fun right?’

‘Who do you think I am?’ We were now whispering a little louder. I was glancing to the front of the room continuously to see I was not interrupting professor Whitestead.

‘Is it because you think you’re better than everyone? Fucking the Paramore’s?’ he angrily spat at me.

Suddenly the guy was lifted by his collar with a squeak and casually removed from the room. A few seconds later Andrew sat down next to me.

‘You alright?’ he had dropped his anger and was flicking his gaze from my face to my hands and body. My hands were fidgeting with my zipper, my breath a little panting and I had broken out in a sweat. Mike gave me some serious flashbacks to Otto and I was grateful that Andrew had noticed.

‘Yeah….’ I swallowed. ‘Thank you.’

He nodded and was still assessing me.

‘He’s full of shit, you know that right.’ Andrew assured me.

His words moved me and I nodded. I suddenly felt tired, from all the emotions and the heavy greasy food. I would not admit the latter to him though.

For the rest of the class Andrew sat next to me in silence. Occasionally I saw him glance at my face and my fidgeting hands but he wasn’t commenting anything else on it. Until he had enough of my nervousness and grabbed one of my hands in his big warm palm. He placed it on his lap and slowly rubbed his thumb over the back of my hand I slow soothing strokes. Which really helped. We sat like that for the remainder of the hour.

He walked me back to my room and we would meet again for practice in about an hour.

I was still feeling down about the Mike thing and he noticed.

‘Princess.’ He searched my room before continuing. ‘Please, stop sulking.’

‘Yeah, I’ll just switch it on again because that’s how it works.’

Andrew glanced under my pillow and I scowled. ‘Find anyone dangerous under there?’

‘There’s my little demon.’ He chuckled and I rolled my eyes.

‘Get some rest, get changed and I’ll see you in the courtyard in an hour okay?’