Theodora
almost a month without arguments.
It’s the last month of the term, and so we spend a significant amount of that time preparing for exams, but it’s still a win for us. Our delicate alliance has seen the merging of our territories in the library, Zach and I sitting side by side to read and write in silence for hours on end.
During the Apostles seminars, our discussions are civil even when we disagree, and Zach no longer seems to be choosing his point of view based on a blatant desire to start an argument—his speciality since we were team captains in debate club.
But not arguing with Zachary comes with its own challenges.
Sitting next to him, with the warmth of his shoulder radiating against me, is stressful in a completely different way. The brush of his arm against mine as he turns a page in his book, his thigh brushing alongside mine when he shifts in his seat after an hour of sitting in the same position, become small, lingering acts of torture. Reminders of what could be between us—of what I’m not allowed to have.
The unnamable, unbearable tension between us, without the vessel of arguments to dispel it, has nowhere to go. So it stays right there, coiling itself tightly, making the air between us dark and hot and suffocating.
Like a serpent preparing to strike, it bides its time.
final lit mock exam, I’m at my usual desk, carefully writing out revision cards for key quotes, when Zachary arrives.
His philosophy teacher has him help out with debate club on some Thursday nights, so I expected him to be late. I’m not annoyed, but I am stressed. Tomorrow’s exam is closed book, and I’ve not been getting enough sleep, and the Christmas break is coming up soon, which makes my skin crawl with unspeakable anxiety.
It’s a sickening potion of emotions that boils and bubbles inside me while I do everything I can to stop it from spilling out.
Zach shrugs off his coat, folds it and drapes it on the back of his seat. Every one of his movements drips with elegance and grace. The deep azure of his sweater emphasises the creamy brown of his skin, and the gold armature of his glasses catches the light. He looks older than his years, poised with a deep inner confidence I could never have, his clever eyes focused on some inward thought.
His gaze meets mine, and he flashes me a smile.
I look away quickly as he sits down next to me, as he usually does, taking out his books and laptop from his leather satchel. He settles himself, his arm brushing against mine as he does.
I close my eyes. It’s warm in the library, but I’m cold—I’m always cold lately. When he stops moving, his chin propped on the knuckles of one closed hand, I shift in my seat, tilting myself away from him with my arm right against his.
Zachary’s warmth isn’t like the normal heat that exudes from flames or skin. It’s a delicious, molten heat, suffused with the scent of his cologne, his presence. I almost melt against it. He doesn’t move, letting my arm rest against him.
We sit like this, the warmth of him an elixir of comfort.
When my revision cards are finally finished, I have no choice but to move, gathering my cards into a neat stack. Zachary looks up from his book.
“Want me to test you?”
I hand him the stack. “Go ahead.”
He takes the stack and moves, turning his chair so it’s facing mine. I mirror him, and we sit facing one another. He’s relaxed in his chair, one arm casually thrown over an armrest, the other propped up, holding a card up to his face. I sit with my legs crossed, laced fingers holding one knee, watching him. Our chairs are so close that my shin rests against the front of his seat, between his legs.
“Alright.” Zach sounds quite relaxed. He glances up at me and gives me a lazy smile. “Time to test that Othello knowledge. Why don’t you tell me your best reputation quotes?”
I reel off my quotes one by one. Zach nods at each of them, lays down the card when I’m done, picks up the next.
“Three quotes about deception and betrayal.”
I recite them. Zach’s eyes flick up to mine. “You’re good.”
“Thank you.”
“Let’s lift the mood a little,” Zach smirks. “Your best quotes on prejudice and racism.”
I suppress a smile and recite them. Zach nods. “Cheerful stuff, huh? Alright. How about masculinity and honour?”
“My favourite.” I give him a dry smile and recite my quotes.
“Love,” he says next.
I recite my quotes. He cycles through the cards, testing me on each theme and character. After he tests me on the final card—Iago as a villain—he half-tosses it down on the rest of the pile.
“That was perfect. Word for word on every single one of those quotes.”
He suddenly sits up in his chair. Because he was relaxed back in his seat, I could sit close to his chair without being close to him, but now that he’s sat up, I find myself face to face with him.
He gives me a half-grin, showing off those straight white teeth, the gleam of his smiling cheek, the two dimples carved deep by the sharp structure of his face. My breath catches.
“Tell me the truth,” he says in a lowered voice. I swallow, suddenly nervous. “Are you actually a machine?”
His lips are inches from mine. I know he expects me to be the one to back down; I’m always the one to back down. But the tension between us is heavy and electric as a storm—I can’t pull away from it, and I refuse to.
“Do I look like a machine?” I ask. “Do I feel like a machine?”
“Hm.” He hums in an overdramatisation of thought. “Certainly, you look like you could have been made in a lab, yes.” He brushes his fingers over the knuckles of my hands, which are still propped on my knee. “Your skin is cold to the touch.” He lifts his hand to my neck, pressing two fingers right underneath my jaw, his thumb resting in the dip between my collarbones. “There is a pulse,” he murmurs, “but that could just be excellent engineering for the sake of verisimilitude.”
He doesn’t move his hand away, and a shiver courses through me. He responds to it with a thoughtful tilt of his head.
“Are you cold, Theo?”
“Always.”
I look at his mouth. I know he wants to kiss me.
“Maybe that’s why you’re always cold,” Zach says in a hushed tone. “Because you’re not a real person.”
“I’m a real person,” I answer tightly. “I’m as real as you. I have skin and bones and a mind and a heart and blood running through my veins—just like you.”
“Then how are you so perfect?”
The mocking edge has vanished from Zach’s voice.
“I’m far from perfect. I’m cold and tired and stressed and angry and sad.”
It’s a more honest response than I intended to give him. Maybe part of me wants him to know how broken I am.
Maybe I don’t want him to be in awe of me anymore. Maybe I don’t want to be his equal, his rival, his nemesis. Maybe part of me wants him to see me for what I really am and pity me. Maybe I want him to want to fix me, to protect me, to take care of me.
It feels like a taboo thought to have. I’m strong and intelligent, a feminist in a society that is still profoundly, harrowingly patriarchal—I know that I should be the one to fix myself, to protect myself, to take care of myself.
But I’m so very tired, and I’m so bad at it.
Zach’s eyes search mine like he’s looking for the perfect reply. I don’t want a reply. I just want to be saved.
I want him to save me.
“My beautiful nemesis,” he whispers in a sigh. “What’s making you angry? What’s making you sad?”
There’s a lump in my throat and a burning in my eyes. I’m not worried about crying in front of Zach. My tears don’t fall when I’m alone, why would they fall when I’m not?
“Everything,” I answer.
“Even me?”
My eyes flick to his mouth, to the kisses he refuses to give me, the pleasure that glimmers there, unspent and selfishly withheld.
“Even you,” I tell him. “Especially you.”
“I’m sorry,” Zach says. His hand moves up my cheek to gently cradle my jaw. “I’m sorry, Theo. Don’t hate me. Don’t hate me. Please. Love me.”
“How?”
“Love me like I love you,” he says. “In every way possible. With your mind and your heart and your soul.”
I know then I’m going to kiss him. It’s inevitable, isn’t it?
A shadow crosses the corner of my vision, and I look up with a start. A student emerges from one of the reading nooks on the top floor, making their way wearily to the staircase. I can’t tell who it is, and we’re sitting far enough into the shadows that I doubt the student saw us, but I’m startled back to reality as if I’ve been thrown into ice-cold water. I push my chair back and stand, feeling suddenly stupid, vulnerable, as raw and exposed as an open wound.
“We should get some sleep before the exam,” I mumble. I don’t dare look at Zach, so I stuff my things haphazardly into my bag.
“Theodora.”
I grab my revision cards, my laptop, my pens, throwing them pell-mell amongst books and notepads. “Goodnight, Zach.”
“Theodora.”
Slinging my bag on one shoulder, I wave a hand. “I’m sorry I made tonight so weird—we barely got any revision done and…” He stands, startling me. I take several steps back, eyes wide, babbling on, “Please ignore what I said. I wasn’t even really being serious, I—”
He reaches for me, and I cringe back, but his hand closes around the handle of my bag, which he slides off my shoulder. I pull away from him with a frown as he carefully sets my bag down on a chair before stepping closer to me.
I retreat once more, backing away from him and into the shadowy corridor of an aisle. The soft green carpet swallows the sound of my footsteps. Zach follows me, plunging into the darkness of the enormous Victorian bookshelves with me.
“I wish that—I wish I had…” I mumble without really knowing what I’m saying.
With slow, calm movements, Zach takes off his glasses and folds them, sliding them into his pocket. Then he reaches for me, and this time, it’s me he’s reaching for.
His hand catches the back of my neck, holding it through my hair. His touch is impossibly gentle, but he’s firm as he pulls me to him by my neck and presses his mouth to mine.
My words melt on my tongue like snowflakes, becoming liquid and inconsequential. Zach’s kiss is as gentle as his fingers as they glide down my neck.
It’s a chaste, tender kiss, lingering yet pure. He pulls away first, and I retreat deeper into the shadows, my heartbeat an uncontrollable gallop, my cheeks smouldering like burning embers.
“Zach…” I breathe.
“Theodora,” he replies, his voice low and firm.
He follows me until my back bumps the end of the aisle. Zachary lays his hands on the bookshelves at the sides of my head, trapping me between his arms. My senses are filled with the smell of old wood and old books, with the rich scent of sandalwood and blackcurrants. I’m dizzy and disoriented and terrified and elated.
He kisses me as if he aches, long and slow and deep. His mouth opens against mine, and I reach up, taking his collar in my hands to pull him closer, to anchor myself to him. His tongue brushes past my open lips, teasing me, tasting me. I meet it shyly with mine, not sure what I’m doing.
One kiss melts into the next, into another. Hot, burning, insistent kisses, full of anguished desire. His arm curls around my waist, pulling me flush against him. His body is solid and warm and strong, so much stronger than I expected for a scholar like him.
With his free hand, he cradles my head, tipping it up to his like a flower to the sun. His thumb caresses my cheek and tugs at my bottom lip.
And just like that, our kisses change, become something hotter, hungrier, dirtier.
Zachary lifts me into his arms, and I grip his shoulders, steadying myself, squeezing his waist with my thighs. His mouth moves wetly from my lips to my cheek, to the corner of my jaw, to my neck. I’m warm and tight and aching between my legs, I arch against him without even meaning to, and my head rolls back against the books behind me.
“Theodora,” Zachary murmurs against my throat. His voice is rougher than I’ve ever heard it before, rough as if he’s been screaming for hours, rough as if he can barely speak. “My beautiful nemesis. My delicious, darling adversary. My Theodora.”
His mouth closes on the hollow of my throat, and he sucks on it until I let out a whimper. He presses me closer by my waist, his other hand propped against the bookshelf, and he traces a path of lingering kisses up my neck.
“I adore you,” he breathes in my ear, his lips against my hair. “I adore everything about you, and I want you, I want you laughing and victorious and happy, I want you kiss-drunk and wet and breathless with pleasure. I want you so much I could die from the hunger of it.”
His words send shivers through me that make my teeth chatter. My fingers are clenched so hard into his shoulders I’m sure I must have pierced through his jumper. I roll my hips into him, seeking the pleasure he’s promising.
In the darkness of the aisle, sheltered by the thick mahogany and the silent tomes, I feel free and feral, as if the shackles of being myself have fallen away.
Zachary shifts me against him and then sets me slowly to my feet. I stare up at him, and his face in the shadows is solemn, his eyes a dark glitter, a burning intensity rising from him like black flames.
“What—what are you doing?” I ask.
With infinite tenderness, he brushes my hair back, fixes my clothes and then his.
“I thought perhaps you wanted me to kiss you,” he says quite calmly. “And in any case, I desperately wanted to kiss you. I’ve desperately wanted to kiss you for a very long time. But I won’t pressure you into doing anything els—”
“You’re not pressuring me,” I say quickly.
“—and we do have an exam first thing tomorrow morning.”
Zachary pulls me out of the aisle and back into the golden lights. I half-expected the desire coursing through me like liquid lightning to melt away once we left the shadows, but it doesn’t. If anything, the sight of Zach, with his smooth skin and his dark hair and his intense gaze and that tender, confident smile, sends a fresh wave of desire through me.
“Don’t be cross at me,” Zachary says. “There are a thousand things I would love to do to you, my Theodora, and I would do anything you ask. If you’d like me to pleasure you in the Spearcrest library, right against the works of the philosophers and poets we love, I will. I’ll kiss every part of you and make you feel so good your cries will make Keats shiver in his grave. I’ll do anything you desire, everything you’ve ever craved. You need only ask.”
“You know I won’t ask,” I snap at him, grabbing my bag as he gathers his things with unhurried movements.
“No,” he says, glancing up at me over his shoulder as he neatly tucks his things into his satchel. “I think you will.”
