Fangirl

The rain drummed deafeningly on the gravel of the path as I approached the entrance of the academy in the blue gloom. I stepped up onto the wide lit porch and stopped. Clods of mud from boots adorned the gray slabs. I smiled — now everything was the way it should be. Returning to the academy after the talk, I froze at this very spot in confusion. Phillip was supposed to have come down before me, which meant the threshold couldn’t be clean. But it was. It couldn’t have been washed so fast. The help would take up the task the next morning at the earliest and only after the rain stopped. I quickly realized that he must have taken shelter under the treetop on the way, having been caught in the downpour, and decided to wait out the first blows of the weather. Most likely, he’d stayed on the side of the road somewhere. There was no point in going deep into the forest, there were wild beasts as well. That thought was enough to make me hurry to the door. I grabbed one of the umbrellas in the hall, and rushed back. I found him quickly. Paused, deciding how to offer an umbrella. He wasn’t likely to be very happy to see me, but I couldn’t leave him alone in the dark, where there were bears and wolves, and in the cold he couldn’t stand. It seemed that instead of helping, I only frightened him more. He didn’t take the umbrella, just ran away. But now he was safe and warm in the thick walls of the castle, and I was glad. I leaned over and touched fresh dirt, rubbed it in my fingers with a sense of satisfaction, and then walked through the door. *** For the next couple of weeks, I’d been especially circumspect and could bet he never caught my gaze even once. I only let myself stare when Phillip’s back was turned to me, or when the distance was so great and there was no way to see me. I didn’t look at him in the lunchroom or in the classrooms. It was hard, but I held on, thinking that it would make it easier for him. It is a doubtful pleasure to be the object of someone’s obsession. Especially if you didn’t like that person, or worse, thought they were weird. So I did my irrenowned deed for Phillip with all the dedication I could. Let him feel that I was no threat. I was the last person in the world who could harm him. Looking past a perfect face, I just pictured him wherever my gaze stopped, admiring the memorable moments I had in my head. How serious and inspired he looked, reading a report about the swamp kikimora that lived in the northern latitudes. How sad and pensive he seemed sitting on the bench during magical competitions. How peaceful and calm he was staring into the distance, while stretched out on the lawn in front of the academy. I suppressed a sigh. Nothing would tell him that I had violated his boundaries, : not a glance, not a breath. Phillip could be perfectly sure. *** After a month, I had mastered the art of discreet observation. I put in a lot of effort until covert attention had become a second skin. Such a life seemed as natural as the previous one and was almost comfortable. It turned out there were advantages to this behavior. Deprived of the pleasure of looking at him, I was elated when I did happen to touch him with a gaze. Thanks to the randomness of movement around me, which was bound to happen in the midst of a huge crowd of students, Phillip would sometimes suddenly appear at my side, and to turn away would be to attract his attention by the commotion erupted. The best thing to do was to blaze past following a given trajectory of movement as if I were not even there. And yet a fleeting moment when my gaze slipped from his face felt almost as sharp as a touch of my fingertips on his skin. The touch on that November day that would never fray from my memory. Cherishing my treasure trove of memories and endlessly poring over the sparks of precious moments, I went to the library on an early weekend afternoon. The passages were empty, echoing only with the sound of my footsteps: almost everyone was still asleep. December, cold and snowy, was coming to an end, and it was time for the annual inventory of manuscripts. From every group, a representative was appointed to help with the task. I was assigned that first year without being asked; they just wrote my name in. No one wanted to spend their free time doing the tedious task of inventorying dead parchment. From then on, that duty was tacitly placed on my shoulders. I didn’t resist. I had no friends and plenty of free time, so I didn’t mind doing something to keep myself busy for a change. Besides, the library wasn’t the worst place to conjure up the marvelous image of Phillip, and that was what I was going to do. The annual duty in the library meant twenty-four hours sharp; twenty-four hours that could be split as I saw fit. I preferred to sacrifice time in the mornings on rest days, when the library was pleasantly empty and quiet. Every year I chose the same place — the far corner of the small reading hall. The students didn’t like the musty smell of antiquity, which was impossible to remove, and the endless draughts. Now the windows were tightly closed and the odor was stifling. But it didn’t bother me. The window arches were high and narrow, facing north, so they were always shaded. Now there snow rested outside the glass — frosted and painted with icy patterns. The light was scanty. Bookcases that went to the low ceiling cut the space into sections. There were desks in each, but the farther away from the window they were, the less light they offered. By a little research done through trial and error, I found that only the outermost desk in the corner by the window was suitable for work. There, left to myself, I usually lurked. Once in the great hall, I checked in with the head librarian, took a few logbooks, and headed for my den. As expected, the library was almost empty at this early hour; the only exception was few students, beavering away at their books with manic fierceness. They sat at an impressive distance from each other, as if shared the territory, and paid no attention to anything. There was a lot to see in the library though. It always looked to me like a palace of perfect autumn. The grandiose hall went high into the dome of one of the wide towers. Its drum, all glass, diffused the soft morning light around. Generously gilded trim caught the rays of the rising sun, coloring richly decorated space in vivid shades. Library stacks glowed with a noble metal along the lines of portraits, candlesticks and lamps. Painted velvet of book spines, as if leaves at the end of summer, pressed tightly to one another, creating an orderly cacophony of hues along the even row of shelves. The bookcases, like irregular trees with unnaturally straight — only vertical and horizontal — branches, tightly girdled their once crowns. Floating in the slanting sunlight and waltzing dust, I found myself at the opposite wall from the main entrance, turned left, went down a couple of steps, crossing a narrow arched passage and, finding myself in the darkness of the small reading hall, went straight to my desk. My place turned out to be busy. There was sitting Phillip, surrounded by logbooks like the ones in my hands, writing painstakingly. I hesitated, turned around, and decided to leave so as not to bother him. ‘Hey! ’ Phillip leaned back in his chair, returning the quill to the inkwell. ‘Good morning.’ ‘Morning.’ ‘Come to work? ’ He nodded at the stack pressed against my belly and, receiving a nod of confirmation, pointed to the chair across. ‘Here is a place.’ ‘I don’t want to disturb you.’ ‘You don’t.’ He said and went back to his notes. I didn’t hesitate long, sat down across him, opened the logs, and started to check the dates of the manuscripts given out and returned. ‘How’s it going? ’ He asked. I looked up at the guy. He returned me the look. The desk was not wide and it must have been a strange picture. We were staring at each other with pocker faces. ‘Okay, thank you. How are you doing? ’ ‘Could be better.’ ‘Is anything wrong? ’ I tried not to show a light surge of excitement, but instinctively pulled myself up. ‘Nothing special.’ Phillip tried to sound nonchalant. ‘It’s just I’m a little nervous about the elemental exam.’ ‘What element? ’ I asked to keep the appearances, because I knew the answer. ‘Fire.’ At the end of each semester, in addition to the subjects mastered during the period, it was necessary to pass an exam on the non-native element; the native element was taken separately in a small group of own kin. There were four such groups respectively. The alien element was taken by the whole stream. The student was obliged to choose one element and master a new spell. The elements had to be done in order. I did the math a long time ago. In the first semester of the first year, Phillip chose fire and almost failed. There was no way my element wanted to respond to him. Luckily, it was my turn next, I stood behind and helped. After, Phillip chose water and earth. Then it was another full circle, and now the time for fire had come again. ‘Need a hand? ’ ‘Yes.’ I noticed that Phillip didn’t need a pause to answer. It meant that he had counted on my offer and, therefore, accepted it. ‘A couple of weeks to go, have you chosen a demonstration assignment yet? ’ ‘No. May be you have an idea? ’ He asked with some challenge. I swallowed; he couldn’t guess that I had helped him for the first and second time in the exams. The first time I was present in the exam room by accident; the second time when he was taking fire I’d rigged it all up to follow him. By then, I had worked out that Phillip could handle water and earth bending, but tame the fire was beyond his power. I remember before the second time with the fire he hid in empty classrooms to practise lighting the way. The spell was trifling, no serious expenditure of energy was needed. You just had to make a spark on the palm, and then, tying to it your own energy thread like a wick, hold it for a while. The spark flared up a couple of times, but he failed to keep it. Failed again and again. Phillip was angry with himself, tried harder, but with the same result. He hid every night to get a handle on the simplest magic, but alas. Gloomy and burned out, he showed up for the exam. On his face, there was determination to try no matter what. When he cast the spell and the spark flashed instantly, he froze. I stood behind him, a little to the side, and noticed his puzzled look. Surprised to the extreme, he hadn’t even remembered to tie the thread, so the fire would feed on something. ‘Next.’ The professor said, bringing him out of stupor. ‘Excuse me? ’ ‘It’s been a minute, you’ve passed, don’t hold up the other students.’ Phillip stepped aside, and then looked at his own hand for another long moment, as if he could find answers on it. I would have gladly offered them, but Phillip didn’t cheat on exams, and I doubted he’d be very happy about my unwelcomed intrusion. ‘Okay.’ I said calmly and confidently. ‘I’ve picked one. When shall we try it? ’ I caught Phillip by surprise, but he tried not to show it. ‘May well now. Why not? ’ I nodded. ‘Do you have some paper with you to write it down? ’ Phillip reached into the student’s bag. Every of us had one. I didn’t take mine because I expected to get what I needed from the head librarian, and then I was going back to my room. I recited one short spell by heart. Phillip took careful notes while I was looking at the perfectly straight curls of his writing. ‘So what do I need to do? ’ He brought me back to earth with a question. ‘Here.’ I tore off a small corner of his paper — the size of a fingertip, and placed it on the table in the middle; we’d moved the other belongings aside. ‘With this spell, all you have to do is set the object on fire.’ ‘What is the difference between the usual candle burning and this option? ’ ‘It’s simple. When you light a candle, you throw out a spark for the duration of the burning time of a wick or, say, another object. That’s the aim. This spell should burn the object lit to the ground and only then extinguish, and neither the surface of the table nor any other on which the spell works should be harmed. Just the thing in question.’ ‘Clever. What happens if you use this spell to light the candle? ’ ‘It would burn to the end. The aim is not to set it on fire, but to burn it.’ ‘Got it.’ Phillip said thoughtfully. ‘Must be complicated.’ The confidence with which he had started this conversation cracked — now he looked worried and insecure, thinking he would fail. ‘Not at all. All you need to do is set the edge of the paper on fire with a given pulse, magic will do the rest. There’s no need to keep the source tethered. Try it.’ Phillip nodded, and I could see his cheeks turning pink — he was getting more nervous. He cast the spell, but nothing came out; he pressed his lips tightly together not looking at me — he felt embarrassed. ‘How do you feel the fire? ’ I asked. ‘Obviously, like something searing and painful if you don’t keep distance.’ We looked at one another. ‘Fire can be warm and caressing. May I? ’ I extended my hand as Phillip nodded, and touched his fingers relaxed over the paper. I shared the warmth again and savored the touch. ‘The fire caresses and gives itself, if you offer something in return. You sgould open yourself to it, feed it. Fire wants to take and only then give. If you are afraid of it and close yourself off, then you are not ready to share, and, as a result, it does not answer to you.’ I took my eyes off his hand, where I kept touching, and looked into his face. ‘Try the spell again. Only this time, open yourself to the fire, offer yourself to it.’ I swallowed, trying not to lose concentration. It was very difficult at Phillip’s presence. ‘I’m here, with you. I will protect you… Trust me.’ Phillip looked at the spell again, thought about it, and then pronounced the words, glanced at the scrap of paper. It smoked and burst into flames. Phillip watched mesmerized as the last yellowish piece burned away, turning into fragile black ash. Getting serious, he suddenly asked: ‘Was it you or me? ’ I wanted to answer, but it didn’t seem enough, because it was absolutely clear that he guessed how he had passed his exams with fire element in previous years. I tore off another scrap, put it where the ash remained, stood up, gathered my logs and left. It certainly wouldn’t hurt him to believe in his own magical powers a bit more. And I needed to breathe on the sidelines. Like that piece of paper, I was burning up from touching his skin, from looking so straight into his eyes and us being so close. After a month of escaping him, the feeling was deafening. I was like a drunk who got a rare aged drink shoved under the nose. I needed to cool down.