Page 20

Chapter 20

THE BOOK OF DISQUIET

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 28

Of course the weekend is when my body naturally wakes up before the bell tower’s obnoxious little song. Which is for the better. Midterms are approaching too quickly for comfort, and I need to study. But it’s the principle of the matter.

Shoving on my glasses, I roll over to face Jasper’s side. He stands at his dresser with his hands on his hips, half clothed in slacks and an unbuttoned dress shirt with his number-one enamel pin on the collar. He’s studying the fragrance collection—eau de parfum, as he calls it—along the top. As if there’s a choice to make. He always goes for the one called TEARS that torpedoes fresh lilac and orange flower petals up my nostrils.

Jasper’s head tilts. Like he senses me watching. He turns.

I slam my eyes shut before he can catch me.

What the hell. Why was I watching?

I need to keep my head down. I need to keep my head down. I repeat this to myself so I don’t forget it again. The more I watch Jasper, the more I instigate interactions between us. The closer he gets, the more dangerous it is for me.

Like now, as Jasper’s footsteps approach the foot of my bed. The room falls so silent that I hear my pulse thrum in my neck. He just noticed a crack in my wooden bedpost. He dropped his tie, and he’s glaring at it with hatred since he’d rather die than wear one.

Or he noticed something familiar about me.

My body locks up, dread crashing through me so hard that I feel like I’m drowning in it. I failed. I’m going home. I didn’t get my single room in time.

But then Jasper’s footsteps drift away, and a door closes.

I open my eyes again, mentally kicking myself for getting caught staring. For ever looking his way, even once.

Light shines from underneath the bathroom door, and I can hear him brushing his teeth.

My adrenaline shoots my body right out of bed. I can’t keep my head down anymore; I have to know if he knows. I storm up to the door and knock once, so hard it makes my knuckles throb.

Jasper opens the door, eyes wide. His toothbrush hangs loosely in his hand. Toothpaste is splattered across the mirror like I startled him into spitting it out.

I follow the dripping spit-paste with my eyes. “Can… I join you?”

Jasper’s surprise flips to a smile, and he quickly shuffles over to make space like he fears I’ll change my mind. The way he acts whenever I approach him first. Like nothing has changed between us. He wets his toothbrush again and resumes brushing.

Did he figure it out?

As I grab my toothbrush from our shared wall holder, I realize we’ve never gotten ready together. Jasper is usually out the door before I’m out of bed.

Jasper spits out his toothpaste, into the sink this time. “Did I wake you?”

“N-no,” I say, directing my stare to the sink.

“I’m glad. I try not to.”

Is this why I usually sleep through his routine? “Thanks.”

“You usually aren’t up this early.” His voice is as melodic and articulated as usual.

Same as always.

“I have lots of studying to do,” I mutter, feeling like the most brainless Excellence Scholar to ever enter Valentine. Of course Jasper wasn’t examining my face while I was sleeping. He was staring out the window. Or something. Right? After how much Ms. White harped on the scientific method in chemistry last week, she’d be ashamed of how Jasper makes me jump to conclusions. “I gotta keep up my grades to stay here.”

Jasper looks right at me. His morning-person joy has been wiped away by a frown. “Von Hevringprinz, you were selected out of thousands to be our Excellence Scholar. Please, never think of leaving.”

“Jasper’s love life?” Xavier asks, voice strained. He’s fighting for his life with a jammed lever on the side of a workout machine, since I finally recovered enough from the cardio he had me doing to graduate to weights.

“Yeah,” I say, wiping my forehead. We’ve just started our first weight training session with stretches, and I’ve broken a sweat. Somehow, Pragma Recreational Center always magically smells like a bouquet, even though each body in here has to be as sticky as mine. Must be the work of Saint Valentine’s spirit. “What’s going on there?”

“How come you’re super interested?”

“Not super interested.” But Blaze couldn’t give me a firm answer last night, and without this information I’ll never be able to write the love letters to Jasper’s satisfaction. Xavier seems to know him best among the student population, so he’s my last shot. “I should know since he’s my love tutor, you know? His credentials. A résumé.”

“You seem interested.” Xavier manages to shove the lever down a few rungs, and it echoes through the abandoned room. Whatever he’s changing seems related to the weights. He must need to make adjustments because I’m weak.

“I’m not.” But as I say it, even I hear how ridiculous and whiny it sounds. I was already insecure enough working out with Xavier, but now I’m asking about another guy’s love life when we’re supposed to be acting like manly men. “Forget it.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah, we got belldumbs to lift.”

“Dumbbells. We’ll start slower than that.” Xavier stands, grabbing a curved bar hovering above the machine’s seat. I swear I see his bicep pulse through his tracksuit. “This is a lat pull-down bar. It simulates pull-up motions on an easier scale, especially if you can’t lift your whole body mass yet. As you get stronger, I’ll readjust the lever I was messing with. Word?”

My zero strength was the reason for the adjustments. “W-word.”

Xavier pulls a stopwatch out of his track pants pocket. “First, let’s see where you’re at. Pull down that bar as many times as you can in one minute.”

I sit on the seat. At least no other students are here to witness my inevitable humiliation.

Shifting into position, I place one hand on the bar. My new tracksuit might be a size M instead of Xavier’s XL, and this equipment might be ten times my weight, but I’m as tall as Jasper at five eight. He could probably pull this bar a lot of times. I can match him. “Ready.”

“Charlie?” Xavier makes a face. “You gotta use both hands.”

“Oh.” I place my other hand on the bar.

He doesn’t stop staring. “Have you done a pull-up before?”

Should I have? Is this something boys innately know how to do out of the womb? Am I so unteachable that Xavier will walk away?

“Not really,” I admit.

Instead, Xavier laughs deeply, in a manly way I wish I could, filling up the room. “I’ll teach you the correct form.”

He walks up behind me and readjusts my grip.

My body tenses. He’s close.

“Face your hands away from yourself,” Xavier instructs, and I try to pay attention over the blood pumping in my ears. “Your grip should be slightly wider than your shoulders.”

“Okay.”

After a few more adjustments, Xavier steps back, and my shoulders finally relax.

He lifts his stopwatch. “Go!”

I flex my biceps. The bar lowers, and my forehead nearly taps the bar. But then my arms give out, and the bar slaps back into place. I grunt.

“Try again!”

I follow Xavier’s instructions. The bar gets closer. Closer. Closer. I finally feel a tap.

“One! Make it two!”

One turns into two; two turns into three in a row.

“Time!”

My arms crash down, burning like they went through a paper shredder.

“Three,” Xavier calls. “Not bad, but we can improve.”

So, I performed worse than he expected. The failure knocks me hard. “Do you actually think my grade rank will get better by finals?”

“Why wouldn’t it? I’m the best trainer in Au Sable Forks.” He grins.

A smile breaks across my face too. For someone so kind, the fact that Xavier has stayed single since his breakup last year is an eighth world wonder.

Would he say anything if he found out what I’m hiding?

“Did you know Jasper has a poetry book?” Xavier asks suddenly.

“Huh?”

“You had questions about his love life? That may help. You’ve checked it out?”

I keep forgetting Jasper handed me a signed copy when we moved in earlier this month. “No. How’d that book even happen?”

“I think Jasper already had a decent following online when he came to Valentine, but then P.M. helped him blow up over last year’s winter break. His book came out a bit after. Sucks that Jasper isn’t doing any new writing for his followers while he’s here.”

“He’s leaving things inactive? Can’t he update during breaks, like you said?”

Xavier bends down to perform more witchcraft on the machine weights. “I think he’s chosen this hiatus on purpose to focus on Valentine.” He smirks. “I don’t know if you know how famous Jasper is—he’s, like, over-a-million-followers famous nowadays. Power of Rank One for you.”

Jasper’s full name next to a 100 on the ranking board flashes through my brain.

“How?!”

Xavier startles so much that his grip slips, and weights slam together. “How what?”

Did I say that out loud? “I just don’t get why he’s Rank One.”

“Tell me about it. I study every second and barely stay Rank Four in my year, yet the guy barely does for a second.”

“Not even that. He’s at a hundred numerical class average. That means he’s never gotten a single point off an assignment?”

“Oh, Jasper can take one more core class than the rest of us because he’s gotten out of the PE requirement. Even though Valentine readjusts our classes out of a hundred, he’s inflated over that. They just don’t show it, or there’d be revolts.”

“Wha—?” So much rage boils inside me that I can’t see straight for a second. “How’d he get exempt?”

I’m not sure why I bother asking. I already know the answer.

“Principal’s nephew powers,” we say at the same time.

I try to ignore my jealousy over how easy his life is, but I barely can. “If his aunt weren’t the principal, you think he’d still hit top five?”

“To be real? I think so. It’s like he has a photographic memory. Instructors could be being lenient on his essays, I guess, but most scores come from our multiple-choice tests. His always come back perfect. Not much subjectivity there, man.”

I huff. Jasper’s book smarts are why I fell for him at camp.

“Anyway,” Xavier says, “Jasper has a few copies of his book lying around his office in the crypt. Maybe you’d get the answers you’re looking for.”