Page 10 of Broken by my Bully

“How can we definitively say that someone is, in fact, being cruel?”

He lifts a finger, turning and heading back to the board. “You’re not the only ones having a tough time putting a cage around this thing. Philosophers have been grappling with it since the dawn of Hellenic thought. Plato spoke of a man ruled by his basest desires who inflicted suffering on others for his own gain.”

Rooke raps his knuckle beside the word INTENT. “That’s an easy one. He didn’t have good intentions, and someone suffered for it.” He raps beside IMPACT. Shrugs. “Two out of three ain’t bad.”

I take notes, alternating between chewing my pen and tapping it against my chin.

If this is what college is like, I’m fucking hooked. I still don’t know what the Lucifer Effect scrawled on the board means, but maybe I’ll have scrounged up enough guts to speak to him after class.

Professor Rooke lectures about Aristotle, Freud, Seneca, Nietzsche.

Some names I’ve heard before, others are brand new. Time slips away, his lecture so riveting that I forget I’m in a class with thirty other students…

…and a boy who would giggle with me as we jumped into rain puddles together.

How did we get from there to him spitting on me and calling me a whore? I expectedsomedegree of anger, but this?

Then again, he has spat at me before. But the context was completely different. There was mutiny involved, for one, and a very grubby bandana that was supposed to be an eye patch. Plus, he kept saying, “Aargh, me matey.”

My head is reeling by the time Professor Rooke glances at his watch. Sighing, he sets down his chalk, keeping his back turned as his students slowly emerge from his spell. Some stretch, others take quick peeks at their phones.

But then he speaks again, and everyone is immediately straining to hear his low words.

“No matter where you think it comes from. Nature. Nurture.” He turns, arms crossed. “If you want to label it evil, or neutral, or ‘it’s complicated.’” He puts air quotes around the word, and I hear the redhead beside me huff out in amusement.

“We all have a cruel streak inside us. A muscle we’re born with.” He holds out his hand, then slowly closes it into a fist, the dark blue-green veins under his skin stark.

I suddenly get all the fuss about vampires.

“Much like the Native American parable of the two wolves, there are those who choose to let that muscle waste away…” he opens his hand and shows us his palm before squeezing his hand shut again. “And those who hit the gym five times a week.”

He claps his hands together, and my soul leaves my fucking body.

“Unnecessary,” I mutter, tugging in a breath to replace the air in my lungs. The redhead turns and gives me a little smile, her hand still pressed to her chest.

“Right,” Professor Rooke announces. “I touched on some assignments you’ll be completing for me this semester, but I left the best for last.” He extends his index fingers, hands still clasped, and points at us. “Journals are all the rage these days. Or maybe you kept a diary as a kid?” He laughs, but the sound is sardonic. “Christ, what am I saying? You’re all still kids.”

There’s a smattering of laughs and a few groans.

He gives us a genuine smile, and damn it if I don’t feel that warmth all the way down into my toes when he glances over at me.

But his voice is frosty when he says, “Mr. Jordan?”

There’s a jolt inside me. It’s as if Professor Rooke is asking me what the hell my deal is with Kai.

But then my all-grown-up childhood friend stands, snatches the stack of notebooks off the desk, and saunters over to us.

Even though I’m the closest, he walks right past me and starts handing them out at the far end of the row, working his way up and telling the students to pass the notebooks along until everyone has one.

Except me.

I guess because he waited until last to come and give me mine…in person.

Oh God, is he going to spit in my face again? I doubt he’d get away with it in front of Professor Rooke.

But there’s still a nervous flutter behind my belly button as he heads in my direction, a couple of notebooks dangling from his fingers, his other hand shoved in his pocket.

Kai locks eyes with me as he swaggers over, and it’s like time slows down so I can properly appreciate how much he’s changed.