Page 103 of Oleander

“Is it you? Did you do this?”

He’d started with shock before sliding his body forward to perch on the end of the chair. He reached for the papers. Sliding his glasses back on, he began to scan the pages. I’d watched his face closely for clues for something that would give away the truth of it, but there’d been only a slight lift of his brow, which had disappeared a moment later.

Finally, he handed me back the papers, his gaze incalculable.

He said, “Well, that is quite something.”

“Well, is it? Are you the ‘anonymous benefactor’?”

He was perfectly still for a moment before he set his book aside and stood up.

“Perhaps it’s best not to poke at these things too hard; who knows what might fall out. Besides, you know what they say about curiosity. It seems to me like someone wants to see you do very well for yourself, Jude.” He pointed at the paper in my hand. “And has all but given you the means to do it.”

It wasn’t a denial. It wasn’t an answer. But it was all I got.

I had to assume that it was him and that he simply didn’t want Cas to know. But why? I couldn’t understand. Neither could I understand my hesitation to accept it. What was I waiting for? I knew the offer had no expiration date, but it still sat on my desk the entire week like a glowing treasure chest just waiting to be opened.

I wanted to speak to Caspien about it. But not over the phone. I wanted to show him the paperwork and have him pour scorn over it and tell me to burn it, or tell me I was the biggest idiot on earth not to have signed it yet.

He was due back that Thursday night; his last teaching day had been on Tuesday, but he had a Fence tournament on Wednesday evening that he had to stay at school for. He had to beat Hannes Meier in the final for a gilded replica of a trophywhich was over 100 years old. I wished him luck and told him I’d see him on Friday night. Gideon was again in London (I remember wondering if he was meeting Blackwell again), so it meant we’d have the house to ourselves.

That Friday, Luke had a big contracting job on in Beaumont and couldn’t leave the site to pick me up, so that morning I’d taken the bike to school. The ride home had taken me around forty minutes, the last part quite heavily uphill, but I’d arrived home energised and sweating from the workout.

Caspien had arrived home late the night before; I’d seen the car come up the drive just after ten. Still, I’d waited a half hour before I’d texted to ask if he was in bed yet. I wanted to sneak out and go to the house to see him, and if he’d given me any indication it would have been welcome, then I would have. I missed him like an ache, a deep knot in my chest that I knew would only release when I saw him.

He hadn’t texted back until after midnight.

Caspien:

About to sleep. Come over tomorrow night.

Me:

did you beat him?

Caspien:

Yes. 15 to 11

I’d gone to bed with a proud smile on my face.

Since he’d told me to come over in the evening, I showered, made myself a sandwich, and tried reading a book for an hour or so. I was distracted, agitated, and excited to see him, my stomach and chest in complicated knots. That was the moment I realised, with startling clarity, how tightly my mood was linked to Caspien.

I thought about those months when he was cold and abrupt with me; how difficult I’d been. How unpleasant to Luke I’d been on those days he’d asked me to help out at the big house, specifically because I knew Caspien would be around and I hated being so small and insignificant to him. I thought of how lost and uncertain the world felt when he returned to Switzerland, leaving me alone to deal with feelings I couldn’t control or understand.

Then, the inverse: how every moment of wonder and pleasure and thrill I’d felt for the last few months had been because of him. Because I’d had him in ways I hadn’t even known I’d wanted.

I wasn’t sure it was normal or even healthy to be so completely wrapped up in another person – now I know it was neither—but I also couldn’t stop it, not least because it would mean a return to that feeling of before. For good or bad, I was tied, soul bound, to Caspien. It was terrifying and electrifying all at once. I was alive and in love, and the future we could have – that I would convince him we could have – stretched out before me, endless and shimmering.

I couldn’t wait to tell him about the golden ticket burning in my hand, about all the ways I was going to make him come thissummer, about how I was going to be everything he needed and wanted. I couldn’t wait to tell him I loved him.

I was in love. And I was still young enough and naïve enough to assume that was all I needed, to assume the power of that alone was enough to protect me from everything else.

But Cas had been right; I knew nothing of what love was supposed to be.

Unwilling to wait another minute to see him, I grabbed the trust paperwork from my desk and flew out of the house, convinced of my place in the world and Caspien’s place right next to me.

I’d thought about texting him first, but then I thought about his little gasp of surprise and the way his eyes would light up when I appeared, pushed him against whatever wall was closest, and kissed him. I thought about how easily he’d open for me when I dropped to my knees and fumbled with his belt. Of how he’d grow hard and desperate around my tongue, pleading with me even as he gripped my hair in his fist.