Page 27 of Scars of Anatomy

Body Heat

“Everyone, stay calm,” Tracy instructs, sounding anything but, her authoritative resolve cracking under the pressure of unforeseen circumstances. “The lights will come back on,” she says optimistically.

We all stand still for a moment, looking up at the lights as if they’ll magically turn back on. With no luck, everyone turns to their phones, typing out frantic texts.

“I guess I should call my parents,” Delilah huffs, looking disappointed.

“I’m sorry, Dee,” Olivia says sympathetically, giving her friend’s arm a reassuring squeeze.

“It’s okay.” Delilah gives a small, halfhearted smile before walking off down the hall for a bit more privacy.

Olivia’s shoulders slump. “I guess I should call my parents too. Hopefully my mom made it home already,” she says, pulling her phone out of her back pocket to check if she has any missed messages.

“I’ll be back.” She slips out of my grasp and walks down the hall, opposite to the direction Delilah went.

I take a seat on one of the couches, watching the chaos slowly ensue. There’s about fifty kids loitering around the front entrance of the science building, not knowing what to do or where to go. Then there’s Tracy, sprinting down the hallway to the offices.

I pull out my phone to text Chase and Brennen, seeing if other buildings and the dorms have power. By the sounds of their replies, it seems like there’s a campus-wide power outage.

Olivia reappears, and plops onto the couch beside me, looking bummed.

“Guess we’re not going to English today, huh?” I joke, trying to lighten the mood.

She lets out the tiniest amused huff and pulls out her phone, checking her email. “Professor Hobb just sent out an email thirty minutes ago. Class is canceled for today.”

“Darn.”

She elbows me in the ribs, trying her best to throw me an unamused glare. I grin, slinging my arm around her shoulders and pulling her into my side. She lets out a little shriek of surprise, giggling as she tries to squirm out of my hold.

I feel the couch shift, and Olivia and I both still. Looking down at the opposite end of the couch, I see a pair of beady little eyes staring back at us.

Olivia slips out from under my arm, sitting up straight and fixing her hair. When Delilah appears in front of us, plopping into the armchair across from the couch with a huff, Olivia sits on the edge of her seat, all her attention focused on her distressed best friend.

“Were you able to get a hold of your parents?” Olivia asks.

“Yeah,” Delilah says, dejected. “They told me to stay put and just come home tomorrow whenever the roads are safe again.”

Olivia purses her lips into a remorseful frown. “I’m sorry, Dee. We should have just skipped lab and gone home.”

Delilah shakes her head. “It’s not your fault.

I decided to stay too. Maybe it’s better that we did.

Who knows what we would have gotten caught in if we’d left a little earlier?

At least we’re spending the night in a building instead of in a car on the side of the road somewhere,” she says, trying to be a little optimistic.

My stomach twists uncomfortably at the thought of them driving in this weather, possibly getting stranded on the side of the road. Or worse. Much worse.

“Honestly, these chairs are probably more comfortable than my car seats. So there’s that,” Delilah says, trying to ease some of Olivia’s obvious guilt.

“We’re not spending the night here,” Rat Boy grumbles irritably.

“And where exactly do you think we’re going to go? Home? Because I don’t think anyone brought their ice skates,” Delilah fires back, equally as annoyed, if not more so.

Rat Boy huffs, crossing his arms over his chest and rolling his eyes.

I swear, if I have to spend the whole night in his proximity I’m shoving his ass in the lab supply closet with all his relatives. It’ll be like he never missed a minute of Thanksgiving.

Looking determined, Tracy skids around the corner with a flashlight, even though it’s still daylight and everything is visible inside the building with all the large floor-to-ceiling windows.

She makes her way to the center of the crowd, then stands on top of one of the side tables to make herself more visible.

“All right, everyone!” she calls, trying to gain everyone’s attention by waving her arms above her head.

“It looks like we’re going to be stuck here for a while, but don’t worry, the science department has some water bottles, granola bars, and flashlights to get us through however long we’re going to need to stay here.

If there is an emergency, I and some of the staff are going to be in our offices just down the hall,” she informs us, acting as if she’s taken on the role of the main character in a postapocalyptic movie.

“Just hang in there and we’ll be out of here in no time,” she chirps before hopping down from the table and heading back to the offices.

“Aye, aye, Captain,” Delilah mumbles sarcastically, giving a less-than-halfhearted two-finger salute.

She turns to Olivia. “Have you talked to your parents?”

“Yeah, Mom just made it home, but it looks like Dad’s going to be stuck at the store. At least the store has electricity. For now. If it goes out, though, I’m pretty sure there are some battery-powered space heaters in stock, thankfully.”

“Speaking of that,” Delilah says, shifting around in the chair to slide on her winter coat. “How long do you think it’ll be before we freeze our asses off?”

“I don’t even want to think about it,” Olivia groans, pulling her coat tighter around her body.

Instinctively, I drape my arm over her shoulders and pull her into my side to provide her warmth.

Delilah grins, her brows rising suggestively, and while I don’t look at Rat Boy, I can practically feel the steam rolling off of him.

Maybe if I piss him off even further we’ll have heat for the whole damn building. Problem solved.

On a serious note, I can’t help but worry about Olivia as night approaches. I know her tall, willowy frame won’t retain a lot of heat, and there’s only so much body heat and layers I can provide her. If we’re without power for the rest of the night, we’re all fucked.

“We can go to my apartment,” Rat Boy suggests, looking solely at Olivia. I don’t think his we included either me or Delilah. “It’s less than a half a mile from here.”

“Again,” Delilah chimes in dryly, “how are you going to get there?”

“Walk,” Rat Boy says, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world.

Delilah snorts. “ Okay . I’m pretty sure Liv would rather stay here than freeze to death trudging to your apartment in the ice, with the possibly of breaking a bone.”

At least she said it and not me. Thank you, Delilah.

“We’d be fine,” he spits, throwing her a glare.

“Oh yeah? If it’s that easy, run to your place and bring us back some blankets, will ya?” Delilah counters, and the two of them bicker back and forth, Delilah clearly having the upper hand.

Olivia lets out a tired sigh, mildly surprising me by closing her eyes and laying her head on my shoulder. I stroke her hair, marveling at the silky smooth caramel-colored strands.

A couple of hours in everyone is bored out of their minds, and have resorted to using the flashlights Tracy handed out as the sky faded to black.

Some kids sit on the floor, playing with them by making shadow puppets on the walls while others use theirs to explore and scope out a place to sleep tonight.

Everyone is using whatever furniture is available as a makeshift bed.

Everyone has also slipped on their winter gear, the heat in the building significantly dropping. Olivia has her gloves on, and is struggling to tear open the wrapper of her granola bar. I gently take the food from her hands, using my ungloved hands to open it for her.

“Thanks.” She nibbles on it, looking down at my bare hands with concern. “You didn’t bring any gloves. Are you sure you don’t want your jacket back?” she asks, already trying to hand me the jacket that Brennen returned to me this morning. I draped it over her about an hour ago.

“Nah, Finch. I’m all right,” I assure her, securing my jacket back over her.

She frowns. “Aren’t you cold?”

“I’m all right,” I lie. It’s fucking freezing in here, but I know she needs it more than I do.

Her frown deepens and then her eyes widen as if a light bulb just went off inside her head. “Are you sure? I can check if Professor Cooper has a blanket in her office or something. I don’t think she’d mind if I borrowed it.”

“You have a key to Professor Cooper’s office?” Delilah asks, stunned.

Olivia looks away nervously. “Yeah.”

“Why am I even surprised,” Delilah mutters under her breath. “I told you, that woman’s in love with you.”

Now Olivia rolls her eyes. “Whatever.” She sits up straighter, leaning over to reach inside her backpack on the floor and pulling out a key ring with about five keys on it, including her car keys. She stands up, adjusting all her layers of clothing. “I’ll be right back.”

“Uh-uh,” Delilah says, popping up from her chair. “I’m coming with you.”

“What? Why?” Olivia asks, brows pinched together in confusion.

“Because I want to see what her evil lair looks like.”

“Dee,” Olivia groans, exasperated. “No.”

“Come on,” Delilah pleads, mustering up her best puppy dog pout.

“Forget it.” Olivia sighs, sitting back down. “I shouldn’t be going into her office when she’s not there anyway.”

“Bull. I know that’s code for you’re just going to sneak off to her office later without me,” Delilah argues.

“No,” Olivia lies, her voice rising a few octaves higher. “I shouldn’t be going in there without permission. It’s rude.”

Delilah walks over to her best friend, somehow managing to sneakily and swiftly pluck the set of keys from her hand like a snake. “Well, then, what’s the purpose of giving you a key? And guess who’s not always polite,” Delilah says menacingly, smirking as she takes off down the hall.