Total pages in book: 117
Estimated words: 113051 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 565(@200wpm)___ 452(@250wpm)___ 377(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 113051 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 565(@200wpm)___ 452(@250wpm)___ 377(@300wpm)
I shake my head. “No. I need to be able to think while I’m here. I need my brain at its best. I need to concentrate on my capstone.” I lie about the last one.
“You’ll be fine. I promise. Just a couple of weeks, and if you don’t see a difference, go right back on them. You have to conserve them anyway.” He pauses, licking his lips, his gaze sharpening on mine. “Don’t you trust me?”
I feel my breath hitch in my chest. “I don’t know you,” I whisper.
“Haven’t you ever trusted someone you don’t know before?”
“Yes. And it never ended well.”
He nods slowly. “I understand. Well, then I’m asking you to trust me, Sydney Denik. I only have your best interests at heart.” He swallows. “Please.”
I find myself agreeing. “Okay.”
He gives me a genuine smile, one that makes his eyes crinkle, lines along his cheeks lighting up his face for one brief, beautiful moment.
Wow. I can’t help but smile back.
“I won’t let you down,” he says. Then he coughs lightly and turns his attention back to the pad of paper, the spell between us broken. “How are you getting along with the rest of the students?”
I shrug. “Uh, I mean, I’ve made some friends, I think.”
“Does that come easy to you? Making friends?”
“Define friends,” I say wryly. “I seem to get along with most people. On a surface level, anyway. I think I’m easygoing and fun. People seem to want to be around me…”
“And below a surface level?” he asks, leaning forward on his elbows and steepling his fingers together.
I fall silent at that, digging deep. “I think I have a hard time keeping people engaged. Because even though I feel like I’m honest, I’m also holding the real me back.”
“You’re masking.”
“Yes. Not consciously. I have to know someone and trust them to let them see the real me, and when I do, that’s when I often lose them.”
“I bet the real you isn’t that different from the one that people see,” he offers quietly. “Sometimes others pick up on the fact that you’re masking, and so they think perhaps they aren’t worthy of being shown the true you. It’s not always about people not accepting who you are. Sometimes it’s about them feeling like they aren’t good enough for you or worth your time. Sometimes people just want to feel worthy of being let in.”
I rub my lips together as I think that over. I’d never thought of it that way. “Maybe,” I concede.
He studies me for a moment, his gaze so inquisitive that I have to stare down at my nails. Normally, I’ve picked them raw, one of my stims, but lately, they’ve been looking good. I’d paint them if my polish didn’t chip after a day.
“And how are you dealing with the lack of communication and internet?” he finally asks.
“It’s only been three days,” I inform him. “I’m fine.”
“You let your friends back home know where you are, of course.”
“Yep. My friend Chelsea has all my stuff. She knows I’m out of contact.”
“All your stuff?”
Oh fuck. He doesn’t know I was kicked out of housing.
“There was no point being in student housing over the summer if I was going to be here,” I say smoothly.
“Of course.” He stares at me, and from the barely perceptible wince, I can tell what he’s about to say next. “You wrote down a lot on your application…I know you lost your father a couple of years ago. And your grandmother a year before that. Are there any other relatives that you have a relationship with, that you stay in touch with?”
I shake my head. “I have an aunt, but we don’t really talk.”
He writes something else down, then looks up, his forehead wrinkling.
“You lost your mother at a young age too,” he says softly.
“Postpartum depression,” I tell him. I don’t have to tell him the rest.
“You’ve experienced a lot of loss during your life. How old are you?”
“Twenty-six.”
“Oh. You seemed older,” he says. “No offense.”
“I’m not offended. It’s just rare to hear.” Everyone usually thinks I’m younger than I am, probably because I have a baby face. Oh, and I’m incredibly immature.
“And how has your relationship with death changed? Do you think about it often? Do you fear it?”
The questions are starting to make me uncomfortable now. I shift in my chair, the leather groaning loudly. “I don’t think about it. I used to fear losing my family, but after my grandmother and my father…there’s no one left for me to lose. I guess that’s the silver lining, isn’t it?”
I give him an awkward smile, and he scribbles something down.
“I fear my own death though,” I go on. “I fear dying before accomplishing all the things I want to accomplish, before I get to experience things and leave my mark on the world. But everyone fears that. Don’t you?”