Page 52 of And They Were Roommates

A blur of reds and blacks torpedoes out of one, and I screech as I’m tackled onto the gazebo floorboards. A figure pins down my wrists and digs his knees into my thighs to keep me in place. His black-dyed hair is so floppy that I barely make out his childlike face, but the blazer tied around his neck like a cape is a dead giveaway.

“Blaze?” I mumble.

“Usurper! How dare thou speak my unceremonious title. Your lowly rank shall denote me as Chief Magistrate of the Brotherhood of Ancestral Darkness.”

“Can I at least ask why you pounced me?”

“My ancestral ring forewarned me of your attendance.” Blaze releases my hands to do his familiar, fluttering butterfly pose, showing off the ruby varsity ring that matches mine. The only difference between ours is how Blaze wears it on his thumb. His fingers must be too small.

“What are you doing?” I ask.

“’Tis the flames burning alongside the blood in my ring. Thus, I am cognizant of bloodlust from up to seventy kilometers.”

So, not a butterfly. Flames. “I just wanted to ask you a question.”

Blaze pulls out a slingshot and marble from his slacks pocketand aims the marble at my face. “Wherefore shall I, Blaze Alpha Destroyer (of Worlds), heed your qualms?”

This isn’t working.

With the other twelve-year-olds I tutored in Queens, talking to them like an equal was key. Maybe the only way to speak with someone like him is to match him. “I desire your aid. I… must write to… womenfolk.”

“Women—?” Blaze suddenly lets out a half cry, half bleat, and jumps off my body so speedily that his bangs scatter, revealing a pudgy face that could only belong to someone as young as him. His slingshot and marble clink to the floorboards. He points at my left hand—my varsity ring. “A Ring of Ancestral Darkness has passed down through your lineage too?”

“This isn’t—” I stop. “Indeed. It was my mom’s. Your family went here?”

“My kin gifted this gazebo. And the dining quarters.”

“Wait, Dixon is your family?”

His eyes blow out. “No.”

“You’re Bingo A. Dixon. Our second year’s Rank Three. Luis’s roommate.”

“I’m Blaze A. Destroyer (of Worlds).”

“Right,” I say slowly. This whole time, I assumed he was a first year. He skipped even more grades than I thought.

Blaze sighs. “I have been detached from the Brotherhood for epochs, comrade. I do not even wish to be here. No one comprehends me. STRIP tries. After all, I did join those valiant warriors upon my arrival straightaway, for I was moved by their battle against Valentine’s law. However, I fear they still fail to comprehend my own war against the arachnids.”

It reveals more than Blaze says with his whirlwind of words. Like me, he seems to feel alone here. STRIP may even be a way for him to belong despite still being a kid. If that’s the case, then for once, I can actually sympathize with someone wanting to join this ridiculous program. “You never wanted to go to school here?”

“I was never bestowed a choice. In Father’s eyes, an education such as Valentine’s is compulsory for Wall Street.”

Wall Street.I suppose Blaze is Rank Three. “I get that. Kind of.”

“You too are fighting for an occupation?”

I like tutoring. And I like books like Mom. But when Mom chased books, she tripped and came crashing down, even though I worked alongside her in the store when I could. Of course, without her asking. Mom would never ask for help.

“Maybe something smart?” I say, trying to think of a path as impressive as Robby’s MIT or as lucrative as Blaze’s Wall Street. But all I can think to say is, “Um. Math?”

I expect Blaze to laugh at me, but he just helps me to my feet. The moment my weight hits him, he falls back on top of me. Groaning, I rise up on my palms. Blaze’s cape blazer is flipped over his head, spilling across my chest along with his seaweed hair.

He rolls off my body, then taps his ring against my own. “I will contribute to any mission under your command, comrade. But perhaps from here on the floor.”

“Then, if you were to confess your feelings to someone, how would you say it?”

He considers before dramatically clearing his throat. “Whilst lunation echoes along the lakefront, I contemplate your light. My moon, my moon, never wane from my sight.”

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