Page 22 of Sparks of Insanity
“I… of course-”
“We’ll do the talking, Teach. I think it’s best if you don’t address our girl right now,” dad Gray butted in, frowning at me. “What did you send, Chica? You shouldn’t be texting your teacher, you know that, right?”
Wow. Dad Gray was lecturing me on the etiquette and rules of propriety in dating?! Hypocrite much? I opened my mouth to say as much, but mum spoke again.
“Have you been leaving suggestive drawings for him too? Em, please, why would you do this?”
My god. What hadn’t he told her? I felt so betrayed by him, that fury was building inside me at an alarming rate. I wantedto grab a knife and jam it into his cruel heart, right in front of everyone. I wanted to make him feel the same pain he was causing me, because right now it felt like he’d done exactly that; jabbed a knife into my heart and twisted it, tearing agonised screams from me, as he tore my soul apart at the same time.
“Why?” I begged, wishing he’d look at me instead of the damn table. “Did it mean nothing to you? Am I nothing, Ethan? Am I just a way to pass the time until you move on to the next job?”
His eyes lifted, and I saw the pain there, the anguish, but was it because of what was happening right now, or because of what he stood to lose if this came out? I choked back a sob as I stood up, a fist over my mouth to try and hold in my words, to stop this before it could continue, so I could try and undo it.
“I think you’re done here, Teach. You stay away and we’ll keep this quiet, for now,” dad Gray said, surprising the hell out of me, but dad Dory cursed and glared at him.
“NO! No way are we keeping quiet! This is an abuse of power! You don’t play with the hearts of impressionable kids, dammit! Look what you’re doing to her, and don’t you dare tell me this is all one-sided, you asshole. We warned you about this.”
“Dory, we don’t need more attention on-”
“How could you do this to me?!” I screamed at Ethan, feeling my entire world crashing in on itself, because he didn’t want me. He didn’t see value in me. He wasn’t feeling anything for me like I’d hoped he was. I was nothing to him. Nothing to anyone.
“You were… you were my…”
He held up his hands as he stood too.
“Please, Em, just-”
“You gave me my first orgasm, you bastard! How can you just pretend that means nothing?!”
“You fucking son of a bitch!” Dad Gray lurched up from his chair, but somehow he didn’t beat my other dad in reaching Ethan, and they both started hitting him, as mum and I startedto scream at them, but punch by punch, I quieted down, as I realised that it didn’t matter. None of it mattered, did it? I didn’t matter, and that was the point that had just been driven home with a sledgehammer.I didn’t matter to anyone.
I edged out of the room while their attention was on him, grabbed a knife from the kitchen and ran to my room, locking myself in my sanctuary, my sanctuary that now felt tainted by him, because I’d let him in here, and now he’d abused that privilege. Abused me, like they all did.
The only thing that kept me from falling over the metaphorical edge I’d climbed up onto, was my door crashing open, breaking the lock, and Ash bursting in. He took one look at the knife in my hand, sneered and lunged at me to take it, making sure to cut himself in the process because he was a sick little shit.
Ethan
THAT DIDN'T GO TO plan. Wilma managed to keep the two sick fuckers from beating me too badly, but I’d taken a few punches to my face and stomach, oh, and my chest, like they wanted to literally bruise my heart, but the damage was already done, because her face… oh god, her face as the betrayal sank in. I did that to her, and now it would be impossible to take it back.
Her dads had taken photos of the message on my phone, and demanded to take the sketch she’d drawn, but I assured them I’d burned it. I hadn’t, but I couldn’t tell them I wanted to keep it, to add it to the book with the others I’d kept. I knew I should destroy them, but destroying art was sacrilege, right?
I made my way home, after it was made abundantly clear that I was ‘so fucking fired, I should be engulfed in flames’, especially as those words were followed up by actual threats to burn meto death, and leave me in so many pieces that even birds would struggle to find a mouthful. Ugh.
I knew they were twisted, but seriously, they were terrifyingly so. My only saving grace was that they’d assured me they’d leave me alone, if I never returned. Did I fully believe them? Not especially, which was why I was already considering moving house, moving town even.
A day later, I was walking away from a meeting with my employer at the education board, still smarting from the verbal spanking that preceded my suspension. I’d hoped they wouldn’t report me, but I just wasn’t that lucky.
“Ethan, these are incredibly serious charges, and we can’t let you remain in any placements with students until this is resolved.”
“Resolved? How can you resolve accusations without proper proof?” Clive Head, my direct employer, and the man with my future in his hands, sighed, lifting up the file in front of him.
“Don’t push me to show you what they’ve provided as their ‘evidence’, because you know what you did. She may not have been under-age but she’s a vulnerable person, and you abused your position of power over her. Her parents do admit that they shouldn’t have trusted you behind closed doors, and in her bedroom… her bedroom? Why in the world were you ever in her bedroom? Why were you exchanging text messages? There’s talk of physical sexual misconduct here, Ethan. My god, this is enough to end your career, because nobody would hire you with this on your record. It’ll look to the world like you were grooming her.” Jesus. One crush on a student, and letting her get too close, and I was finished. My life was fucking over, wasn’t it?
I rested my head in my hands, my heart racing faster, as the panic over my destroyed future started to really sink in.
“What do I do, Clive? I have no idea what to do here,” I murmured, feeling crushed under the weight of everything I’d worked for being torn away from me for one mistake.
“Ethan, the girl was distraught. She attempted,” he paused, sighing heavily, but my heart was racing faster than ever as I lifted my head in horror, “she-”
