Total pages in book: 164
Estimated words: 156728 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 784(@200wpm)___ 627(@250wpm)___ 522(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 156728 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 784(@200wpm)___ 627(@250wpm)___ 522(@300wpm)
Too much.
He collapsed to the floor, covering his face as he wailed with frustration. Sob after bleating sob. Despite his deeper voice, he was still just a boy. A boy who would never understand how a mother could allow this to happen.
Cold hands grabbed at his arms, forcing him to look at her. “Sweet baby.” Her withered arms pulled him against her hollow frame as they sobbed in a tangle of limbs and grief.
“You let it happen. You said it would stop, but you lied. You’re a liar. Just like him.”
“No, baby. I didn’t mean it.” Apologies tumbled out of her in broken fragments. “I’m sorry, I’m so, so sorry, sweet baby. I wish I was stronger for you. I wish I was better.”
Despite his anger, he hugged her tightly—a little boy desperate for the shelter of a safe adult. Beyond forming words, he let her rock him as he moaned through the pain poisoning his mind.
“Shh—shh—shh…” She stroked his hair and held him tight, the way she used to when he was small enough to fit in her lap. “Mummy’s here.”
“I can’t… I can’t do it anymore,” he sobbed. “I can’t. I can’t. I can’t… I can’t.”
“Shh, baby, don’t think of it anymore. You’re home now.”
He didn’t know how long he stayed like that, crying in his mother’s arms. When he woke up the next morning, he had no recollection of getting off the floor or moving to his room.
They never talked about that moment again.
No resolutions were made, and no promises were left unbroken.
Eventually, he returned to the estate.
None of it mattered. Not his pain. Not his words. And not his tears.
He was powerless.
Just a boy, moving from one prison to another.
Half his life was trapped by poverty. Dripping pipes and distant screams. The scrabble of rats in the walls and the scent of hunger hanging low in the air like a fog that never faded.
The other half of his life hung in a gilded cage, dripping with luxury and privilege, where his screams were the only ones crying out in the night.
After taking his bag to his room, he twisted the gold knob and stood at the threshold. A dizzying chill crawled over his skin as he tried to make sense of what he saw—or didn’t see.
His bookshelves were empty, gaping like a mocking grin of missing teeth.
The table where they’d spent countless hours studying was bare, wiped clean, as if years of lessons had never happened.
Fear sparked inside of him, igniting a brushfire of rage that compelled him down the hall until he was standing in the chancellor’s office.
“Where are Mr. Carrow’s books?”
“Carrow,” the chancellor spat as he finished signing his name to the paperwork on his desk. “That pretentious little worm. I should have fired him years ago.”
The floor dropped out from beneath Jack’s feet. “Fired?”
“Creative differences.” The chancellor sneered. “I should sue him for promising something he couldn’t deliver.”
“I don’t understand.”
“My autobiography.”
“Is it finished?”
“Finished?” He barked out a laugh. “The little Cambridge shit never started it. Years of dictation and taking notes, and for what?”
“But—”
“He’s gone now.”
“Gone where?”
None of this made any sense.
Mr. Carrow had been working on the book for years. Jack saw the pages amass, witnessed him make endless revisions.
“Not my concern. I had the servants pack up his garbage. Books, papers, all of it.” He waved a dismissive hand. “We’ll find you a new tutor. Someone who won’t fill your head with useless drivel.”
Jack couldn’t speak. Couldn’t breathe.
Gone.
Mr. Carrow was gone.
The one person in the world who saw him, who truly cared about him.
He hadn’t even been given the chance to say goodbye.
Where would he go? Jack didn’t know where he lived. He only knew he could count on his showing up.
“Why?”
The chancellor frowned, only then realizing how much this upset him. He sat back and eyed him critically. “Careful, boy.”
Jack swallowed back his rage, but it only pushed further up his throat. A lump that refused to go down.
He never wanted to hurt someone as much as he did in that moment. He imagined lunging at the chancellor and strangling his saggy neck until his beady eyes popped out of his hog-headed skull. But he knew how that would end.
He was the devil incarnate, and there was no winning in hell. Only losing. And layers upon layers beneath rock bottom, that the chancellor’s opposers eventually met.
So he turned and left, hardly able to make it back to his bedroom before dissolving into tears.
Golden fixtures blurred around him as he fell onto his bed and screamed into the pillows. His fist pounded on the mattress, but it wasn’t enough.
He wanted to hit the wall hard enough to break the world into a million pieces and then carve the chancellor’s eyes out with the shards.
The painted cherubs watched from above, silent witnesses to another death. Mocking him with their bright eyes and unwavering grins.