Common Ground (The Common Ground Trilogy Book 1) (24 page)

“Subject: Monday Morning Meeting”

Professor Woodward,

Hi, this is Zoe. I was wondering if you have any free time on Monday morning and can meet with me? There are a few questions I have about our last meeting, and was hoping to talk with you when you have some time.

I have Yoga from nine to ten, but after that I have a small break until about noon. If you have any time to squeeze me in, that would be great! Please let me know.

Have a good weekend.

Zoe”

I reread the message a few times before it sent. There was nothing in it that gave off a signal that something bad had happened. But knowing him, he’d want to see me as soon as possible after reading that I’d had some questions about our previous meeting. Once the message was gone, I closed my laptop and climbed into bed. Within a few seconds, my eyes began to shut while I hoped against hope that the entire night was just another in a very long line of terrible dreams that I’d eventually survive.

In what felt like a flash of light, my alarm clock was screaming at 8:30 on Monday morning. Groggily, I rolled over and smacked the snooze button in hopes of catching a few extra minutes sleep before going to yoga. But the sunlight had broken through the cracked open shutters and stung my closed eyes, forcing me out of bed earlier than planned. The weekend had flown by without a word from Professor Woodward or Annie, leaving me trapped in a depressed state of mind somewhere between loneliness and agitation. I tried to accept that no news was good news with Annie, and that Liam really had taken care of her. If something had gone wrong, I would have known.

Pushing the concerns about Liam and Annie aside, I rolled out of bed and stammered over to my computer to have my customary email check. But after a weekend of an empty inbox, I held no hope that Professor Woodward would actually have written me back. When the computer finally booted up and I opened my email, my heart jumped a few beats as Professor Woodward’s response awaited me in the inbox. With my hand shaking slightly, I clicked on the message and started to read.

“Zoe,

I have a class this morning at 10:30, but am around in my office until then if you can somehow make it in before Yoga. If not, try to get to here as quickly as possible afterwards so we can have adequate time to talk.

I hope you had a good weekend,

LW”

My eyes instantly flew to the nightstand clock, which read 8:35. For a moment, I weighed the option of skipping Yoga all together in order to see Professor Woodward as soon as possible. While my brain battled over the decision to ditch my first ever class, a loud knock on the front door resonated through the entire apartment. Leaping out of my chair, I rushed to the front door, hoping to see only one person standing there.

Steph’s misshapen face was looking back at me through the peephole as I unlocked the door feeling slightly irked. It was stupid to think it would be Annie, given the fact that Steph had actually knocked on the door. But after another weekend without her and not knowing if she was okay, seeing anyone else didn’t make me feel very good.

“Good morning!” she sang, poking her head into the apartment. “Care to join me on a walk to class?”

“I’m not sure I can make it to class today,” I said, opening the door enough to let her though.

“Why not? What better way to start your week than with a refreshing Yoga class?” she asked curiously.

“I need to go see another Professor about something, it’s pretty important.”

“Oh, what Professor?”

“Professor Woodward, he’s my religious studies teacher. We, uh, have a big test this week and I need to get a handle on some stuff,” I replied nervously, throwing the door closed behind her.

Some of the light in her face faded for a moment as my words sank in. Her normal smile had diminished slightly while she stared at me. The pause was miniscule, but noticeable. Seeing my puzzled expression, she quickly regained her composure.

“Oh come on Zoe, you’re the smartest person I know. Can’t you just wait until you have class with him? It’s important to get your body off to a proper start for the week. He’ll be there after class!”

Both the studious and curious sides of my personality were clashing like gladiators. Even though I’d been waiting all weekend for the chance to talk to Professor Woodward, the hesitation to miss my first class ever made the choice more difficult than it should have been. Steph stared at me eagerly, bouncing on the balls of her feet. I could tell that there was no way she’d let me miss class.

“Alright,” I surrendered. “You win. Give me a minute to get ready.”

“’Atta girl!” she smiled, patting me on the back. “I’ll just go say hi to Annie real quick. Is she still sleeping?”

“Actually,” I stopped with my back to her. “She hasn’t been home all weekend.”

“Oh,” she replied uneasily. “I know the two of you went out on Friday night to fix things. I’ve been running around all weekend so I didn’t have a chance to see how it went. Must not have gone so well then?”

It was too painful to relive everything that had happened that night. Recalling the tale to Professor Woodward later in the morning was going to be hard enough, let alone telling it for the first time to Steph. Even if I wanted to say something, what would it be? That I’m supposedly some hybrid angel and demon? She’d tell me I was crazy and probably never talk to me again. Unable to lie directly to her face, I kept my back to her and responded.

“No, it didn’t go so well. It ended pretty badly and she’s been at the Beta house all weekend.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know,” she apologized. “How are you holding up?”

“The weekend helped, gave me time to think about things. But I don’t really want to talk about it, I’ll be out in a minute,” I said shortly and continued onto my bedroom.

“Any time you want to talk about it, I’m here for you,” she said to my back as I closed the door behind me.

When the clock on the nightstand read 8:45, I started to feel rushed. Moving quicker than ever, I threw on a pair of white running shorts and a sea blue tank top then ran to the bathroom to brush my teeth. Without even realizing it, I was back in the foyer of the apartment and ready to go in no more than five minutes. Even Steph looked surprised.

“Wow, that was fast!” she exclaimed while I opened the front door again and beckoned her out. “I’ve never seen anyone get ready and look so good in that short of time!”

“When you’re in a hurry, you’re in a hurry,” I shrugged, locking the door behind me.

“I guess so,” she smiled. “I’m glad you’re coming to class. You won’t regret it.”

We descended the stairs and started walking towards campus. Steph’s earlier inquiries about Annie, although innocent, were still difficult to hear. In an attempt to avoid talking more about Annie or even Professor Woodward, I shifted the topic of conversation before she could ask anything else.

“So, how was your weekend? You said it was real busy right?”

“It was awesome,” she gloated as a mischievous smile spread across her perfect lips. The excitement in her voice was unmistakable. I decided to push for more, hoping that her ranting would help clear my mind for Yoga.

“Details!” I demanded.

“Okay, well you know Damien right?” she asked.

My stride faltered briefly as I stumbled, taken aback from her question. Knowing Steph and, to a lesser extent Damien, I could see where she was going with it. I just nodded uneasily for her to continue.

“Well, he took me out on Saturday night and let me tell you…” she whistled, nodding her head slowly in some type of sick approval.

It was hard to stomach listening to her talk about the two of them, even though I had no attraction to Damien whatsoever. For the first time ever, I’d been a victim of guys and their stupid games, with one of my good friends being the ultimate prize. Blaming Steph wasn’t the solution though, so I tried to focus back on her.

“And?” I said, hoping she’d spare me any gruesome details.

“Let’s just say I didn’t leave my room much yesterday and this is the first time I’ve been outside since Saturday night,” she said, barely able to contain her excitement.

Knowing exactly what she meant by it, I couldn’t figure out who had the worse weekend: me with the mugging or Steph with an intimate weekend with Damien?

“Wow, I guess congratulations are in order then?” I asked in a bad attempt at sounding supportive.

She just giggled and started skipping dreamily, jumping between the sidewalk and the parking lot as we approached the main gym. Her outlandish behavior had captured my full attention and as a result, I barely had time to jump out of the way from a jogger that sprinted by the two of us while we turned the corner towards the main steps of the gym. In a quick moment of frustration, my head turned around to find the culprit, who was long gone before any identification could be made. Annoyed, I turned back forward and ran to catch up with Steph, who had somehow managed to dance her way around the corner and out of sight.

“Oops, got here a little quicker than I thought,” Steph chuckled minutes later, turning on the lights to an empty yoga studio.

“A little quicker?” I responded flabbergasted. “Nobody’s even here yet!”

“It’s okay Zoe, now we have some time to warm up before everyone else gets here.”

“Fine,” I sighed. “Let’s go.”

We both walked over to our customary places in the far back corner and set up our stations. More students came bustling in minute after minute until the place became packed. Over 30 girls were chatting and stretching lightly, waiting patiently for Mr. Himani to arrive. After what was at least 15 minutes, our instructor finally came strolling inside.

“Good morning class,” Mr. Himani said merrily, entering the room with yoga mat and stereo in tow, with his bald head shining under the fluorescent lights above. “Today is going to be a challenging day for many of you. It will be a difficult test of your concentration and flexibility skills. We will be attempting a beginners’ version of the vasisthasana, or side plank stretch. You need to be on top of your game today to receive maximum benefit. Let’s begin with some simple breathing exercises to warm up.”

The class continued on as usual, with Mr. Himani demonstrating poses for the class before allowing us to experiment ourselves. My concentration had been sorely tested that morning and all weekend with Annie’s absence, Liam’s surprising exposé and Professor Woodward’s meeting each fresh in my head. In return, I had expected a miserable, uninspired session that day. But as the class progressed, I found myself completing exercises and stretches in a way I’d never even gotten close to achieving before. Even Mr. Himani noticed during his regular inspection.

“Zoe, what a surprise!” Mr. Himani gushed, stopping in front of my mat during the plank stretch he’d warned us about. “You have perfect balance! I must say that you’re vast improvement comes as a pleasant surprise. Have you been practicing?”

“Not really,” I said coolly between deep breaths. My gaze was focused straight ahead while my entire body weight flooded my right arm. My balance and stability was sturdier than a rock, which was unbelievable.

“Amazing. No practice and you’re doing it even better than Stephanie! Keep up whatever it is you are doing!”

I looked over at Steph who just glowered at me from her own pose. The look on her face was a mix of awe and shock.

“How are you doing that?” she panted while barely maintaining her stability.

“I don’t know,” I huffed.

“B.S… you’ve been practicing haven’t you? Did you go out and buy one of those home DVD’s? Please tell me you didn’t!”

“I swear to god I didn’t,” I replied, still maintaining my perfect balance. “Your guess is as good as mine.”

“So, glad you skipped your meeting now?” she asked while her right arm started shaking uncontrollably.

Truth was that I still felt guilty for not taking advantage of going to Professor Woodward’s office when I had the chance. There were so many questions and it was going to take much longer than the half hour he booked for me. To appease Steph’s ego, I replied as politely as possible.

“I guess so,” I said, refocusing my gaze back towards the front of the room.

“Unbelievable,” Steph muttered in awe and she finally collapsed from the pose.

Steph’s reminder of Professor Woodward sat in my thoughts for the next few minutes until Mr. Himani ordered everyone into the corpse pose. While he changed the CD to a mix of soothing beach sounds and shut off the lights, I began to think about all the questions that brewed in my head. My frustration grew and I thought again about not taking advantage of Professor Woodward’s earlier offer. I’d need all the time I could get just to ask him about what Liam had said, let alone everything else about his crazy theory.

Following Mr. Himani’s instructions, I lied flat on my back and breathed deeply, ignoring the growing butterflies that churned in my stomach. Getting all of my questions finally answered made me feel a little nervous. It had been weeks since Professor Woodward’s revelations flipped my world upside down and it was almost time to get to the bottom of the whole thing. One final deep breath exited my body before my eyes shut and I began to drift.