A/n: for you necrocelia

Chapter Two

She has a new obsession. Cherries. Soft, plump, round and innocent. She buys a whole carton and spends the entire afternoon eating them. The small berries burst as her teeth sink into them, their juice as sweet and red as blood.

She holds one up to her face, gazing at it solemnly. She squeezes it between her fingers, and it bursts, splashing juice everywhere.

Her pale face is now blotched with red.

“Splish, splash,” she says seriously.

Each day is a new beginning with Jade. Connor learnt long ago to expect nothing when it came to her. There was no aspect of her that was reliable. It was almost as if she had no idea of protocol. She obeyed nobody’s rules but her own. Somewhere deep inside him, Connor knew he envied that.

Once he took her to the beach. She had only ever been once before, and that had been before her parent’s divorce. It had been a windy day, and her sundress whipped around her legs, the force of the breeze almost blowing her over.

She smiled fiercely as they stood on the sand bank overlooking the sea, Connor clutching a bag with picnic food in it.

“Not a good day to be at the beach,” he said glumly. This caused her to frown.

“Are you unhappy?” she asked solemnly.

“No. I’m never unhappy with you,” he grinned. Her face broke out into a smile to mirror his own.

“Make a castle with me,” she ordered. “For us.”

They spent hours building and rebuilding their castle. There was something so carefree about the day that he felt reckless.

In the afternoon, after he had packed up, he turned to see Jade standing close to the ocean, the waves crashing just in front of her, the wind dragging at her clothes and hair.

He walked up to stand beside her silently. She turned to look up at him, a smile about her lips.

“There is something in my nothing, and a nothing in my something,” she whispered. Then she frowned. “What is wrong?”

XXXX

Alex and he studied in the library some lunchtimes, when their workload had doubled and redoubled. It seemed as though the teachers went into a frenzy towards the end of semester, piling more and more assessment onto the students until they barely had time to eat and sleep let alone have fun.

Jade hated it when they worked. She had no trouble completing her work, and always had it done long before the due dates. This was one thing no one could understand about Jade. She behaved as if she were seven or eight, but achieved just as much as her sixteen year old fellows. None of the doctors her father had taken her to had been able to come up with a diagnosis for her. By all accounts, she should have been an ordinary teenage girl. Her condition was mental, definitely, but no one could define what it was.

They were in the library that day, both Alex and Connor revising for a test they had next period, with Jade slumped at their table, looking decisively bored. Finally she sighed in exasperation and stood up.

“This is very dull,” she stated, her hands on her hips, glaring at them both.

Alex raised an eyebrow.

“Couldn’t agree more, honey,” she said wryly. “But we’ve got to do it.”

Jade stamped a foot, and frowned.

“Why do you find this so hard to understand?” she asked. “It’s simple. I understand it, don’t I?”

Connor smiled, and set down his pen.

“We’re not all as smart as you,’ he said. Pushing his chair back, he stretched his arms up above his head and yawned. “I really need a good mark on this test.”

“Then I’ll help you,” Jade said firmly. She sat back down, and dragged his books in front of her. “See, this is chemistry, its simple. You just have to make sure all the valences balance, and the equation is fine.”

“Yeah, but how do I know what the valences are?” Connor countered.

“Well, it all depend on where the elements are on the Periodic Table,” Jade continued, pointing at the printout of the Table in front of them. “See?”

Alex was watching them thoughtfully. Jade appeared so ordinary like this. She seemed to be genuinely enjoying herself. As Alex watched, Jade pointed at various elements on the Periodic Table with a pencil, and then tested Connor on their atomic mass and valences.

“You know, you’re a natural,” Alex remarked. Student and teacher both turned to look at her quizzically. “At teaching, I mean. Have you ever though of becoming a teacher?”

Jade stared at her, frowning a little. Then she smiled, and shook her head bashfully.

“I wouldn’t be very good,” she muttered. “I’m too impatient.”

Connor glanced at her, then at Alex. Jade was never quiet or shy about anything, least of all her own abilities.

“I think you’re brilliant,” he said. She looked up at him silently, and then smiled slightly. He grinned back, and then shook his head as if to clear his thoughts. “Right. Test revision.”

XXXXXX

Connor passed the test with amazing grades, far better than ever before. Jade was proud of him, as if he truly was her student. He was ecstatic, and so was she, both captured in a bubble of their own success.

Alex watched them from a distance, recalling their conversation in the library. Jade had the makings of a true teacher, but lacked both the understanding and confidence. It was incomprehensible for her to even consider doing something she enjoyed for the rest of her life. She knew that people often pursued their dreams. But for Jade, her dreams weren’t worth the effort.

XXX

a/n: hmmm..review?