Gloria
The glass hit the floor like gunfire. Shards scattered across the tiles, glinting under the fluorescent lights. For a beat, my body refused to move. His chest was iron beneath my palms, solid, immovable.
Valevsky didn't flinch. Not even at the violent crack of the storm rushing through the broken window. He only shifted, pressing me behind him with a motion so fluid, so instinctive, it was like he'd done it a thousand times before.
"Stay down," he murmured, low.
I didn't have time to argue. His command slid into my bones before I could think. My knees bent, and I ducked automatically, heart slamming against my ribs.
Another crash. Not thunder this time. Something heavier, metallic, bouncing across the floor.
A bullet. The metal clanked on the floor as my eyes widened.
Valevsky didn't pick it up right away. He stood there, behind me as a guard, still as a shadow, eyes on the window as if expecting more to follow. The storm outside howled through the jagged frame, carrying the sharp scent of rain and danger.
Finally, he crouched, picked the bullet up with his fingers, and scanned it once. His jaw tightened.
I stood up.
I strained to see, but he folded it into his palm before I caught a single word. His gaze cut to me so sharply that I was afraid to move a muscle.
"Who knows you were here?" he asked.
My throat dried. "No one. I was just—" I held up the lie in my trembling hands. "Returning your handkerchief."
Something unreadable flickered in his eyes. He exhaled slowly, as if testing whether to believe me.
"You should not have come."
I took a step back. Was that a warning? Regret laced his voice as if I had committed a serious crime and he was the one who had to pay for it. My simple motive was to just return the handkerchief and be gone from his presence as soon as I could.
Wasn't it quite obvious for me to be afraid of him when he stared at me as if he knew every inch of my soul?
I scoffed and squared my shoulders. "I merely came here to return you something you should not have left. Besides, if there is a school shooting going on outside, then wouldn't it be better that I am here and not," I pointed outside the window. "And not there?"
His eyes cut through mine like a laser. His veiny hands tapped his temples. "It's not a school shooting." He huffed.
I bit the inside of my cheeks. The curiosity grew inside me. Was he insinuating that he was the target of the bullet? Moreover, he speaks Russian, as I was not supposed to hear it.
I assessed him with my eyes. He was not just a teacher; even a blind person could figure that out. What is he hiding behind his mask?
My thoughts cleared immediately when he grabbed my wrist and pulled me outside of the room. The door closed loudly but he did not let go.
"Is anyone coming to pick you up?" He asked, sweat dripping from his temple as his honey brown pupils dilated while looking at me.
I saw his eyes travel its way from my eyes to my cheeks to my nose and lips. At last, they settled on my frown. Is he checking me out?
I huffed in pure frustration. Right. What in the world am I doing? I fainted during my first class of the first day of school, my image was ruined before I could build it, someone almost shot me just now, and my homeroom teacher is looking at me weirdly.
What a great welcome to this town!
"I don't need your help if that's what you are planning to do. My guardian would be here any time, and I will be just fine on my own." I said.
The sudden roar of the engine made me flinch. I barely had time to register the sleek black car skidding to a halt in the driveway before the door flew open and my mother stormed inside, heels striking the floor with deliberate force.
"Gloria!" Her voice cracked just enough to carry fear underneath the sharpness.
I froze, staring at her. "Mom? What—what's going on?"
"Oh my, God. I'm so glad you're fine." She lunged forward, grabbing my arm with an iron grip that burned through the fabric of my blazer, hugging me.
I struggled under her grip as confusion got to me. "Mom, what are you-,"
"No questions, out. Now!" She dragged me away.
Valevsky stepped in front of me, blocking her path. "She doesn't belong—"
"She's coming with me," my mother snapped, voice like steel, eyes scanning him like she could see straight through him. "Step aside."
He didn't argue. His jaw tensed, a shadow of frustration flickering across his face, but he stepped back. The corner of his eye lingered on me before he finally turned toward the broken window. My chest hammered as adrenaline spiked. I wanted to ask him what it meant, but the words stuck in my throat.
My mother yanked me backward, and I stumbled over my own heels. "Mom! Wait! I—"
"Keep moving!" she snapped, dragging me across the wet tiles toward the door. My pulse raced. Bullet. Storm. Valevsky. My mind tried to piece it together, but nothing made sense.
The wind whipped at my hair as we burst out of the entrance, rain soaking through my blazer, slicking the pavement beneath my feet. My mother shoved me into the car, slammed the door, and I barely had a moment to catch my breath before the engine roared to life. Tires squealed as we pulled away, spinning into the rain-slicked street.
"Mom, stop!" I pressed against the glass, voice shaking. "What's happening?"
"Not now!" she barked, hands gripping the wheel as if her life depended on it.
I pressed my forehead to the window, watching the school shrink behind us. Valevsky had vanished, leaving nothing but the jagged outline of the broken window and the memory of the bullet clattering across the tiles. My stomach twisted. Someone had tried to kill me. Or him. I didn't know which, and the fragments my mother had let slip told me only that she knew more than I did.
"Mom," I whispered, voice tight. "I don't understand. Why—"
Her eyes flicked to mine as I saw a fragment of desperation. "You don't need to understand. Just trust me. You need to be safe. That's all that matters."
Her grip on the wheel was iron. Her jaw clenched so tightly I could see the strain in her throat. I wanted to argue, to demand answers, but I realized I was powerless.
The storm outside and the tension inside the car pressed down on me. Every nerve was alive. I felt the adrenaline pumping, the fear clawing at my ribs, the urge to ask questions battling with the undeniable knowledge that I was in the middle of something far larger than myself.
The city lights blurred across the rain-streaked glass, and my gaze drifted to my hands, clenched so tightly I could feel my nails digging into my palms.
For a moment, everything that happened today felt deliberate.
I didn't understand what was happening, and yet, in the fragments I saw, the urgency in my mother's movements, the shadow of Valevsky's eyes, the shattered glass, the rain whipping at the streets. I knew my life had just shifted. Danger wasn't a story anymore. It was here. And I was caught in it.