Chapter Text
It started with an email.
Crammed between students asking for help or extensions and various forgotten store deals, an email. It makes one almost miss those days before the internet, when things like this were delivered with a thin paper envelope, neatly written address and sticker for the sender; perhaps even farther back an official seal, carried by a messenger as swift as Hermes, envelope yellowed and slightly water-wrinkled from its journey. How the weight was so apparent as it crashed upon an old wooden desk, the room stilling in anticipation as the recipient grasps for the blade of the letter-opener like Abraham over Isaac, trembling-
They’re stalling. But of course they’re stalling this isn’t the sort of thing you just… deal with. Not that Riley has any frame of reference for this situation.
The old foe-turned-friend anxiety buzzed in their fingertips, given a voice by the soft whir of the silver spinner ring on their right hand. It’s soft noise brought them back, a steady ache coming to the old knees as they kept bouncing beneath the desk. There is that sick humility of wanting to ask for somebody to tell you what to do, familiar to the child and the isolated dependent. Riley sighs. They’d given up having these things be dictated long ago, but they still sometimes missed knowing what to do- what was expected for them to do.
The computer screen was starting to blur.
Breath in.
See: brown, cheap Office Depot desk; old jeans worn on the knees and ankle holes; squirrel grasping the wall outside their window; a picture of their kids.
Breath out.
It comes out as more of a cough.
Careful not to look at the address, dark eyes flashed to the computer’s clock. They have a class in fifteen minutes. That’s too close to cancel. Shit.
Riley felt their spine, taut, and forced their body to press back into their chair, tongue stuck between grinding teeth. With deep, measured breaths, they focused on the offending message, glowing mockingly. Not breaking, their hand caressed the trackpad. And clicked.
>Hello sweet baby!