Act 8, Tether.

Emily's finger coiled around her white strands of hair, expelling a sigh, her fingers were tingling with excess energy - it had started since she departed from Kacper. Yesterday. It had dragged over to today and it wouldn't stop. Like fizzing under her skin, like a bath bomb in water.

It certainly did not help that earlier in the day she had confessed to her friends that she had a strange nightmare and it was quite rudely laughed off.. it didn't help that her bad dream had parallels to the one Kacper explained in the café. He had sunk away after telling her, she really ought to control her expressions better.

It is what drew her to steal Kacper's student card, to have a part of him with her to try soften this overwhelming feeling chipping away at her patience. She had been flipping the card between her fingers, the plastic smooth and calming against her finger tips.

It served to calm her minutely.

She had come to the library to study, but now couldn't get her mind off of that boy.

Rotating the card in her hand so it was pinched between her thumb and ring finger she finally decided to look at it, the ID's photo was not one taken at school - probably a home photo due to the fact Kacper joined the school later in the year. She hummed, tilting her head as she studied the card, amusement shining in her red eyes.

The boy in the picture was younger than Kacper was now, his cheeks chubby making him look almost infantile, it brought a smile to her lips - she couldn't help snapping a picture on her phone, tracing his little face with her finger.

She was utterly infatuated by him.

Yet... couldn't help but feel a weird jealousy towards Kacper, they were alike in many ways but he took the punches as they came. Jealousy hurt, jealousy over someone she barely knew hurt more, it was very self aware of her to know such.

It felt as if a barbed needle had been plunged into her core, being spun and twisted around within her layers and blending her innards to a thick slurry.

She had known him for a day. A day and this weird sort of rage was building within her.

And at the same time a dual feeling of mania was drumming at her skull, lilted voices acknowledging her every move - though they couldn't serve to smooth over her rage, the raw agonizing rage building up below the surface.

She drew her hair back from her face with a steady hand, continuing to scan the student ID, her eyes raking over the barcode first, unlike hers - which was older by a year or two - was clean, no scratches in the plastic disrupting the black lines, even the little row of numbers under the barcode was still visible.

Below stated his name, class and gender. Her eyes narrowed as she flited over the details, before landing on the gender section, where an ominous "X" lay where an "F" or "M" would usually sit.

She pressed the card flat against the table, face down.

~

Kacper had been low and contemplative since lunch, all this attention was making his chest feel tight, like a hand was wrapped around his torso and wouldn't stop squeezing.

He let out a shaky breath, hands working up to cup over his ears, nails just shy of digging into his skin. Everything was so loud, his hands were shaking, eyes screwed tight and body bowed against his desk.

The bell screeched loudly, causing him to flinch and gawk at the room as the flurry of classmates ran past him to go home, he took a collective of frenzied breaths before his shaking hands sunk to his lap, he still couldn't catch his breath, his heart felt as if spasming. He couldn't get a grip on himself, he couldn't control how he was feeling in any amount, it was like his body itself was betraying him. He had never, not once, gotten worked up like this before - he was scared.

Kacper looked upon the classroom, chairs all laid out empty, eyebrows starting to pinch together as he struggled with himself, before letting out a quiet whimper. Everyone had already left, bet he stuck out like a sore thumb... idiot.

That was all it took for the female teacher to come rushing to his desk, folding over to be eye level with him.

"Are you ok, Kacper?" She inquired, her tone motherly, he let out a short nod, hands going to his locks, feeling around through them - the texture calming him "If need be you can go to the nurse..?" She had continued, kneeling now, it felt wrong. This all felt wrong, this interaction didn't feel right, didn't feel real.

Kacper let out another shaky breath, before jolting upright and grabbing his bag "I'm- i'm okay, i just- sorry!" Kacper stammered , gripping the beige strap of his bag, forcing it up and onto his shoulder.

The way she was looking at him-

He shot off before the conversation could continue.

-was like he was a piece of meat.

Kacper felt his chest heaving as he ran through the long halls, it would've been rammed with students it had been any other block, trying to get out of the main gates - but this was the English block, which was at the far right corner of the school grounds. He was thankful for it.

He slammed himself into a set of double doors, using his weight to make them open before scrambling into the schools library, the smell of damp and old books hitting him like a soothing aura, he slumped down at one of the segregated study tables and buried his head in his arms, taking raspy breaths, the room spinning from said breaths. 

His hands found purchase on the edge of the table, rubbing up and down the length of it to try ground himself until suddenly- 

"Hey," He heard over his shoulder, a coincidence, it sounded like Emily.