Oil & Water

Arrival at Blackmoor Academy

The taxi stuttered to a stop in front of Blackmoor Academy, its wrought‑iron gates stretching high enough to block the sun. Beyond them sprawled a campus that belonged on the front of a luxury magazine: manicured lawns spilling into marble walkways, limestone buildings rising in orderly grandeur, ivy slicing green trails up their facades.

It didn’t look like a school. It looked like a castle.

Students breezed through the gates in tailored uniforms that fit as if they’d been sewn for each body individually. Laughter, high and effortless, drifted across the courtyard, wrapping the air in wealth I didn’t have.

Meanwhile, my suitcase squeaked behind me like an insult. The tie around my neck was loose, my jacket was thrifted to the bone. Same uniform, different world.

Inside the academy was worse. Polished floors, curtains heavy enough to drown a sound, the faint scent of cedar and citrus polish, and everywhere, whispers. Quick flicks of manicured fingers pointing, eyes darting like I was an accident someone refused to claim.

A woman approached—late thirties, blazer sharp enough to slice. Clipboard in hand, expression carved from ice. Lady Spitefulness, my brain embroidered instantly.

“Elodie?” she asked, her voice so crisp it cut.

It was close, but wrong. It always was. Elodi, like Melody without the M, not El-O-dee. El, to the people who knew me. But I didn’t correct her. Not today. Not when it would mark me as difficult before I even started.

So I nodded, accepted the folder, and kept moving.

Aunt Catherine’s neat handwriting filled the margins of my schedule. Notes. Instructions. Her signature already looping in the parent line beside mine. My mother’s name nowhere. She’d been erased with the efficiency of someone used to drawing clean slates.

My pen pressed hard against the page as I replaced Catherine’s signature with my mother’s instead, dark enough to cut through the paper.

My mother got me here. Not Catherine. No one can erase that.

The Roommate

My dorm room was half‑alive.

The left side, hers, looked like it belonged in a catalog. A monogrammed suitcase still open yet perfect, stacks of ivory blouses folded like origami, a velvet chair angled at the window, sunlight dripping over the fabric like it bowed to her. Even the chocolates on her nightstand weren’t touched, as if taste could ruin the aesthetic.

“This is my kingdom. You're allowed to exist....quietly.” The voice floated over polished glass. A blonde girl, Angela Fairfield, adjusted her mirror but didn’t bother to meet my eyes.

My lips curved, humorless. “I hope you didn't take a piss on my bed.”

Finally, she turned. Sharp eyes, sharp smile. “I didn't. But maybe I should.” Her gaze skimmed my cardigan, my slanted tie. Judgment glittered in her expression like diamonds catching light. Costly. Heartless.

I stared at my half of the room—bare, unwanted. “Thanks for the heads‑up.”

Her smile tightened. “Mind if I ask how you ended up in this… arrangement?”

“I requested a scholarship roommate.” My chin tilted, my voice steady.

The flicker in her eyes was immediate. She recovered fast, too fast, with a soft, cutting laugh. “A scholarship roommate? Darling, this isn't The Bunker. Just… don’t expect people here to treat you like you belong. Your aunt has money. You don't.”

My hand closed fast around my suitcase, steadying it instead of swinging it. “Good thing I don’t need your approval.”

Her laugh died, temper flat. “Good. Because you won’t get it.”

She walked away, satisfied with the line she’d drawn through the center of the room.

First Day Disasters

By midmorning, I’d been lost three separate times and humiliated once.

The map Blackmoor gave us could’ve been a relic stolen from a fantasy novel—paths curling like secret code, entire wings left off. After circling the literature building twice, I finally pushed into a classroom I thought was correct.

It wasn’t.

A row of perfectly pressed students turned, their gold pins gleaming against their lapels. A boy with slick hair arched a brow. At the front, a tall man glanced up from his lecture notes, eyes like cold iron. Professor Aldridge. The name clanged too late in the back of my head.

“Can I help you?” His voice invited no answer, only efficiency.

“Wrong class,” I muttered, stepping backward.

“Scholarship trash,” a girl near the front announced, not bothering to lower her volume.

Laughter rippled, not cruel in volume, but sharp in intention, like they were all reading from the same silent script.

Heat crawled up my throat. I turned and walked out before I gave them more to laugh about.

An Unsolicited Encounter

By lunch, my patience was threadbare. The line into the dining hall crept forward, trays clattering against polished counters. My legs ached, my clothes itched, and I hadn’t even found the right classroom yet.

Then Angela slid in next to me like she owned the air. Her uniform fit so flawlessly it almost mocked me—tie knotted to perfection, skirt hemmed by precision, ponytail smooth as glass.

“You do know there are rules about uniforms, right?” she asked, no smile, no softness. Just sure.

I looked down at myself. Wrong skirt color. Mismatched socks. Jacket rubbed thin at the elbows. “I'm in uniform.” My tone was flat.

“Barely.” Her eyes skimmed me once, sharp enough to scratch. “Blackmoor isn’t just a school. It’s a standard. If you don’t meet it…” She paused, letting the silence sharpen her words. “…you’ll find out what happens.”

“Sounds like a threat.”

“Sounds like reality.” She flicked her tray sideways, stepping ahead as if I’d already been dismissed.

My chest tightened, frustration pressing against my ribs. “Just one year,” I whispered. “That’s all I need to get through.”

A voice drifted from somewhere ahead in the dining hall. Low and steady, cutting through the chatter. It wasn’t speaking to me, but I heard it anyway.

Maybe that was a sign.