Player: Felicia
Location: World 1, Science class
“Hearts.”
The science teacher—Mr. Science Teacher, as I had dubbed him—was pacing in front of a whiteboard with a huge, aggressively messy heart scribbled across it in red dry-erase marker. It looked more like a mutated potato with angry veins than an actual heart, but I appreciated the effort. Sort of.
Science was soooooo boring. I’d much rather be out staking vampire hearts than listening to a man monologue about blood flow and ventricles. And trust me, vampire hearts are way more educational—especially when they explode.
“I don’t have a very good heart,” Mr. Science Teacher announced, dramatically clasping his chest like he was about to faint in a soap opera. “But this student does.”
There was a vial sitting on my desk. It looked ominous. Could’ve been filled with man-eating goblin goo for all I knew. Probably cursed. Maybe both. I didn’t touch it. Just… stared at it like it might sprout legs and dance off. Nope. Just a vial. A perfectly ordinary, science-class kind of vial.
Then Deepika’s boots—big, shiny, glittery monsters—caught the light just right. A sunbeam bounced off one, ricocheted off a metal pencil sharpener, hit the vial, and lasered straight into my eyeballs. I hissed like a cat and covered my face. Science class was actively attacking me now.
When my vision stopped sizzling, I looked down—only to see big, gooey footprints all around my desk. Like someone had walked through jelly. Deepika must’ve stepped in that puddle of fairy goo in the hallway and tracked it in. Typical. Fae residue clings to everything.
Mr. Science Teacher started walking toward me, stepping past a few students who gave him the kind of glares that said, please stop talking forever. Guess science wasn’t their favorite subject either. Not that I blamed them. Still, it felt kinda rude to glare a guy right in the face when he’s talking about hearts. I mean, I’ve got a stake that’s taken out goblin hearts, and I don’t go around scaring science teachers. No, no. I scare other students instead. Much more polite.
“Felicia,” he said, nodding at me solemnly, like we were about to summon an old god “She has a very good heart.”
I blinked. “Really? Well, thanks. Maybe I should pay more attention in science class.”
I was actually rethinking my whole life for a split second. Maybe I could become a scientist. Study magical anatomy. Discover dwarf blood was a whole new element. Win awards. Become famous. Get invited to wizard galas. I could wear a lab coat and slay monsters. Multitask my way into history. And who would I have to thank?
Mr. Science Teacher.
He sighed deeply. Like the weight of the world—or at least a very disappointing class period—rested on his shoulders.
“Not that she’s kind,” he added dryly.
“Never mind,” I said, resting my head on my desk. “Spacing out seems very inviting.”
“You see,” he continued, pacing like some tragic philosopher, “the real heart that beats has nothing to do with the heart of the soul. Felicia just has a good, healthy organ. Nothing more, nothing less.”
Rude.
Next to me, Deepika was sketching furiously. Her notebook had been transformed into a chaotic swirl of doodles. I peeked over. She was drawing a goat. With wings. A pegasus goat, if you will. Majestic. Probably deadly.
“On my search for a good heart like hers,” Mr. Science Teacher said, striking a new pose, “I found a team that explored caves beneath this land. Beneath us. They discovered something unusual. A new chemical. And that’s what’s in the vial in front of you.”
Cue dramatic music. I squinted at the vial again, half expecting it to glow or explode or whisper ancient secrets. Nothing. It just sat there. Being all mysterious.
“Hey,” I whispered to Deepika, elbowing her softly, “did you learn anything from that textbook you were reading earlier?”
“What textbook?” she asked, not looking up.
“The science one you kept flipping through before class.”
“I was looking for a doodle reference. Not science.”
“Right. Should’ve known. But have you read anything remotely textbook-ish?”
“In my training arc, yes,” Deepika said solemnly, like we were in an anime and she was about to monologue through her
“Hey Felicia,” she sang, hands on her hips. “I’m here to rescue lonely ol’ you by being your science partner!”
“Oh.” I tried to smile. I wasn’t not happy to see her. I was just... hoping for someone else. Someone tall. With the perfect body. With the perfect soul. And tragic backstory energy.
“What’s wrong? Why am I starving your fun?” Felicia asked, already following my gaze like a detective.
I was staring at Victor. Again. Couldn’t help it. The boy had main-character energy. He probably woke up in the morning to theme music and lighting effects. He really did look like a model.
Deepika glanced over at the ridiculously good-looking Victor. Her eyes narrowed like she was preparing to attack.
“Is that bag of bones you’re staring at a monster? Do you want to be his lab partner so you can help bury his body?” she whispered, dead serious.
I winced. “No! That’s Victor! He’s human. He’s kind, he’s attractive, he’s... just lovely. He even told me I was prettier than a blood-soaked elf!”
Deepika blinked. “So that’s the boy you’re in in love with. Huh, he looks nothing like Easton.”
It happened a few days ago. I was minding my business—well, sort of. I was working on my book while walking to class, juggling my bag, a slightly sticky protein bar, and a magical field guide that had been cursed. Then Victor appeared out of nowhere like the lead in a dream sequence and said it—out loud.
“You’re prettier than a blood-soaked elf.”
I was stunned. I think I made a weird sound. Then I spun on my heel and ran straight into the nearest restroom, where I nearly exploded trying to call Deepika—but my phone had died, of course, because fate is cruel.
At the time, I was mad at him. I thought he had a girlfriend. I had heard the rumors Glinda made up and assumed the worst. But looking back now? It was... kind of beautiful. Tender, in a very murder-fantasy way. I used to admire blood-soaked elves in my fantasies, too, Victor. I get you. I get you.
“Say no more!” Deepika said dramatically, standing up like she was about to deliver a speech on top of a cafeteria table. “I shall bless another human with my presence and be someone else’s lab partner! And I will convince Victor to be yours.”
“Oh—you really don’t have to do that—”
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“VICTOR!” she bellowed, flapping her arms like an inflatable tube man outside a sketchy car dealership. “This girl wants to engage in romantic activities with you! I hereby hand over this lovely maiden to be yours, young man! Now—who wants to feel greatness by being my lab partner?!”
Every head in the room snapped toward her like we were in a horror movie and she’d just summoned a demon. The classroom, once full of chatter and sighs, fell into stunned silence.
One kid near the back ducked under his desk. Another pointed at the student next to him, who swatted the hand away like it was diseased.
No one moved.
I sighed internally. It was very likely Deepika would be my lab partner after all. And, honestly, that was fine. She knew how to work with magical substances without blowing things up most of the time. I also knew how to dodge her “monster catching” advice. (Don’t ask.) Like that one time she insisted the janitor was a troll in disguise. He just had allergies.
I dared to look across the room again. Victor was staring straight at me. Emerald-green eyes. The kind of eyes that make you feel like you're in a music video—slow-motion hair flip and all.
He mouthed something.
“Am I lucky enough that you want to be my lab partner? Or do you want to spend time with a kid who can’t even spell ‘bueaty’?”
Or... at least that’s what I’ve been told he said. I couldn’t really read lips. For all I knew, he was asking me if I had a sandwich.
I snatched up my notebook like a sword, scribbled in the biggest, boldest letters I could manage:
“WHAT DID YOU SAY?”
I held it up like a medieval scroll.
He squinted at me.
Nothing.
No sign, no smile, no wink. Just mild confusion and a slight tilt of his head. My stomach did a cartwheel. Or maybe a backflip. Or maybe it just collapsed from stress.
It was the longest minute of my monster-hunting life. And that includes the time I faked being sick to fight demons in a sewer. (In my defense, they were rude demons.)
Then—he stood up.
And started walking toward me.
Even his walk had swagger. Not the forced kind. The unbothered, I'm-in-a-teenage-girl’s-fantasy kind.
“Oh no, Victor,” Felicia said, still beside me, clutching her folder like it was shielding her from the plague. “You can’t be my lab partner. I don’t spill chemicals on my best friend’s crush.”
“Oh, I’m so disappointed,” he replied, mock-wounded, hand over his chest like he’d been stabbed with a pipette. “But I hear Bob doesn’t have a partner yet. He might be interested.”
“You mean the boring boy with the cracked glasses? All he talks about is numbers.”
“Everybody else is taken.”
She sighed like her soul was evaporating through the ceiling, then slunk off toward Bob, who was already measuring something with the intensity of a caffeinated scientist. I was genuinely worried—if she was this mopey, she might not have the energy to scream Billie Eilish songs with me in the car later. Then again, she knew better than to get emotionally attached the way I did.
“Finally, she’s gone,” Victor said, suddenly closer—close enough to count the tiny freckles on his nose. “Waiting for you has been an eternity.”
“She’s not that bad,” I said, shifting my weight like the floor might open up and swallow me. “She just thinks she’s the morally gray banshee in everyone else’s tragic villain origin story.”
He paused. Blinked. Then nodded solemnly. “Yeah. That actually checks out.”
He picked up the vile on the desk “Do you want to be my lab partner”
“I... don’t know,” I added, nervous rambling kicking in. “Do you want me as yours? If not, that’s okay! It might not even be that you don’t like me. Maybe you just have to—I don’t know—go clean a bloodstain or something. It’s—”
“You would make me the happiest being in the world if you were my lab partner,” he said.
“Really?”
“I’ve been turning down other lab tables. I was waiting for you.”
My brain short-circuited. Like, total static. He really liked me. He might even want to be my boyfriend. I should ask him that. Right now. Or maybe later, when I could form actual sentences without sounding like I swallowed a blender.
I didn’t want to make a scene. The teacher, oblivious, was still droning on: “A check is a written order instructing a bank to pay a specific sum of money to a designated person or entity—the payee…”
And there we were. Possibly falling in love, mid-lecture about checks.
He tilted his head thoughtfully. “You know, a lot of churches I check out turn me away. They keep asking for checks too, come to think of it. I guess explaining how someone could load a gun, fire it, and then put the used bullet back inside the chamber to get away with murder wasn’t... appreciated.”
Okay, maybe he wasn’t trying to be romantic. Maybe he just wanted to be friends.
Maybe he only wanted to be friends.
“Hey Victor,” I blurted out. “What do you find romantic?”
Please say being lab partners. Please say being lab partners.
He scratched his chin. “Hmmm. I’d say… giving someone a handwritten note. You?”
Oh no. Rotten slugs. He didn’t give me a handwritten note. This wasn’t meant to be.
“I bought this necklace for myself from Lucia’s,” I said, fiddling with the chain around my neck. “I always imagined my soulmate would put it on me at a sushi restaurant.”
“Hm. And you’re going to give it to your soulmate before they give it back to you?”
“Nice of you to understand,” I said. “You really are a smart cookie.”
“Well, if you like sushi restaurants,” he said, digging into his backpack like it was a magic bag, “I’ve got some sushi right here.”
He pulled out a box, popped it open—and yep. There was sushi.
“No thank you. I appreciate the gesture, but I don’t eat candy from strangers.”
“Sushi is kind of like candy.”
“Well… I guess I meant I don’t take food from strangers.” I paused. “But maybe you won’t always be a stranger.”
You could be my husband, I thought.
We stood there in the weirdest, most hopeful silence. I waited. He’d give me a note, right?
He looked a little... sad. Like, emotionally damaged. Like Lisa’s pet fish, Einstein. Always looked like it knew something we didn’t. I never understood why she liked it so much.
Behind us, other students murmured in that distracted background-noise way. One said, “Did you see the boy on TV getting shot? Maybe I should talk to a fortune teller about it. There’s more of them popping up lately.”
Another chimed in, “You're still worrying about that? I just want a guy who speaks slow and hot. Sadly, my boyfriend talks too fast. My aunt says she sees things in her sleep. That’s why she’s disappointed in my boyfriend.”
I stared at Victor.
Still no note.
I guess I’d have to make the first move.
But first… I had to tell him what I was. Because if I waited until we were married and then he divorced me? That would shatter the tiny pieces of my heart like I was a building caught in a Kansas tornado. Maybe worse. Maybe like a glass chandelier being hit with A bat by God himself.
“We need to heat up this vial,” Victor said, adjusting his goggles like he thought they made him look scientific and not, you know, like a steampunk rat. “Weird how they’re encouraging students to start fires. I mean, it’s right up my alley, but still—”
“I’ve got a secret,” I said, casually getting out my notebook. “Don’t worry—it’s only that I’m kind of a murderer. Emphasis on kind of.”
Now that wouldn’t scare him off. Whoop-de-doo. Just another day being way better at social skills than most people. Honestly, it’s still a mystery why the school’s terrified of me.
“Oh really?” he said, grinning like I’d just told him I was part-time royalty. “I’m intrigued.”
“Well,” I began, swallowing the lump in my throat. “I was just a normal teenage girl with zero demons in her world. My biggest concern used to be passing geometry. But then... I started seeing things.”
“Things?”
I paused. Lisa told me not to overshare. Monsters who know I kill them might try to kill me.
“Can you promise not to tell a soul? Even if it gets eaten by a banshee? A real one—worse than Deepika.”
“My lips are sealed forever,” he said solemnly. “Even if it means the end of the world.”
Instead of throwing up, happy words spilled from my mouth without permission.
“This is the best day of my life! And to think I almost stayed in bed just to watch some lovely nightmares. But instead, I stayed up... and saw something even more wonderful.”
I couldn’t help it. I was grinning like I’d won the lottery—no, better—like I’d discovered a secret door that opened to a world where everything made sense. And I was holding the key.
My joy, however, was short-lived.
The sound of a loud slam echoed through the lab. I jerked my head up to see the teacher standing over us, palm flat on the desk, like a judge preparing to deliver a sentence. His expression was all business—except the eyes, which were giving off that familiar "I’m too tired for this" vibe.
“Have you two done anything besides talk to each other?” he asked, voice dripping with thinly-veiled sarcasm.
I looked at my notebook, then back at him, eyes wide. “I mean... Victor sat down and everything.”
The teacher raised an eyebrow, clearly unimpressed. He wasn’t buying the charm.
“She’s just joking,” Victor jumped in smoothly, giving the teacher an easygoing grin like he hadn’t just melted my heart ten seconds ago. “We already finished the project.”
Sure enough—the once-blue vial now glowed a deep, successful red. The chemical reaction was perfect, the way it was supposed to be. It was a small victory, but in the context of everything, it felt monumental.
The teacher stared at us for a moment, his face the picture of mildly annoyed authority. Finally, he muttered under his breath:
“Didn’t think she was that funny.”
But he walked away.
As he retreated, I exhaled a breath I didn’t realize I’d been holding. That was a close call, though—one of those moments where you can feel the world’s eyes on you, but you somehow manage to duck out of the way just in time.
“Wow,” I said, still a little breathless from the rush of emotions. “You’re more amazing than a survivor of the zombie apocalypse!”
Victor chuckled, shaking his head. “Thanks, but I wouldn’t have tried so hard if I wasn’t helping you.”
“That’s even more amazing.” I raised an eyebrow. “I’m starting to think you might actually be some kind of prince in disguise.”
“Maybe I am.” His grin was a little too perfect, a little too mischievous. He leaned a little closer, just enough to make my heart skip a beat. The air between us thickened, charged with something I couldn’t quite name, but I was beginning to like it. “I have a gift for you in my locker... if you’re tempted to see it?”
Temptation. That word hung in the air like a delicious forbidden fruit.
Temptation. It was practically a main character in the For(ward)bidden Love series!
“I like temptation,” I said, my voice a little softer than I intended, like I was testing the waters of this new, strange connection we were forging.
Victor’s eyes gleamed. “I do too. Though it’s just A gift. I’ll show you after science class.”
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