thanh.nguyenhoang.1403@gmail.com
Stories
168
Chapters
1,512
Words
3.2 M
Comments
0
Reading
11 d, 4 h
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— The Magnolia Society Buried the Wrong Girl The oppressive humidity of the French Quarter does not respectfully halt at the wrought-iron gates of the Sainte Aurelia Conservatory. It bleeds through the limestone walls, settles into the velvet of the auditorium seats, and coats the lungs of every musician in the rehearsal hall. But today, the suffocating weight in the air has nothing to do with the New Orleans summer. It has everything to do with me standing at the threshold of Room 104. Two years. It…-
23.0 K • Completed
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The oppressive humidity of the French Quarter does not respectfully halt at the wrought-iron gates of the Sainte Aurelia Conservatory. It bleeds through the limestone walls, settles into the velvet of the auditorium seats, and coats the lungs of every musician in the rehearsal hall. But today, the suffocating weight in the air has nothing to do with the New Orleans summer. It has everything to do with me standing at the threshold of Room 104. Two years. It has been exactly two years since I was escorted…
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23.0 K • Completed
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The rare collections reading room of the Sainte Aurelia library smells of decaying paper, lemon oil, and secrets. It is a smell I used to find comforting, back when I believed the history of this conservatory was a sacred thing to be studied. Now, sitting at a scarred oak table in the deepest corner of the stacks, the scent makes me nauseous. I keep my hands flat on the table, staring at the scrap of vellum I peeled from beneath the piano. They buried me. Beside it lies an open volume of The Musical…
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23.0 K • Completed
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By nine o'clock the next morning, the physical architecture of my ruin has been carefully, brilliantly redesigned. I stand in the arched doorway of Rehearsal Hall 104, staring at the stage. Overnight, the seating schematic of the Sainte Aurelia graduate symphony has been entirely reconfigured. The strings, woodwinds, and brass have been pushed back and elevated on the acoustic risers, forming a towering, imposing semi-circle of power. And the Steinway grand piano—my piano—has been moved off the main…
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23.0 K • Completed
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The donor supper moves from the suffocating heat of the courtyard to the air-conditioned, gilded drawing rooms of the Laurent estate by eleven o'clock. Waiters in crisp white jackets circulate with silver trays of snifters, pouring fifty-year-old bourbon for board members whose faces are flushed with alcohol and institutional power. The heavy, syncopated rhythm of a jazz quartet playing in the parlor bleeds through the mahogany walls, a sterilized, polite version of the music that beats in the real veins…
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23.0 K • Completed
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The suffocating heat of the New Orleans night clings to me like a second skin as I move through the labyrinthine alleys of the French Quarter. My pulse is a frantic, deafening drumbeat in my ears. I can still see the shattered look on Camille’s face in the dark of her mother’s study. I can still hear the devastating admission that the plagiarism accusation—the scandal that tore my life apart—was a manufactured shield to save me from a federal prison sentence. But I am not running away from the…
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23.0 K • Completed
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SEBASTIAN The Saint Aldwyn clubhouse on Commonwealth Avenue has been transformed into an empire of shadows and velvet. It is the night of the Masquerade, the most guarded and grotesque tradition in Bellwether University’s history. The air in the grand foyer is thick with the scent of burning beeswax candles, expensive French perfume, and the metallic tang of cold champagne. A string quartet plays a haunting, minor-key arrangement of Vivaldi from the mezzanine, their notes floating down over the masked…-
22.5 K • Completed
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ROWAN The blue glare of the server room monitor casts long, jagged shadows across the steel floor. My pulse thrashes against my eardrums, deafening and erratic. Scholarship/Financial Aid Vulnerability Index. The line of code sits on the screen of my tablet, glowing with the radioactive truth of what Sebastian Vale actually is. I take another step back, my spine hitting the edge of the server rack. The cold metal bites through my tuxedo jacket, but it is nothing compared to the ice flooding my…
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22.5 K • Completed
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SEBASTIAN The pale, sickly light of the Somerville streetlamp bleeds through the vinyl blinds, illuminating the digital death warrant glowing on the phone screen. Immediate Suspension of the Saint Aldwyn Charter. Rowan’s breathing, previously a soft, even rhythm against my chest, turns shallow and jagged. She stares at the email from the university president, her mind struggling to reconcile the text with the reality of the titanium drive sitting untouched on her kitchen counter. "If we didn't…
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22.5 K • Completed
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ROWAN The Bellwether Ledger building sits on the northernmost edge of the campus, a converted nineteenth-century chapel of blackened stone and narrow, arched windows. Usually, it is my sanctuary. Today, it is a fortress that I am locked out of. I sprint across the icy pavement of the faculty parking lot, my breath tearing through my throat in ragged, freezing gasps. Behind me, the heavy footfalls of Sebastian’s boots hit the snow with relentless precision. The wail of campus security sirens is growing…
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22.5 K • Completed
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