The audience quieted as a tall man in a dark blue suit and white shirt stepped onto the stage from behind the curtains. The spotlight reflected off his rectangular glasses, hiding his eyes. Like a TV star, he strode to the wooden podium with a microphone and waved a greeting to the arriving guests. As soon as he smiled, applause broke out from the back rows, which I joined out of politeness rather than respect, as I hardly knew anything about the man on stage. If not for the photographs on the university's homepage, I would have had to guess his status.
"Good evening, dear friends!" The man, standing at the microphone, spread his arms as if trying to embrace the entire hall. "My name is Pavel Pavlovich Pankratov, and I am pleased to welcome new applicants and their parents to the Xerton State Institute. For the past thirty years, I have served as rector of this, I dare say, outstanding institution. Within our walls, great minds grow strong, and coal turns into diamonds before facing the harsh but fair world."
Pavel Pavlovich's inspiring speech was interrupted by the loud bang of the heavy door at the hall entrance, followed by a quiet giggle and a hissing sound in the distance. Curious, I, like others, turned toward the source and saw Stanislav and Artur, who hadn't even had time to check their coats.
"It is very pleasant to see so many inspired and youthful eyes striving for knowledge," the rector continued as the brothers hurried to the empty seats in the back row. "Education at our university rests on three pillars, as the ancients believed, which maintain balance in the world. They are called discipline, mutual support, and order. By joining our institute's family, applicants will discover new horizons of knowledge and self-realization through the abundance of faculties and programs, which department heads will explain in more detail. But before I leave, I want to announce the following: the doors of my office are always open to those wishing to engage in active and socially beneficial activities aimed at the institute's welfare. Office hours can always be confirmed with my secretary, Olga Mikhailovna."
Despite his advanced age, the rector descended the steps briskly to applause, buttoned his jacket, and soon sat in his reserved seat in the front row.
While the new speaker waited for a presentation to appear on the screen covering the far wall, I took the opportunity to look for Stas, but even with my werewolf vision, finding Smirnov in the crowd of strangers was difficult. Giving up, I took out my phone and texted him:
A: Where did you leave Rostov?
The two checkmarks indicating the message had been read appeared quickly, but there was no reply. When I stopped waiting and locked my phone, preparing to focus on the economics faculty speech, the phone vibrated.
S: She probably won't come today.
A: What, did the talk go badly?
S: Something like that. For her, at least.
A: I hope you didn't eat her? :D
S: That's more your department now ;)
Stas's joke sent a shiver down my spine. He would reply too. Well, I started it.
A: How did it go?
S: Not now, okay? I don't want to recount it in messages.
A: You're not obliged to tell me anything anyway.
The phone went silent. So we weren't that close if Stas politely avoided the topic, citing a vague "later." The sting of distrust bit sharply, like a snake, and I spiraled into thoughts that I had misunderstood everything. What if Stas didn't value me the way I did him? What if, in his mind, we were never friends, just acquaintances forced together by coincidences and misfortune? In a city where vampires, werewolves, and who knows what else lived among humans, mythical creatures could create a safe circle in which, with some exceptions, they could reveal their true selves. Doomed, never choosing friends. Bound by a chain of birthright and blood. Bastards created by foolish witch magic. I had never looked at friendship with the Smirnov family as inevitability rather than a choice of the heart.