Obsidian Eyes

I'm actually re-writing this story and making it long to include more details. It was originally a short story for my Into to Fictional Writing class, but now that I've taken other fiction classes, I've improved upon this story. This is the final version that I turned in for my Intro to Fictional Writing class. Enjoy!

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When I was five, I asked Mama why I didn’t have a father. She replied, “Everyone has a father and that includes you.”

“Then where is he, Mama?”

“He teaches at a boarding school, here in London.”

“But Mama, why isn’t he here?”

She didn’t reply for a long time, but after a while, she looked at me with sorrowful eyes and said, “I always wish he could still be with us, but he left after you were born. You are too young to know the reason right now, but when the time comes, I’ll tell you.” Ever since I could remember, Mama always told me about my father and what he was like. She said that when I turned eleven, I would go to the same boarding school where he’s a professor, in general science. She seemed excited at the prospect of me going to a school with my father. She had never received any letters from him since I was about a year old. The last time she heard from him was when she received a letter stating his farewell to her. I knew she wanted to know what I thought of my father and to fill her in on what he's had been up to.

Ever since I brought up the subject of my father, Mama told me everything she knew about him. She knew that even as a five-year-old, I was more mature and serious for my age. When I got older, she said that I acted a lot like my father and that she wished I could see him for myself. “You will see him soon, Mercedes. You will see that he is a good man, caring, and sweet. When you look him in the eyes, you’ll know.”

When I was eleven and had first set my eyes on him, as Mama had predicted, I knew he was my father.

He had raven-black hair and eyes that were obsidian. Whenever he looked at someone, he looked them straight in the eye and whoever could look straight back saw that his eyes were steel, portraying no emotion except the coldness that seized his soul. He had a confident stride and he never made a mistake in class.

I think I was the only one who wasn’t terrified of his stare, except for the first day I had class with him when I made the mistake of calling him “Papa.” I never knew he could have such a short temper, but of course, that was only a warning. Ever since then, he would always glare at me with his cold eyes whenever I would raise my hand to answer a question. When I had a perfect paper, he would scowl at me and make snide remarks about my paper.

Since the day I called him “Papa,” I never knew a school could have a teacher that was as strict and severe about punishments as he was. Out of all the classes in Canterbury Boarding School, his were the worst. The first year to the seventh year students were terrified of him, but when I looked at him, I saw my father.

I never did tell any of my friends about him. They would always notice whenever I watched him, though and they would always say something like, “You know, if you keep on staring at him, he’ll probably give you a detention to last a lifetime.”

As far as I could tell, he was not the sweet, caring man that Mama had made him out to be. He would use cruel and heartless punishments...verbally assaulting us with his cold words. No other teacher taught like him. I respected him—I’m not sure why, but I did. Maybe it was because I was hoping that under those cold eyes, he was the kind and caring man Mama talked about or maybe because whenever he looked at me, I could see the cold, steel eyes but at the same time there was something else…something that I didn’t recognize.

The summer before my seventh year was the most horrifying summer I’ve ever had in my life. When I came home from the grocery story, I had heard the water running and thought Mama was taking one of her bubble baths.

Something wasn’t right. She wasn’t humming like she usually does when taking a bubble bath or a shower. I ran up the stairs and found water—bright red water—coming out of the crack of her bathroom door. I opened the door and found Mama in the bathtub, with her white shirt and tan pants on, and bullet holes through her forehead and chest. The faucet for hot water was opened and the pungent odor—the metallic smell of blood reached my nose. While the tears blinded me, I noticed that the window was open and saw a man turn around and stare at me.

I ran out of the room, tears sliding down my cheeks and called the police. It broke my heart—all I wanted to do was stay in my room and never come out. I didn’t want to believe any of it. I wanted to pretend like it never happened. That’s why I never talked about it with anyone except for the police that came that day.

I found out that Mama had left all her money to me, so I sold the house and moved our belongings into an apartment. The flashbacks of that day were never-ending. Through his mask, I had seen his eyes when he turned around and stared out the bathroom window and then I noticed the gun in his hand. I could never forget those cold, obsidian eyes.

In my seventh and last year at Canterbury Boarding School, I was ready to confront a man who I knew as my father.

Walking down the corridors brought back many memories of a time of innocence and naiveté. I only wish those days could’ve lasted longer.

The first day back, the time passed by faster than I thought it would have. I was hoping the time wouldn’t fly by so fast because I still didn’t know what I would say to my father when I saw him again. His being the last class of the day made things a bit easier because I wouldn’t have to rush through our conversation to get to my next class.

The bell rang as all the students entered his classroom. He was as strict as he’d always been, but when I looked at his face, I could see that the wrinkles on his forehead and at his temples were more prominent than they were before. Throughout his lecture, he never once looked at me. Not a single glance.

When class was over, I took my time packing up my stuff. One of my friends asked, “Mercedes are you coming?”

“I’ll be there in a minute. I need to ask Professor Kent about my paper,” I replied.

I turned to face the professor but it seemed as though he didn’t notice. He sat at his desk, grading papers. The sound of his pen on the paper was the only noise in the room. He finally looked up. “Why are you still here Miss Pelham? I believe it is time for dinner.” There is a silence in the conversation while we intently look at each other. Cold, obsidian eyes stare into my black onyx ones.

“What were you doing at my house this last summer?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about but—”

“No! Don’t you dare say that you don’t know! I know it was you! Tell me why you were there holding a gun and wearing a mask, Papa!”

His eyes had glanced at the door and then he turned on his cold voice and said, “Miss Pelham, you now have earned yourself a detention! You’re detention starts now.” He looked at me, glanced toward his office, and then looked at me again. I stared up at him and then slowly made my way to his office. Five minutes later, he came in and locked the door behind him. He then grasped my arm and led me into his living chambers. The memory of seeing his obsidian eyes under the mask kept flashing before my eyes.

Once we were in his chambers, I asked, “Why did you have to give me detention?”

“Someone was at the door, listening to our conversation.”

He then turned around, held my chin, looked into my eyes and said, “What I am about to tell you, must not leave this room, understand?” I looked into his eyes and nodded. “Mercedes, I don’t know what you think, but I did not kill her.” Staring up into his eyes, I knew that what he told was the truth—I don’t know how—but I knew.

He smiled at me and said, “You have grown into a beautiful young woman, Mercedes. Your mother raised you well.” I was a little shocked when he had complimented me, but then I smiled back and said a whispered, “Thank you.”

Suddenly, I remembered why we were here in the first place and before I could ask Papa any questions, he said, “I suppose I should tell you now before you start firing away at your questions. Your mother didn’t want me to tell you until you were out of school, but I think it is time that you knew. You may have noticed how reserved I am towards everyone and everything. That’s because I’m in the CIA. Before your mother and I married, I was in the military and then later on was handpicked to be a CIA agent. Jeremy Wilson, one of my best friends throughout my military years was also picked to be in the CIA with me. We had a mission to find out who was assassinating the professors and students, at schools all across England. I met your mother in London and we started dating. About two months afterward, I found out that your mother was our mission…our target, you could say. She was reported to be a spy for another agency that was reportedly killing off the people in the schools.

I knew what the senior officers said was not accurate, so I looked your mother up on everything that the CIA had, including all information outside the CIA that even the senior officers didn’t know about. All the information that I acquired pointed to your mother’s innocence. I knew then that someone had been feeding information to the chief officers of the CIA.
I don’t know what he did, or how he thought your mother was involved in this, but Jeremy was the one who fed this information to the senior officers. When the senior officers found out that they had been lied to, they fired him. He is the one who killed your mother, my love.”

The expression on my face was filled with shock and horror. “But Papa, he was your best friend why did he do that? He must have known that you loved Mama!”

“Mercedes, he was the spy. We were so close to finding the secret agency that he decided to frame your mother. He was the spy all along and when our backs were turned, he was one of the ones assassinating people at the schools. He wanted to take his revenge on me because when the senior officers had fired him, he couldn’t spy on the CIA’s next move.

That’s why we never lived together. Because I was the one who located a safe place for you and your mother to go into hiding. Your mother and I never married because, if he found out, he would have killed both you and your mother. I couldn’t let that happen to you Mercedes!” His obsidian eyes were bright and misty…I was sure he was going to break down and shed his tears any moment now.

“I wanted to tell you this before, but I had promised your mother that I wouldn’t until you were eighteen. Another reason why I didn’t tell you was because I didn’t want you to be close to me. He has his ways of getting information and when he would find out that you were my daughter, he would have killed you.”

I was speechless. The information was still trying to process itself in my head. Papa was a CIA officer and his best friend had betrayed everyone and had killed Mama. Tears that I had been trying to hold slowly crept down my cheeks. Papa came up to me with tears in his obsidian eyes and embraced me. He gently stroked my hair and my arms tightened around his middle.

“You should go now Mercedes. Everyone will be waiting for you. You have to pretend that none of this happened. You can do that can’t you?” I nodded my assent. He smiled at me and said,

“Go. We will have another detention next week.” He told me to go to dinner, yet he didn’t let go of me, which made me smile. After a couple more minutes, he slowly leaned down and kissed me on the forehead, pulled my arms off of him, and led me to the doorway leading to his office and out into his classroom.

“Now I know the façade that you guard well within your eyes, Papa. You tried to save her, didn’t you? Mama was right when she said you were a kind and caring man.”

He looked up at me, shocked. “She said that? When?”

“She said it all the time. She would tell me how much you loved me and even though you weren’t close by, she always said she could feel you praying for me. Now I know what she meant when she said that.”

He wipes away my tears with the pads of his thumbs and says, “Remember that I love you Mercedes and I will never let anyone harm you.” Before I went into the classroom, his warm, obsidian eyes stared into my black onyx ones and I knew that everything would be all right—I don’t know how—I just knew.