Chapter 8 - Vale Had Been Copying Me Too
“You told me you trained me.”
Vale looked confused.
“I did.”
“You also changed your stance because of me.”
His face shifted.
Mason had been right.
We were in the empty canteen before breakfast service.
Same steel counter.
Same tables.
No audience this time.
“Who told you?”
“Mason.”
Vale looked annoyed.
“That doesn't make it false.”
“No.”
I waited.
He sat at one of the tables.
“When you came to me, you kept your left hand low.”
“You spent weeks correcting it.”
“I tried.”
“What happened?”
“You were faster from there.”
I frowned.
“Then why tell me it was wrong?”
“Because it was wrong for most people.”
“But not me.”
“Eventually I stopped trying to make your body look like the manual.”
That landed deeper than it should have.
“You started using it.”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“After Alden.”
I stared.
“You carried something of mine.”
Vale looked at me.
“Yes.”
“Did you ever tell anyone?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Who was I supposed to tell?”
I almost laughed.
“Maybe me.”
His expression tightened.
“Fair.”
I walked toward the steel counter.
My reflection stretched across it.
The shape of my shoulders looked like someone else's memory.
Vale came up beside me.
Not too close.
“I wasn't lying yesterday.”
“You said you trained me.”
“I did.”
“You raised your hands exactly like mine.”
“Yes.”
“That was deliberate.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
He looked at the reflection.
“Because I wanted to see if you'd recognize it.”
I turned.
“You tested me.”
His face changed.
He had heard the word.
“Yes.”
I stared.
Eleven years.
First minute back.
And he had already turned the reunion into an experiment.
“What did you expect?”
“I don't know.”
“Recognition?”
“Yes.”
“Gratitude?”
“No.”
“Hurt?”
Vale said nothing.
I laughed quietly.
“You haven't changed as much as your rank suggests.”
He looked down.
“No.”
That answer kept me there.
Vale continued.
“When I saw you take Mason down, I knew the movement immediately.”
“So you copied it.”
“Yes.”
“I froze.”
“I saw.”
“And you liked that.”
His eyes came up.
“No.”
I held his gaze.
“Part of you did.”
Long silence.
Then:
“Yes.”
There it was.
He looked ashamed.
“I wanted proof that something between us survived.”
I looked away.
That sentence could have been tender.
It wasn't.
Not entirely.
“You could’ve said hello.”
“Yes.”
“You could've walked over.”
“Yes.”
“Instead you gave me a memory test through a metal counter.”
“Yes.”
I turned back.
“What if I hadn't recognized it?”
Vale thought.
“I would have said hello anyway.”
“Would you?”
He did not answer quickly enough.
That hurt.
Then he said:
“I’m sorry.”
I nodded once.
No forgiveness.
No performance.
A kitchen employee entered from the back and began stacking trays.
Our private room disappeared.
Good.
Vale moved toward the door.
I stopped him.
“Adrian.”
He turned.
I had not called him that since I was eighteen.
His face changed.
“Why did you keep my stance?”
He looked toward the counter again.
Then:
“Because after Alden, I wasn't sure how much of what I taught was really mine.”
May you like
He left before I could answer.
For once, I let him.
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