Cuts and Cake

Chapter 2:

This is not a good idea.

Ciel paused with the knife in his hand, ready to cut. He had been about to cut to calm himself down when the image Sebastian Michaelis' smirking face had flashed in his head and he realised that a fresh cut would add more fuel to the fire if the annoyance decided to expose him the next day. No, he would have to wait until the marks faded or Sebastian left him alone. He had sensed that the teenager had been sadistically enjoying himself throughout their altercation.

He sighed and replaced the knife back in its hiding place under the loose floorboard. Now he had nothing to block out the trauma from the past.

Ciel wrapped himself in his duvet and perched himself on the windowsill to look out at the night sky. There was a full moon shining down surrounded by twinkling stars. Sometimes he wished that he didn't exist as a human and was a non-thinking organism like a star, a ball of dust and gas powered by hydrogen with no memories of the past and nothing to worry about especially not sadistic dark haired males.

At 1 o'clock in the morning, when he had finally got into bed to attempt getting some sleep, his aunt came rushing into his room, brimming full of questions. She sat down on the edge of his bed, knowing that he was still awake from the rate of his breathing.

"Ciel, how was your first day at school?" she asked happily, not caring about the late time.

Her nephew twitched his uncovered eye and rolled over to face the wall. "Terrible, thank you very much."

Angelina pulled the covers off him and pulled him into a hug, undeterred by his coldness as she was used to it now.

"I'm sorry for being so late. I had a long shift, then I got invited to a party..." She apologised feeling guilty about how much she neglected him at times when he needed company the most. "What went wrong?"

Automatically Ciel pulled away from her and subtly glanced at his pyjama sleeves to make sure that his wrists were covered. She was unaware of his habit as he was always careful to keep his arms covered around her and do it when she wasn't at home.

"Everything. They all thought I was a girl, the lessons are so boring, everyone is as dumb as a single celled organism, I threw up after eating lunch, and..." 

"And what?" she prompted, noticing his pause.

"Nothing. I'm taking my own lunch tomorrow by the way."

He knew he would never be able to tell her what had happened in the toilets. That would mean that she would find out everything and would want to keep a permanent eye on him and quit her job. He didn't want her to have to do that to look after him.

"So you are going tomorrow," she smiled, fully aware that he was keeping something back.

"I lost that game against you so I have to go to school for at least a week," Ciel mumbled. "A true Phantomhive keeps his word."

His aunt patted him on the head. "That's my boy."

***

"Damn it, she did this deliberately," Ciel cursed out loud.

There was nothing suitable to take to school for lunch. The kitchen cupboards were all empty of food apart from cereal and porridge oats and there was nothing suitable in the fridge.

"Does that woman want to kill me will greasy school food?" he asked out loud beginning to get annoyed at the prospect of having to be sick in the toilets after school.

Desperately he checked the fridge again in hope that he had missed something. On the top shelf he spotted a cake. Feeling suddenly more happy, Ciel pulled it out and found that it was an entire Strawberry Shortcake.

"This should be suitable," he said to himself. "It's got fruit, one of your 5-a-day."

He grabbed a knife from the block and cut himself a generous slice which was more like a quarter of the cake which he placed in a plastic container along with a silver fork with the Phantomhive crest on. That was lunch sorted.

"Hurry up Ciel!" his aunt shouted from the doorway to the house. "Do you want to make me late for work?"

"I'm coming!" he shouted back and shoved his lunch in his backpack.

"Ciel, did the headmaster say anything yesterday about being in a house and assigned a mentor?" Ciel's form tutor enquired, leaning down to talk to the boy who sat alone at the back of the classroom, away from everyone else in his form.

Ciel looked up from his Sherlock Holmes novel. "Yes, he said I was in the scarlet house and would be assigned a mentor to look after me today," he answered vaguely and returned to his book.

"We normally select a suitable student to be one from the same house, but this time we had a volunteer," the teacher smiled. "I think you know him already. Ah, he's just arrived." He waved.

With dread in his heart about who it was Ciel looked up from his book and confirmed his suspicions. Sebastian Michaelis was standing in the doorway staring directly at him with a sadistic smiled decorating his face.

"Why does it have to be him of all people?" he hissed angrily.

"Please put up with it," the teacher begged. "He's never shown much interest in school before and this is the first time that he has attended form time, I'm hoping he will keep this up, it will improve my reputation. Please Ciel."

Cogs began to turn in Ciel's devious mind as he scented the teacher's desperation to have Ciel go along with it to improve his standing among the teachers. "All right, on one condition," he replied quietly as Sebastian began to walk towards them.

"What's the condition?"

"Give me his school record later and tell me everything you know about him. I will come after school," he whispered.

Sebastian pulled out the chair next to Ciel noisily, took his coat and shoulder bag off and slid into the chair gracefully.

"Good morning Sebastian. Please look after for Ciel for a while," the teacher greeted.

"I will, Mr Wordsmith," he replied smoothly.

"How are you, Ciel? By the way I've transferred into all of your classes so I can do my job as a mentor properly," he said as Mr Wordsmith walked away.

"You did WHAT?" Ciel shouted.

Seeing Sebastian's face all day was his idea of hell on earth. Now actual school didn't seem to be too bad compared to spending every moment with a grinning sadist. At the sound of his shout everyone's head spun in his direction.

"I'm sorry," he apologised hastily. "I just hit my hand on something."

Sebastian snickered quietly at Ciel's expense. "All I had to do was prove that I was smart enough to be in all of the top groups like you. Luckily Physical Education is mixed otherwise I would be in a higher group than you," he smirked.

"Tch," was Ciel's only reply.

At lunchtime after suffering through four lessons of Sebastian's sniggers at every little thing he did, Ciel felt he was justified for running away from him as soon as the bell rang for lunch break.

Happily, he sat down on a bench outside in a secluded corner, not minding the cold wind and opened his container to eat his cake. He ate a contented mouthful and sighed at the taste of sponge, strawberries and cream.

As there was no sign of Sebastian he assumed that he had given him the slip. He raised the fork to his mouth to another piece of cake.

"So that's the Phantomhive crest?" a familiar voice came from behind him.

His heart lurched with shock and he spun round to see Sebastian standing behind him with glinting eyes.

"You can't give me the slip that easily, Earl Phantomhive," he said with a dangerous smile that showed his perfect teeth.

Ciel froze upon hearing him state his title. "How- What makes you think that I'm an Earl" he asked in what he hoped was his normal voice as he tried to calm his heart down.

Sebastian sat down next to him and put Ciel's forkful of cake in his mouth. "I researched you last night, but I had already guessed from the way you spoke and the fact that it was your first day at school that you had a high social standing."

"I see."

It was useless to deny if Sebastian had researched him.

"I am an Earl, but I see no reason to use that title: it doesn't really belong to me and I have no use for it," he said sadly, beginning to think about the past again and the previous Earl's untimely death.

"There's something I'm not so sure on," Sebastian paused for a second. "What happened to your parents?"

***

Thank you to everyone who reviewed the first chapter, I will hopefully continue to update regularly. Since I am English and the story takes place in England I am using the English school system.