The Fragile Ordinary

“Yes,” Mr. Stone nodded, his gaze softening ever so slightly. “That’s exactly right. Well done.”

As class continued, I struggled to stay focused. It was hard to after discovering there really was a reason Tobias King had been placed in my English class. The boy was smart. So why was he hanging out with Stevie Macdonald and his crew of miscreants?

And why oh why did he have to be the one boy whose voice made the hair on my arms stand up?

Just before the bell rang, Mr. Stone announced something that took my day from bad to worse. “Team assignment. We’re going to get your talking outcomes out of the way this year, since I know how much you love those.”

We all groaned. Well, I didn’t groan. I blanched.

“To make things somewhat easier on you, you will be working in teams of two. Look at the person sitting next to you, because they just became your talking outcome partner.”

No.

No. Way.

I looked at Mr. Stone like he’d just betrayed me, and he gave me a small smile before addressing the rest of the class. “Each of you will be given sections of the play to present on. A few of you will be sharing the same assignment, so it’ll be interesting to see what you come up with. You’ll have roughly a month to put your presentations together. I’ll provide you with your talk date and time next class. I’m coming around with your assignments now.”

Mr. Stone stopped at Tobias and me first, and I still hadn’t gotten over my shock so it was a miracle I even processed what he said to us. “Tobias, Comet, I want you to present on Hamlet’s character development through his soliloquies. Remember to pick quotes from the soliloquies to present to the class to highlight your analysis of his character evolution.” He placed a copy of the assignment on our desk.

We were silent a moment, an awkward, terrible silence, as Mr. Stone moved on to the rest of the class. I couldn’t be the one to speak. It seemed impossible. Even though I was panicking at the thought of messing up an English assignment, I was unable to turn to Tobias to arrange time to work together. That would bring reality crashing down around me.

Tobias did it for me. “So I guess you’ll want to get together to do this?” He flicked his piece of paper with the assignment on it. He couldn’t have sounded less enthusiastic if he tried.

For some reason my irritation with his tone helped clear my throat. “Yes. I don’t want to fail.”

I still hadn’t looked at him, but I could feel his gaze on my face. The burn of it was too much, and I finally caved and returned his stare. Tobias seemed to study me for a moment and then he sighed heavily. “Fine. My house after school.”

Wonderful.

Not only, I guessed, was I going to be lumbered with most of the work, I was going to have to drag my butt out of my comfort zone and visit a boy. At his house. “Where do you live?”

“Do you know where Stevie lives?”

“Stevie Macdonald?”

“Yeah.”

“No, I don’t.” Why on earth would he think I would?

“He’s my cousin. My mom and I are staying with him and his mom for a while.” He flipped his copy of the assignment over and began to scrawl on the blank side. Finished, he shoved it toward me. “Tonight. Seven o’clock. Be there. If you don’t show, I’m not waiting around.”

I was shocked to hear that Tobias and Stevie were related, but suddenly their attachment to each other made more sense to me. Perhaps it was merely familial obligation that had brought such different boys together in friendship?

As much as I hated to say it, considering I was already anxious about the fact that I had to go over to Stevie Macdonald’s house that evening, I said, “One night won’t be enough.”

Tobias’s lips curled into an arrogant smile. “I’ve heard that before.”

It was so cocky that even I couldn’t stop my eye roll. Nor could I stop the pink blooming on my cheeks, which only made him chuckle.

Flustered, I stared studiously at the address he’d written down.

After another moment’s silence, Tobias said, in a surprisingly gentle tone, “Okay, don’t get all worried-looking. We’ll work out other times to do the assignment when you come over tonight.”

Before I had a chance to think up a reply, the bell rang for the end of class. I shoved my stuff into my bag in one sweep and shot out of my chair. A minute later—because I’d moved that quickly—I was halfway to the cafeteria.

I needed distance from the American, and I needed a few moments to gather myself before Steph and Vicki teased me about my presentation buddy.

* * *

“So tell me, does Tobias King smell as good as he looks?” Steph said without preamble as she and Vicki sat at my table in the cafeteria.

I shot her a droll look and she giggled.

“Don’t, Comet.” Vicki shook her head adamantly. “Don’t let her encourage you. Tobias King is the last boy you want to crush on. Guys like him are users.”

Hearing the bitterness in her words, I felt a pang of sadness for her. And more than a pang of anger toward Jordan Hall. Ever since he’d made Vicki cry, she’d had moments of ragey bitterness. It had been only a few weeks since the incident, and I was hoping time would heal her wounds.

“Boys can be dipshits.” She stabbed her straw into her carton of orange juice. “I’m giving them up.”

Steph looked horrified. “No way.”

Determination blazed in Vicki’s eyes. “Yes way. I need time to forget he who shall not be named, and then I’ll be cool. But I’m not falling for just anyone.”

“So...” Steph frowned, obviously not sure how to process the idea of a world without boys. “What are you going to do with yourself?”

Vicki burst out laughing while I struggled not to roll my eyes. “I’m just concentrating on me and design school. Parsons may be a long shot but the London College of Fashion is not and I’m going there if it takes all my blood and sweat. But no tears!” Vicki shook her head vehemently. “Tears just hold you back.”

Frowning at her, I really, really hoped time would heal the wound Jordan had cut into her. Until she’d cried in my arms, and the subsequent moody days since, I’d had no idea how much Vicki had liked Jordan. If he were in front of me right now, I might have kicked him in the nuts. And I wasn’t a violent person by nature.

“Well, just because you’ve given up boys, doesn’t mean the rest of us have.” Steph huffed. “We’re allowed to talk boys.”

Vicki just shrugged.

Steph turned to me and grinned. “You guys are meeting up, right? To do the presentation?”

The thought of going to Stevie’s house that evening to work with Tobias made my skin prickle with a cold sweat. Tobias King inhabited an entirely different planet from the one I lived on. It would be like trying to talk to someone who didn’t speak a language known to man.

“He’s Stevie’s cousin. I’m going there after dinner—”

“Second cousin,” Steph interrupted.

“What?”

“Tobias is Stevie’s second cousin. Their mums are first cousins.”

“How do you know that?” Vicki said.

Steph threw her a mysterious smile. “I know everything.”

“Well cousin, second cousin, whatever. The point is that I’m not crushing on Tobias,” I semi-lied. “We’re working on this presentation and that is it. Sorry. No boy talk from me.”

Her lips parted at my announcement but then they pinched together for a few seconds before she let out an exasperated, “You two are no fun.”

“There are other things to talk about,” I reminded her. “Like the school play.” Only last week, Steph had landed the part of Roxie Hart opposite Lindsay Wright, the sixth year playing Velma Kelly. And thankfully, Heather was in the chorus.

Steph’s face lit up, and Vicki shot me a grateful smile. For the rest of our lunch we sat and listened patiently to our friend as she divulged the trials and tribulations of putting on a grand show.

Although all the while angry butterflies fluttered wildly in my stomach.

* * *

All I could do was stare at the building. I willed my feet to move but it was proving difficult. Stevie lived on a street that bordered Portobello and Niddrie. It was a good thirty-five-minute walk from my house on the beach, and our situations couldn’t have been more different. While I lived in a midcentury seafront home, Stevie and Tobias lived in a drab building that housed six flats. Stevie’s flat was on the ground floor. The gray pebble-dash render on the building, along with the overlong front lawns and toppled rubbish bins, gave the place a depressing feel.

It bugged me that Tobias lived here, and I couldn’t explain to myself why that was. I wondered why he and his mum had to live with Stevie. What happened to them back in the US?

And suddenly Tobias was there, standing in the open entrance to the building. His face was in shadow, but I knew it was him by his height and the way he held himself. He wore only a T-shirt and joggers, no shoes, just socks, and he had his hands stuck in his pockets. “You plan on coming inside anytime soon?”

I jolted at his question, and to my everlasting mortification I blushed again, before finally making my feet move toward him. “I wasn’t sure I had the right house,” I lied.

He smirked. “Right. You’re one of the smartest girls in school but you don’t know how to read a street sign.”

I ignored his sarcasm. “How do you know I’m one of the smartest girls in school?”

“Stevie told me. Plus, you can’t exactly get into the classes you’re in if you’re stupid.”

“True. So why do you pretend to be?” The question was out of my mouth before I could even think about it.

Tobias looked as surprised as I felt. He also did not deign to answer me. Instead he led me inside the ground-floor flat, and the lingering smell of Chinese food hit me as I stepped into the narrow hallway. I followed him, dodging the several pairs of shoes that were strewn in the hall near the entrance.

As we passed an open doorway, I glanced in and saw two women lounging on a couch. There were empty Chinese takeaway containers on the coffee table in front of them. One of the women was thin with wispy fair hair. Her neck was bent at an awkward angle, and it appeared she’d fallen asleep. The other woman met my gaze as I passed. I got an impression of pale skin and dark hair, but we were moving too quickly down the hall for me to observe anything else.

“Tobias, where are you going?” The woman’s voice rang out just as he put his hand on the knob of a door around the left-hand corner at the end of the hall.

“Room,” he called back. “I told you I have an assignment to work on.”

“Well, I’d like to meet your friend. Where are your manners?”

He shot me an exasperated look like it was my fault. If only he knew I was even less inclined to meet the person I was guessing was his mother. The less I knew about Tobias King, the better. He gestured for me to go back the way we’d just come, and I drew to a halt at the sudden appearance of the tall brunette from the couch. She had big, sad, dark eyes and chin-length dark hair, pale skin and freckles across her nose that, along with her trim, slender physique, made her look too young to be the mother of an almost seventeen-year-old boy. Appearance-wise there was very little of her in Tobias. I wondered if he took after his dad. And then I wondered where his dad was.

She looked at Tobias and raised an eyebrow.

He sighed heavily, as if she were forcing him to do something unpleasant. “Mom, this is my English presentation partner, Comet Caldwell. Comet, my mom.”

“Hi, Mrs. King,” I said. “It’s nice to meet you.”

“Call me Lena, please.” She spoke with a Scottish accent muddled by an American one.

“Okay.” I smiled, but it faltered as her gaze drifted over me in an assessing manner and I suddenly realized I should have perhaps dressed more conservatively for coming to Tobias and Stevie’s flat. I was wearing a dark green velvet skirt with a black-and-green striped top with arms that were tight at the wrist and then puffed out in balloon sleeves. On my feet were green flats with an oversize yellow bow on the front.

Not giving away her thoughts, Lena turned to her son. “Carole is worn-out. Try to keep it down.”

“Where’s Kieran?” Tobias asked.

If I remembered correctly, Kieran was Stevie’s little brother. He was around six or seven years old.

“In Carole’s room reading. I’ll keep an eye on him. You just get your homework done like you promised.”

“That’s what Comet’s for,” he said.

Ass.

His mum seemed to think it was a crappy comment, too. “Don’t you leave all the work to Comet. Promise.”

“I could make that promise, Mom, not keep it and you still wouldn’t do jack about it. That’s what you’re good at, right? Being a liar and doormat.” He didn’t wait for her to answer, just turned and bulldozed his way into the room behind us.

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