The Academy--The Bird and the Beetle

by C. L. Stone

  “I know,” Kota started. His eyes were fixed on me and his face was as serious as Nathan’s. “Has this happened before?”

  I shook my head.

  “Why did they do it this time?”

  I glanced at Nathan to divert my eyes somewhere besides Kota’s face but Nathan was making me tremble just as badly. “Silas called,” I whispered. “A boy’s never called before. Please don’t tell him. He’ll feel bad. It’s not his fault.”

  Nathan grunted. “Start at the top. Are you telling me I can’t come for you if you’re at your house? I can’t call you? How bad are we talking?”

  The sound of a car driving up and a short car honk cut through. Ugh, more people, I thought. Victor and Gabriel. This was way too complicated. I wanted to go home and hide, only I wasn’t brave enough to move. Now Gabriel, a complete stranger, was going to learn about this, too. I shook with humiliation.

  I hesitated and Kota stared at me a moment but then he got up. “Your voice will come back. You just need to rest your throat. Hang on a second.” He crossed the room and ran down the stairs. I heard him answering the door below.

  The moment he was gone, Nathan turned to me. “Why don’t you just say it? Do your parents beat you?”

  I waved my hands in the air across my body. “It’s not quite like that. They don’t hit me or anything.”

  “But they don’t like you hanging out with anyone? What happens if I show up?”

  “Don’t. Please.”

  His mouth turned into a frown. “Would they flip out if they found out you were with me today?”

  I nodded.

  “Hey,” he said, he leaned toward me until his face was close to mine. “Don’t worry. I won’t say anything to them. What about the other girl? You have a sister, right? Did she get this, too?”

  I shook my head. I slid out of the office chair and onto my knees to sit on the floor, sitting delicately on my heels. “She didn’t have to drink...” I said, but my voice fell then. I swallowed.

  Nathan moved off of the bed and then sat next to me. He was about to say something when thudding on the stairs sounded again. I heard someone shut the door downstairs and the flick of the lock and then three heads appeared as they got to the top of the stairs. Victor was first. He was wearing dark designer jeans this time; his shirt was white, buttoned up to his collarbone. His face looked a little strained, but when he saw me, he relaxed a little. He pushed his wavy hair back away from his eyes. Kota followed behind him. A moment later, another guy popped up from the stairs, looking as if he’d jumped the last couple of steps.

  When I first heard the name, I thought it would be a girl. Gabriel was about Victor’s height, though a little slimmer in the hips. His hair hung long around his chin, but was brushed back away from his face. Two locks of hair, one tucked behind each ear, were colored a light shade of blond. The rest of his hair was a rich brown. His eyes were crystal-like, bright blue, excited and wild. He had a couple of rings on each of his hands and stud earrings in each ear, his right had three more rings going up along the top. He wore jeans and a neon green tank shirt which showed off lean, but defined biceps.

  “Oy,” Gabriel said, his voice surprising me as it was deeper than Victor’s. “So you’re the troublemaker.”

  Heat radiated at my cheeks. Was that what they were saying about me?

  Victor gave him a chop on his head. “Don’t pick on her.”

  Gabriel ducked away from Victor's hand and then moved to sit next to me. “Hey, I was only teasing,” he said. “I didn’t mean anything by it.” He turned to me. “Don’t listen to me, okay?” His face was so bright and happy. He had an angular chin, a slight nose and shaped eyebrows. His crystal blue eyes were dazzling like sunlight in pool water.

  Kota tucked his chair back toward his desk and then sat across from us. Victor plopped down on Kota’s bed, hands tucked behind his head, and looking up at the ceiling.

  “We need to be more careful around her parents,” Nathan said.

  Kota nodded. “I think that’s why we need to talk about it.” He looked at me. “Tell us what we need to do.”

  I blinked at him, not sure what to say. What was this? They seemed to freely accept that my parents were difficult, and now they were willing to learn how to handle this? This seemed impossible. Anyone normal would have told me to go home and wouldn’t want to get in the middle of it. I flitted looks from Kota’s green caring eyes, to Nathan’s serious expression, to Gabriel’s curiosity... I even caught Victor turning his head, looking at me, and the fire in his eyes was a little subdued but working, as if thinking.

  “I’m not sure where to start,” I whispered. Did Victor and Gabriel know? Did Kota tell them?

  The guys looked at each other. Gabriel and Nathan had that same knack of being able to read the others. There was the slight incline of the head from each of them before they turned back to me. “What would we have to do if we wanted to come over?” Kota asked. “Let’s start with that.”

  As soon as the words were spoken, a thudding sound started to reverberate from the quiet of the neighborhood. A basketball was being bounced outside in the street.

  Looks were exchanged between all of us. Nathan jumped up and rushed to the window seat, leaning against the frame to look outside. “It’s Derrick.”

  Everyone else got up at once. Kota and I stood on either side of Nathan and looked down into the street. Victor and Gabriel moved to the other window to look out.

  A guy about our age was walking up the street. His hair was black with a bowl cut. He was tan and wore jean shorts with no shoes, his removed shirt draped over his shoulder. He bounced a basketball with his hands as he walked down the street.

  “Where is he going?” Nathan wondered out loud.

  We watched in silence together as the boy walked to my house and started to head up the drive.

  My eyes widened. What was he doing?

  Kota caught my hand that was fluttering at my throat, enclosing it with both of his hands. “Did you meet him? Is he going to ask for you?”

  I shook my head, watching as the boy disappeared into the open garage attached to the house toward the side door. “I’ve never seen him before.”

  He let go of my hand. I think we were all holding our breath, waiting for whatever was going to happen.

  After what felt like eons, the boy reappeared. Marie trailed behind him, slow, hesitant.

  They started playing basketball.

  I blinked. My sister was playing with the boy down the road. What was she doing?

  “Looks okay to me,” Nathan said. He turned to me. “Maybe we should go over.”

  “Wait a minute,” I said, taking a hold of his shirt sleeve to stop him before he could leave. He looked at me and then back out at the house.

  It only took a few minutes. They were trading off the basketball in what looked like a game of HORSE or PIG. The ball was tossed at the goal. Marie started to run for it but stopped dead. They turned their heads toward the garage. My sister ducked her head and ran for the garage. The boy collected his basketball and started his way back down the drive.

  “What happened?” Nathan turned to me. “Was it your mom?”

  I nodded. “She called to them at the door.” I watched as the boy made his way back up the road. “You should go home. She has chores to do,” I recited the line my mother always used. While we didn’t live close to other kids, a few neighbors had grandkids that visited and would ask to play if they saw us in the yard. My mother always sent them away.

  “Do you have chores?” Gabriel asked.

  I shook my head. Marie and I did split chores, but the house was usually pretty spotless. We were never outside our rooms so most of the house was never touched. Depending on my mom’s mood now, Marie might be told to get on her knees in the kitchen for hours or something else. I shuddered, worried for her, too. I wondered what she was thinking to run outside like that. There was a possibility Marie thought Mom had been dead asleep. She was wrong. “
I don’t know what will happen to her.”

  Victor made a fist and then flopped back onto the bed. “I don’t like this.”

  Kota and Nathan moved away from the window seat, but I remained, watching to see the boy disappear around the bend in the street. “It’s her way of keeping control,” I said softly. My face was radiating heat and I felt a tear in my eye and I blinked it back. I thought I had gotten used to the way my parents handled things. Keeping it in the dark was how I handled it.

  Gabriel moved to sit on the bed near Victor’s legs. He patted the floor below him with his hand, looking up at me. “Come here. Your hair is bugging me. Kota, do you have a brush?”

  Kota leapt up and disappeared into his bathroom for a moment. He found a blue hair brush and tossed it over to Gabriel.

  Gabriel caught it with one hand and curled his fingers at me. “Come on,” he said.

  I felt awkward, but did what I was told, moving to sit at his feet, leaning a little against the bed. I pulled the hair clip away, letting my hair fall in a wet clump against my neck.

  “And what do you call this look? Wet shag?” His fingers fell over my hair, lightly tugging at the knots.

  Victor toed at Gabriel’s back to poke at him. “Leave her alone.”

  “Hey, I’m fixing it.” He smoothed out my hair at the tips, starting with combing out the ends. “I’m going to detangle it, but we’re going to wash it out and then dry it.”

  I shot a pleading look at Kota, feeling awkward. It was as if I was being told I didn’t know how to handle my own body, like being told I was smelly and needed some deodorant. Kota didn’t seem fazed by it.

  “It’s my fault,” Nathan said. “I pushed her into the pool.”

  They all looked at him. I did, too. I hadn’t expected him to talk about it. My blush continued on my face, now waiting to see if Kota or Victor appeared angry that I went swimming with Nathan instead of coming over. Why I felt that way, I wasn’t sure.

  Only they didn’t look angry. They looked surprised. “What happened?” Kota asked.

  Gabriel brushed out my hair while Nathan explained about how he found me in the tree and how he’d pushed me into the pool, all the way up until we were standing at Kota’s door. He complimented my swimming. Again the warm, tender sensation washed over me. I appreciated how normal they were. We were talking and hanging around together. For the moment I was so glad they were forgetting about my problems. I tried not to look as excited as I was. I knew that Kota sitting on the floor a couple of feet away wasn’t feeling his heart thudding or even thinking about the situation in the way I was. Touching, talking, laughing... So this is what happens when people got together?

  I was envious of the years they must have spent together to be so comfortable with one another. Would I ever be so cozy with them? Would there ever be a day when I wasn’t really conscious about the moment?

  Gabriel patted my now smoothed strands of hair. Soft curls fell around my shoulders, still wet but now brushed. “Your color is amazing,” he said. “How is it so many different colors?”

  I wasn’t sure how to respond. “It’s like a dirty blonde or something.”

  “Or something is right,” he said. “There’s a little red in there. Various shades of blonde. It’s crazy.” He urged me up by nudging me in the shoulder. “Let’s go wash it. I want to blow dry it and see how it looks.”

  I again looked at Kota, who only smiled a little sympathetically at me. Nathan was smirking. I think he was enjoying this. I was feeling silly, but I stood up. Gabriel stood, grabbing my arm and pushing me toward Kota’s bathroom.

  He shut the bathroom door and we stood alone in the enclosed space. I felt my breath catch, not expecting this. Flashes of my imagination went through my head of things my mom would tell me about when boys got you alone. If being in Kota’s room together with all of them wasn’t bad enough, here I was in a locked room with one who wanted to play with my hair.

  Gabriel went to Kota’s shower and found a bottle of shampoo and conditioner. “These aren’t ideal for you but it’s what we have right now.” He made a gesture to the sink and then patted me on the hip. “Let’s get to work.”

  My cheeks radiated and I moved forward to face the sink.

  Gabriel stood next to me and twisted the knobs, testing the temperature with his fingers. “Tell me when you think it’s okay.”

  I reached in, waiting for the water to warm. When it did, I nodded to him.

  “Get in there,” he said.

  I could hear voices from the other side of the door. I had a feeling it was about me, and I strained to hear over the sound of the rushing water.

  When I ducked my head under the faucet, I couldn’t hear the voices. Just Gabriel.

  “You’re going to our school, aren’t you?” he asked, his fingers combing through my hair again, rubbing along my scalp behind my ears and really working his fingers along the base of my head. The massaging motion relaxed me. He was good at this.

  “Yes,” I croaked, not sure what to say. I was feeling even shyer now that he’d seen such an intimate side of me and learned the awkwardness of my family. He just met me and he knew the worst things so far.

  “We’ll be in the same grade,” he said. “Going to sign up for art class?”

  I laughed. “I can’t draw.”

  “Neither can I,” he said. He moved behind me, I felt his hip meeting mine. Touching was impossible to get used to. I resisted the urge to leap away from him, though it was difficult. “I hear you just show up and play with paint. There’s not much to it.”

  There was the fragrance of soap filling my nose and his fingers lathered up my hair with shampoo. “So you want an easy grade?” I asked.

  “They don’t offer the classes I want to take.”

  “What do you want to take?”

  He finished rubbing the shampoo in and then pushed my head a little until I was further under the running water. He cupped his hand into the water to redirect the flow to run over the base of my neck. “I wouldn’t mind learning bass. I already play guitar. There’s one class at... um... another school.” His fingers smoothed over the locks of my hair. I thought I felt him curling some of the strands but it was hard to tell.

  His hesitation confused me. “Another school?”

  “Just one of the private schools.”

  “Are you considering going to the private school next year?”

  His hands moved away from my head and he was silent. I thought I might have said something wrong but I heard a bottle being squeezed and he was rubbing something between his hands. “Might.”

  “Is there a requirement to get in?”

  He moved his fingers through my hair again, taking time to work the conditioner through every strand. “There’s always a requirement for a private school, sweetie.”

  The endearment made my breath catch. People don’t call other people sweetie up north, not unless they were sweethearts. I wondered if there was a hidden meaning, or if that was just how people talked here in the south, like I’d seen in movies.

  “So it means you won’t be going to my school if you go to the private one,” I said softly.

  “Maybe,” he said. “Victor’s so mean, isn’t he? Did you see him kick me? I was trying to be nice and fix your hair and he’s kicking me.” Was he dodging the question, or was it obvious?

  “He’s not so bad,” I said, thinking of the day before, how he had held my hand on the way out of the mall, and of the sheet music.

  “No, he isn’t bad. He’s just a pain in the ass, sometimes.” He finished the lather and then had me dunk my head into the water once more.

  When I was finished and dripping into the sink, he found a towel in the tiny bathroom closet and held it out to me. I wrapped my hair into it while he dug around in the cabinet under the sink. He pulled out organized blue bins, reaching deeper inside for one near the back.

  “So how do you know everyone?”

  “Huh?” he asked, pulling an older mo
del brown dryer out from under the sink.

  I swallowed and tried to stage whisper. “I mean, how did you meet Kota? And Victor? When did you all become friends?”

  He pushed the blue bins back underneath the sink and plugged in the dryer. He snapped his fingers and pointed at the closed toilet seat. When I was sitting, my head came up to his stomach. He flipped on the dryer and started combing his fingers through my hair. “I met them all in kindergarten,” he said. “We went to the same elementary school. Everyone but Silas and North.”

  “Who’s North?”

  “Another one of the guys,” he said. “There’s me, Kota, Victor, Nathan, Silas, North and Luke.”

  “Who’s Luke?”

  “North’s brother.”

  I blinked. Seven of them.

  Gabriel reached for the hair brush on the counter and started smoothing out my hair. “You see, everyone except North and Silas grew up together. Silas didn’t move here until maybe when we were ten. North came about a year later.”

  “Where was North?”

  “He was living with his dad in Europe,” he said, brushing my hair up against the air from the blower. “They live with their uncle now.”

  “Do they stop by here often?”

  “You’ll see them sometime,” he said.

  A silence grew between us as he focused on fixing my hair. With the way I was sitting, I couldn’t see what he was doing to me. Mostly it felt like he was just drying it out, but he was doing a twist thing to add a little volume. It was more than I ever bothered to do.

  There really was no reason for me to do more to it. I usually never saw anyone but my own family. Marie would trim my hair for me. She wasn’t very good, but with my hair pulled back, no one noticed.

  When he was done, he put down the dryer and the brush onto the counter top. He smoothed his fingers through my hair. “Your hair is soft. I was right about the color, too. It’s chameleon.”

  “Huh?”

  “Changes color depending on the light.” He put the brush back in a drawer and then tossed the blow dryer under the sink. I wondered if Kota would be upset he didn’t carefully put it back where he’d found it. Gabriel curled his finger to me. “Come here, step in front of me.”