School For Troubled Boys

by Lina Langley

  That was much more poetic than what I was thinking about, which was entirely sexual. I cast my eyes down toward my lap, feeling chastised. I didn’t think he had intended to do that, but it didn’t feel good.

  He squeezed my shoulder. “Thank you,” he said.

  I looked up at him, my gaze darting around his face. I was trying not to look into his eyes because I didn’t think I would ever be able to look away if I did. I could see the lines on his forehead, his sharp jaw and marked cheekbones. He wasn’t handsome yet—but he was clearly going to be, give or take five or so years. He was magnetic, regardless, beautiful, faery-like.

  I could feel his breath on my skin before I could process what was happening. He was inching closer to me, his lips very close to my own, his gaze darting between my eyes and my mouth.

  I wanted to kiss him, but I couldn’t. There was Alix, for starters, who was my best friend. I couldn’t just do something like that to him. And, in any case, even if Alix wasn’t in the equation, we weren’t allowed to have relationships with each other.

  It was a really bad idea. If a guard found us, we would probably have to stay longer at Freemount and… fuck. I didn’t want to think about the consequences.

  “Thank you,” he said when he noticed I wasn’t moving. “For holding my hair.”

  I exhaled through my nose. “Yeah,” I said. “You’re welcome.”

  He got closer to me, then, as he was about to kiss me, he turned his face away from me. “Wait,” he said. “I should probably brush my teeth.”

  I laughed and shook my head. I watched him get off the chair and began to walk away from me. “Wait,” I said as he walked in front of me, grabbing his wrist and stopping him.

  “What?” he asked, his gaze on my hand around his wrist. I wasn’t holding him softly. I should have been, because all I had wanted to do was stop him.

  I should have let him go.

  When I willed my hand to move, it didn’t work. I looked up at his face. His cheeks were slightly red, but at least he had some color in his face. “We can’t,” I said.

  He furrowed his brow. “We can’t…”

  “Alix likes you,” I said, then bit down on my lower lip. My fingers were slack around his wrist now and I looked away from him when I spoke again. “Shit. I don’t think I’m supposed to tell you that.”

  “Probably not,” he replied. “But I would be an idiot if I hadn’t noticed it.”

  “You noticed it?” I said. He hadn’t moved his arm away and my fingers were still around his wrist, though they weren’t really holding him in place anymore. They were just sort of holding him, almost as if we were about to hold hands, as if he was going to interlace his fingers into mine and climb on my lap.

  Of course that was ridiculous. Of course I knew he wasn’t going to do that. But fuck, I couldn’t help but hope that he was thinking about something similar.

  He could clearly read me extremely well, but I had never managed to read him at all.

  “It’d be hard not to,” David replied. “And I don’t have anything against him. I don’t. He’s cute and everything, I just… I don’t know. I guess I didn’t think I’d be getting into a relationship when I came here.”

  “A relationship,” I echoed.

  He paled a little at that. It was marginal, but with how ivory white his skin was, whenever he paled, it looked like he was about to faint.

  “I should go,” he said. “Get ready for bed. The doctor said I had to get some rest.”

  “Nurse.”

  “Huh?”

  “He’s a nurse,” I said. “The doctor comes around every month or so, but he’s a nurse.”

  “Right,” he replied. He didn’t say much else as he walked out of the room and I tried to ignore the growing pit in my stomach as I watched him close the door softly behind him.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  I tried not to talk to David the next day. It wasn’t personal, but I couldn’t tell him that, because then it would feel personal. I got up early, didn’t grab any books off the shelf and walked outside to stretch.

  The cool air hit me as I opened the door to the porch. Some boys went out and jogged around the facility, but I never liked jogging. I liked sports better than working out because at least those had an outcome. Jogging just felt like going in circles and achieving literally nothing, which felt too much like a metaphor for my life.

  I couldn’t deal with it. I stuck my hands inside the pockets of my hoodie and watched as my breath gathered in front of my face. I walked through it quickly, taking longer and longer strides. I could hear the ground I was kicking under me, I could feel it gathering dust under my feet. I was walking through, not caring about the reddish mark it was leaving on my jeans or about the explanation I would have to give the people back at Freemount.

  It was just a walk. There was nothing delinquent or maladaptive about going for a walk. I did think about getting drunk, but of course, there was no alcohol on the premises and I wasn’t going to sneak out just for a beer.

  I hadn’t realized how far I had walked until I reached the closed double gate. The property was big and I hadn’t realized I had been so absorbed in my thoughts that I had almost managed to leave Freemount.

  It wasn’t like jumping the gate was out of the question. It could easily be scaled, and even if that didn’t work, there were trees all around it. I considered it for a second.

  Breaking out meant no more restrictions, no more curfew, no more gardening and kitchen duty and group therapy. It meant no more crying in class, no more restriction from electronics, no more being stuck in the same house except when we went on expeditions.

  But it also meant no more Alix. It meant I wouldn’t get my stuff back and it meant I would probably never be allowed to go home again. I wouldn’t finish high school and God knew if I would have any chance of getting a job.

  And then there would be no David.

  And fuck, I hated that he was even a consideration.

  Because I had met him all of two or so weeks ago and he shouldn’t be. He shouldn’t have ranked at all among my concerns.

  I was so deep in thought I missed that someone had snuck up behind me. It wasn’t until I felt their touch on my shoulder that I turned around, ready to punch the guard that had come to disturb me.

  My fist was flying through the air when I realized, with some horror, that the person I was about to punch was David. The cat-eye glasses, the slicked back blonde-pink hair… it was obvious and I had been so lost in my thoughts I hadn’t even considered that he might be out there.

  I didn’t manage to stop completely since I had put quite a bit of momentum into it, but I did deviate a little from the original course of the punch. I caught him on the cheek, enough to get him to stumble back, but it didn’t seem like I caught any of his bones.

  If I had, I’m pretty sure my fist would have hurt more.

  My arm still outstretched, I blinked a couple of times as my gaze landed on his face. He was staring at me, wide-eyed, his mouth half-open, his cheeks red.

  He was holding the side of his face with his hand, too. I cleared my throat. I wanted to die a little but I knew that apologizing would have to come first. I could think about dying later.

  “Shit,” I said, walking over to him. I grabbed his hand and looked closely at his face. “Shit, David, I’m so sorry, are you okay, did I hurt you, I—”

  “I’m fine,” he said, looking at me from the corner of his eye. “Seriously.”

  “David—”

  “Seriously,” he said, cracking a smile. “I shouldn’t have startled you. I didn’t realize you had navy-like reflexes.”

  I tried to smile at him as I hooked a finger under his chin. He tried to move his face away from me, but I needed to see if I had done any damage.

  “Stop,” I said. “I need to know if I hurt you.”

  “You didn’t hurt me,” he replied, but he did stop moving his face, which made taking a closer look at him a little easier. The morning
was dark and overcast, so I couldn’t see his skin that well from where I was. I got my face closer to his own, level with his cheek, where my fist had grazed him.

  “You seem okay,” I replied, finally letting go of his face. “But if there’s anything—”

  “No,” he said, laughing and shaking his head. He had turned around to look at me and had begun to rub his cheek again. “There’s nothing you can do. I just know not to sneak up on you again. Damn, what was that?”

  “I’m wily,” I said, winking at him. “That’s what my parents say, anyway.”

  “Wily,” he replied, looking up and down at me. “I think I can see that.”

  We stayed there, looking at each other for what seemed like a very long time. It couldn’t have been more than a couple of minutes, but it felt like forever, and when he took a step close to me, I didn’t push him away.

  I didn’t back away, either.

  I swallowed as I looked into his eyes. “I can’t, David.”

  “Then don’t,” he replied. He dropped his hand to his side and grabbed my wrist, pulling me closer to him. I could feel his breath on my skin as he inched his face closer to mine. “Tell me to stop.”

  I closed my eyes. “I should.”

  “You should,” he replied, then pressed his lips against mine. There was a millisecond when every reason to stop him came into my head, crowded it like it was the only thing I could think about, like it was the only thing I should have ever thought about.

  But as the kiss continued, his lips warm against my own, firm, hesitant, I could feel every thought other than him melting away into molten lava inside of me. I had become nothing while he had become everything and all I wanted to do was to kiss him back until I wore his lips away with mine.

  He opened his eyes and moved away from me, stumbling as if I had just punched him. Again.

  “Whoa,” he said quietly.

  “Yeah,” I replied as I tried to catch my breath.

  He raised his eyebrows. “I wasn’t expecting that.”

  I cocked my head and laughed a little, though I still didn’t feel like myself. I didn’t know when I would begin to feel like myself again. “What is that supposed to mean?”

  He licked his lips. “Nothing,” he said. “Nothing.”

  “Okay—”

  “They’re waiting for you,” he said. “For breakfast. You’ll get in trouble if you don’t go.”

  “I know,” I replied. “Thank you for coming to get me.”

  He shrugged his shoulders, stuck his hands in his jean pockets—again, I couldn’t help but marvel at how the fuck he was doing that—and nodded as he began to walk away.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  I sat down next to Alix and noticed that David had gone to sit somewhere else. I hadn’t even realized he had made other friends since he had been at Freemount, but I couldn’t exactly begrudge him that.

  Alix patted my shoulder when I sat down next to him. “You okay, Q? You look like shit.”

  “I’m fine,” I replied, wondering if it sounded like a lie. I should have been fine.

  It was only a kiss. I shouldn’t have been thinking this much about it. David wouldn’t even meet my gaze from where he was and I couldn’t help but wonder what I had done wrong.

  “I’ll kill him,” Alix said quietly, so only I would hear. “Whoever he is.”

  I tried to smile at him, but it was hard. I needed to tell him about David and I needed to do it quickly. He couldn’t find out from anyone else. He definitely couldn’t find out from David.

  Pete was sitting across us, playing with his food. “Do you guys think this is what made David hurl?”

  “The eggs benedict? I doubt it,” Alix replied.

  “Why did they make eggs benedict anyway?” Pete said as he looked at the kitchen. “Yo, Brian, stick with the bagels next time, okay?”

  “Fuck you, Pete!” Brian replied from the kitchen.

  Any other time, it would have made me laugh. Right then, I felt like being sick. I wasn’t going to be able to get out of sharing a room with David and things were just going to get awkward between us.

  But at least I would get to see him.

  There was something magical about seeing him, when he was just waking up, when he was searching clumsily for his glasses with his hand. Even then, when he looked human, there was something endlessly attractive about him. And I—fuck, I needed to tell Alix.

  I looked up at him after checking to make sure that no guards were looking at us. “I need to talk to you,” I said.

  “Sure,” Alix replied, looking at me with something that appeared to be a cross of concern and pity. Whatever it was, I didn’t like it.

  We stood up quietly and made our way toward the hallway. I pulled him in to the space behind the stairs before I spoke. “Listen,” I said. “Okay? Before you say anything, just listen.”

  He didn’t say a thing. I took a deep breath and tried to find the words to tell him, but it was hard. “Okay, so David…”

  He raised his eyebrows, waiting for me to finish.

  “Okay, so he sort of, kissed me, I guess, okay, but please don’t get mad,” I said. “I mean, you can get mad if you want.”

  “He kissed you?”

  “Yeah,” I replied. He continued staring at me, so I had to tell him everything. I could see how he was taking it from his face and he didn’t seem too happy. By the time I was done, I was breathless, but I felt better about it all.

  At least my best friend knew. It was better to think about not being alone in trying to navigate this, because I wasn’t sure I had ever had the feelings I had for David with anyone else. Toward anyone else.

  It was hard to parse, even in my own head, and I knew I could use Alix’s help navigating it. When I was done sighing with relief and I looked at his face, all I could see was anger.

  “Really?” Alix asked after a little while.

  I swallowed. “It wasn’t on purpose,” I said. “I—”

  “I asked you for one thing,” he said. “One. We’ve been in this shithole seven months together and I have literally only ever asked you for one thing.”

  “I couldn’t really control it,” I said. “How David feels isn’t really something I can change.”

  “Bullshit you can change it,” he said. “You think I don’t notice how you look at him? You think I don’t notice you pick up Camus instead of your standard Danielle Steel when you know he’s going to be watching what you’re reading?”

  “Danielle Steel is a national treasure,” I said, an edge creeping into my voice.

  “Whatever,” he replied. “You’re an asshole.”

  “Alix—”

  He turned on his heel and walked away from me. Our conversation felt like it had been cut short and it definitely hadn’t made me feel any better. If anything, it had made me feel worse.

  I took a deep breath, my hands fists at my side. David was just a crush, one that had snuck up on me. Alix was right. I was being an asshole. I could have easily gotten control over it, but I hadn’t wanted to.

  I liked David too much—no, I corrected myself. I liked the way I thought David made me feel too much. I shook my head. That didn’t seem much better.

  I pinched the bridge of my nose and looked up only when I heard a sound coming from the door.

  “Hey,” David said.

  I bit my lip. “Fuck,” I said. “David. How much of that did you hear?”

  “None of it,” he said. “But I gathered something had happened from Alix storming out and you not coming back into the dining room.”

  “I thought you were avoiding me,” I said, my gaze darting away from his face. I couldn’t bear looking at him.

  “You’re right,” he replied, crossing his arms over his chest. He leaned against the wall in a way that seemed practiced and I didn’t know whether I wanted to punch him or kiss him more. Both seemed about as appropriate right then. “I am avoiding you.”

  I swallowed, my heart beating fast. “Why?”<
br />
  “You didn’t want me to kiss you,” he said quietly. “And then I did, and I thought if I didn’t get to do it again, I might, you know, explode. So I’ve been trying to give you some space so I can get my head on straight.”

  “Good luck with that,” I said, smirking at him.

  “Har har,” he replied, rolling his eyes but smiling at me. Then he looked at the front door, where Alix had left from, and sighed. “And I didn’t want that to happen, either.”

  “That wasn’t your fault,” I said quietly.

  “It feels like my fault,” he replied.

  “Nah,” I said. “No. That was all me being terrible.”

  He twisted his lips. “You didn’t do anything wrong,” he said.

  “Yeah,” I replied. “Okay.”

  “Seriously,” he said. “I don’t know how I can convince you, but—”

  I looked at him and shook my head. He was the one who had gotten me into all this trouble in the first place. Before he had arrived, all I could think about was getting better so I could get out.

  “You can’t,” I replied, walking past him as I went to look for Alix, practically shoulder-checking him when I did.

  David got out of my way, side-eyeing me but saying nothing. I tried to catch a glimpse at him from over my shoulder, but by the time I opened the doors, he was gone.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Alix was sitting on the porch, quite literally kicking rocks. When he heard me approaching, he didn’t look up. “Quinn,” he said.

  “I’m sorry,” I replied. “You’re right. I’m an asshole.”

  He looked up at me then, then shook his head. “No,” he said. “You’re not.”

  “No, I am,” I replied. “I should have told you earlier. I mean, you were the one who wanted to get together with him and I—”

  He laughed, throwing his head back. “Yeah, but it just means you have good taste,” he said. “For what it’s worth, I totally get it.”

  I smiled, a little weakly. “Do you mind if I sit with you?”

  “Nah,” he said. “Go ahead. Though if you keep disappearing, you might get in trouble.”