Don't Forget Me

by Victoria Stevens

  Within ten minutes Maddie had given up on trying to explain the rules of the sport and decided to concentrate instead on getting him to actually hit the ball at all. After what felt like a hundred serves, he finally managed to hit three in a row in a rally, even if none of them landed inside the white lines. He was trying so hard, though, that Hazel found herself jumping up and down on the sideline in excitement whenever the racket and the ball connected.

  After a quick break to eat lunch, Hunter and Maddie swapped sides on the court and carried on practicing, with Hazel continuing her cheerleading from the sidelines. They were just getting into the swing of it when Luca appeared, hovering on the edge of the court like he wasn’t sure if he was welcome. Hazel had texted him at the beginning of lunch to let him know where they were, but she hadn’t expected him to come—this was hardly their usual quiet, relaxed lunchtime setting.

  “Hey, Luca!” Hunter said cheerfully to him, waving his racket about precariously in greeting.

  “How’s it going?” Luca asked.

  “He’s doing great,” Maddie said. “We’ve got a good twenty minutes yet; that’s loads of time to master the backhand.”

  “Backhand?” Hunter echoed, his frown deepening. “Which one’s that again?”

  Maddie shook her head almost imperceptibly. “Don’t worry about it. The names aren’t important as long as you can hit the ball.”

  “Preferably over the net, though, right?”

  “Preferably, yeah. Are you sure tennis is the right fit for you?”

  “Only one way to find out,” Hunter said.

  He and Maddie went back to practicing, and Hazel moved next to Luca to watch, where they stifled their laughter every time Hunter swung for the ball with his racket and missed horribly or hit the ball outside the court. To her credit, Maddie remained as patient as ever, calling out words of reassurance and not even blinking when he asked her for the fifth time which of the lines were the boundaries of the court.

  Finally, the bell rang, signaling the end of lunch, and it was time for them to give up and head to their classes.

  “Hey Hazel,” Hunter said as they walked toward the main building. “Are you ready for the Math test tomorrow?”

  Hazel sighed heavily. Her teacher, Mrs. Williams, was giving the class another test, and would be using Hazel’s results to decide if she needed to be moved down a level. She was already nervous. “Please don’t remind me.”

  “Oh yeah,” Luca said suddenly. “I was going to ask if you wanted me to come over after school to run through some equations one more time?”

  “You don’t mind?”

  Luca shrugged, and Hunter shook his head in amusement. “I’m surprised your brain is still intact. I feel like crying every time he attempts to explain even just one equation to me.”

  Luca shoved him in the shoulder. “Yeah, right. I’ll remember that next time you’re begging me for help.”

  “Ha!” Hunter scoffed. “And I’ll remember that when I’m a professional tennis player and getting paid a million dollars a day to model Adidas gear!”

  “You do know if that ever, ever happens, you owe me everything, right?” Maddie cut in. “Seeing as I’ve been the one suffering through all of this for you.”

  “Suffering?” he said. “Suffering? Is that all this has been to you? And there I was, calling it the best time of my life…”

  She shoved him in the shoulder too, and he let out a booming laugh and pulled her against him, holding her tight. Hazel couldn’t help but glance over at Luca to see what he thought of their play fighting; he was already looking at her, eyebrow quirked upward in amusement.

  * * *

  Less than half an hour into the tutoring session that afternoon, Hazel’s head ached from the sheer amount of work her brain was being forced to do, and her eyes hurt from staring at the textbook trying to make sense of the numbers. It wasn’t that Luca wasn’t a good teacher, because he was—she was just sick of math. They’d crammed in a whole load of quick tutoring sessions in the last couple of weeks, be it on the field after training or in their free periods at school, and if it wasn’t enough to help her show Mrs. Williams that she could handle the topics she was going to cry.

  “Hazel?” Luca said loudly, tapping her on the arm to bring her back to the sum at hand. She looked down at the paper and the number there; it began with a four and ended in a stupid amount of zeros. “Come on. You can do this. Just tell me what the number is in scientific notation.”

  She chewed the end of her pen in frustration. “You say that like it’s so easy.”

  “It is,” he said. Then, gently, “Go ahead.”

  Hazel shot him a glare, because even though he was only there to help her, it felt as if he were killing her slowly. That was how it had been every time they’d sat down for a tutoring session: the calmer he stayed, the more stressed she got. “Right. So now there’s four, and if we count the zeros up after it, we get … eighteen.”

  “Exactly!” he said, and for a split second, she actually felt pleased with herself.

  “So that’s four times ten to the power of eighteen?”

  He nodded again, giving her an encouraging smile as he moved to shield the sheet with his palm. “Right. Which is how many zeros?”

  She let out a groan. “How am I supposed to know? You’ve covered it up!”

  “You’re supposed to know because we’ve literally just done this!” he pointed out, still managing to sound surprisingly cheerful. Perhaps he enjoyed her pain. The sadist. “You know how to work it out backward. You just convert it, remember? Like when we did five times ten to the power of three?”

  “Five thousand,” she said automatically.

  “See? You do get it! This is exactly the same principle, just with more difficult numbers.” He held his hands up in front of her. “If it makes it easier, you can use your fingers—if you don’t mind feeling like a preschooler.”

  “Okay, okay,” Hazel said gruffly, swatting his hands away. “You’ve made your point.”

  She took a deep breath and closed her eyes for a moment, trying to visualize the sum in her head. “Okay,” she muttered, more to herself than to him. “So it’s four, to start with. Four and … and eighteen zeros?” She opened her eyes to peek at him. “… I think?”

  He just smiled. “Correct.”

  She gave a sigh of relief. “Jeez. This is way too difficult.”

  “But you’re really getting the hang of it now!” he said. “So if it’s a four and eighteen zeros, what number does it make?”

  She stared at him. “Seriously?”

  “Seriously.”

  She heaved another sigh, rubbing her forehead with the palms of her hands. “Okay. Let’s think this through logically. Six zeros is a million, so twelve is a million million which is a trillion. And then eighteen is three sixes so three times a million is a million million million, which is … a quintillion? So four times ten to the power of eighteen is four quintillion?”

  He broke into a grin. “Correct again. Probably. Although you could just be a million or a million million or a million billion trillion short. Who knows at this point.”

  “Hilarious,” she said, but he just smirked back at her. “You know what? You’re just jealous I can count that high.”

  “Because that makes sense when I’m the one teaching you math.”

  “This is scientific notation, it’s not math.”

  “Pretty sure it is, Coach.”

  She gave him her sternest look. “I’ve told you a million billion trillion times, Luca. Coach on the field, Hazel off of it.”

  “Okay,” he said. “I get it. Sorry, Coach.”

  “Screw you.” She slammed her book shut. “I never have to deal with this sort of crap from your brother.”

  “That’s because he thinks you’re an angel,” he said with another smirk.

  “Right,” she said. “Except he doesn’t, at all.”

  “So you say—but you also claimed you studied th
is topic back home, so…”

  “Don’t blame me, blame my teacher,” she said, and Luca narrowed his eyes at her.

  “I can only work with what you’ve already got, Coach. It’s just a shame you haven’t got very much.”

  “Just because you’re Red’s brother doesn’t mean I’m above hitting you.”

  “I’d like to see you try,” he teased back, and so she raised her hand in a fist, swinging it toward his arm. His reflexes were fast; he caught her hand in his, his strong fingers closing around her fist like a cocoon.

  “Nice try,” he said, and let her go.

  “Come on. I need to pass this test tomorrow, or I’ll have to sack you.”

  “I’m not sure you can sack someone you’re not even paying.”

  She rolled her eyes at him. “Just get on with it, Cawley.”

  * * *

  They studied for almost another hour until the doorbell rang just after six. Hazel opened the door to find Maddie and Red standing on the doorstep.

  “Hi guys,” Hazel said. “What’s up?”

  “This is an intervention,” Maddie announced. “We’ve come to save you from the deathly throes of mathematics.”

  “And, more important, we brought food,” Red added, holding up a huge cardboard boxful of what smelled like Chinese takeout. “Because food makes everything better.”

  Luca appeared behind Hazel. “What’s going on?”

  “We’re saving her from your terrible teaching skills.” Red grinned at him. “And just in time, by the looks of it. You look like you’ve been to hell and back, Hazel.”

  “Thanks.” Luca snorted. “We were basically done, anyway.”

  “Get bored of torturing her?”

  “I’m helping her, you moron. Which is more than you’ve offered to do.”

  “In case you forgot, I’m in art school. Where I study art.”

  “Yeah, but that’s only because you’re—”

  “Enough!” Maddie cut them off with a fond roll of her eyes. “Let’s dish this up before it gets cold.”

  The twins traipsed ahead into the kitchen, but Hazel stopped Maddie. “Where’s Hunter?”

  She just sighed. “Practice ran over, he just called.”

  “And?”

  “And it doesn’t sound like it’s going all that great.”

  “Poor Hunter.”

  “I just wish I could help him, you know? Make him happy.”

  “Maddie, you do help him,” Hazel said. “You know how much he appreciates your support.”

  “I know, I know.” Maddie sighed. “I just wish one of the boys was more into sports so they could help him too. He really wants to find a place to fit in.”

  “He’ll figure it out,” Hazel said lightly, and they followed the others into the kitchen.

  * * *

  Hunter turned up on the doorstep soon after, along with Graham, and they joined them for Chinese food.

  “Tennis,” Hunter declared as he collapsed into the kitchen chair next to Maddie, “is not my thing.”

  “You didn’t enjoy the practice?”

  “Not even remotely.” He shook his head in annoyance, making his curls bounce. “Too many balls flying everywhere, it’s a safety hazard. It’s okay, though. I guess it just wasn’t the right sport.”

  “Hunter,” Luca said carefully, “I’m not trying to be funny, but are you sure there is one?”

  “Yes!” he said indignantly. “And I’ll find it to prove it.”

  “What about swimming?” Hazel suggested. When he wasn’t working at the waterfall, he was constantly at the beach. “You love the water, don’t you?”

  “I do, yeah, but the swim team’s really competitive, and it’s already filled up—even for next year. Coach said I could have a place on the synchro team for next year if I wanted it, but I told him to get screwed.”

  “A little more politely than that, I hope,” Graham said without looking up from his plate.

  “Of course.”

  “What’s so bad about the synchro team?” Maddie asked.

  “Callum would have a field day. It’s the only sport in the whole school that’s worse than doing nothing at all. I’d probably have to wear a stupid flowery swimming cap and prance around in a pink costume…” He shuddered. “Nope, my masculinity is too fragile. I’ll just find something else.”

  “Are there many sports left that you haven’t tried?” Hazel said.

  “Coach said I could go along to a fencing practice in a couple of weeks.” He sighed.

  Maddie just leaned over to squeeze his shoulder reassuringly. “It’ll be okay.”

  * * *

  As Mrs. Williams handed out the test papers in Math the next day, Hazel’s heart was racing, and her palms were clammy. As soon as Mrs. Williams gave them permission to start, Hazel took a deep breath and opened the first page, eyes focused on the numbers written there. She smiled, nerves dissipating; she knew this. She put her pencil to the paper and scribbled away as if her life depended on it.

  She finished with time to spare, even after she’d checked through her work twice to make sure she’d answered all she could. The test wasn’t easy by any stretch of the imagination, but it wasn’t just blurry numbers anymore; it actually made sense.

  When the bell rang for the end of class, Mrs. Williams asked Hazel to stay behind.

  “I know you’ve been struggling, Hazel. Would you like me to grade this now so we can see how you did?”

  Hazel nodded and took a seat at one of the desks in the front row, waiting quietly and hoping with all she had that she’d at least managed to pass this test. It only took Mrs. Williams a few minutes to grade the paper, and then she was beckoning to Hazel, her face unreadable.

  Hazel approached her desk slowly and took the paper she was holding out. She almost didn’t want to look at the grade scrawled in red at the top, because she was scared, but then she had to and … wow.

  She’d done more than pass. She’d gotten a big, fat B+. She exhaled in relief.

  “Happy?” Mrs. Williams asked, although Hazel was pretty sure she could tell from the way she was beaming. “Congratulations, Hazel. You deserve this—you’ve obviously been putting in a lot of hard work.”

  She just nodded dumbly. Those sessions with Luca had been intense. She owed him big-time.

  Mrs. Williams waved her off. “Go on then, go eat lunch. And Hazel?”

  Hazel paused in the doorway. “Yes?”

  “Keep up the good work.”

  * * *

  Luca was the first thing Hazel saw when she walked out of the classroom, leaning ever so casually against the lockers, waiting for her. He looked up at the sound of her approaching, and she crossed the hallway to him, ready to hand him the paper, but instead she found herself throwing her arms around his neck and hugging him tightly.

  For a fleeting second he was stiff in her arms, unyielding, but then something changed, and he was hugging her back, laughing into her ear and spinning her around. It felt so carefree and natural and normal. The moment was brief, and it vanished as soon as they pulled apart, but it had been there, and it took her breath away.

  “I take it the test went okay?” he asked then.

  “Mrs. Williams graded my paper early,” she said.

  “And?”

  Hazel showed him her test. “And I got a B+!”

  “Well done, Hazel!”

  “Thank you,” she told him sincerely, and hoped with all her heart he knew just how much she meant it.

  28

  That weekend, Claire had invited Hazel and Graham over to the house for a proper sit-down meal with the whole family. Red had told Hazel that his dad had arranged with work to stay in Port Sheridan for good, which she knew was going to be a really positive thing for the family. She’d spent the last few days avoiding the Cawley residence, figuring it was best to let the family settle back in with one another first.

  Marc was nothing like Hazel expected—he was younger, warmer, more friendly look
ing. His entire face lit up when he caught sight of Graham standing in the hallway, and he crossed the room in three strides to pull him into his arms. “Graham!” he barked, clapping him on his back. “Good to see you!”

  Graham hugged him just as tightly. “You too, Marc. It’s been too long—when was the last time I saw you? July?”

  “Just before you jetted off to London.” He looked past Graham for the first time, and when his eyes landed on Hazel his whole face changed. His eyes softened, and the corners of his mouth turned down.

  “Christ,” he murmured. “You look just like her, don’t you?”

  Hazel’s breath caught in her throat, but before she could say anything Red instinctively stepped forward between her and his father. “Let’s get some drinks, shall we? Hazel? You want to help me?”

  Hazel nodded, glancing briefly back at Marc—who was watching her closely—before following Red into the kitchen.

  * * *

  No one brought up England or her mum after that, which Hazel was thankful for. They ate in the dining room, with Hazel and Graham on one side of the table, the twins on the other, and Marc and Claire sitting at either end. It was strange, seeing how comfortably Graham interacted with Red’s parents. Strange but nice.

  After they’d finished eating, Hazel and the twins excused themselves from the table and headed up to Red’s room to watch a movie. Hazel paused in the dining room doorway, looking back at Graham over her shoulder. He was laughing, his head thrown back, green eyes sparkling. He looked so relaxed, so at home. He looked happy, truly happy, for the first time since she’d met him in the lawyer’s office in London. It was a nice sight; she hadn’t realized how much his happiness had started to mean to her.

  “You coming?” Red called from down the hallway, where he and Luca were waiting at the foot of the stairs for her.

  Hazel tore her eyes away from Graham. “I’m coming,” she said cheerfully, and went to join them.

  * * *

  Luca’s newest running goal was to get below thirteen minutes before the end of November—just a week and a half away. A couple of months ago, the idea would’ve seemed impossible to Hazel, but she knew now that Luca was more than capable.