Plan B

Chapter Twenty-one

Fran spent the rest of the day avoiding Brookie as much as humanly possible.  It was fine until Simon and Kevin, accomplices in tow, cornered her behind the science labs and she had to make a hasty escape to the boarding house and to her room just as prep was starting.  Brookie was already sitting at his desk, hand under his chin and with a textbook open.

Flustered, Fran tucked a stray strand of hair behind an ear before remembering that it wasn’t really something most boys would do and sat down at her desk.  Somehow, she managed to concentrate on her maths homework enough to get it done, and then she settled down to annotate Goblin Market for her English coursework.

It wasn’t until Rico came and knocked on their door to do the evening check-in – Mr Carson had gone out for the evening and Rico couldn’t be bothered to shepherd everybody into the downstairs common room – that Fran realised she’d been working solidly for two hours.  She hadn’t even started on her French work, but since she hated the subject so much, she figured she’d just procrastinate if she contemplated doing it, and decided to put it off until Tuesday, or possibly Wednesday.

Yawning, she closed her books and shoved them to the back of the desk.  It had been a weird day.  She hadn’t even argued with Brookie.  With a muffled groan, she got to her feet and stretched, and then gathered her pyjamas so that she could get changed in the bathroom.  I must remember to lock the door today.  She snuck a peek at Brookie as she passed him.  He was taking a break from his work, leaning back in his chair with his hands on his head and staring into space.  Raising her eyebrows, Fran slipped into the bathroom and pulled the door to behind her, making doubly sure that she double-locked it.

When she emerged in her pyjamas, towelling her hair dry, Brookie hadn’t budged an inch since she’d last seen him.  He didn’t even seem to notice that there was anybody else in the room with him.  It was unusual, even by Brookie’s standards.  Come to that, had he actually been working?  When Fran had entered the room, he’d only had a textbook open.  Now that she thought about it, there wasn’t a pen in sight on Brookie’s desk, and there wasn’t any paper around either.  Frowning, she peered closely at the film star.

What she saw gave her a bit of a shock.  His face was a little blotchy, almost as if he’d been… crying.  His eyes were red, though clear, and his expression was completely blank.

“Are you all right?” Fran asked without thinking.

Brookie jumped and looked frantically around before spotting her.

“Yeah.”  He forced a wan smile before his gaze returned to the middle distance.  “Yeah, just a bit tired.”  He rubbed his right eye and sighed.  It sounded as though he was trying to convince himself as much as Fran.

Perturbed, Fran edged away from him and almost bolted back to her side of the room.  She wasn’t used to Brookie being like this.  Something was clearly eating him.

A couple of seconds later, she heard him get to his feet and he too headed into the bathroom.  Letting out a breath she hadn’t even been aware she was holding in, Fran scrubbed her hair with the towel one last time and cast it over the back of a chair so that it could dry out.  Then she turned out the main light and crawled under her duvet with a book.

She had just turned on the bedside lamp when there was movement by her desk.

“Frankie,” said Brookie’s voice as he came into the pool of light, “how much do you know about girls?”

Fran let her book drop into her lap and surveyed him.  She still couldn’t get over how ridiculously cute he looked in his pyjamas.  It wasn’t a word she’d normally use to describe a handsome, well-built guy, but the loose clothing and his favourite pink hoodie, which he often slept in, somehow softened his appearance and made him seem vulnerable.  The cuteness was overwhelming when he rubbed his eye with a hand that was half-tucked into the sleeve of his hoodie.