Lonely Hearts

Chapter five: Lincoln

The teenagers at the home, no matter what clique they belonged to within the home, always stuck together in school. That's why I found myself sitting next to Darren and quietly reminding myself that, within these walls at least, we were acquaintances. We stuck together. There were one set of rules for the Inside, a whole other set of unwritten ones for the Outside.

I caught myself looking around for Skye, trying to spot her dark head among the other students.

"What are you fussing for, Mama's boy?" Darren muttered, flicking me with his pen.

I scowled and ignored him, looking back down at the formulae on the sheet and trying to shake her out of my mind.

"Hey, Mama's boy, what's this mean?" Darren asked, sticking his paper in front of me and pointing to a formulae.

I rolled my eyes at the nickname and studied the formulae for a minute.

"You need to find the area." I said. "πr² equals the area."

"Right, thanks." He turned back to his sheet and I finished the questions quickly so I could go back to my daydream.

Well, I would, just as soon as I gave my sheet to Darren to copy. Otherwise he would bug me for the rest of the day.

A grunt of appreciation and he was quiet, slowly scribbling down my workings out and answers. If he couldn't keep up, he would move down another set and then he wouldn't have anyone to copy off and he would fail. We were doing each other a favour. He wouldn't fail maths again and I had backup when someone rubbed me up the wrong way.

Maths was comforting. It was one of the few things I understood, in a world where uncertainty and confusion were the centre of my existence, maths provided a certain comfort more commonly found by others in books, films or friendships.

I found myself sinking into thought again, the teacher's voice fading into the background. A smile haunted me. The smile they used to give me when I read them a book or made their dolls sing or played house with them. That familiar smile.

The smile changed to something new, different. The laugh, the crookedness, the pearly white teeth, all different, yet oddly familiar. A smile I had only seen once but hoped to see again.

I would spend the rest of my life trying to earn that smile.

~*~

"Hey Mama's boy, thanks for your help today." Darren called, on the bus home.

I shrugged.

"By the way, if you do anything to screw with my little sister, I'll mess you up. I still haven't forgiven you for upsetting her last week." He added.

I shrugged again.

"I could care less about what your bratty sister thinks, Darren." I said. "She shouldn't have tried messing with the system."

We watched each other carefully for a minute and I waited to see what he would do. But he simply gave me a glare that promised revenge if I messed with his family. We all knew family was priceless here.

I turned to look out the window and put my earphones in, turning the volume up to drown out the other sounds and people babbling, as I watched the world blur by.

A sharp tap made me turn around and remove an earphone to look at Skye who grinned.

"Hey Daydreamer." She said, still smiling.

"Hey." I said, pausing my music and making myself comfortable.

"Where have you been hiding?" She asked.