Strings Attached

Chapter One

I gasped. "That's sexist, too!"

"It is not!"

"It is!"

I turned to see his suitcase and noticed that it was mostly full of wires and books.

"Why do you need those wires?" I asked.

"They are from my robotics club," he said, smiling.

"And you read, too?"

He nodded. "I love to."

I raised an eyebrow. "What kind of guy are you, Theodore?"

He shrugged. "A normal one, I suppose."

I grabbed one of the wires and stared at it. It was a purple wire, and it looked like a pretty normal wire to me, so I asked Theodore what it did, and he said it did nothing, so I asked him why he needed it.

"Because it is not about what it does," he said. "It's about what it used to do. It used to bring things together, to unite them. Now it has been ripped apart, and it no longer unites anything, but maybe if I fix it, it will be able to connect more stuff."

"And what's so great about that?" I asked, curious.

His eyes lit up. "I just love to bring stuff together. I did not even pay attention to the robotics teacher when he talked. I only asked him for the prettiest wires and took them home with me. I would rather keep them than throw them away. Anything that once united something is worth keeping."

I thought about it. He was kind of right. Sometimes even people needed for something to connect them. Sometimes families needed a wire to help unite them, a wire that ensured that nothing or no one ever separated them. My own family had needed one. Heck, we would have killed for a wire to bring us back together.

Too bad there are no wires to connect humans. Too bad humans are not bonded by anything, and nothing lasts forever. Too bad no bond could ever be as strong and permanent as we all wished it could be.

Every single bond I had ever known had been destroyed by something or someone else. Every single bond I had ever known had only been temporary and weak.

"I guess," I said, trying not to show him that he had given me something to think about.

"Do you want one?" he asked. "I have a lot! You can start your own collection!"

I shook my head. "No, thanks. I'm good," I said.

"You sure?"

"Positive."

"Okay," he said, grinning and folding another XOXO boxer.

I examined Theodore. He did not look like the kind of boy who would like things that connected stuff. He looked like the kind of boy who broke stuff instead of mending it. He did not seem like the kind of guy who would like wires. He seemed like the kind of guy who would like to listen to loud music and to flip off random people just for fun.

Theodore Harper surely did not look like the kind of boy who liked to read, either. He looked as though he would not read a book even if his life depended on it, and I wondered if it was all a show and he was lying to impress me. If so, then he was failing miserably, for I do not get easily impressed.

"You're strange, Theodore," I said out of the blue.

He flinched. "I, um, do not like to be called that. You could call me anything, but... please don't call me that."