The Rugby Player and Me

6. What Kind of Man-Child..?

In that case, I take it back. I don't add everyone on snap you are the one and only haha

oliviabcker

now that's what I wanted to hear. you sure know how to make a girl feel a certain type of way

What was that supposed to mean? My thumbs hovered over the keyboard for a few moments before I decided what to type.

camerondavies10

What can I say? I'm good like that ;)

"Are you even listening?"

"Huh?" I asked, looking up.

"Cam," my mother repeated, sighing. "Your toast is done." She said, before turning back to her work.

I grabbed my toast and began buttering it, putting my phone away. Retrieving my school bag from upstairs, I walked out the door to wait for the bus, toast still in hand.

The bus pulled up, and a few minutes later I was standing outside St Patrick's Boy's College.

The building was unlike any other in our area. It had an Old-English styled vibe, what with its towers made of bricks that seemed to reach the sky and the ivy that clung to the walls.

For mid-North Island New Zealand, the school was definitely a foreign sight.

I took a deep breath and made my way through the double wooden doors.

Inside the school was also pretty cool, I guessed. I remember on my first day here, when I had stood bug-eyed in the centre of these halls, mouth agape. Over the years, awe of the place had turned to a dull appreciation of it. The more you saw something beautiful, I heard, the more you got used to it.

I wandered into first period a few minutes early and set my bag down next to my usual seat. I rested my chin on my hand and zoned out, looking at the white walls. This was how I spent most of my classes, bored and not paying attention.

I yawned. While I loved going for my early morning runs, I couldn't deny they made me feel tired, and when I was tired, I had even more trouble concentrating in class than I usually did. And it wasn't like I had gone to bed early last night either. I decided I would start going to sleep earlier.

"Cameron Davies?" a rough female voice asked. My eyes flicked to the speaker, a middle-aged woman in a matching shirt and pant outfit.

"Yes?" I asked.

"You're wanted in the office, dear. Principal Marcus wants a word with you. You can leave your stuff here, if you want. It will only take a few minutes." The woman said.

Sighing, I grabbed my bag and swung it over my shoulder. I had learnt the hard way that 'a few minutes' actually translated to something more like 'forty-five minutes.' Principal Marcus had a habit of rambling.

Principal Anthony Marcus was a balding man, but you couldn't deny it: he had character. He was loud and very out there. And he was incredibly hyper-active. Despite all of this, most of the student body adored him.

Miriam Johnston – that's what the name-tag of the woman read – walked me into the main office, Principal Marcus's door was open, and I was sure that's where he would be lurking. Miriam Johnston moved to behind her desk and ushered me to go in.

Sure enough, when I got to the doorway, there was the principal playing with a ball that was attached to a table tennis bat. The constant tap, tap, tap of the ball against the wood lulled me into a hypnotic state, and I just stood in the doorway until Principal Marcus finally noticed me.

"Cameron, my boy! Come on in!" Principal Marcus had a deeply intense yet grandfatherly voice which was almost comforting to hear. Even when he was telling someone off his voice never lost the kindness that weaved its way through his tones.

"Right," he began. "What can I do you for, Cameron?" He started stacking paperwork on his desk, not looking at what he was stacking. I was certain he wouldn't be able to find anything later.

"You asked me to come here." I told him, and he frowned. Principal Marcus gestured for me to take a seat on one of the Mickey Mouse-themed sofas that he had picked up from a garage sale not too long ago. Quirky sofas for a quirky man.

Principal Marcus's office was laden with odd finds. He had a small ornament that looked like a mountain of hard hot glue, some arguably inappropriate abstract paintings on the wall and even a piece of his own bone he had been given after a surgery to remove it. I only knew this because he told me.

He even had some stuffed ducks sitting on the mantel.

"Ah!" Principal Marcus said, eyes lit up with recognition. "Why, of course I did! How could I forget?" He shuffled some more papers around before looking back at me. "I've been monitoring your grades the last few weeks. Is everything alright at home?"

I cast my eyes down and pushed my glasses further up my nose. I hated when people asked me about my family or home or whatever. I didn't really like opening up to people. And it wasn't like it was anyone else's business, anyway.

"Nothing different than a few weeks ago." I said, frowning.

Principal Marcus watched me over is arched fingers for a few moments, before casually nodding.

"Well, it seems to me that your English grades are even worse than what they already were." He laughed, and I shot him a glare. "We are going to need to find a solution to this or I'm sorry Cameron, you can't play rugby."

"Sir, with all due respect-"

Principal Marcus held his hand up to silence me. "I'm sorry, Cameron, but I don't make the rules." He said. I raised my eyebrow. "Well, I don't make most of the rules." He corrected.

I sighed.

"It's really not that bad. And I feel that getting a tutor or something would really help your situation. You aren't going to be able to play rugby forever, you know." He told me.

"You sound like my mother." I muttered.

Principal Marcus laughed. He grabbed the water jug off his desk and poured himself a glass. He raised another glass towards me and I shook my head. He placed the glass back in the shelf behind him and took a small sip of his drink.

"Your mother is a great woman, boy." He said.

I sighed again and leant back in my seat.

Principal Marcus spoke one more time. "Sort this out or there will be consequences." He narrowed his eyes and wrinkled his eyebrows together.

Then all of a sudden, he laughed. "Sorry, kid," he said, hunched over. "Oh boy, that was hard." His shoulders shook with laughter and I eyed him warily from across the desk.

"Sorry-" he broke off in laughter. "That was a good laugh. Y-you can leave now." He said again.

I watched him for a few more moments before pulling out my chair and opening the door, leaving a still-laughing Principal Marcus in my wake.

Two things were clear, when I walked out of the office and into my next period like I had suspected I would. The first being, I was in trouble. Big trouble if I couldn't get my English grades up.

And the second was that Principal Marcus was absolutely, undeniably off his rocker.

~+++~

Um... 430 reads??? what the heck?? Thank you so much!!

Shout out to everyone who has added this book to their library, voted, etc.

You guys are amazing!!

-Mia