Crumbling Walls (Jack and Emily #1) Read online

  Knowing that idiot grin of Tim's too well, he relaxed some, nodding, “Thanks.”

  Just as she stood and they headed towards the main steps of the school, Tim nodded towards a girl quietly standing on the steps, studying a piece of paper “Hey, Emily, do you know her?”

  "Yeah. Um, at least I know her name. Sarah Wheaton.”

  With a grin, “I think I’m gonna go play the lost new student routine.”

  Jack just shook his head in amusement, “Be nice.”

  “Always.” Before he walked away, he thumped his brother on the back, “Good luck.”

  “Thanks.”

  Knocking Emily's backpack lightly with his knuckle, “See you in class.”

  ▪▪▪

  Reams of kids streamed past and, without thinking, Emily took Jack’s hand and guided him towards his locker on the other side of the building. “You’re here and I think I’m,” turning around once before pointing across the hall, “right over there.” Jack nodded, his stomach jumping as it usually did the first day of school. Indicating her backpack, “I’m just gonna dump this off, then I’ll get you to your first class.” Staring for a second into his slightly pale face, “You okay?”

  He nodded again, “Just nervous. I’ll be fine once the day actually starts.”

  With a final squeeze to his hand, “Be back in a minute.”

  Jack turned to his locker and for the first time in his school career, got the lock open first try. Stashing his stuff and grabbing a pen, pencil and his notebook, he shut the locker again, only to be confronted by a tall boy with green spiked hair and a pierced eyebrow.

  He was also mumbling to himself as he wrestled with his own locker, “Two more years, two more years.” Jack guessed he stared a second too long because the boy suddenly looked over at him, “Problem?”

  “No. Just wasn’t sure if you were talking to me or not?”

  The boy finally yanked the door open and heaved a saxophone case into the locker, slamming it shut with a satisfying bang, “Nope. Just cursing the world.” As the door swung open of its own accord and the boy tried slamming it again, “And apparently the world wants some more.”

  At this point, Jack was pretty sure he should walk away, but Emily returned to his side quietly reaching out to shut the still stubborn locker door, “Dex, it’s not the locker’s fault.”

  “Girl, it’s always the locker’s fault.”

  “Boy went green.”

  “Girl like?”

  She nodded, “Girl like.” Turning to Jack, “I see you’ve found Dex.”

  “More like Dex found me.”

  Dex turned towards Emily, “I was bitching about my day and he got to listen in.”

  “How can you be complaining already? We’ve still got ten minutes until class starts.”

  “It’s easy to complain when you find out that the girl you’ve been lusting over for two years has moved to Georgia.”

  “You finally scared her away, huh?”

  “But I’ll get over it … eventually ... maybe ... with the help of a good six days of very loud and obnoxious music listening.” Pulling out his class schedule, he handed it to her, “So, what’s your take?”

  Jack interrupted, “Are you like the number one go-to about every teacher here?”

  Dex slapped him on the back, “This girl is the authority on everything you or I will ever need to know. Except for math, but that’s not her fault. Everyone needs to have something they suck at.”

  Rolling her eyes, Emily studied the schedule, “You’ve got both math and English with us, but you haven’t got any easy test givers. Sorry.”

  Taking the schedule back, “Well, at least I’ll have company for a couple of classes.”

  Turning on her heel and heading down the hall, both boys keeping to her sides, “Where’s Gil?”

  “We had a falling out this summer. He decided he likes to smoke weed and I decided he was an asshole. That and the fact that he got busted for the aforementioned weed and is now attending a nice little place I like to call private school."

  “I’m sorry.”

  “S’okay, who needs him anyway?” Putting his arm over Emily’s shoulder, which Jack noticed she didn’t flinch away from, “I’ve got my girl and the new kid who hasn’t figured out yet that I’m not exactly normal and who hopefully won’t see that until after he discovers he likes me for me and not for my hair color.”

  Jack laughed, “Um, can I ask why green?”

  “’Cause they were out of orange.”

  As they dropped Jack off at his first class, “Makes sense.”

  And with that, their junior year began.

  ▪▪▪

  By the time art class rolled around Tim was dragging a thousand books with him and he dropped them with a bang on the table next to Emily, “Mind if I share?”

  “Nope. What’s with all the stuff?”

  “Locker lock’s broken and apparently maintenance can’t fix it until after school, so I get to haul all this crap with me until then.”

  Standing back up, “Come on. I’ll let you use mine for now. You can’t be carrying everything with you. You’ll look like a freshman.”

  Gathering up his pile, “Thanks.”

  They made it back to class before the bell rang, given her locker was only a few feet down the hall. Settling back at the table, “So, how’s Jack surviving?”

  “He’s doing okay. A little nervous this morning but then I turned him over to Dex and he should be completely corrupt by tonight.”

  “Dex?”

  “Yeah, tall kid, green hair, pierced eyebrow.”

  “Cool name.”

  “Well, Dexter really didn’t fit him so he shortened it. I’d say it was a good call.”

  “Oh yeah.”

  Just then the teacher walked in, “Pencils up, paper ready, draw.” And she set a bowling pin, a Rubik’s cube and a golf ball on the table in the middle of the room. “One catch, they can’t be actual size. Bigger, smaller, I don’t care, just not life-size.” And with that, she walked back out.

  Tim looked over at her confused, “What?”

  With a grin, Emily stood to collect two boards and some paper for them. Clipping the paper on the plastic boards, she handed him one, “Do what the lady said.”

  “We just draw then. No teaching?”

  “Not today. She did this last year too. First day out, she jumps in to see where everyone stands. We’ll critique near the end of class and go from there.”

  Already digging up his favorite pencil, “Kick ass.”

  “Generally.”

  Everyone talked throughout the class. There were several room wide discussions of movies, vacations, classes and teachers as well as people getting up, moving around, looking for different angles, light sources, more comfortable chairs. By the time Ms. Tassleman got back and critiques began, Tim had decided this was by far the best class he’d been to yet.

  Emily had turned slightly away from him and worked diligently throughout the hour. When her critique came up, Tim couldn’t do anything but stare. He had thought he was good, but he could see now she would be very tough competition.

  After the class had finished ripping her paper apart, as they had with everyone’s, with extremely constructive criticism, it was his turn. Walking to the front of the class, he set his board against the chalkboard and stood beside it.

  He wondered whether they’d be slightly easier on the new kid.

  They weren’t … although for the first time ever, he didn’t feel like he was being attacked. Sure, they were directing their onslaught at his paper, but the things said were useful and he could immediately see how to make the picture better.

  And Emily seemed to be the worst critic in the bunch.

  He fell in love with her right then and there in that classroom. Not the whole ‘sweaty palms, stammering, wanna hold your hand’ kind of thing, but a genuine artist to artist ‘I know you’ll tell me the truth and I’ll still like you in the morning’ k
ind of thing.

  After class, their drawings were collected and filed away in wide, slim slots in the walls, each person already having their names assigned.

  “Everything gets saved from the semester and at the end, there’s an art show for the best stuff. She also likes to see our progress when it comes time for grades.”

  Tim nodded, “Does she keep the homework too then?”

  “Yeah. She says that she knows teenagers and their lockers and the work is far safer in her room than anywhere else.” Spinning her lock, “So we can also drop our stuff off when we get here in the morning. You don’t have to store it in your locker until class.”

  “Cool.” Reaching over her head to get one of his notebooks and his lunch from the top shelf, “Can I have your combination so I can get in here for the rest of the day?”

  Writing it on the underside of his notebook, “Just make sure it shuts.”

  “Will do.” Having already turned to go, he stopped and came back, “Thanks.”

  “It’s just a locker.”

  “I mean for the critique and the locker and being nice to Jack and being my friend.”

  She just smiled at him, “You’re welcome.”

  ▪▪▪

  Jack was already sitting by the time Emily made it to English and sliding into the seat behind him, “Where’s Dex?”

  “I left him with the principal, arguing the merits of his hair.”

  She smiled, “He’ll win.”

  By now Jack had turned around in his seat, “How can he win against the principal? Isn’t he basically law around here?”

  “For the most part, but I’ve seen it happen. If you do it rationally, quietly and politely, he’ll listen and decide from there.” With a twinkle in her eye, “How do you think he got to wear the eyebrow ring?”

  “He’s done this before?”

  She nodded, “Yup. And he’ll do it again, too. It’s only the first day.” And true to form, Dex walked into class ten minutes later with a late pass and a grin. Emily leaned forward and whispered in Jack’s ear, “Told you.”

  Now, a girl should know she should never whisper in a boy’s ear during class. For starters, the message rarely gets through and if it does, it’s immediately forgotten in the wake of the girl’s breath tickling those small and extremely sensitive hairs.

  Suffice it to say, Jack wasn’t good for much for the next few minutes except for thinking of that beautiful girl stationed only one chair behind him.

  ▪▪▪

  Finally, they made it to lunch and were regaled with a word for word account of the hair argument. It was animated, done in several different voices and with some food involved to show proper positioning of the principal and Dex. After he'd finished replaying the discussion, Dex gleefully bit the head of the carrot principal off with his teeth, grinning hugely.

  All in all, the day passed quickly, with the group heading to math together then splitting up for the final class.

  ▪▪▪

  Jack found Emily back at her locker after the final bell and watched as she dug out several books, jamming them into her backpack before moving out of the way so Tim, who had just came up, could get to his stuff.

  “So little brother, how’d it go? Any fights? Detention? Hot teachers slipping you numbers?”

  Jack just grinned, “No, but I’ll bet you’ve hit on at least three girls and already sniffed out the best exit for ditching class.”

  Tim shrugged, “Just Sarah and she shut me down, but I'm pretty sure she wants me to keep trying. As for ditching, there're actually two exits that I can use to get to the parking lot unnoticed and if you're nice to me, I'll tell you which ones.” Reaching over Emily’s head as he had earlier in the day, “Thank God you’re short," he dragged out a couple things, “and can I leave my stuff here, at least until tomorrow when the lock should be done?”

  Emily nodded, “’Course.”

  “She’s a keeper, Jack, don’t screw it up.” Smiling over at the slightly red-faced Jack, “Sorry to talk and run, but I've gotta get home and back to work by four. See you tonight.”

  “See ya.”

  Left alone once more, Jack asked if she was ready to go.

  “Sure am.” Starting down the hall, “You know, you don’t have to walk me home.”

  Loving the mirrored conversation, “Do you mind if I do?”

  “Never.”

  Twining fingers with her once again, “Perfect.”

  Dex chose then to come up behind them, “Do you know that my hair could very well be the new rage that drives women wild?”

  “And how do you know this?”

  “Some girl stared at me when I walked past her just now and it was one of those ‘I think you should date me’ stares as opposed to the ‘you’ll never date me’ stares.”

  “Dex?”

  “Yeah Em?”

  “Are you sure it wasn’t one of those ‘he’s got green hair’ stares?”

  “Potayto, potahto ... choose to see the world how you must.” Speeding up, “Gotta go, duty calls. Catch you tomorrow.”

  Finally clearing the hallways and making it unscathed to the sidewalk, “Duty calls?”

  “Yeah, Dex watches his nephew after school.”

  “He’s an uncle?”

  “You know what they say about all shapes and sizes.”

  ▪▪▪

  Given Dex’s nephew and Emily’s work schedule, the three took to spending their lunch hour in the library, eating stealthily while holding breakneck tutoring sessions for math because, as it turned out, Dex wasn’t that great at the subject either.

  “Dude, what the hell is all this? Why am I learning it? And who decided math teachers were allowed to be so sadistic and get paid for it?”

  “Dude, shut up and do the problem.”

  Yes, Dex and Jack were definitely getting along just fine.

  Suddenly the librarian was next to them and she set a carpet sweeper beside Dex’s chair, “Dude, if you’re gonna eat in here, at least clean up after yourself.” With a smile, she pointed towards the sandwich sitting on his lap, “as for that, put it on the table and eat properly. You’re not some green haired beast in the wild.”

  With a sheepish look, “But we can’t eat in here.”

  “I’ll bend the rules for you because you actually seem to be trying to learn something. Just don’t let it get around or else this place’ll go to the mice.”

  Dex grinned at her, “Thanks.” With a last amused look, the woman walked away and Dex turned to Emily, “You womenfolk might not be so bad after all.”

  Chapter 4

  A week or two later Jack deposited Emily at her front gate, but didn’t leave as usual. “Can I ask a question?”

  “Sure.”

  “It’s still a few weeks away, but would you maybe like to go to Homecoming with me? I mean, I know it’s a silly dance but …”

  Trailing off, he let the sentence hang there between them, shaded in nervousness, until Emily moved back towards him, standing closer than she normally would, “I’d love to, but I don’t think I can.”

  “Oh. Okay.”

  “It’s not that I don’t want to go with you. I just don’t have the money.”

  He nodded, trying not to show his disappointment, “It’s okay. I just thought I’d ask.”

  Tilting her head slightly so she could look him in the eye, desperately wanting to alleviate his saddened look, “If I could find the money, I’d go … in a heartbeat. But given I don’t have a dress, tickets or anything else, I don’t see a way around it.”

  “You can’t ask your mom?”

  She just shook her head, “I’m sorry.”

  He continued to stand there for a few moments, thinking fast, until a grin spread across his face, “Well, are you working that night?”

  “I assume until eight, like usual.”

  “Okay, how ‘bout I take you out for an extremely cheap dinner after work, then maybe I can take you to the really cheap dollar show
and we can watch really bad movies for as long as we can stand it?”

  Not sure if there was sarcasm hovering somewhere in there, “Huh?”

  Taking her hand and playing with the fingers, “I just want to spend the night out with you without worrying about school or anything else but having fun. And since I’m still unemployed, cheap is all I can really afford at the moment, too.”