After the Moment (14 page)

Leigh decided he was going to have to ask Maia how Oliver Lexham had made her life a living hell. Preston, as if knowing where Leigh's thoughts had gone, said, "So you and Maia are dating."

Leigh kept sorting the forks he was going through to make up napkin and silverware sets, but he nodded, trying not to smile. Yes, they were. They were dating. Apparently the only person who did not know this was Astra. Leigh noted this unacceptable fact and vowed he would tell her soon.

Very soon.

"Was it, you know ... did you, how did you..." Preston stammered around, finally asking, "How did you get her to like you?"

"Maia?" Leigh asked, just to be clear, as clouds of confusion about
how
to tell Astra swirled across his brain. "You know, I'm not sure. I never really understand girls."

This was in fact true, although he did secretly feel that he understood Maia better than anyone in the world.

"Girls are strange," Preston said, and then, "Hey, no one at table nine has water."

They
are
strange,
Leigh thought, looking over at his own tables and grabbing a water pitcher. But Maia had made him think of strange as something marvelous.

On the first day of school, Leigh waited for Millie to find her pencils, locate her shoes, and run back into the house to kiss Bubbles goodbye. The dog, his sister told him, would be lonely now that everyone would be away again during the day.

"Eighth grade was fun," Leigh said, thinking that Seth Davis probably called Millie at the start of each school year.

Maybe they compared notes about how each was preparing. Seth usually taught summer school, but September might have felt like a fresh start all the same.

" 'Fun' is a vague description," Millie said.

"It is," Leigh said. "Subjective too."

They stopped to pick up Franklin because Millie said Kevin had refused to drive his brother to school.

"Refused or couldn't?" Leigh asked, but Millie only shrugged.

Pulling up in front of the Staines house, Leigh saw Franklin running off the porch, dressed in his usual khaki shorts and dress shirt, but also a blue blazer that looked as if he had stolen it from his father's closet. Leigh hoped that Mr. or Mrs. Staines would get around to buying Franklin some clothes that fit him. It was as if they were waiting for him to have a growth spurt. Instead of a messenger bag or backpack, he was carrying a briefcase.

"Interesting bag," Leigh said as Franklin got into the back seat.

"Thank you," Franklin said.

"His grandfather gave it to him for sheet music," Millie said.

"It has a multitude of purposes," Franklin said. "And here's the American heiress."

Millie had told Franklin about the romance she was writing, as Leigh discovered when Franklin started calling him the duke's dark son. Millie got out of the car so Maia could sit in the front.

Maia kissed Leigh, turned toward Franklin and Millie, and asked, "So are we ready for hell on earth?"

"We are," they both said.

Leigh looked in his rearview mirror. "Mill, I thought you liked school."

"I do," Millie said. "I love school, but everyone's going to be all 'How
are
you?' thinking that means they've been understanding."

"And I'll get hit or something today," Franklin said. "But school is my favorite thing in the world."

"Which is why he'll get hit or something," Maia said.

"No one is going to hit you, Franklin," Leigh said. "I promise."

"But I'll have a worse day than you," Maia said, and Franklin smiled at her. "Way worse."

Leigh thought he knew why she was dreading school. She had told him that though she wasn't any kind of social pariah at school, she wasn't very popular.

"You're dating outside of your pool," she had said. "The soccer star, straight-A boy is slumming."

This was insulting (unfair and inaccurate) on so many levels that he just stared at her.

"You won't gain anything by being around me," Maia had added. "I'm just trying to warn you."

"Consider me warned," Leigh had said, trying to make it funny.

She was worried about something that was real for her but which he couldn't see as serious. While aware that popularity was an issue, he hadn't ever really thought about it. He supposed that social standing in high school was something that preoccupied kids who didn't have it or who had it and were invested in keeping others from having it.

Leigh mostly liked school, had always had the friends he wanted, and felt that what was wrong with him was his own doing. He knew that not having to think about his popularity was a little like living in a country at war and not having to worry about fighting in it. Unfair, no doubt, but also, short of enlisting or purposely becoming an outcast, a little beyond his control.

"We're all going to have a good day," he said, although the floating fears building up in his car were beginning to make him nervous.

"Sure we are," Maia said.

He hoped he would be smart enough to figure out what about school made her unhappy. Because then maybe he could fix it.

~~~

At the school, Millie gave him directions to student parking, where Preston was leaning against his mother's van.

"Franklin, how was your summer?" Preston asked after hugging Millie and saying
Morning
to Leigh and Maia. "Did you play a lot of piano?"

"I did. Thank you for asking," Franklin said.

Preston told Leigh that at Calvert Park Prep, all the new students got a guide, as a kind of mentor.

"It's usually someone a couple of grades ahead, but since you're a senior, another senior's all they could come up with," Preston said. "And you got stuck with me because they know I know you already."

"How do they know that?" Leigh asked, wondering who had been reporting on him.

"You've met the headmaster at the club," Preston said. "The guy who wears his tie tucked in his pocket?"

"Chicken salad on toast?" Leigh asked, and Preston nodded.

Leigh remembered the tie wearer as drinking lots of iced tea but always asking that there be no ice in his water. He was a good tipper and said
Thank you, young man
as if he meant it.

They all headed toward the main building, where everyone had to pick up schedules and get first-period assignments.

"First period's like study hall," Maia said. "And that teacher is kind of your advisor. They're called firsters."

"Or your jailer," Millie said.

"Your firster is the person you go to see when you're in trouble," Franklin said. "Before the headmaster gets involved."

"Kevin almost got thrown out last year," Millie whispered. "His firster was Mr. Wynne, who's really strict."

"He's not strict," Franklin said. "Kevin violated the honor code."

"He wrote Jonathan Kimber's history term paper," Maia said.

"Jonathan Kimber is on the lacrosse team," Millie said, which Leigh already knew from Preston. "He's mostly nice, but he doesn't do so well at school."

"Kevin
allegedly
wrote that paper," Preston said. "But it didn't happen. Your brother's a good guy, Franklin. Wynne was just gunning for him."

Leigh saw Kevin on the wide front steps. He was standing with a couple of guys and a girl whose curvy body and blonde hair made her boringly pretty.

"Hey," Leigh said to Kevin, hearing Preston exchange greetings with the other guys. The girl told Maia that she liked her dress, it looked so comfortable.

And then, more quickly than he could follow:

"Hey, munchkin, you look like a freak," said one of the boys as he reached past Leigh and grabbed the loose folds of Franklin's shirt.

The motion threw Franklin off-balance and he dropped his briefcase, which Leigh bent to pick up, while at the same time smacking the guy's retreating arm.

"What is your problem?"

"
My
problem?" Leigh asked.

"Yeah."

He was shorter than Leigh, but thicker, and he was surrounded by three other guys. All of them looked kind of alike, in their khakis and dress shirts. At their feet was a pile of backpacks and blue blazers.

Leigh, dressed almost identically to the group he was facing, felt his own backpack's weight against his shoulder. In it he had stuffed a blue blazer that Lillian and Pete had, at Janet's suggestion, bought for him. If he were simply to take one step away from Franklin and three steps forward, he would look as though he belonged with the four boys. From the corner of his eye, he saw Maia and Preston exchange a glance.

Did he have a problem? Leigh could almost feel Franklin vibrating in terror. No one would want to have his shirt pulled, but surely it was the unexpectedness of it that was so insulting.

"What is the point of assaulting a kid half your size?"

"You think I assaulted him? You want me to show you what an assault looks like?"

"Try it," Leigh said, pretty sure he could take the guy but a little worried about his friends.

"Oliver," Preston called. "Let it alone."

Oliver Lexham. Of course. Now Leigh
wanted
to punch him. Maia had, after much prodding, told him how Oliver Lexham had made her life a living hell. Last year, she'd gained enough weight by January not to look, as she put it,
horrible and scary.
Oliver Lexham had asked her out, and they dated a few times, but she had to start saying no. Oliver kept dragging her to places with crowds of kids, which made her anxious, and that made eating harder than usual. She had tried to be polite about it, but told Leigh she'd probably mucked up her words because Oliver said she just wasn't pretty enough to have so many problems.

"He dates the most beautiful girl in school now," Maia said. "I have no idea why he bothered with me."

Leigh, looking at Oliver Lexham, could guess why Maia had said yes and why the blonde girl was now dating him. Oliver Lexham was that guy. Guys are never supposed to notice how other guys look, but there's always the one who makes all the others say,
Of course.

Look at him—of course he has that girl. That car. That life. Marcus Fields had been an
of course
guy. And Oliver Lexham was one. In Leigh's experience, these guys were pretty decent to know, if only because they had no reason to be jerks. Life was good to them: math was easy, women caused them no problems, and they did not get stress fractures.

But this one, he was a jerk. Oliver Lexham was an
of course
guy with a problem.

Leigh had not known he could feel this much rage. This was worse than wanting to punch a wall. He really needed to calm down. He looked away from Oliver and saw Kevin. That didn't help. Why the hell did Kevin hang out with guys who picked on Franklin?

"Leigh," Millie said. "The first bell is going to ring."

"We have to get our schedules," Maia said.

"Maia Morland," Oliver said. "How
are
you? You look ... okay."

"I'm great, thanks," she said. "Leigh, come on."

He looked from her to Franklin to Oliver.

"Just leave the kid alone," Leigh said. "And then we have no problem."

This was the most boring and stupid and terrifying moment of his life. And satisfying. In a way. He couldn't bring Seth Davis back to Millie, he couldn't get Josh out of prison for Maia, but he could probably protect Franklin.

"Fine," Oliver said. "You can have your little faggot."

And Leigh laughed, all of his thoughts and fears sliding away.

"That's the best you got?" he asked. "You can't do any better than calling him a faggot?"

"Oh, I'm sorry, did I insult you?" Oliver asked. "I didn't know you were one. No offense."

"No one cares," Leigh said. "That's like the lamest insult."

This was not actually true, as Leigh knew. Yes, at his old school, everyone was very careful to use it as a joke and never at a kid who was suspected of being gay, but that was precisely because the word carried a power far beyond its meaning.

But knowing that he liked girls and being big enough to knock someone out gave Leigh the rare privilege of being able to laugh when the word was turned in his direction.

The bell rang.

"Nice meeting you," Leigh said, letting Millie pull him toward the building. He called over his shoulder, "Next time I'll try not to be such a fag."

"Oliver's not what you think," Preston said as they went into the scheduling office. "He's just very—well, he has his ways."

"He hit an eighth-grader," Leigh said, wondering if this had somehow escaped Preston's attention.

"He only grabbed my shirt," Franklin said. "He's not stupid enough to hit me."

"Well, no one's going to hit you now," Maia said. "Now you have superhero protection."

Preston laughed and Leigh wondered if Maia was making fun of him.

But as the day went on and folded into a week, then two weeks, and so on, it became clear that in facing down Oliver Lexham and his gang, Leigh had become a hero of sorts. Franklin had to tell the story countless times, and in the hallways, as well as on different sports teams, people could be heard telling each other, by way of apology or excuse,
Next time, I'll try not to be such a fag.

That this was not heard on the lacrosse field was to be expected, but Oliver never passed Leigh without averting his gaze. Which was a lot, since they had most of their classes together. Leigh, without trying to engage him, studied the guy who was Preston's best friend and who had dumped Maia. By the time two weeks had passed, Leigh decided that Oliver Lexham was a super jerk, but one who managed to make most people think he was a great guy.

Oliver was smart, could be funny in class, was charming to his teachers, and was by all accounts an amazing athlete. He also interrupted his girlfriend whenever she spoke, and ignored any student who wasn't popular. Leigh wanted to judge Oliver for the careless way he treated his girlfriend, but he himself had been plenty careless with Astra. Leigh was nicer to kids than Oliver was, but he knew that his own protective feelings for Franklin had to do with Millie.