Run to Me (7 page)

Todd catches up with me in the parking lot.

‘Are you all right?’ he asks. ‘Did they give you
a hard time? You look kind of flushed.’

He is standing almost on top of me, searching my
face.

‘I’m fine. Fine,’ I say, shaking my head and
opening the car door to throw my bag on the backseat. ‘Just a bit red from the
running I guess.’

He pulls a face. ‘Come on, Abby. I saw you. You
were hardly running at all.’

‘I was...’

‘You were watching,’ he says, throwing his hands
up. ‘Checking out their styles. Right?’

‘Yeah. Yeah. And you were right. Some of them do
have potential.’

I slam the door and move to open the driver’s
one, hoping Todd will just drop it. I don’t want to admit it was Paul Beckett
who put me so on edge. I’m not even sure what happened. I thought I was in
control at first, playing the disciplinarian, but he just kept smiling at me.
It was unnerving.

‘So, any of them keen on the race?’ Todd asks,
obviously taking my hint.

‘Yeah. Two of them.’

‘Who?’

Todd cups the door frame as I lower myself into
the seat.

‘Matt,’ I turn and busy myself with adjusting my
seatbelt. ‘And Paul.’

‘Beckett?’ Todd says.

‘From watching him it looks like he’s actually a
pretty strong runner.’

‘Yeah. There’s more to him than meets the eye,’
says Todd.

Tell me about it.

‘Well, listen. I’ll see you tomorrow, Abby.’ Todd
winks at me, shuts the car door and waves.

I wind down the window. ‘Thanks Todd. See you
tomorrow.’

I shift into reverse and back out of the space. The
lot is mainly empty now, save for a few cars. As I drive, I try to focus on
other things but the image of Paul smiling at me keeps flashing through my
mind. He really threw me right out of my comfort zone with all that. It was
like I was standing on a ledge and I had nowhere to go but down. All from a
smile
.

As I pull up at the house I see Luke slipping in
through the front door. The clock on the dash reads 5:45. He’s home early. I
park the car and hurry into the house. He’s standing by the open fridge,
leaning heavily on the door with one arm and reaching for a beer.

‘You’re home,’ I say.

He laughs. ‘I do live here,’ he says, turning
around to kiss me. ‘You seem surprised.’

‘It’s a pleasant surprise,’ I say, smiling.

He cracks open the beer and backs up to lean
against the kitchen bench. I grab the fridge door before it swings shut and
pull out the water jug. We both take long swigs of our drinks.

‘So how was your day?’ I say.

Luke frowns and straightens up a little. ‘Busy.
Yours?’

‘Good. Had the first running session.’

‘Right.’ He takes another swig of beer. ‘How was
that?’

‘Fine. There’s this one kid, Paul. He looks
really good.’

‘Yeah?’

‘Yeah. And you know what’s funny. I think I
embarrassed him.’

‘How?’

I shrug. ‘Corrected his grammar.’

‘How very English teacher of you.’

‘I can’t help it. But anyway, he was blushing and
everything.’

Luke starts to laugh.

‘What?’ I ask, swatting him playfully on the
arm. ‘What’s so funny?’

‘Sounds like you’ve got an admirer.’

I roll me eyes. ‘I know. I mean, that’s what I
thought at first but come on. Getting embarrassed easily? Surely he’s too old
for all that. It’s kindergarten behaviour.’

‘You underestimate’, he takes a large gulp of
beer, ‘the male brain. Especially the
teenage
male brain. He’s got the
hots for you. No doubt about it.’ Luke pauses and looks me up and down. ‘And
who can blame him?’ he says with a smirk.

‘Well I am pretty hot,’ I say sarcastically.

‘He’ll get over it.’

‘I hope so. But he’s in my class and now I’ll be
coaching him for the race...’

‘So you talked him into doing the race then?’

‘Well, actually...’

‘Let me guess. He volunteered? No coaxing
necessary?’

I shrug sheepishly. Luke drowns the rest of his
beer and places the empty can on the counter. He steps over to me and pulls me
into a hug. His hands roam over my back, down to my butt and he kisses the side
of my neck.

‘Does this mean,’ he says, pulling back to look
at me. He is smirking. ‘That you’re going to be spending a lot of time with
this young admirer of yours?’ He leans in to kiss me.

‘Mmm,’ I say through the kiss.

He pulls back again. ‘Well I can’t say I’m happy
about that.’ We both laugh. ‘What if this kid, what’s his name...?’

I am busy unbuttoning his shirt. ‘Paul,’ I say
absentmindedly.

‘Right. Young Paul. What if he thinks he can...’

I open his shirt and start kissing his pecks. My
tongue flutters over his skin while he runs his hands up the back of my T-shirt.

‘Shh,’ I say. ‘Enough about...’, I pause to
flick my tongue over his nipple, ‘... what’s-his-name.’

‘I agree,’ Luke nuzzles into my neck. ‘Who were
we talking about again?’

His hands are all over my back and I can feel
his erection growing. I step back, pulling him with me, so we are against the
bench. It’s been a long time since we’ve had sex in the kitchen. I put my palms
on the edge of the bench, ready to brace myself when he lifts me up to sit on
it. But he doesn’t. Instead, he is shaking his head.

‘Let’s go to bed,’ he says gruffly. 

 He grabs both my wrists and yanks me towards
the bedroom. I know how this will go now. The missionary, then me on top.

He stops at the foot of the bed and raises my
arms above my head to pull off my T-shirt. I unbuckle his belt and trousers,
letting them fall to the floor. He slips out of his shirt as I step from my
tracksuit pants and underwear. He pulls me to him and we are kissing again. I
climb onto the bed, on all fours, hoping I might be able to coax him into
trying it from behind. And for a moment I sense him considering it, his hands
roaming over my butt cheeks and parting them slightly. But then he flips me
over and, coming in so my legs are over his shoulders, plunges into me. He is
groaning, kissing my neck, and it feels great but I can’t stop myself thinking
about the repetitiousness of it all. Years and years of this same, routine sex.
I clamp my legs around his waist and try to enjoy the moment. But my mind is
ticking over and then that image is back. Paul Beckett smiling at me.

Five

On Wednesday English is straight after morning
break. Five minutes before class I tell the lads I’m off to the toilet, but
once I slip out of their sight I head to room thirty-two. I figure if I get
there early...ah shit I don’t know. Don’t know what I figure. I’ve just got to see
her. 

I was thinking about her all last night. I
started out being angry about the way she’d pulled me up in front of everyone.
I lay in bed and tried to think up ways to get back at her, to humiliate her.
But somehow, after a while, I stopped feeling angry, and then I kept imagining that
hot arse of hers. I couldn’t seem to get it out of my mind. She was walking
about in front of me, shaking her arse and smiling at me. I had a hard time
falling asleep.  

As I’m crossing the quad I see Amanda lounging
on the grass. She is leaning back on her elbows, her hair falling down her back
in waves. Whenever we were getting it on, she’d climb on top of me and bend her
head so her hair would fan out over my chest. Then she’d sway from side to
side. I hated it at first, it tickled the hell out of me. But she wouldn’t stop
and after a while I could stand it. It made me even hotter for her and helped
things along no end. She only had to sway a couple of times and I was raring to
go.

Now I watch her demanding everyone’s attention
and the idiots circling the bait. All eyes are on her and all she’s doing is
talking. The first time I noticed her, it was the same. She was telling some
stupid story about when her parents took her skiing. About how tangled up she’d
gotten. And how some ‘hot’ instructor had saved the day. I remember it was like
a punch in the guts and I reckon it was then and there that I decided I had to
screw her. And I guess she was thinking the same thing.

I hear her laugh. It rings out over the whole
quad, echoing off the buildings. She laughs like a monkey with a firecracker up
its arse. The shriek can be heard for miles. It’s just another of her little
ploys to get attention, because you sure as hell can’t ignore it when she gets
going. I slow my pace to see if I can hear what’s so damn funny. But it’s just
her screeches and the minions sucking up to her. ‘You’re so funny, Amanda.’

The first time we did it was at her place, on
the floor in her room. She rode me like a cowgirl. I didn’t even have time to
get my gear off. My trousers were bunched up round my ankles the whole time and
she was still wearing her school uniform. I felt her up through her shirt, but
never caught sight of her bits. I could feel them though. Warm and wet around
my dick, the muscles relaxing as she bounced up and down. It was my first time,
not sure about her. I’d seen her snogging that dude from the bowling alley, but
don’t know if they ever got down to it.

The laughter stops just as I make it to the
door. I glance back towards her group. She is looking at me. Our eyes lock and
I feel that punch in the guts again. Only this time it’s different. This time
it’s like she’s got hold of my insides and she’s wringing them as hard as she
can. A Chinese burn for my guts. I straighten up a little, trying to release
her hold and she smirks. Her hand comes up, as though to wave at me, and she
flips me the bird. I shake my head and turn away.

She’s always giving the finger. I bet she
reckons it’s her trademark, like she invented it or something. The afternoon I
caught her with McFadden, she flipped me one. That was her reaction. She didn’t
seem guilty or surprised. She just looked smug, like I’d made her day. I found
them at the skate park. He had her shoved up against the brick wall, one hand
up her skirt, the other groping her tit. She saw me coming from over his
shoulder. Hell, she probably set the whole thing up. It was broad daylight, for
Christ’s sake. And she knew I’d be heading there after school. The skank wanted
me to catch her. She was too chicken to dump me face-to-face.

I try to shake the image from my mind as I pull
up outside the classroom. The door is ajar and I can see Mrs Fox inside, taking
books out of her bag and arranging them on her desk. Her hair is dead straight,
not wavy like Amanda’s, but it’s just as long. I reckon she’d do a mean hair-flick-to-the-chest.
I watch as she bends to drop her bag on the floor. She’s wearing a low-cut top
and I can see the deep curve of her cleavage. I imagine muzzling into them, sucking
on her nipples, squeezing them between my fingers. I stick my hands into my
pockets to hide the semi-erection and step forward into the room. She notices
me, looks up, and our eyes meet.

***

When I look up Paul is standing by the door,
staring. His hands are shoved deep into his pockets and his shoulders are
hunched forward. I can tell he is trying to hold my gaze, but on seeing him the
memory of last night with Luke flashes into my mind. I can feel my pulse
quicken with excitement so I look away. I turn towards the whiteboard and busy
myself wiping off the left-over pen marks. The room is silent, except for the
swishing of the cloth in my hand as I sweep it over the board. He must be still
standing there, looking at me. I close my eyes and slowly count to ten. Outside
in the hall the bell rings. I hear his feet shuffling on the carpet, the chair
being pulled out from the desk. 

I turn around but keep my head down, wiping some
imaginary lint off my top. His books are being dumped on the desk, the lid
being pulled off his pen. These noises are exaggerated; he wants me to look up.

I pull the chair out from my desk and take a
seat, all the while managing to keep my eyes averted. I pick up my copy of
Wuthering
Heights
and finger through the pages. I was planning to talk
about obsessive love in today’s lesson. The way one can lose themselves in
their love for another. Now this seems inappropriate somehow. I can’t see
myself wanting to talk openly about obsession with him staring at me the entire
time.

Why do I feel so uncomfortable?

I look up at the sound of footsteps and voices rumbling
down the hallway. A group of kids appear at the door. A couple of them glance
at me but most are too involved in their conversations. I watch them saunter to
their desks, careful not to acknowledge Paul at all. Matt and Reggie arrive and
head straight over to him.

‘Hey. We were looking for you. Thought you’d
fallen in the dunny,’ says Reggie.

Paul grunts but offers no reply. I catch Matt’s
eye and he smirks at me, just like he did yesterday before running. I shake my
head at him. The stragglers are wandering into the room now, so I walk over to
the door and swing it closed behind them. The chattering turns to whispers but
doesn’t cease completely. I clap my hands loudly, twice, as I’m walking back to
my desk.

‘That’ll do everyone. Let’s get started. Everybody
get out their copy of
Wuthering Heights
,’ I say, stopping in front of my
desk and leaning back on its edge.

I give them a couple of minutes to settle down.
Some, mostly girls, wait patiently with me, their books lying ready on their
desks. The boys take their time, stretching and flicking each other with
rulers. Anything to delay the lesson. I don’t make an issue of it, better they
think it doesn’t annoy me. I see Matt pass something to Paul, a scrunched piece
of paper. He takes his eyes off me for a second to glance at the page, then his
head flips up to shake nonchalantly at Matt. I turn away before he sees me
watching.

‘OK. So what does everybody think of
Wuthering
Heights
? Is it convincing?’

There is silence as they all look around at each
other. Some shrug, some lower their heads, hoping that will stop me from
calling on them.

‘OK. Easy question. Hands up who likes this
novel?’

A scattering of hands reach into the air. Becky
is the only one who seems confident in her response. Her whole arm is raised
straight up, like a confused ‘Hail Hitler’. I point at her.

‘Why do you like the novel, Becky?’

She drops her arm and smiles broadly. ‘Coz it’s
a love story. I mean, a
true
love story you know? Catherine and
Heathcliff loved each other even through death.’

‘That’s right. Theirs is an eternal love and...’

‘Excuse me, Miss?’

It’s Paul, raising his hand to interrupt me. I
allow myself to look at him.

‘Yes Paul?’

‘I think I changed my mind about Heathcliff.’

He is smirking at me.

‘Oh yes? Not a loser anymore?’

He has the book in his hands, bending and
squeezing it.

‘Yeah, I mean, there is something weird about
him. He seems totally messed up, and it’s all because of Catherine, right? I
mean this woman must be some hottie to make him go nuts over her.’

He pauses to look at me with raised eyebrows.

‘I kind of get him,’ he says, resting the book
on his desk and crossing his arms. ‘I get how he is so obsessed with Catherine.
Can’t get her out of his mind.’

I can’t believe it. He’s given me an in for my
discussion on obsession. I straighten up and move around to the whiteboard. I
try to collect my thoughts as I write ‘OBSESSION’ with the blue marker.

‘That’s right, Paul,’ I say, turning back to
face the class. ‘Heathcliff and Catherine do share an obsessive love. Now what
is it about this obsession that creates madness in them both?’

Sarah raises her hand. ‘It’s the dark side of
love. Obsession, I mean. Coz in a way it’s wanting to control the person you
love, rather than just accepting them, maybe?’

‘Hmm. That’s one side of it,’ I say.

‘I don’t think that
is
love,’ says
Melanie, shaking her head. ‘Obsession in this book is cruel and damaging. I
mean, they ruin each other. And for what? How can that be love?’

‘Yes, Melanie, they do destroy each other, but I
think that is what Emily Brontë was trying to portray. As Sarah said, the dark
side of love. That perhaps popular opinion, or storybook love, isn’t so clear
cut. A love that totally consumes can bring not only beauty into our awareness
but also the violent nature of humanity as well. If love is the grandest high
any of us can experience surely the awful low, its diametric opposite, must
exist also. For how would we know love as a high if we hadn’t felt true
darkness?’

‘You mean that saying? Like to get rainbows you
have to have the rain. Or something like that?’

I nod at Melanie. ‘Yes,’ I say, starting to
laugh. ‘I think Dolly Parton said that.’

The whole class laughs with me. I let my eyes
stray over to Paul. He runs a hand through his hair to get it off his face and
pulls out a giant smile directed just to me. I have to turn away to stop myself
from smiling back.