rich man's world; charlie dalton

[six] ducky

"Yes, Mrs. Dalton. Everything is going amazingly."

She looked around in alert in case someone else needed to use the telephone. It was the brink of curfew but Mrs. Dalton insisted on conversing with her. Any slip in behavior from Charlie's part. She figured it came from a good place.

"Not having any trouble making friends are you?"

"No, no! Charlie and his friends are real gentlemen. I couldn't imagine having a more wonderful group."

"Good, good! Don't forget to call your own father. He must be worried seeing as your brother forgets where the phone is. And, stay safe Sigrid Taylor. I don't ask for much, tell Charlie I'll call him tomorrow!"

"I will. I will, Mrs. Dalton. The next time I see him."

"Call me next Thursday. I think it's best we keep in touch."

"I think so too, Mrs. Dalton," she heard the line go flat with an ear-teasing smile. Sighing, she placed the phone back slowly and took her notepad out of her purse to write down.

"So...how'd you meet my mother?" Charlie came up behind her, gripping her shoulders to look over her. She yelped, tearing the excruciating millisecond of silence she'd made for herself. The question that had been neglected up into this point was the only thing he could think of but he might as well have said anything else to startle her.

Sigrid licked her lips in thought, hesitant to just say well I bumped into her because my father's a jackass who thought I'd enjoy walking a couple miles, but instead said, "Did you know that we're neighbors?"

He raised his eyebrows in curiosity and shook his head, he moved on of his arms to grasp the back of her elbow. He led her away from the telephone distantly. Going up the stairs, she hid her notepad back in her leather purse.

"Well, we are. My house is the small one in front of yours that always looks like it has the lights off. My father's cheap so he doesn't like to pay for electricity, we use candles everywhere in the house."

"I thought the people that lived there were the Wacowski's?" He let go of her elbow and pushed her hand away playfully, she rolled her eyes and jogged a little, he could hear her saddle shoes lightly squeaking at the sudden pace. "I don't remember any Bambi's."

She punched his shoulder with a scowl, "You probably haven't even been to your own house since you got into Welton, unlike you rich boy, I had to go to public school most of my life."

"And you're still sensitive?" His laugh rang through her ears, it was an unfamiliar sound, his inner-child was enjoying every moment of harmless bullying. Sigrid found herself laughing, looking at the way Charlie's eyes creased at the sides.

Todd looked at Neil from the opposite side of the classroom as Mr. Keating had yet another lecture about what they had explored with their minds at the beginning of the week: Carpe Diem. And while Sigrid was right next to him in the individual tables adding the finishing touches to the drawing of a peach, Todd was chewing on his bottom lip imagining how sweet Neil smelled when he walked into the dorm room after a shower. Todd always finished showering before the other boys. His old school-bullied used to steal his clothes. At Welton. Showering was a mission nowadays.

That didn't stop him from smelling like lavender and a spring morning.

So he wondered how the droplets of water gently went down Neil's shoulders and how the towel wrapped him like a Greek god, one image after the other his lip got redder and he looked at the boy in front of the class hopelessly. Lovingly. And respectfully all at once.

Sigrid caught on to Todd's unsubtle attempts to sneak a peek at Neil and made a sound to catch his attention, the people around them were too invested in the lecture to pay them any exclusive attention, Todd turned to her only to see her already smiling widely. "Careful there, Anderson. I think I see some drool dripping down your chin. Someone you fancy nearby?"