“What does he look like?”
Charlie thought of the photo in his desk drawer and shrugged. “No idea.”
“He sounds hot.”
“You got that from his name?”
“You can tell a lot about someone by their name.”
Charlie snorted. “You’ve been reading too muchHeat.”
“Better than those crap comics you read.”
Charlie grinned. Jess’s scowl always made him laugh. Her nose screwed up and made her resemble an angry racoon. And he tried not to think about the odd urge he felt to shield Leo from her attention. Or, as he glanced around the tennis court and took in the gangs of posturing boys and tarted-up girls, anyone else’s.
Get a grip, de Sousa.It’s not like he’ll notice you anyway.
Apart from Charlie’s loyal band of girls, and the goons who liked to pull his hair and call him a poof, no one ever did.
Charlie cycled his BMX home at half three. As usual, along the dirt track that cut behind Heyton’s town centre, he encountered the gang of year elevens who often heckled as he pedalled past. They didn’t let him down today.
“Backs to the wall. Faggy Charlie might jump ya.”
Wankers.Though Charlie couldn’t deny that they were kind of astute when it came to his sexuality, aside from the jumping, of course. Darren Stroud was the chief idiot, and Charlie wouldn’t touch him if he was the last boy on earth.
After running the gauntlet, Charlie usually loitered in the park in a fruitless attempt to convince himself that the whole world didn’t think like year eleven’s finest, but not today. Today, everyone in the Poulton household had strict instructions to come straight home, except Andy. He was never around on Thursdays, and Kate wanted everything as normal as possible.
But nothing felt normal when Charlie pushed his bike up the garden path and stowed it in the shed. For starters, Fliss was home and downstairs, rather than holed up in her room, living her life on the internet.
Charlie chucked his bag on the kitchen table. “What are you doing here?”
“What do you think?” Fliss opened the fridge and retrieved sausages and a bag of potatoes. “Mum asked me to cook dinner for the new arrivals.”
“Only them? Or are you making some for everyone?”
Fliss tossed a glare over her shoulder. “Very funny. Maybe I won’t bother with your plate.”
It was a hollow threat. Dinnertime was sacred in the Poulton house, and for all her faults, Fliss was well versed in Kate’s compulsion to feed people. “What time are Mum and Dad coming back?”
“Mum called five minutes ago,” Fliss said. “They’re leaving Swindon now, so a couple of hours. Have you got homework? Mum says you have to do it before dinner.”
“What do you care?”
Fliss shot Charlie another sour look. “I don’t, but Dad will do his nut if he has to bitch you out in front of the new kids. Just get it done.”
A dozen insults crossed Charlie’s mind. He uttered none and swiped a Mars bar from the forbidden cupboard, dodging the spoon Fliss chucked his way. On the table, his phone flashed with a new message from Jess.
Are they there yet? Lucy wants a pic!
Charlie rolled his eyes and turned his phone off. “I’m going upstairs.”
Fliss grunted, and Charlie left her to it.
Upstairs, he closed his bedroom door and leaned back against it. He had physics homework, but that could wait . . . it could all wait until he’d put the finishing touches to Leo’s room. He rummaged under the bed and found the box storing the illustrations he liked enough to keep, but not enough to put on the walls. The Olympic sketches were at the very bottom. He’d drawn them for a school project and never thought of them again until Kate had relayed Fliss’s suggestion.
He spread them out on the carpet. Diving, long jump, and boxing: nothing that resembled football in the slightest, save the fact they all featured men in shorts . . . except the diving, of course, which was pretty much—
Stop it.
