The Secret (Boston's Best 1)

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Maddie

Matt takes off his tie and undoes the top button off his shirt and drops his head on the table on top of his books.

I roll my eyes at his dramatics, "Get up, Matt. It's just implicit derivatives and optimization. You know this, c'mon."

He pouts at me, "But it's hard, Maddie. Like who the fuck came up with this shit?"

"Isaac Newton."

"No need to be a smartass."

I shrug, "You asked."

He smiles at me, "Yes, and you are very very smart and please never don't be, except for when I am clearly in a crisis."

"Okay, okay," I hold up my hands, "I will never bring up Mr Newton whenever you are disgracing his work ever again."

"Thank you." He nods and then puts his head back on the table.

"Matthew Fionn Brown."

His head lifts, "Yes, mom?"

"Funny."

"It actually kind of is. You know, cause she's dead."

"Matt."

He sits up straight in his chair, "Okay, I'm done."

I open up his textbook on the page we're meant to be on and place it in front of him, "Do the first five equations and if you get them right then I'll give you a prize."

"A prize?" He asks, looking much more interested than he was five seconds ago.

"I'll tell you when you're done."

He gets to work right away and I chuckle.

We're studying in the school library because our finals start next Monday and it's Wednesday right now. I'm pretty confident and Matt should be but he's slightly panicking.

And I suppose some people could call this tutoring but it's not really because I'm barely helping him, and who knows if he's actually fluent or just pretending and dumbing down to make me help him.

I still cannot believe that he is basically fluent in French. Like he's not as good as me but that's just because I grew up around it and speaking it, he just learnt it in classrooms and he is just slightly more advanced than what an above average classroom French speaker would be.

He is plenty capable of spending a week in Cannes and being able to live life without hassle.

Tricky little shit.

A piece of paper gets placed in front of me and I look up and see Matt grinning at me. "Finished. Where's my prize?"

I hold up my index finger, "Give me a second to look over it."

I scan it and see that he got everything correct and I smile, "Well done, Mr Brown. I think you understand implicit derivatives and optimization."

"Thanks." He points at his lips, "Now my prize, please?"

I gasp, "Who do you think I am? Some common piece of nothing? I don't hand out kisses for nothing. You gotta work for it."

His face falls, "I thought I just did work for it."

I smirk, "Tsk tsk tsk, it is never that easy with me, Matthew. Pack up, we're taking a break."

"Where?"

"The fields. I'm gonna whoop your ass on your turf too." I grin and walk away.

"Madeleine Élea Áine O'Brien." He calls after me.