Heart Of Gold

5 - Aurelia.

5 - Aurelia.

Soon enough it's Friday, and back home detectives are milling around the blackened and burnt warehouse, and the smell of smoke is still faintly in the air. However, over at school I'm taking a maths test.

I look around the room in pain, my collar becoming tight and my neck becoming hot as the boy beside me scribbles madly in the area for working out. I try not to sigh out loud, and I wish Nadia was here to look at me confusedly and not get it either and make me feel better, but she isn't in this class.

"Five minutes," Mrs Campbell announces. I look over to my left to Serena Dixon. We've been sitting near eachother in a lot of classes recently; something that was silently decided. She is sitting there casually flipping through the test paper, having finished, while I haven't even got onto the last two questions yet. Beside her, Serena's boyfriend - Reuben Young - is lounging in his chair with the test paper turned over in front of him, the pen neatly laid down on the desk beside it.

I'm sweating like crazy and my face feels ablaze when the teacher calls out that time is up. As she tells us to swap papers with someone, I feel slightly relieved that the torture is over, but also embarrassed and frightened to see what my result is going to be.

"You wanna swap in a three with Reuben and me?" Serena's soft voice shakes me out of my internal battle and I look over to her desk, to see Reuben leaning across his desk to talk to the boy in front. Mrs Campbell calls for silence and I nod, then hand her my paper. She hands me hers, which means that Reuben must be going to get mine seen as we are doing a three-way swap.

Great. If it was Serena marking mine that would be alright, but Reuben is not only the coolest boy in our year, but somehow the cleverest too; he's a mathematical genius. He's a genius in everything else too.

Now I'm really going to get shown up.

"The answer to number one is x equals six, y equals four," Mrs Campbell calls out. I look down at Serena's neat answer and sigh; she's got it right, whereas I suck at simultaneous equations and I know I did not put that answer. If this is the first question, I don't even want to see the rest of my paper.

Half an hour later I get my test back from Reuben with 51% scrawled across the top in blue biro beside my name.

Barely scraped a pass.

I sigh as I hand back Serena's - 89% - and as the bell goes I sigh to myself, not wanting to hand it in so the teacher can document the mark.

Mrs Campbell's eyes enlarge slightly when I hand her the paper and she sees the mark. I watch sheepishly as she flicks through it, then frowns and looks up as I see Reuben's slim hand glide in front of my body to hand his paper in - on the top is a big 98%.

"Reuben, have you thought any more about that course?" Mrs Campbell asks loudly. I am about to turn away when her hand suddenly lands on my arm and I am held in position.

I force myself to look at Reuben Young, with his raven-black long hair and nicely chiseled features - high cheekbones and fair skin. I gulp as his eyes flicker from my face to the teacher's.

"Uh, still thinkin'," is his reply. I wonder if he's also thinking about how thick I am and how stupid I am and how weird I am and how annoying I am; someone as smart as him in this field obviously would.

Mrs Campbell turns to me. "Aurelia, who marked your paper?"

I glance over at Serena who is standing in the doorway, not believing the embarrassment of the situation. I gulp. "Um, Reuben did."

"Reuben, do you think you could maybe tutor Aurelia - for a few weeks?"

My heart drops, and I feel my entire face just flush red. I stare down at my clean, polished shoes, as there is a silence for a few seconds.