Copy, (An Astro Boy Story)

Chapter 12: The Announcement

Toby's POV:

The next morning, Toby purposely avoided his father.

It wasn't that hard, considering when Orrin woke him up to get ready for school, he was still fast asleep and snoring like a vacuum cleaner in the master bedroom next door.

Nevertheless, when Orrin went upstairs once again twenty minutes later to wake the scientist up for work, Toby gobbled down his breakfast in a couple mouthfuls and hurriedly got in the limo before his Dad had a chance to get up and come downstairs.

He wasn't exactly sure why he was avoiding him. It was just a sort of feeling he had after last night. A desire to not have to speak or see his dad for the time being.

He figured it had something to do with his father lying to him. His brown eyes narrowed and he scowled just at the thought.

It was a small thing. Tiny, in the scheme of all that had happened to him in the past few days, really. But it bothered him to no end.

He'd lied to him. Lied. And what for? All he had asked was if he knew Cora, and he'd lied through his teeth. It was so obvious that he most definitely did know who Cora was, and that for whatever reason she bothered him.

But why? Toby had lay awake last night for a long time pondering that one question. Why did the mention of Cora's name make his dad so uncomfortable? Was he hiding something? Had something happened that he wasn't aware of?

And more importantly, did it have something to do with Astro?

Much to his frustration, no amount of meditating on the provoking question gave him any answers, and Toby tried to put it out of his mind as Orrin got into the limo and he fastened his seatbelt.

Still, he had a bad feeling that even though it had only been a small occurrence—and a small lie—that it pointed to something else.

Something big.

And something bad.

~O~

The second day of school turned out to be much more tolerable that the first. People paid a lot less attention to him in class now that they knew he was just plain ol' smarty pants Toby Tenma. Everything felt a whole lot more normal and it was actually a bit comforting to him. He didn't think he liked change all that much.

Throughout the day, he kept a sharp lookout for Cora. He couldn't stop thinking about their talk yesterday, or pondering yet again about the stuff he didn't know about her and Astro. A feeling he was unaccustomed to settled in the pit of his stomach every time he thought about the two of them.

Jealousy.

He spotted her once, during a passing period between classes. She had looked up and had seen him staring at her from across the crowded hall, a look of anguish washing over her features before she looked away.

The look had earned her a small frown from Toby that had stayed on his face for a while longer.

He had a nagging feeling that the look of anguish was because he looked just like Astro and not because of him himself, and he found that incredibly bothersome.

He somehow managed to shake this off though and continue on his boring, dull day of 'learning'.

At least that part would never change.

Before long, the day was almost over, and Toby felt a mixture of joy and dread at the thought. He was happy at the thought of leaving school for another twenty-four hours, but was dreading to return home to the empty apartment building—if it was empty. If it wasn't, Toby thought it might be even worse.