One For The Road

Chapter Twenty One

Alright, so the first day back had been a living hell. That much was clear.

Between the three of us, Just, Heidi, and I had a mountain of makeup work to do. Most of it was for our math classes. Calculus was unkind in its complicated and slow ways, and Heidi said she was drowning in Geometry assignments that she'd missed. Again, I felt guilty for keeping them away, but I tried to push it away. If my mother hadn't wanted my senseless apologies, I imagined my friends wouldn't, either.

We spent most of that evening at the public library trying to get through at least some of our assignments. I think Heidi fell asleep on her history textbook after about an hour. On the bright side, we did manage to get at least most of our work done, despite the amount of procrastination we went through. It left us with less to do later in the week.

The next day wasn't much better; in the hallways, we were still asked where we had gone, why we left, how we were doing now that we were back. I still got a lot of jeers about my sexuality. I thought the people going to my school were at least a little more mature than this. I guess I was wrong.

In English, Ms. Hemmingway assigned us a new book to read and a project to go with it. We were assigned Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury and create a presentation with a partner about who the real villain was and why. I immediately thought of Heidi and Just, and when Ms. Hemmingway dismissed us to choose our partners and discuss reading schedules and work schedules that would work, I met with both of them.

"I have an acquaintance in this class that I can work with," Heidi said to Just and I. "You two can work together if you want, and I'll partner up with her."

"Sounds good," Just said with a shrug. "If you want, you can bring her to our homework session tonight so you two can get some work done."

"I'll think about it." She gave a tiny wave before heading to the other side of the class, meeting up with a girl with unruly ginger curls and an explosion of freckles all over her face. Just turned to me and smiled, his eyes soft. I smiled back.

The remainder of the day went by fairly quickly. As it turned out, Heidi couldn't come to the library to work with us— she had complications with Blitzen and figuring stuff out with her family— so Just and I were left alone to finish the work we owed for being out. Most of it was spent in silence, but he did eventually speak.

"Should we work on the English project at one of our houses instead of here when we actually finish reading the book?" he asked. "That way, we can actually talk without risking being yelled at."

"Sounds good to me," I murmured with a shrug. "We can meet up at my house. With just Kaleb there, it's generally pretty quiet."

"Sounds good."

We went back to doing our work, and I found myself grateful that my mother wouldn't be home. Why that was, I couldn't tell, but it brought a sense of relief over me.

•••

A week passed, and Just and I decided that if we were going to get anywhere good with our presentation, we should probably start now. I drove him to and from school and offered to drop him off at home after we finished working for the night as well.

"I don't know about you," Just was saying on the ride to my house, "but I think that contrary to popular belief, Mildred was actually the real villain of the story."

I wrinkled my nose, keeping my eyes on the road. "You sound like a report with all of that language, but go ahead and explain."

"When she found out about Montag's stash of books, she was super quick to eat him out on it. She wasn't supportive of his curiosity and just..." He shrugged halfheartedly. "She put the horror of his books before his own life and well-being."

"That's a good argument," I praised, "but I'm going to have to go with Chief Beatty as the main villain."

"That's such a cookie cutter answer," he whined, and his tone almost reminded me of a toddler being told he couldn't go outside and play with his friends because it would be getting dark soon.

"Maybe," I replied, "but it's backed up with a lot of evidence. He made it seem like he was all fine and dandy with Montag exploring these books for a while, but as soon as he decided not to give the books up, Beatty basically sent a hound to kill him. That's a little extreme, even in a place where books are banned, don't you think?" I glanced over at him to see him staring at the dashboard, clearly analyzing and digging through what I was saying. "Plus, it's partially Beatty's fault that Mildred is even like that in the first place. He and he other firefighters are keeping up this awful 'tradition'"— I briefly lifted one hand from the steering wheel to do air quotes— "of telling people that books are bad. He and the other firefighters are keeping up that lie."

We debated over it for the rest of the car ride and still couldn't come up with a solid decision, so I got out of the car and said we could have a snack and discuss the project afterward. I needed to get Kaleb off the bus in about half an hour, anyways. I still found it unfair that the elementary school was about a five minute drive away whereas the high school was almost twenty.

I led him inside and offered him some chips, which he gladly took. I set my backpack on the couch and grabbed a small bag of chips for myself, leaning on the kitchen island and looking over at him. He was absentmindedly staring into his bag of chips as he ate, clearly deep in thought. His eyebrows were furrowed slightly, but that barely-there hint of a smile was still evident on his lips, just like it always was.

Always happy. Always smiling. A pretty smile. How did he do it?