Tutoring the Bad Boy [REWRITTEN]

03. fathers and fears

"YOU'RE REALLY INTERESTING, Anderson," Archer spoke, seemingly entertained by the fact that I was struggling to teach him how to do a discrete dynamical system.

"Excuse me?" I said to the dark-haired boy, taken aback by the abrupt comment.

"You're interesting," he repeated, looking up from the sheet of paper and at me. It was something I started to notice about the boy; he always made eye contact to the person he was talking to.

"I heard what you said, I'm just confused. How exactly am I interesting?" I asked and furrowed my eyebrows in confusion.

"It's a good thing," he told me, disregarding my previous question, "you're just interesting."

I decided to not press on any further, knowing that he probably wouldn't tell me anyway. However, the majority of the time spent tutoring him was him being puzzled with the work, me trying to being as patient as I could, and both of us ending up moderately frustrated. The dark-haired boy let out a groan and leaned back into his spinny chair as he closed his eyes.

     In conclusion, this wasn't working out as good as I thought it was going to. I let out an exasperated sigh and fell back onto the bed, and holy shit. I almost let out a moan from how comfortably soft the bed was, but I refrained myself since Archer was in the same room. If I closed my eyes, I would most definitely fall asleep.

I almost gave into the temptation, but somebody yelling Archer's name interrupted me from doing so. I sat up and looked up at the boy. There was a flash of fear in his eyes, but it was gone as quick as it came. The action made me question if it was even fright at all because now his face was back to hard and stoic— almost angry.

It could have been the homework.

I was proven wrong when he looked at me for a moment, then proceeded to walk out of the room without another word. I should've stayed in the room, but I didn't. He didn't try to stop me from following him either.

The atmosphere was tense. No stupid jokes, no half smiles, no anything. From the time I spent tutoring him, he seemed a lot more relaxed than I've ever noticed at school, but this was the most tense I've seen him. Though I was behind him, I could tell by the way he clenched his fists. Part of me was glad that I wasn't face to face with him.

I wanted to ask what was wrong, but part of me was afraid of how he'd respond so I kept my mouth shut. Pretty soon, we were both standing outside of a dark brown, wooden door. The dark-haired boy next to me knocked on it before a deep voice told him to come in.

"Archer," a man spoke his name, an uninterested look etched onto his face as he looked up from his computer.

"What do you want?" the boy questioned with a glare. The detestation and abhorrence was written all over his face and heard in his voice, but the man— which I'm assuming was his father— didn't seem bothered by it. It was sort of unnerving.

     "Is is too wrong to want to see my own son?" he asked while glancing towards me but not saying anything.

     "Cut the bullshit."

     "Your grades are slipping."

     "Is that all you wanted?" He turned around to leave before the man spoke again.

     "How the fuck are you going to take over the business with your shitty grades?" his father inquired passive aggressively, causing him to stop and turn around again.

     "Is that all I'm good for, Dad? What now? I'm a failure because I can't live up to your expectations?" he told the man, and even though his voice screamed hatred, there was a hint of sadness in it.