by K T Bowes
From Sophia’s Dilemma
Book 2 of the Troubled Series.
“Yeah? You wanna try it?” The voice caused the smaller boy to back away, dropping his hand to his side.
“Na, bro. Not today.”
“Not ever!” The tall man-boy gave his adversary a withering look which left him in no doubt who the alpha male was. “Push me again and you’ll be sorry.”
“Ok.” The other boy, a few minutes ago so cocky and confident but now deflated like a balloon, picked up his bag and blended into the crowd. His face looked downcast and his friends surged around him with excitement. Dane McArdle was a few weeks away from his seventeenth birthday. He was of average height, but his proportions showed he still had a way to go in an upwards direction before he was done growing. His features were handsome and brooding, reminiscent of the father he once loved dearly and whose death scarred his life irrevocably. He hardly ever smiled. Until recently there was little to smile about and the world had been denied the profound transformation of his face, into something less intimidating, a tiny chip in his front tooth representing the only blemish. He pushed his way through the crowd of teenage bodies, going against the flow of people leaving the school building.
The other kids moved out of his way, shrinking back from his reputation more than from the boy himself. His school bag was strung across his body and his hands sunk deep into the pockets of his second-hand grey school trousers. His face, usually an unreadable mask, lit up in a smile that looked unusual on him. His blue eyes danced and sparkled and his lips looked full and pink against his dark hair and skin as he ploughed relentlessly through the crowd and back into school.
“It’s Dane!” a younger girl hissed at her friends. “He’s so hot!”
“He’s trouble!” replied her companion.
“He’s the strong silent type. I could go for that,” she sniggered.
“He looks happy and that can’t be good. Come on. The bus is leaving!” The girls sped off towards the bus stop, Dane’s smile adding a whole new dimension to their fantasies.
“Where ya going, bro?” a blonde boy called to him, embarrassed when Dane ignored him and kept pushing on through the bodies. The boy turned and cut a track through the wake that began to close ranks after Dane’s passage. He fingered the packet of cigarettes in his pocket but wouldn’t dare light up inside school. “One more dean’s detention away from complete expulsion!” the dean’s voice returned to him. He couldn’t risk that at the moment, not with nothing else to go to.
He followed Dane to the doors of the art room and watched as the taller boy leaned against the door frame, looking at something – or someone – inside the room. Dane’s face lit up like a Christmas tree and there was a serenity about him which made the scraggly blonde boy jealous. Darren heard a gentle girl’s voice and Dane’s face broke into a wide beam. Darren could only see him from the side, but it was obvious Dane was pleased to see the owner of the voice.
A girl from their tutor class came to the door, fitting herself into a navy school blazer whilst struggling with a heavy rucksack.
“Give it here.” Dane easily lifted the strap of the rucksack and swung it over his shoulder. It weighed her down but looked empty on Dane’s muscular frame. The girl was pretty, very pretty. Darren had liked her since Year 10 when they worked on an English project together. She was polite and considerate, not treating him like the outsider he felt he was. He asked her out on a date and she smiled kindly and told him her parents wouldn’t allow her to date until she was sixteen. It was so gently done. There was no, ‘get lost, you’re an ugly git,’ or ‘not if you were the last man on earth,’ none of that. Dane gave him a slap once for talking dirty about her. Suddenly it all made sense if he had the hots for her too.
Sophia Armitage had dark brown eyes with long black lashes and wavy chestnut coloured hair that curled at the ends down near the middle of her back. It swished in her pony tail when she walked or turned her head and in Year 10, it smelled so good. Darren hadn’t been able to get close enough since to know if it still did. Her skin was tanned and healthy now, although she looked dreadful a couple of weeks ago after the stabbing. She needed an operation to sort it all out. The word around school was that Dane had been a hero and saved her, but he didn’t talk much to Darren anymore. Darren flexed his fingers in temper. I thought we were mates, he complained inwardly, knowing he would never do it to Dane’s face.
Their friendship group had detonated spectacularly a few weeks ago, leaving the other members drifting around like flotsam. Darren felt vulnerable and angry. So this is why, is it? Because of this chick?
“Sandra should have killed you,” he chuntered to himself, keeping out of sight. “She liked him for years. You don’t get to do this, Sophia Armitage.”
“Any news on your mother?” the girl asked Dane and he shook his head.
“No. And I don’t want to know. She could have turned him away or got the cops when he got out of prison. But she didn’t. Now she’s lost her kids. She made her choice.”
“But...”
“I don’t wanna talk about it.”
Sophia’s ponytail swung as she finished putting her blazer on and she smiled up at Dane. “Ok, sorry.”
Then it happened. Dane bent down and kissed her full on the mouth and she did nothing to stop him. She looked as though she quite liked it. Dane put his hands on her hips and pulled her in close to him, burying his face in her hair and probably breathing in the lovely clean perfumed smell, which Darren craved every time he saw the girl. The blonde boy balled his fists and gritted his teeth, thinking all kinds of awful swear words in his head.
“We agreed,” Sophia said quietly into Dane’s ear, “that it would be better just to be friends at school.”
“School’s finished!” he complained and kissed her again before putting an arm protectively around her shoulders and leading her down the corridor, in the opposite direction to Darren.
“Have you heard anything about Sandra?” Sophia turned her face to look up at him and Dane shook his head.
“I’ve heard she’s not allowed back. The cops are charging her with wounding with intent.”
Sophia stopped dead. “I’m kinda relieved not to have to see her here. But I feel responsible. If I hadn’t head butted her...”
“Then you’d be dead!” Dane’s voice was stern. “Wise up, Soph. This started way before you and me. I knew she liked me and I ignored it. She was just my stepdad’s niece and as rotten as him. I was never interested. It was always you.” Dane reached his hand out and stroked Sophia’s cheek with such tenderness it made Darren’s eyes bug. His car keys jangled to the floor and he backed away from the corner just as Dane looked his way. Dane reached down and kissed Sophia’s upturned lips and then took her arm, moving her along the corridor.
So that’s his game then! Darren raged inside his head as he bent down to retrieve his keys. No wonder Sandra was driven to distraction, enough to really hurt the other girl. She fancied Dane since primary school, even before her uncle married his mum. It hadn’t stopped her messing around with the other boys in the group, but they had all knew where her real interests lay.
Darren drew the cigarettes out of his pocket and lit one up, satisfied as the poisonous chemicals were sucked down into his lungs. He thought about the other girls in the dwindling group and contemplated seeking them out for some fun. Jane was usually good for a laugh but had begun to get clingy lately, demanding things like movie nights and gifts in return for their fumbled pleasures. Louise was acting weird.
He walked down the corridor, following after Dane and Sophia, puffing at the lighted cigarette. He couldn’t resist the urge to jump up and wave the burning white stick underneath the smoke sensors half way down. It took a couple of goes, but eventually the alarms sounded and he whooped and ran off, remembering too late the new security cameras installed just after the stabbing. He ran to his beaten up old car in the student car park, suspecting he had just enjoyed his last da
y at school. Ever.
The next book in this series can be purchased at your usual retailer HERE
Dear Reader,
If you enjoyed this book, please leave a review at your retailer. You can find them by following the LINK. As an independent author, I rely on reviews to help me in the hazardous world of book writing. You don’t have to write something that will pass an exam; just a few words would be really helpful. Even just giving it a star rating will be fantastic and allow me to reach a wider audience.
Thanks so much,
K T Bowes