Higher Learning (The Charlie Davies Mysteries Book 4)

by Clare Kauter

  I glared at him, angry that he didn’t seem to care that I’d been flirting with another guy and furious at myself for caring about that. Had our kiss really meant that little to him? OK, so it had been ages since it happened and we hadn’t addressed it yet. Was it just a silly spur of the moment thing? Well, if James was so unconcerned about it, then I supposed it was time for me to move on as well.

  “You have no honour,” I said. “Also Elliot’s hot these days. I think he might beat you out for teacher the most students have crushes on, James. How embarrassing for you. The one thing you had going for you and suddenly you’re not the most attractive guy at Gerongate High anymore.”

  James raised his eyebrows at me. Clearly he hadn’t been expecting quite so much vitriol in my response. Well, screw him. I didn’t care anymore. How dare he move on without even telling me? Why had I ever thought that kissing him was a good idea in the first place? I was an idiot. Not as much of an idiot as James, but an idiot nonetheless.

  “Are you alright, Charlie?” James asked.

  I glared at him. “Fine. Better than fine. The best I’ve been in a long time. Like Tim said, I got my flirt on with my science teacher.” I smiled sweetly. “And I happen to already know how good a kisser he is.”

  The answer to that was ‘not at all, dear god please get your tongue out of my mouth – are you some sort of human-squid hybrid?’ but I didn’t tell the others that.

  James opened his mouth but closed it without saying anything.

  “I have to go, anyway,” I said. “Bye.”

  “Do you need a lift home?” James asked.

  “No thanks,” I replied, immediately regretting it.

  “You sure?” James asked. “You’re still kind of limping. It’s no trouble.”

  “James,” I said, “I didn’t say no because I didn’t want to inconvenience you. I just don’t want to be stuck in a car with you.”

  “Charlie –”

  “Bye,” I said, turning and walking out of the office. Well, limping.

  CHAPTER TEN

  By the time I reached my front door, I was nearly in tears. My legs and feet had never hurt this much. Well, not since I first started jogging, at least. Still, the alternative – being stuck in a car with backstabber James ‘kiss and run’ McKenzie – wasn’t much better. The entire trudge home was fuelled by my anger with James. I couldn’t believe I’d ever liked him. What a douchebag. He didn’t care that I had a thing for Elliot, therefore I shouldn’t care about James anymore. Of course, I didn’t really have a thing for Elliot – been there, done that – but James didn’t know that. And he hadn’t even been mildly jealous. Nothing.

  Prick.

  I pushed through the front door and found Stacey in full party preparation mode. Stacey worked as a receptionist for an advertising company, but had taken a half-day off purely for the purpose of organising tonight’s event. I had been under the impression that it was just a dinner party, but now that I was looking around at the dining room covered in decorations, I was beginning to wonder. There were candles and flowers and doilies and bunting and fairy lights everywhere.

  “Stacey,” I said, “is someone getting married?”

  “Not unless there’s something you haven’t told me. Speaking of which, what’s your secret story?” she asked eagerly.

  For a second I thought she’d somehow found out about my kiss with James, but then I remembered our earlier conversation.

  “Oh, well,” I said, “I –”

  “Wait, are you wearing our high school uniform?”

  “Yep,” I said, and explained my undercover case. By the end, Stacey’s jaw was just about dragging on the floor.

  “Oh. My. God,” she said, her eyes shining with excitement. “You mean I get to teach you to cheer?”

  I nodded. “Yep.”

  “Is it too late to cancel tonight’s party?”

  I frowned. “Definitely,” I said. “Maybe we can do some cheering afterwards.”

  She grinned, her eyes looking kind of insane. “Yes, perhaps...”

  The front door opened and Celia came in carrying a cask of wine. “Afternoon,” she said. “How are you?”

  “Good,” I said. I nodded at the box of wine. “Fancy.”

  She grinned. “I was hoping you guys had an empty bottle we could decant it into.”

  “Well, it just so happens that we keep an empty bottle on hand for that exact purpose,” Stacey said.

  “Brilliant.”

  The line between insanity and genius is very thin.

  Celia and I helped put up decorations, and when Lea arrived she helped Stacey in the kitchen. While we were hanging yet another string of fairy lights, wrapping them around the banister on the staircase, Celia leaned towards me.

  “I invited James,” Celia whispered, wiggling her eyebrows at me until she caught the look on my face. “Oh, for fuck’s sake. What’s happened now?”

  I sighed. “Nothing. I just don’t think it’s ever going to happen between us, that’s all.”

  C folded her arms. “Really.”

  “Really.”

  She continued to stare at me with her eyebrows raised until I broke down and told her the truth.

  “Fine,” I said. “But you’re going to think it’s dumb.”

  She nodded. “Every time the two of you have an argument I think it’s dumb. If you’d both stop messing around, you’d be married with two kids already.”

  I grimaced. “My god. Remind me to never stop messing around. That sounds awful,” I said.

  “Kids are cool,” C said. “Vi and Janine would look after them for you all the time anyway.” (Janine was my mother and Vi, McKenzie’s mother, was her best friend.) “Not to mention all of your friends. You’ve got loads of babysitters.”

  “Still not really feeling it, C.”

  “But what about Arnold? You love her.”

  Arnold was my pet pig. Well, I call her a pet, but really she was more like a friend. And yes, I’m aware that I sound insane.

  I frowned. “Yeah, but I didn’t have to squeeze her out of my –”

  “Right, I get your point,” C said. “OK, forget the kids. You could be with James. You could have a boy on demand.”

  “Netdix.”

  “Exactly.”

  I smiled, then the smile left my face when I remembered what had happened that afternoon.

  “OK, come on,” said Celia. “Tell me what he did now.”

  I sighed. She wasn’t going to let this go until I told her. “Tim told James that I’d been flirting with someone and James...”

  “Yes?”

  “Didn’t care.”

  C frowned at me. “Are you serious?”

  “Yes. Elliot Bicknell is a science teacher now, and –”

  “Elliot Bicknell? Seriously?” she said, looking disgusted. “That’s who you were flirting with?”

  I crossed my arms. “What?”

  She shook her head at me. “Is that the whole story?” she asked.

  “Yes,” I said. “What?”

  She rolled her eyes. “So James wasn’t a dick and that’s what’s annoying you?”

  “No, I –”

  “You would have been just as angry if he’d been all weird and jealous.”

  “No, I wouldn’t have been,” I said.

  “Really?”

  “Yes, really,” I said. “I would have been moderately annoyed, but also kind of satisfied. He just didn’t even seem to care.”

  “Maybe he just realised that you wouldn’t really flirt with Elliot Bicknell.”

  “I promise you, Elliot has blossomed.”

  C rolled her eyes. “Caterpillars blossom. Slugs do not.”

  I crossed my arms. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Charlie, I think you’re being silly. So James isn’t jealous of Elliot, just like the rest of the human race.”

  “Why do you hate Elliot so much?”

  She pretended to think. “Hmm, maybe because he
was eighteen when you guys dated and you were only fourteen?”

  “Yeah, but we didn’t do anything,” I said, rolling my eyes.

  “Would you date a fifteen year old?”

  “Ew, no!”

  “So you get my point.”

  “Whatever,” I said with a sigh. “So you don’t like Elliot. James still could have been a little bit jealous instead of not caring, that’s all. I don’t think it’s going to happen between me and James.”

  Celia rolled her eyes. “Maybe you should just talk to him about the kiss instead of waiting for him to bring it up.”

  “Why do I have to bring it up?”

  “Maybe he doesn’t want you to feel awkward about it if you’ve moved on.”

  “Well, I have moved on now,” I said.

  “Clearly.”

  “Shut up.”

  “Charlie, at some point you’re going to have to grow up and start talking about your feelings instead of just letting them boil and fester until they spill out and you attack people with blunt instruments.”

  “I haven’t attacked anyone with an instrument of any kind for ages,” I said.

  “Good! Keep that record intact. Talk things through with James.”

  “I don’t want to talk to him.”

  She rolled her eyes. “I don’t know why I even bother. Date Elliot Bicknell, see if I care.”

  “We should stalk him on Facebook,” I suggested. “Then maybe you’ll understand why he’s a viable option.”

  “Charlie, my darling best friend, please hear me: personality is what you date, not looks. I don’t care what Elliot looks like now. The Bicknell is still in there.”

  “He’s not that bad!” I said, a little too loudly.

  “Who?” Lea asked. Stacey was also looking over at me.

  “Elliot Bicknell,” I said.

  “Creepy Elliot?” Lea said. “Oh, he is that bad.”

  “He’s gross, Charlie,” said Stacey. “You said that kissing him was like making out with an octopus.”

  It was true, I had said that. Not just because of the slimy, sucker-like mouth, but also because he seemed to have more arms than a normal person, snaking their way all over me.

  “OK, so he wasn’t a great kisser at the time,” I said. “But he was a lot younger.”

  “He was a year younger than you are now,” said Celia.

  I grimaced. When she put it like that, it did sound kind of bad.

  “He’s hot now,” I explained to the others. They both just looked at me like they were disgusted with me and didn’t believe a word of what I was saying. “That’s it. We’re Facebook stalking him.”

  “Charlie, even if he is good looking now, it’s not the looks that are the problem,” Lea said.

  “Thank you, Lea,” C said. “That’s exactly what I said.”

  “Why are you considering Elliot, anyway?” Stacey asked me. “You can’t be that lonely.”

  “He’s not that bad!” I said.

  “Charlie, when this many of your friends think your ex is a creep, it’s definitely time to consider that maybe getting back with him isn’t a good idea,” said Celia.

  “I wasn’t planning on getting back with him,” I said.

  “Then why are you defending him so heavily?” Lea asked.

  “Because – never mind. It doesn’t matter.”

  Stacey shrugged and got back to her cooking, but Lea gave me a knowing look. She suspected it had something to do with James, I could tell. She knew better than to say anything in front of Stacey, though.

  “So, who’s coming tonight?” I asked, desperate to change the subject.

  “Gina’s coming when she finishes work,” Celia said.

  “Cool, good,” I said.

  Celia rolled her eyes at me. Gina was Celia’s girlfriend, and she didn’t think much of me. She considered me to be a crappy friend, which to be honest had been completely true up until recently. As much as I tried to show Gina that I’d changed, she still didn’t seem all that impressed by me.

  “Just keep trying,” said Celia. “She’ll forgive you one day.”

  I grimaced. I hoped so. “Who else is coming?”

  Stacey answered this time. “Jo and Oswald, James McKenzie, Gina...”

  “I invited Joe Winton, too,” said Lea. We all turned to her in surprise.

  “Is there something you want to tell us, Lea?” I asked.

  She shrugged. “He’s cute,” she said. “Plus if Joe’s here, at least James will have someone to talk to when you have your inevitable falling-out with him.”

  I crossed my arms.

  “Ah,” she said. “So you’ve already had a fight. Great. This should be fun, then.”

  An hour or so later, the guests started arriving. By then, we’d decanted the wine into the fancy bottle and set the table ready for dinner. Before eating, we all sat around in the lounge room. I made Arnold sit on the couch next to me so that there was no chance of James sidling up to me. Unfortunately, it turned out that despite Arnold’s recent growth spurt, James still didn’t have much trouble picking her up and placing her on my lap. He pinned me under Arnold and sat down next to me.

  “I’m sorry I insulted Elliot,” said James. “I didn’t realise you guys were still close. I was kind of under the impression you dumped him because he was a creep.”

  Why did everyone keep saying that? Apart from the weird four-year age gap, I mean.

  “We’re not close,” I said. “It just – you were just being a bit of a dick.”

  He nodded. “Yeah, I was,” he said. “Sorry.”

  I nodded, waiting for him to say more. He looked like he was choosing his words carefully and my heart sped up. Was this it? Were we finally going to talk about The Incident? I held my breath, waiting for him to speak, until finally...

  “Arnold’s grown so much since we found her.”

  Maybe I’d misread the situation.

  “Yes, I’m aware, since I’m currently suffocating under her weight,” I said.

  James smiled at me and then grew serious again. “I, um, I wanted to talk to you about...” He trailed off.

  On the other hand, maybe I’d read the situation exactly.

  “The Incident?” I said.

  “Yes.” He paused. “I just wanted to...”

  After a deep breath, I took the plunge. “We’re just friends, right? It doesn’t have to be a big deal.”

  He took a breath and then nodded. “Yeah,” he said. “Friends. Just... yeah”

  “Cool.”

  And then we sat there in silence like a couple of friends.

  I breathed deeply and blinked hard, determined not to let James know that I was upset. This was awkward enough without me getting all emotional. James downed his glass of wine in record time and poured himself another. Good to know the cask stood up to the billionaire test. I would have run away, but I genuinely couldn’t lift Arnold off my lap. I was stuck here until someone released me or Arnold decided to wander off in search of food.

  After what felt like an eternity of awkward silence with both James and I trying to come up with something to say and failing, Arnold got up off my lap. I stood – and promptly fell. I should have expected it, really. With how tired my legs were after today and then a pig sitting on them and cutting off the circulation, I should have known that they wouldn’t be able to hold me up. Unfortunately in my desperation to get away from James, I hadn’t thought of that, and I paid for the oversight. I stood, wobbled and fell – right into James McKenzie’s lap.

  “Oh, god,” I said. “Sorry, I –”

  “No, it’s fine,” he said, helping me up.

  Eventually I steadied myself and limped away at top speed. I made eye contact with Celia and she shot me a wink. I guessed she’d seen my incredibly smooth move from moments earlier.

  When Stacey announced that dinner was ready, I was flooded with relief. There were enough people here that I wouldn’t have to speak to James, and therefore I wouldn’t have t
o address the awkward predicament we’d found ourselves in. At least, that’s what I thought until I reached the table and realised that Celia had put out place cards. Ten guesses who she’d sat me next to.

  James and I took our seats. Just as everyone got settled, there was a knock at the door. I stood straight away. “I’ll get it,” I said, hoping against hope it would be someone from work who’d be able to bail me out. If it was Tim or Adam they could say there was some sort of emergency and I could run away and hang out with them for the evening. Please, please, please be Tim or Adam.

  That was not the case, however. When I opened the door, standing before me on my front doorstep (right on top of the slight bloodstain from where someone had once dumped a faceless corpse), holding a bottle of actual expensive wine, was none other than Elliot Bicknell.

  “Hi,” he said. “I, um...”

  I smiled at him. “Come in.”

  Perfect. Now that I’d confirmed that I was just friends with James, there was nothing stopping me from bringing Elliot to the dinner party. Except, well, not being all that interested in him. Never mind. I took Elliot by the hand and led him to the dining room. When we walked in, Stacey, Lea and Celia simultaneously said, “Oh.” It looked like they understood now.

  “Just let me fetch another seat for you, Elliot,” I said, flashing him a winning smile. He smiled back.

  I grabbed a chair from the ground floor office and when I returned to the dining room I found that James had moved his chair, leaving a gap between his seat and mine. I put the stool there and Elliot and I sat down.

  “My god, Elliot,” said Joanna. “You are so hot now.”

  Excellent. Suspicions confirmed. It wasn’t just me who thought so.

  Elliot smiled and laughed awkwardly, clearly embarrassed by Joanna’s (admittedly kind of terrifying) gaze. I wondered if James was jealous now. After all, Joanna had always thought that McKenzie was the most attractive guy in the world (other than her husband, Oswald), and yet here we were. He’d been replaced.

  Poor little James. I tried to hide my malicious smile. That would teach him to kiss me and then pretend it hadn’t happened.

  Everyone went back to their own conversations, but James, Elliot and I were seated around a corner of the table too far away from the others to join in their conversations. We’d have to talk to each other.