Page 29 of You Float My Boat

The guy on the other side was saying it wouldn’t be as bad as I expected.

At least that raised a smile. It would absolutely be as bad as I expected. Worse most likely.

Either way, at some point I would be walking through the doors I was currently staring at, and I would be in a room with Evie Waters.

The only thing which had me moving again was the realization that I was eating into the early start I’d had. There was a reason I was arriving fifteen minutes before class began, and it would all be for nothing if I didn’t get inside in the next sixty seconds.

One foot in front of the other and all that.

I was still so deep in my thoughts that I didn’t notice the person exiting as I reached the doors, only seeing the glum outline of my reflection. The next thing I knew, I’d succeeded in knocking them plus all their books to the floor.

‘Sorry mate,’ I muttered, grabbing the books as quickly as I possibly could, and pulling the guy to his feet. Though looking at him, skinny arms now laden with the pile I’d stacked in them, it was debatable whether I’d knocked him over or if he’d just toppled.

Whatever happened, it seemed to have ignited the sense of urgency I’d been missing all morning.

‘Sorry again,’ I called behind me and sprinted for the staircase, taking the steps to the first floor two at a time.

For the next eight weeks, ten of us would spend an hour every Thursday discussing themes within the Philosophy of Physics, and writing up summary papers. I already knew Professor Rivers was going to split us into groups, but there was absolutely no way any group I was in would also include Evie.

No way. None.

Therefore, I’d spent last night devising a strategy to ensure it didn’t happen under any circumstances.

I’d taken Rivers’ classes before, and I knew he held a morelaissez-faireattitude to the way he taught. Students took responsibility for themselves. While he might tell the room to divide into two, the actual organization of each group would be down to us. I couldn’t risk leaving it to chance which would no doubt descend into a jumbled rush of deciding on the spot so I took the initiative to do it ahead of time.

It was brilliant, if I do say so myself.

The only downside was the way I’d had to split the group so Rivers wouldn’t suspect an ulterior motive. Rivers or anyone else. I hadn’t reached the top step ofthe first floor before Gordon Cherriot spotted me. His hand shot in the air with a wide wave.

‘Charlie. Charlie. Over here.’

I stopped walking for a fraction of a second, reminding myself I had bigger things at stake, and they’d come with a cost. Gordon was the price I had to pay.

Oxford University was teeming with nerds. There was one around every corner. Hell, I was one – or would be if I didn’t have a life outside the physics department. But Gordon Cherriot was in a nerd league of his own. Easily the biggest in the entire university.

He had no competition.

I didn’t even know where his IQ stood, somewhere in the 170s probably. He’d be walking away with a first come the summer, no doubt about it. And that wasn’t the most impressive thing about him – because Gordon Cherriot was only sixteen.

A child prodigy, a chess Grand Master – he’d taken his A-levels before his thirteenth birthday and arrived at Oxford the following September. There was a rumour on the grapevine that if Oxford hadn’t insisted he kept to his academic schedule he’d have taken both his first- and second-year courses concurrently.

But the downside to Gordon – he didn’t play well with others.

I’d known him since the first term at Oxford when we’d been in the same quantum mechanics class. I personally found him harmless, and kind of amusing. But I’d also learned to tune out most of what he said. I tried to remember he was a kid who’d never really had the chance to be a kid, and as someone who knew what itwas like to have their intellectual capacity make them stand out, I mostly cut him some slack.

To nearly everyone else, he was self-important, smug and borderline intolerable. It was hard to see him as a sixteen-year-old when he was constantly telling you why you were wrong. And how wrong you were. He excelled at it almost as much as he excelled at Einstein’s Theory of Relativity. And it wasn’t exclusive to students. More than once he’d told our professors they were wrong, although that did usually raise a smile from everyone else in the class.

Luckily, even in our small group, I’d managed to weed out enough people who Gordon hadn’t completely alienated, and therefore found him tolerable enough to be around; or at least tolerable enough for me to plead to their sensibility and desire for an overall first grade. Plus, I knew Evie well enough that she would take one look at Gordon and dismiss him as not worth her time.

I eased off my backpack and dropped it on the ground near his feet. ‘Hi mate. How are you today? Rivers here yet?’

He frowned and pushed his glasses up. The ones forever sliding off his nose. ‘Yes, of course he’s here.’

‘Did you talk to him?’

‘He’s in a class, Charlie. I’m not interrupting.’

I nodded, stupid question. ‘Anyone else from our group here?’

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