Page 5 of Neverland

“Two wrongs don’t make a right, Lucy. A girl as smart as you should know that.”

“Mr. Rosser, that boy wanted a fight—”

“And Mr. Sanchez gave him one,” he argued.

I hung my head knowing like most adults, they simply failed at understanding life in the schoolyard.

“Lucy,” he attempted, this time reading my mind. “I know you have every reason to think adults fail you. A good percentage in your life have. I’m not about failing you. Had you come and told me about the incident then we could have dealt with it. It didn’t need to escalate to the point which it did.”

“I understand that…” I paused because it was hard to explain. “Romeo sees more, that’s all.”

Principal Rosser leaned back in his chair and tapped his expensive pen on the open diary while contemplating his next question. “How’s things at home, Lucy?”

Biting my bottom lip, I drew blood. Rosser only knew the basics of what happened within the walls of my home. In order to keep Child Protection from prying, my parents had become expert storytellers so I was forced to compartmentalize the most disturbing details. With one exception—Romeo knew everything. And that’s why Principal Rosser would never understand why Romeo came to my defense even if he knew he’d lose against the older boy.

I managed a small smile and hoped it was convincing. “Improving,” I lied.

He returned my smile. A smile which said he didn’t for a second believe me.

Rosser leaned forward, interlacing his fingers. “Lucy, I’ve reviewed the CCTV in the quad where the altercation occurred, and unfortunately because you made contact with another student to cause physical harm, you too will have some form of consequence.

My jaw tensed so hard it hurt. These were the school rules no matter how much we all disagreed with them. Even the student defending him or herself was held accountable. But that wasn’t what I was concerned about. The consequence I faced in school would be nothing to what I’d receive at home if my father was sober enough to comprehend my actions.

“And you don’t have to worry,” he said, reading my mind once more. “I won’t be phoning home. You will, however, be expected to complete your punishment here at school.”

“I understand.” I stood to leave but his voice stopped me before I reached the door.

“And Lucy.”

“Yes?”

“Purely off the record, you’re my vote for the Stanton scholarship, so keep that record clean.”

I nodded, still tasting the metallic tang of blood in my mouth.

That scholarship was my only out. With it, I could leave this life behind and start again with a promising future where the past would never find me.

~~~

“You look like a panda,” I gently teased, spraying CleanAid onto the cloth. We sat at the large study table in the library, my job to clean the covers of all the books, working my way through the endless shelves.

“Do I look like Josie Walner when she’s in Goth mode?”

“It definitely looks like you borrowed her makeup.”

Sitting across from me, Romeo gave his lopsided smile. His punishment was to rip out the old record tabs on the inside of each book and glue in another before handing it over to me for cleaning. Despite Rosser going easy on us, Romeo was lagging. “I’m truly unsure which one I prefer.”

“Pandas are cute. I’d go with that.”

Stilling the glue stick, he looked up through his lashes, a coy grin twitching his lips. “Are you calling me cute?”

I scoffed at his attempt to fish for more compliments, and as always with Romeo, I took the bait. “You know you’re cute, you don’t need me to tell you that. Even with your two black eyes and swollen nose.”

“I knew you couldn’t resist me. All these times you’ve been lying to yourself.”

Throwing the cleaning cloth at his face, I laughed at his lame joke. “Shut up and glue.” With his smile lingering, we fell into a comfortable silence and I watched as Romeo finally got stuck into his task. “I just wanted to thank you,” I said at last.

“For?” he asked without breaking his stride.

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