Spoiler
Austin, Charlie Black's friend, is responsible for accidentally stabbing and killing Aimee Cardle. A few weeks had passed after the stabbing when the boys met Zoey Cardle and her best friend, Beth. Aimee Cardle was Zoey's sister, but no one is aware of that. Zoey, Austin and Charlie met up again some time later, and Charlie now wants to be tutored by Zoey's mum, Sophie. During their meeting, it was uncovered that Sophie knows Charlie back from when he was younger.
Charlie and Austin were walking home when they ran into Lee Pritchard, the boy who was fighting Austin when he stabbed Aimee. Lee accused Charlie of calling emergency services after the stabbing, but Charlie denied it. Austin didn't seem to believe Charlie though and snapped at him before leaving along with Lee.
Charlie and Austin were walking home when they ran into Lee Pritchard, the boy who was fighting Austin when he stabbed Aimee. Lee accused Charlie of calling emergency services after the stabbing, but Charlie denied it. Austin didn't seem to believe Charlie though and snapped at him before leaving along with Lee.
Stop and Stare ~ Part Fifteen
Zoey
“So you haven't spoken to Charlie then?”
I shook my head. “Not a word. Why? Did he say something?”
“No, that’s the problem.” Austin sighed as he tapped the table opposite us. “We... well, we sorta got into a fight, but it wasn’t a fight, not really. It was, well, it’s complicated. Basically, I pretended to get all pissed with him, but I didn’t actually tell him I was faking it, then when I tried to call him afterwards, he didn’t pick up. He ain’t even texted me since then.”
I didn’t even have his phone number, so I wasn’t sure how Austin expected me to have contacted Charlie. Austin, Beth, Jade and I were in a bowling alley right now, and while Beth was lining up for her shot, Austin and I were sitting in the ball area. I gazed around me for a minute or so. The flashes of neon lights and the frenzy of children yelling made it a struggle to let my thoughts process much. I watched as a young child began screaming at his mother after spilling his drink over the wooden floor. That would have been hell to clean up. There was no kind of order in these places, honestly. It was like being in a zoo.
I let out a sigh. I hadn't seen Charlie once since the day he was at my house last, and as far as I was aware, he hadn’t contacted my mum about the tutoring either. I knew it was a bit pathetic, but I was hoping he would have come here with Austin, but Austin hadn’t even mentioned him once besides just then. After hearing that Austin himself had no idea where Charlie had been, it seemed a little odd, to be honest. Something didn't feel right.
“You sure?” Austin asked again. I snapped my attention back to him.
“Definitely.” I narrowed my eyes. “Hang on, and you faked getting into a fight with him because...?”
He muttered something under his breath. “I told you, it’s complicated.” His voice was hard but it soon softened again. “I just thought he might have spoken to you.”
Before I got the chance to say anything more, Austin was standing back up. As he leaned back on the ball machine that resembled the shape of a white wave, he appeared to be thinking quite heavily about something. That was bizarre. Okay, so Austin and Charlie got into a fight, but it wasn’t really a fight, except Charlie didn’t know that but Austin did, and now Charlie hadn’t been answering Austin’s calls since the whole shenanigan? Rather confusing. I crossed my legs and ran my tongue across my bottom lip. Charlie was okay, wasn’t he?
I tried to concentrate on Austin as he made his way to the starting line of the bowling lane. He was soon getting ready to take his shot, and it wasn't long until my eyes were following a neon bowling ball as it glided down the smooth lane. The stillness of the ten pins almost made them appear scared of their soon to be fate as the ball neared them. As it collided with the pins, it was only a matter of seconds until none were left standing.
After yelling a word that wasn’t necessarily suitable to be shouted out in a family friendly place, Austin made a huge fist pump in the air. His heavy thought process was done then. I crossed my arms and shook my head as he strutted back towards the ball area where Beth, Jade and I were sitting.
“Aw, come on! Seriously, Austin, at least give us a chance.” Beth was laughing as Austin poked his tongue out at her through a smirk.
“You know me, babes. I don’t play shit for anyone.” He winked at her. “Pfft, besides, there’s only three of you playing, and Zoey’s scared of the balls anyway.”
I shot him a glare. According to him, I had a phobia of everything in existence. Besides, I wasn’t scared of the balls, I just didn’t like touching them. It was bad enough having to sit on these plastic seats which I was sure plenty of people had spilt sticky drinks over before. How on earth anyone could have had the mindset to be able to slide their fingers into a ball that so many other people had put their fingers into was beyond me, and as well as that, I highly doubted the bowling balls were cleaned very thoroughly. Who knew what kind of fingers could have gone into them? How dirty their nails were? What if a plaster had fallen into one? Ergh! I shuddered at the thought. Disgusting. I was only doing myself a favour by not joining in on the game.
Since Austin had bowled a strike, he got the chance to bowl again. He picked up the heaviest ball he could find--I think he thought it made him look impressive--then ambled his way back over to the red starting line of the bowling lane. With a sigh that badly hid a huge grin, Beth sat down beside me.
“Don’t you think you’re a bit too...” I paused as I searched for the right word. “Attached? To Austin, I mean. You’ve hardly known him long at all.”
“She has a point,” Jade interrupted as she joined us. “It looks like you want to lick his face or something all the time.” As she spoke, she shoved a chip into her mouth from the bowl on the plastic table beside us.
“I just like him, girls. Is that a crime? You’re just jealous because you two haven’t got boyfriends.” Beth smiled.
“I don’t want a boyfriend; my cat’s good enough company for the time being, thanks. Besides, Zoey’s getting into that other guy, isn’t she? ” Jade continued.
I often wished Beth didn’t feel the need to reveal everything about me to people. I had tried telling her to keep anything related to Charlie on the down low, but she obviously didn’t quite catch that detail. It didn’t even matter much though because Charlie and I weren’t ‘getting into’ each other. To begin with, I hadn’t spoken to him in over a week, and by the sound of it, neither had Austin.
“Game’s over!” Austin’s booming voice returned me to the present. He was now bouncing over to the girls as they inspected the scoring screen that hung on the tiled ceiling above the ball machine. “Guess who won? Ah, that’s right, there’s no need to guess because I am a god in the bowling alley.”
“Ah well, I suppose you’ve got to be good at something. Maths isn’t exactly your thing, is it? Or Biology, or English, or History, or Chemistry, or, well, anything academic.” Beth was grinning as she spoke.
“You bitch!” Austin grabbed her by the waist and pulled her towards him as she started laughing.
The two of them were play fighting all the way out of the bowling alley, and as we headed towards the large entrance of the building, Jade and I simultaneously rolled our eyes.
#
The blue sky was beginning to get overpowered by a flurry of clouds by the time we reached my house, and as I felt a pang of something cold on my bare arm, I realised that we’d left the bowling alley at a good time. I certainly wouldn’t have liked it if we had to walk home in the icy rain.
Jade and I were almost jogging down my driveway as the rain became heavier, but Beth and Austin were happily strolling a good twenty yards or so behind us. We waited by my front door as they neared us and I tried to ignore the subtle, yet growing agitated feeling that was brewing inside of me. When I noticed the foul smell of damp concrete slipping its way into my nostrils, I began clicking my tongue in hope of being distracted by it. We were ten minutes late home already thanks to the painfully slow speed of Austin and Beth’s walking, and if we were any later, I swore my entire body would go into panic mode. I told my parents I’d be back by a certain time, and by three o’clock, I meant three o’clock, not quarter past.
“Zoey, you alright?” Austin asked as they finally reached us. “You look kinda... I dunno, kinda like you wanna beat someone up or something.”
“I’m fine.” I had the most staged grin on my face.
Once everyone was inside, they began taking their shoes off. I had to move Austin’s shoes from the floor and onto the shoe rack because he clearly hadn’t realised that when everyone else put theirs on the rack, he had to do the same. Austin was a nice guy and everything, but his organisation skills and what not were terrible. Almost offensive towards me really.
“I’ll be back now,” I said as my friends sat down on the stairs. “I need to put my jacket in my mum’s office.”
My mum had some metal pegs nailed into the left wall of her office, so I always made sure to hang my jacket on one of them because it was a right pain to keep it on the stair’s banister. My jacket always got crumpled thanks to other coats being thrown on top of it when I placed it there. I could hear Austin, Beth and Jade laughing and chatting as I wandered along the hallway. Just as I passed the living room, my dad came out of it.
“Where are you going, darling?” he asked, gently holding onto my arm.
“I’m just going to hang my jacket up,” I replied with a smile.
“I think your mum’s busy talking to someone.” He glanced at the door that led to my mum’s office. “One of the lads you brought here the other day, I think.”
“Charlie?” My eyes unwillingly widened.
“Yeah, that’s the one.” My dad took my jacket form my hands. “I’ll put it over one of the kitchen’s chairs, okay?”
As my dad entered the kitchen with my jacket in his hands, a small but significant feeling of relief overtook me for a millisecond. Okay, good, Charlie was okay and everything then. I’d probably better tell Austin. I returned back to the staircase to find them all still sitting there.
“Hey, Austin.” He looked up at me as I spoke. “I just saw my dad and he said that Charlie’s speaking to my mum in her office.”
“What? Now?” he responded with a smile, and I nodded. “Great!”
Austin jumped up and it looked as though he was about to make his way across my hallway when I stopped him. “We can’t go in there yet. We don’t want to interrupt or anything.”
“Awww, yeah, but he won’t mind. Can I just see if he’s al--”
A sudden ringing sound silenced us. Then there was a loud knock.
“Zoey! Can you get the door please?” my dad called from the kitchen.
The front door was only four steps away from where I was standing, so I turned away from the three on the stairs and grasped the handle of my front door. I was half expecting Austin to make an attempt to sneak towards my mum's office, but thankfully, he sat back down next to Beth on the stairs.
I opened the door to reveal a smartly dressed boy standing on my front porch. His lips were tugged upwards into a smile, and when he saw me, his lips were pulled up further. His face looked maybe two years older than mine, but the white shirt he was wearing along with a rather tasteless tie as well a pair of black trousers made him look much older. The way he had his dark hair slicked back didn’t help much either.
“What the hell are you doing here?” Austin’s harsh voice made me jump. He’d soon nudged his way beside me.
“None of your business, dimwit,” the boy replied, equally as aggressive.
Whoa, what on earth? The boy’s noticeably green eyes flashed with amusement when Austin replied with even more harshness in his voice. As the boy raised his groomed eyebrows, I couldn’t help but get the feeling I’d seen him before. Had I? I honestly didn’t think so, but nonetheless, there was some sort of familiarity there. Strange.
“Excuse me.” The boy seemed to be speaking to me. “Is Charlie here?”
“Um, yes. Who are y--”
Before I could go any further, Austin nudged me hard. I glanced at him to see his eyes blazing as though I’d just done something utterly stupid. He cursed under his breath. There was no need for him to be so blooming rude. As the day went on, Austin seemed to be irritating me more and more. I shot him a glare. If I wanted to speak to the stranger at my door, then I would.
The boy chuckled. “Okay, sorry for disturbing you, but can I speak to him for a moment, please?”
“No,” Austin snapped before I could say anything. “Now sod off, and get a decent set of clothes while you're at it.”
My heart bashed against my chest as a wave of embarrassment flushed through my cheeks. Seriously now, did Austin have to be so arrogant? This boy seemed polite enough, so why Austin had such a problem with him was beyond me. I could only assume that they knew each other somehow. I narrowed my eyes at Austin without waiting long enough to see his reaction before turning back to the boy.
“I don’t see why not. Who are you, by the way?” I asked as I let him in.
I sort of subconsciously emphasized the fact that I was letting him in to Austin because I wanted to show him that being rude got him the opposite of what he wanted. A life lesson, as such. By allowing this boy in, I seemed to do exactly that. Austin was almost stabbing me with his eyes as I did so. I think he may have even swore at me under his breath.
“Sorry, haven’t I said?” The boy rubbed his shoes on my doormat, which was very courteous of him, before taking them off and putting them on the shoe rack. “My name’s William.” He held his hand out for me to shake. “Charlie’s brother.”
Charlie
“I did think about getting a job for some cash, but there’s practically nothing available. I’ve looked into other ways, but I don’t really think I can, uh, well...”
“Afford it?” Sophie finished my sentence for me along with a soft smile.
I nodded slowly and tried to force some kind of happy expression onto my face. She leaned back on the sofa and repeated my nodding motion, but even slower. I was just wasting her time, wasn’t I? I knew it was a stupid idea to come here just to tell Sophie I couldn’t go ahead with the tutoring. I shuffled awkwardly in my seat as I heard what sounded like a doorbell ringing. Sophie looked up after the noise and muttered something to herself before returning her attention back to me.
“Are you sure there’s nothing that can help you out, lovely?” she asked.
I shook my head with another weak grin. She didn’t seem annoyed with me or anything, so I guess that meant I hadn’t, well, annoyed her by coming here. I blooming hoped I hadn’t anyway. For a while, she was silent as she moved her river of wavy hair to sit on one of her shoulders before running her index finger along a couple of her bracelets.
Her gaze returned to me. “Okay then, well, I would have preferred not to ask this, but if you do still want to--”
Sophie was cut off by three hard knocks on her office’s door. She apologised to me before looking over my shoulder--at the door, I assumed--and responded to the knocking with a loud, “yes?” I turned around to see the door handle lower and the door itself creak open. The moment it did, the whole of my insides collapsed.
“Sorry to disturb you,” Zoey said, glancing at me. “Charlie’s brother’s just arrived.”
As Will stepped into the room dressed like a complete twat as always, there was a blatant smirk slapped across his pale face. I could feel his stare on me and I did anything but stare back at him. How the damn hell did he know I was here? Wasn’t he supposed to be in bloody Spain or something anyway? The sweat was seeping out of my skin like a rash as my mind spun with baffled thoughts. Shit, I was screwed. Screwed, screwed, screwed. I faced Sophie once more in hope of the last few seconds merely being some whacked up dream.
“Oh, gosh! Come in!” Sophie’s ecstatic voice made my stomach churn as she beamed at Will. This was real then. She nodded at the empty place next to me. “Come sit down!”
Will happily obliged, of course. He strolled towards us, and even though I couldn’t see his face, I was pretty sure that the smirk still remained on it. As he passed me to sit on the sofa, his knee ‘accidentally’ bashed against mine, which forced me to bite down on my lip to avoid swearing at him in front of Sophie.
“Sorry for interrupting,” Will said in his bad attempt of a posh voice. “I got a bit caught up. Charlie wanted me here earlier.” Like hell I did. “Sorry again, carry on with what you were saying.”
The back of the sofa curved after Will sat down, so I assumed he’d leaned back on it, but my eyes still remained fixed to Sophie so I couldn’t be sure. The powerful fan on the table in front of us was blowing in my direction, but it did nothing to control the sweat that my body was producing. If Will knew about all of this tutoring junk, did that mean my dad did too? I swallowed hard. It must have; Will wouldn’t have found out about my tutoring idea and not told him. I let out a long breath. Oh, crap, no... No. I was dead. I started manically rubbing my hands together. My dad was going to kill me.
“It’s completely fine, Will,” Sophie said in response to my brother.
“Um, William. It’s William now.” A chuckle left my lips, leaving me somewhat happy for about a second.
Will absolutely despied it when people called him Will instead of William, and whenever someone did call him that, his face would fill up with disgust and he'd glare at them as though they were some inhuman specimen. I had no idea what the big deal was though because up until we were eleven years old, everyone called him Will. He was too up his own arse, that was the problem.
“Oops, okay, sorry. William then. Gosh, I haven't seen you in such a long time. I doubt you remember me, do you?"
To both mine and Sophie's surprise, Will nodded. "I do actually, although not in an awful lot of detail, I've got to admit."
Sophie appeared even happier than before. "Well, I'm surprised you remember me at all! I'm surprised both of you remembered me." At this rate, the conversation would turn into into another chat about our life story. "We really do need to have a decent catch up. I'd love to know how things are going for you now, Will." Will frowned at the sound of his nickname. "You both look a lot less alike now that you've grown up though, I must say. Excluding your eyes, you used to be the splitting image of each other." She started chuckling. "Your mother and I used to have this theory that you were actually identical twins, and the doctor's had gotten it wrong."
I could almost sense Will squirm slightly at the mention of Mum. He might have glanced at me too, but I wasn't sure because I was still trying my best not to look at him.
"Sorry, I'm losing track of what we're actually supposed to be discussing again, aren't I? Sorry, lovely," she said to me. "Are you okay for me to go on with Will, I mean, with William here?"
The honest answer was no, it bothered the hell out of me, but I really didn't want to say that. To begin with, I hardly wanted Sophie to think Will and I wanted to snap each other's necks in half most of the time. Plus, if Will left now, I'd miss the opportunity to ask him about what he'd said to my dad about the tutoring. As my thoughts settled, I answered Sophie by telling her that it was okay for my brother to be here.
"Okay then, so as I was saying.” Sophie tucked a strand of hair behind her ear as she turned back to me. “I’d have preferred not to ask you this, Charlie, but because I know money’s a bit of an issue for you, I was thinking that I could maybe give you the lessons, but then have you pay in more of a manual kind of way.” She leaned forward slightly. “Just little jobs around the house, basically. I know it’s not exactly ‘going by the rules’, but my family have been a bit... preoccupied lately, so I thought it would be good if you could do things like help with the cleaning, maybe do some garden maintenance considering it’s in such a state. Just little things like that.” The sound of the pattering rain against the closed windows could be faintly heard while Sophie paused. “It’s up to you, of course, but I’d be more than happy to give you the lessons in return for that.”
“That sounds great.” Before I could even comprehend what she’d said, Will interrupted with sarcasm only I was aware of in his voice. “Doesn’t it?” He nudged my arm, and for the first time since he’d been here, I actually looked him in the eye. As expected, they were full of mock and amusement.
To avoid the embarrassment of saying something mock-worthy in front of Will, I merely nodded my head and turned back to Sophie. She seemed more than happy. At my response, Will let out a snigger that was only audible to me, and at that moment, I wanted to rip the guy’s head off. My jaw tightened and I dug my nails into my palms.
“Perfect then.” Sophie clasped her hands together. “I’ve gone over the dates with you, lovely, and you didn’t have any issues with them, did you? So yeah, everything looks good. Every Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday.” She stood up and as she did so, the jewellery she was wearing made a melody of clinking sounds. It was as though she was a giant wind chime. “I’ll be back now. I just need to double-check all the dates with my diary.”
My jaw went from tight to locked. Sophie was soon parading out of the room in a bounce of happiness, while I became smaller and smaller on the long sofa. The second she shut the door behind her, I blinked slowly, and then Will let out an enormous laugh.
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Click here to read STOP AND STARE (PART SIXTEEN)
Austin was good in this too. He seems to be progressing more and more as the novel goes on and this is good. He's no longer just Charlie's friend. His relationship with Beth is great as it gives him more of a reason to be in the story all the time. I also liked the way that you had him explain about the fight with Charlie in the conversation with Zoey. 
