new girl nerd was in the top classes for everything. But during a study period in the library she’d been sitting near him when he’d flung his poetry book down on the floor, accompanied by a string of curses that had drawn down the wrath of the supervising librarian.
The other kids had egged him on and laughed. He’d laughed too. But it hadn’t been a joke. If he didn’t keep up a decent grade average for English he wasn’t going to be allowed to go to a week-long soccer training camp that cut into the school term by a couple of days. He’d been determined to get to that camp.
The teenage Zoe had caught his eye when he had leaned down to pick up his book from the floor. She’d smiled a shy smile and murmured, ‘Can I help? I’m such a nerd I actually like poetry.’
Help? No one had actually offered to help him before. And he’d had too much testosterone-charged teenage pride to ask for it.
‘I’ll be right here in the library after school,’ she’d said. ‘Meet me here if you want me to help.’
He’d hesitated. He couldn’t meet her in public. Not the jock and the nerd. A meeting between them would mean unwanted attention. Mockery. Insults. Possible spiteful retaliation from Lara. He could handle all that, but he had doubted Zoe could.
His hesitation must have told her that.
‘Or you could meet me at my house after school,’ she’d said, in such a low tone only he could have heard it.
She’d scribbled something on a piece of paper and passed it unobtrusively to him. He’d taken it. Nodded. Then turned back to his mates. Continued to crack jokes and be generally disruptive until he’d been kicked out of the library.
But he had still needed to pass that poetry assignment. He had decided to take Zoe up on her offer of help. No matter the consequences.
Her house had been just two streets away from his, in the leafy, upmarket northern suburb of Wahroonga. Their houses had looked similar from the outside, set in large, well-tended gardens. Inside, they couldn’t have been more different.
His house had been home to four boys: he still at school, the others at universities in Sydney. There’d been a blackboard in the well-used family room, where all family members had chalked up their whereabouts. The house had rung with lots of shouting and boisterous ribbing by the brothers and their various friends.
Zoe’s house had been immaculate to the point of sterility. Straight away he’d been able to tell she was nervous when she’d greeted him at the front door. He’d soon seen why. An older woman she’d introduced as her grandmother had hovered behind her, mouth pinched, eyes cold. He’d never felt more unwelcome.
The grandma had told Zoe to entertain her visitor in the dining room, with the door open at all times. Mitch had felt unnerved—ready to bolt back the way he’d come. But then Zoe had rolled her eyes behind her grandmother’s back and pulled a comical face.
They’d established a connection. And in the days that had followed he’d got to like and respect Zoe as she had helped him tackle his dreaded poetry assignment.
‘I want to explain what happened back then,’ he said now.
Zoe shrugged. ‘Does it matter after all this time?’ she said, her voice tight, not meeting his eyes.
It did to him. She had helped him. He had let her down.
‘Do you remember how hard you worked to help me get my head around poetry?’ he asked.
‘You were the one doing all the work. I just guided you in the right direction.’
He slammed down his hand on the edge of the lounger in remembered anger. ‘That’s exactly right. You made me use my own words—not yours. It was unfair.’
‘What...what exactly happened in the classroom that day?’
‘The teacher had had the assignment for a week. So I was on edge, waiting to see if I’d passed or not. By then it had become something more than just wanting to go to the soccer camp. She handed out the marked essays, desk by desk. She saved mine for last.’
‘You should have easily passed. By that time we’d spent so much time on it—you really understood it.’
‘I thought I’d understood it, too. She got to my desk. Held up the paper for everyone to see the great big “Fail” scrawled across it. Told the class I was a cheat. Read out my grade and added her comments for maximum humiliation.’
The look on that teacher’s face was still seared into his memory.
Before he’d studied with Zoe he would have made a joke of it. Clowned around. Annoyed the teacher until she’d kicked him out of the classroom. But not that time. He’d deserved better.
‘What happened?’
‘I snatched the paper from the teacher’s hand and stormed out.’
‘To find me lurking outside in the corridor. Pretending I was waiting for a class to start in the next room. Ready to congratulate you on a brilliant pass. Instead I got in your way.’
He noticed how tightly she was gripping on to her glass. No wonder. He’d vented all his outraged adolescent anger and humiliation on her. It couldn’t be a pleasant memory.
‘Instead I behaved like a total jerk.’
‘Yeah. You did. You...you thrust the paper in my face. I can still see that word written so big in red ink: “Plagiarism”.’
‘She thought I was too stupid to write such a good essay. And I took it out on you.’
He’d yelled at her that it was her fault. Told her to get out of his way. Never talk to him again. Had he actually shoved her? He didn’t think so. His words had been as effective as any physical blow.
He’d seen her face crumple in disbelief, then pain, then schooled indifference as she’d walked away. She’d muttered that she was sorry—she’d only been trying to help. And he’d let her go.
Worse, a half-hour later he’d encountered Zoe again. This time he’d been hanging near the canteen, with his crowd of close friends and his girlfriend, Lara. Zoe had obviously been startled to see them. Startled and, he’d realised afterwards, alarmed. She’d immediately started to turn away, eyes cast down, shoulders hunched. But that hadn’t been enough for Lara, who hadn’t liked him studying with another girl one little bit.
‘Buzz off, geek-girl,’ Lara had sneered. ‘Mitch doesn’t need your kind of help. Not when he’s got me.’
Then Lara had pulled his face to hers and given him a provocatively deep kiss. Her girlfriends had started to laugh and his mates had joined in, their laughter echoing through the corridors of the school.
He’d just kept on kissing Lara. When he’d finally pulled away Zoe had gone. It was only later that he’d realised how he’d betrayed her by his silence and inaction.
That had been ten years ago. Now she smiled that wry smile that was already becoming familiar. ‘Teenage angst. Who’d go back there?’
‘Teenage angst or not,
