Complicated Read online

  A chorus of "ooooh" follows my response and he laughs good naturedly, ushering me into the room.

  "Allow me to introduce Mr. Liam Payne, Virgo, also single," Zayn announces, and a tall, sleepy looking boy with high cheekbones and brown eyes gives Zayn a condescending look and me a small wave.

  "How's it going?" he says and I smile back at him, giving him a nod.

  "Mr. Louis Tomlinson, Capricorn, and you guessed it, also single," Zayn tells me, gesturing to a boy with dark stubble and shaggy brown hair, who waves at me enthusiastically and I laugh a little, waving back.

  "Mr. Niall Horan, Virgo, wait for it..." Zayn says covering his eyes with his hand and I can't help but laugh, and neither can the stocky young man with the baby face and sleek blonde hair as he gives me a tight lipped smile, "Single!"

  Zayn plops himself down next to Harry, who's leaning tiredly against the arm of one of the couches. He throws an arm around him and Harry just rolls his eyes.

  "And you know our wittle Harry," Zayn says pinching his cheek. Harry scowls and slaps his hand away. "Aquarius and—"

  "Let me guess," I say cutting him off and smiling wryly. "Single?"

  "Well, I was gonna say virgin, but single works too," he replies, hooking Harry's head under his arm and giving him a noogie.

  "Fuckin' stop, Zayn!" Harry exclaims, pushing the other boy's hands away from him. His own hands fly to his head and manically mess with his curly hair as he grumbles, "And I am not a virgin."

  "Hey, Harry?" Niall calls with a sly glance at the other boys around him. "Curl number 734 is out of place."

  "Shut up, asshole," he scowls, flattening his hand over his head nervously.

  I giggle along with the rest of the chuckling boys and Harry reddens considerably before crossing his arms over his chest and huffing a perturbed sigh.

  "Come on, Harry," I say, tilting my head towards the door. "Let's get started."

  "Are you fucking kidding me?" he responds and the smile immediately slips from my face. There goes my sunny disposition. "I just spent the last two hours dancing my ass off and now I have to study during my break?!"

  "Yes," I say flatly and point toward the door, vowing to hold my temper in check and keep a firm grip on my good mood, Khefren's smiling face floating through my mind.

  "This is fucking bullshit," I hear him mutter, pulling himself off the couch.

  "Don't forget your book, man," Zayn says, lifting the heavy volume off the table with one hand and passing it to him. "Jeez, that's heavy."

  "I fucking know!" Harry exclaims, snatching it from him and walking with me to the door. We both make a move to go through and just like yesterday, he rolls his eyes and brushes past me, leading me down the hall and into the dressing room. He drops the book loudly on the vanity, bending over it to fix his hair in the mirror, his bottom lip sticking out as he fluffs at his golden brown curls with his fingers.

  "Okay Harry, prehistoric art," I say, pulling up a swivel chair and dropping my book bag to the floor before plopping into it, balancing my coffee cup on my knee. "Tell me a little about it."

  "Uh..." he begins, glancing at me briefly before going back to the mirror. "It was prehistoric...and there was art at the time."

  "Astute observation," I reply dryly, pulling my folder with my notes from my bag and fighting the urge to roll my eyes. This kid is not ruining my day. "What is significant about this time period?"

  "Significant?" he asks, finally falling into the chair with a sigh and looking at me blankly. "Um...it was prehistoric." He pauses, thinking. "Were there dinosaurs?"

  I stare at him blankly and try my best to remain calm. The trip races through my mind again and I can see the Grecian plain, see the pile of artifacts in my head. I can fucking see it. And here I am, trying to talk to a kid who thinks that there were dinosaurs in the prehistoric period.

  Good mood, gone.

  "No Harry, there were not dinosaurs," I tell him, sighing and he crosses his arms over his chest, pursing his lips. "Just tell me something from the reading," I continue, draining the rest of my coffee and tossing the empty cup into the trashcan.

  "Look, I already told you. I don't have time to read thirty pages on some stupid paintings and shit. This tour is kicking off tonight. Our first big American tour. This could make or break us. I'm sorry, but I don't give a flying fuck about this bullshit."

  And I can't help it, all the rage that I have over being stuck here with him, over missing possibly the biggest archaeological dig that will occur in my lifetime, just boils over and I snap. I drop my folder to the floor and propel myself from my seat. I lean forward, gripping the arms of his chair and his eyes widen, pressing himself back into the seat and as far away from me as he can.

  "You listen to me you pampered little brat. I don't care who you are or what you want. I don't want to be doing this anymore than you want to do it, so why don't you just shut the hell up and do the work and make this as painless as possible for the both of us."

  As soon as the words leave my mouth I know that I'm gone, done, fired. There's no way that this kid is gonna not tell his mother, or his handler, or whoever the hell is signing my paychecks. I wait for him to scowl at me, to rage and call for security.

  Instead he just swallows hard, his bluish green eyes large. "Okay."

  I step back, my brows furrowing, regarding him suspiciously. He situates himself more firmly in his chair, his hand going down to adjust himself as inconspicuously as possible as he looks away from me. He grabs the textbook from the vanity and flips it open.

  "Just gimme a minute," he tells me, surveying the first page. "Prehistoric art, is prehistory," he says, his finger pointing to a sentence in the book, "which means it predates the written word."

  He looks up at me expectantly and I nod, smiling a little. He grins back at me and I breathe out slowly, falling back into my chair as he dips his head to read on. Apparently all you had to do was show this kid who's boss.

  He continues to spout random facts at me, waiting for my nod of approval before going back to reading, a small smile playing across his lips. He steals glances at me every once and awhile, stopping to listen patiently when I expound on a fact from the text.

  He's reading along slowly, fingers flipping the page when his head suddenly snaps up. He whispers "holy shit" and I lean forward to survey the page.

  "Ah, the Woman of Willendorf," I say, smiling at him as he stares wide-eyed down at the statue. "Tell me about her."

  "T-tell you about her?" he asks, swallowing hard.

  "Yes," I respond, relishing in his shock a little. "You'll be required to analyze pieces of art for your tests. So...tell me about her. Tell me what you see."

  "Um," he murmurs, shifting in his seat, pressing the book more firmly into his lap. "She has no face."

  "Good...and what of her form?" I say, smiling inwardly, watching as an uncomfortable look crosses his face.

  "What do you mean?" he asks, glancing at me quickly and I bite my lip to keep the amused smile from my face.

  "Is she clothed?" I question and he swallows hard. I probably shouldn't push him like this but I'm still slightly bitter—okay a lot bitter—and making him squirm is the perfect payback for his shitty attitude.

  "No."

  "And what does that tell you?" God, I am such a bitch sometimes.

  "That she's naked."

  "Yes, Harry," I reply, sighing. "What does that tell you about her, about the culture this piece was carved in?"

  "Um...women were naked?" he asks and I sigh again.

  "Describe her form," I order and he looks at me pleadingly. "Its okay," I tell him, smiling a little. "You can state the obvious."

  "She has huge..." He pauses, glancing at me and then at the floor, shifting uncomfortably.

  "Breasts," I offer, smiling as I nod my head at him, finally letting him off the hook. "And very pronounced genitalia. Good job."

  He smiles weakly at me and I go on about how she is possibly a fertility goddess or some
kind of doll for little girls to play with, which he scoffs at slightly, eyeing the statue's voluptuous form.

  "Hey, Harry," I hear from behind me and I crane my neck around to see Zayn standing in the doorway. "Time to get to work, man."

  A pained look comes across Harry's face but he nods at his bandmate and just sits there for a minute, not really moving. He sighs, finally standing and quickly holding his book to his front and I realize—oh my God—he's hard. It takes everything in me not to just fall out of my chair laughing. Teenage boys; they have a hair trigger. He shimmies past me, making sure to keep his book firmly in front of him as he walks to the door.

  "Are you..." he begins, trailing as he pauses in the doorway and I look at him over my shoulder. "Are you gonna watch the rehearsal?" he asks and I just look at him blankly.

  "I wasn't planning on it," I say because I was actually planning on finding Khefren again.

  "Oh," he responds, his voice a little disappointed. "You should," he adds, giving me a small smile before making his way out of the room.

  I shake my head in amusement. The little brat just needs some discipline. I can handle that.

  3

  Okay, so I'll admit that I grievously overestimated the amount of time that Harry would have available on this tour. The schedule had them performing three nights in a row with a one to two day break in between. I figured that this would give me ample time to work with him and get him prepared for his first test, which I had planned for two weeks after our first meeting. I was wrong. Very, very wrong.

  What I had failed to understand was that the group got up at five every morning to do radio interviews until about eight and then they have personal appearances and charity work that takes them through lunch. My days were spent just trying to keep up: car rides, bus trips and a lot of hurry up and wait. It was enough to make me dizzy. After lunch it's sound check and rehearsal before the Meet and Greet and then the show which doesn't have them back at the hotel until about eleven. And then they have to hit the club scene.

  But Anna put a stop to Harry's late night activities most directly, her fingers gripping her son's ear painfully and dragging him to my hotel room door after a show in Camden, New Jersey, telling me he was ready to study. He had pecked her cheek obediently but scowled at her retreating form, looking at me wearily and rubbing the feeling back into his ear.

  I found out quickly that trying to get him to focus after a show was virtually impossible. He is a ball of adrenaline, tapping his pencil manically against his paper while I'm speaking, legs fidgeting all over the place. After the third night of him standing up mid-discussion to stretch and dance across the room I called it quits, resigning instead to try and teach him whenever he had a free moment. Usually on long bus rides or after sound checks.

  Two weeks had passed and we were behind already but Harry was a quick learner and he never again came to me unprepared. After that first lesson he was eager to please, almost polite in a petulant kind of way. He would whine occasionally but all it took was a weary glance from me and he straightened up, the memory of my outburst enough to keep his bitching in check. In fact, he was usually over prepared for our sessions, having a lot of the things from his handouts memorized. He was very smart and often had eloquent things to say on the subject, his smile beaming bright whenever I praised him.

  The passing of those two weeks also showed me a lot more of Khefren, his charming smile and "Well, well, if it isn't Scarlett the Scholar" being one of the high points of my day. Morning coffee became our ritual, me retrieving the cups from the catering room before making my way to the front of the house booth. He would greet me warmly and take the cup from me, his fingers brushing mine, whether accidentally or deliberately I couldn't quite tell, but regardless, the shiver up my spine was the same. We would, of course, flirt shamelessly and we had even had lunch a few times. I'd spend most of my mornings learning about the sound equipment and swapping stories with him, and while it was no dig for Mycenaean ruins, it was still not as bad as I had anticipated.

  Today was no exception, joking and laughing with Khefren and Dale, waiting for Harry to get off the stage so we could go over the next section on near eastern art. I can't even explain the feelings that I have for Khefren, watching him give Dale a soft punch on the shoulder, tugging his plush bottom lip between his teeth. His eyes catch mine, softening a little and ugh, my insides turn to mush. I really like him. Like, I really like him.

  "Scarlett, tell him I'm a prince!" Khefren says, standing next to me and crossing his arms over his chest, glaring at Dale who is laughing.

  "Well..." I trail, biting my lip and he looks over at me, raising an eyebrow. "He was named after one."

  "See, I told you," he says, clapping his hands and pointing at Dale but throwing an arm around my shoulder.

  I giggle a little as heat floods through me, the dry, spicy scent of him making me a little dizzy. I bring my hand up to lace through his fingers and I look up at him with a smile, his lips so close to mine. He looks at me, his eyes—green with small flecks of gold—glittering in the dimly lit arena.

  "Hey Scarlett!" Harry suddenly greets, bounding up to me and the spell is broken. He's smiling and a little out of breath and when I turn my head to him I notice his grin immediately fade as he eyes Khefren, his brow furrowing in suspicion.

  "Hey Little Man," Khefren says, slipping his arm from around my shoulder and I have to fight my frown.

  Harry scowls at him before turning back to me. "Did you see the sound check?" he asks me a little eagerly and I nod, smiling at him.

  "Yeah, it was nice," I respond even though I hadn't even been paying attention.

  He beams back at me. "You ready to study?" he asks, eyes cutting to Khefren before settling back on me.

  "Yeah, you go ahead and get set up and I'll be back in a sec," I tell him and he waits a beat before nodding and walking back toward the dressing rooms.

  "Someone has a crush," Khefren says, laughing a little as he watches Harry's retreating form.

  "Oh, he does not," I respond, chuckling.

  "Did you see the daggers he was shooting at me?" Khefren asks and I roll my eyes. "He's smitten."

  "Oh shut up," I reply, pushing at his chest a little and he smiles warmly down at me. Our eyes lock and I bite my lip. God, I just want him to kiss me. We've been dancing around in this little flirtation for nearly two weeks now. It's about time one of us made a move.

  He leans in a little and I hold my breath but he must have lost his nerve because he backs away, smiling wryly at me. Or he could just be a tease. "Better not keep lover boy waiting," he grins, wiggling his eyebrows. I roll my eyes, turning away from him but I throw a smile over my shoulder as I leave.

  Harry is sitting at the table in the dressing room, his book open in front of him, reading along silently. He really is kind of adorable in a boyish way, and I'm not the only one that thinks so. I made the mistake of walking to the bus with him one morning and nearly lost my hearing. The girls love him. Absolutely fucking adore the kid. They scream and cry and claw at him and he just smiles and signs autographs, thanking them politely for their marriage proposals and offers of bearing his children.

  He glances up and sees me, his face breaking into a grin as he turns his body towards me, leg jiggling slightly. If he had been a puppy I'd expect his tail to be wagging or something. Jeez, maybe Khefren was right. He has a chair pulled up next to his and I grab it, dragging it a few feet over. He frowns a little and shit, maybe he really does have a crush on me.

  Great, just fucking great.

  "Okay Harry, first things first," I say and he holds up his finger, turning away from me to grab a cup on the other side of him.

  "Here, I got this for you," he offers, handing it to me. I look at it wearily. "It's hot chocolate."

  I can't help but laugh, shaking my head at him as I take it, feeling a little flustered. I jump a little when I grip the cup and his fingers move down and out of their way to brush mine intentionally. I ne
ver know how to act when guys have a crush on me. It just gets awkward and tense and I really don't need that with a student.

  I move to pull back, and he lets go of the cup, the backs of his fingers brushing mine, and I give him an astonished look because this time I have no doubt that it was intentional.

  Yeah, awkward and tense. Fucking perfect.

  He smiles widely at me, watching me until I take a sip and then looking down at his book. God, Khefren is never gonna let me live this down.

  "Okay," I start, setting the cup down and he looks at me attentively. "First, how's your paper coming?"

  His face falls a little and he looks away. Not a good sign.

  "Harry," I say slowly and he looks at me. "You have started your paper, haven't you?"

  "Um..." he trails, biting his bottom lip.

  I sigh.

  "I'm sorry!" he exclaims. "I'm just...we've just had so much stuff and...I'll start it tonight...um...wait... tomorrow." He flinches a little, looking at me, his green eyes large and apprehensive. He tugs his bottom lip between his teeth and I sigh again. He wants to please me, worried I'll be disappointed in him, and I am slightly, but I know the feeling. I've spent my entire life trying to please my instructors, striving to be the best, and it's practically torture when you fall short of their expectations.

  "Harry, it's due the day after tomorrow," I say gently but sternly, and he sighs, nodding. "I don't accept late work. You get it done by midnight the day of or it's a zero, okay?"

  "Okay, I definitely will," he assures me. "Do you like the hot chocolate?"

  "What?" I ask and then I realize. "Oh..." I reach over and pick up the cup again, bringing it to my lips. "Yes, thank you."

  "Sooo..." he says, and I quirk an eyebrow at him. "You and Khefren are friends?"

  Jesus Christ. "Yes."

  "You...like him?"

  I nearly spray hot chocolate all over him. I swallow before saying, "What's it to you?"

  "I dunno," he shrugs indifferently, eyes searching mine. "You just...you're always with him."

  "No, I'm always with you," I say flatly, rolling my eyes slightly but he doesn't seem to notice, and I watch him inflate a little, biting his bottom lip to keep from smiling. I smile a bit too because he really is cute sometimes.