“The flight attendant said if we recline both our chairs and bring down the armrests, we can lower a small pod over ourselves and sleep in our small pod bed,” Nicholas told Seiji. “Want to be in a small pod?”
Seiji turned a page of his fencing book without even glancing up. “I don’t.”
Nicholas felt a lurch of unease, though that might have been the plane swooping some more. This was all so strange to him, and so obviously nothing new to Seiji.
“Are you still startled by the plane?” Seiji asked.
Nicholas shrugged.
“You can read the book with me,” offered Seiji. “But don’t ask me to turn a page before I’m ready. You know I like to take my time and make mental notes.”
“Totally.” Nicholas leaned in against Seiji’s shoulder. After a few minutes of interesting reading, he asked, “When do you think you might be done with this page?”
Seiji rolled his eyes, then said, “I’m not eating all my sandwiches.”
Nicholas cheered up. He could get used to new situations, like he’d grown to love his school. He was starting to like the plane already. The Kings Row team was going on an amazing adventure. France would be great.
10 HARVARD
Harvard was frustrated. Just days ago, he would’ve been thrilled to have been seated next to his best friend for the whole trip from New York, to Paris, then to Nice. Before everything happened between them, they had shared seats on other flights, bus rides, and various trips. It was always comfortable, and it was always fun, but now everything was different.
Now Harvard could only think of one of the last times he’d sat this closely with Aiden, when they’d shared a seat on a Ferris wheel on a date. Harvard tried not to reminisce about that day and what came after, but it was hard when Aiden was this close to him for the first time in days.
They were stuck together on this flight to Paris. For seven hours.
The seats in first class were huge, but the flight attendant had lowered the barrier between them so that they could sleep together in a pod. Which, obviously, they weren’t going to do.
Who had invented the double meaning of sleeping together? It was a confusing and distressing phrase. Harvard had slept in the same bed as Aiden on countless sleepovers, had slept with their beds pushed together since they came to Kings Row. In the olden days, when people had to sleep in the same bed and nothing could happen, a sword might be laid down between them.
Harvard’s obliviousness to his own feelings had been the sword laid between them, and now it was gone. Every molecule of Harvard’s body was terribly aware of the warmth of Aiden beside him, a fraction of an inch away and impossibly distant.
Be a good team captain, be sensible, don’t let anybody down, Harvard told himself, and redirected his attention firmly toward the others. Bobby was singing a song. “I love fencing in the springtime, I love fencing in the fall—”
Dante was sitting beside Bobby, a faint smile discernible on his face as Bobby sang.
Seiji cleared his throat. “The high school fencing season typically lasts from early September until late January. Of course, for any serious fencer, it’s a year-round commitment. If preparing for the summer Olympics, I agree the springtime would be crucial.”
“Um,” Bobby said in crushed, flat tones. “That’s a great point. Thanks, Seiji.”
“It’s fine. Did you make up that song yourself?” Seiji asked, relenting and speaking in his I am taking an interest in Nicholas’s friends voice.
The voice alarmed the other students even more than Seiji’s regular voice. Harvard sympathized. Seiji was a great kid, and an even better fencer, but seeing Seiji try to have normal social interactions was like watching the Terminator at a children’s tea party.
“Ah… yes,” said Bobby.
“Very droll,” said Seiji.
“Sorry for bothering you,” whispered Bobby, staring at the back of Seiji’s head with love that—naturally—flew right over Seiji’s head.
Dante’s smile had snapped off. Neither Bobby nor Seiji noticed.
“You’re not bothering me,” Seiji told Bobby. “Nicholas is bothering me.”
Nicholas, who was taking up half of Seiji’s seat because his arms and legs went everywhere, and was eating Seiji’s sandwiches, gave Seiji a thumbs-up. “You know it.”
Harvard started when a weight hit him unexpectedly, then glanced to the side and realized Aiden had fallen asleep on Harvard’s shoulder.
When Harvard moved, Aiden made a low complaining sound that, because something fundamental had gone wrong in Harvard’s brain, Harvard found sweet. Harvard shifted so that Aiden would be more comfortable, and sighed inwardly. Aiden really should take better care of himself. It couldn’t be all running around having good times with hot boys, Harvard thought, his chest twisting with misery, which he quelled immediately. This wasn’t about Harvard. This was about his best friend, and how Aiden should sleep occasionally.
A lock of Aiden’s hair, silk soft as a whisper, brushed against Harvard’s ear. Harvard endured the torture and turned his attention desperately back on the rest of the team.
Bobby appeared to have cheered up. He and Eugene were telling each other facts about France that they seemed to both know but seemed equally happy to hear. Bobby caught Harvard looking their way as they chattered.
“You know everything, Harvard!” he said enthusiastically.
“Not really,” said Harvard.
Bobby sighed admiringly. “And you’re so modest. Will you tell us all about Camp Menton?”
Harvard gave Bobby a kind smile, to make up for Seiji accidentally crushing Bobby’s tender heart on the reg.
“Sure, I can tell you everything I know about Camp Menton. One thing to remember is that we’ll all have to be on our best behavior and train our hardest. They are famous for their discipline and how rigorous their training program is. Some teams have even failed out of training because they weren’t able to hack it. Can you imagine the shame?”
Everyone looked alarmed, even sweet Bobby, who wasn’t on the team and wouldn’t be training at all.
Harvard was sorry to frighten them, but trouble did seem to follow the Kings Row team around. This might be a good opportunity to scare the team into watching their behavior. “Maybe it’s an urban legend, but I heard one fencer was permanently banned from the camp. Of course,” Harvard added, to be fair, “maybe he deserved it. The guy was infamous for his bad temper.”
He raised an eyebrow at Nicholas and Seiji, who’d been caught fistfighting in an equipment closet a few weeks ago. Seiji looked icily unimpressed. Nicholas gave Harvard a mischievous grin.
“Sounds like a cool guy.”
“Another time, a whole team was thrown out of camp, and then suspended from their school,” Harvard went on. “They say it was because they were having parties in their rooms at night, but who knows?”
Bobby’s eyes went wide as saucers. “Do you think they were engaging in… debaucheries?”
Dante’s faint smile was back, except now it was a faint smirk. “What kind of debaucheries?”
Bobby hit Dante in the arm with a small fist. “Wild debaucheries! Don’t interrupt me. You talk too much!”