Wrong Connections
1088 Words
His father is in school. Exactly a day after the White House memo was released, Jacob Kang decides to pay a ‘surprise visit’ to Wintercrest. Nothing has ever screamed suspicion louder than it.
“Why are you here?” Bren says, falling into step beside his father.
“Good morning to you too, son.”
“Answer me,” Bren presses, obviously not in the mood for his father’s tricks.
Jacob flattens the edges of his sleek, gelled hair. He’s like some movie star, a model out of a magazine. A ‘cool dad’ model, of course. “I’m on the parents board, Principal Jan is my friend, my money goes into this school. Do I have to list a thousand reasons?”
“That’s not why you’re here. What are you planning?”
Jacob halts abruptly and then taking off his shades, he turns towards his son. “So, what is it then? What’s the reason I’m here today? Brennon, you’re the son. I’m the father. These useless questioning should be done the other way round. Go to class.” He pats the boy’s shoulder and moves on ahead.
A deep frown line rests on Bren’s forehead. His father is messing with him. There’s a motive behind his presence at Wintercrest and Bren is itching to know what it is.
“Oh,” Jacob Kang calls from far ahead. “Say hi to Miss Mahoe for me when you run into her.” He winks and ambles on towards Principal Jan’s office. Bren hisses and some cuss words dance out of his mouth. His father is so annoying. And so proud of it too. He stares a bit at the empty hallway before going back to Physics lab. There he sees Kaia, working on fixing some batteries to power a car model they’d made in the previous class. Her brows are drawn together in focus, and she’s biting her upper lips lightly as she thinks of what to do. The sight warms Bren instantly.
“Mr Kang. That bathroom break was too long.” The teacher says and Kaia’s head flicks towards his direction. Bren bites back the smile he’s itching to give her.
“Sorry. Serious number 2,” Bren bows in a rather dramatic posture and saunters to his seat. He puts on his lab coat and instead of staying at his desk, he picks his box of tools and heads to Kaia’s desk. The pure shock on her face almost makes him double over in laughter. He just took a huge move by working with her in class and even though he notices the equally shocked eyes of his classmates, he doesn’t care.
“Fill me in. What did I miss while I was you know, taking a dump?”
Kaia scoffs. “Why didn’t you ask someone else? Laura, Matt, any of them would gladly fill you in.”
He wiggles his forefinger left and right. “No. I want you to fill me in.” Only when he says it does he realize the hint of perversion in the statement. He silently hopes Kaia doesn’t notice it.
She slides her book to him. “It’s very self-explanatory. Skim through.” And Bren does. In a quick glance, he reads through what he’s missed and he figures it out.
“Where’s the—” he starts asking but stops. Kaia’s struggling. “What’s the matter/”
She fiddles with her earring and remains silent, obviously not wanting to tell him anything. “It’s okay. I’d ask Mr Jax for help.”
“No.” he grabs her wrist firmly. She’s already started to leave. “Ask me. I’d show you.”
They lock intense gazes for a brief second but she breaks it first, clearing her throat once. “Okay. Yeah. Sure.” She explains that she’s fixed up the battery but the car isn’t starting. Bren dismantles the battery and figures out that she’d connected two wires incorrectly.
“If you connect this to this,” he practicalizes as he speaks, “you’d never be able to generate current. But when this goes here”— he connects the wires the right way and then inserts it into the car. It revs immediately— “there you go. All done.”
Kaia stares at the car in awe, a huge smile lighting up her face. If Bren had a camera close by, he’d take a picture of this. Wait, no. No. That is stalker vibe. It’s what Mr Ariel would do and speaking of, he hasn’t figured out why Lindsay was asking of his camera and what she meant when she asked ‘is that habit happening again?’
“I just may have passed out from frustration. Thank you so much. I’m . . .i’m truly glad.” Her gaze flickers to the car again and she looks truly glad. It warms Bren on the inside.
“No big deal,” he shrugs. Not wanting to be done hanging out with her, he says, “since I helped you, repay the favour by building mine with me.”
She tsks. “You sly fox. I didn’t ask you for any favours, did I?” she clucks her tongues and circles round him to get access to his box. She starts offloading it, picking out the items for making his battery.
He grins, realizing yet again how precious Kaia is. How precious she just may be to him. Mr Ariel walks into the classroom to talk with Mr Jax. They shake hands and start discussing, but Mr Ariel watches Kaia like a hawk. What the heck? Can he not see me beside her? Bren snorts because that man is just ridiculous. He’s not even hiding the fact that he has a thing for Kaia. His underaged student! Two wrongs all at once.
When he finally takes cognisance of Bren’s presence, he gives Bren a smile and Bren replies with a fake one and a curt nod. Mr Jax then looks over at Bren and Kaia and whispers something to Mr Ariel who nods in response. Huh, weird. What could they be talking about?
“I’m not your apprentice. Get busy!” Kaia pinches Bren’s forearms and he sucks a breath at the sharpness of the pain. He does take his eyes off the teachers though, and the teachers keep their gaze fixated on Bren and Kaia. Something is definitely up. He’s sure of it. But . . .what could it possibly be?
- Writer
