Will would have skipped this meeting if he could. He’d been spiralling all week and didn’t feel he was stable enough to deal with the antagonist Kyle, never-mind being stable enough to mentor him. They met at the cafe again, and Kyle was waiting for Will once more. Will ordered a triple-shot Americano from the waitress, a different girl from last week, before going to the table. He pretended the caffeine would help him.

“Hi,” Will greeted as he sat down. “How was your week?”

Kyle pulled out an ear-bud and closed the journal he’d been scribbling in. He didn’t answer, but glowered at Will instead.

Will had asked Laragh for advice on how to approach Kyle. Laragh told him if he went into the meeting with a ‘technique’ in mind it would be artificial, and Kyle wouldn’t respond. But Will didn’t think he would be responding anytime soon. “You’re in secondary school, right? What year?”

“What does that matter?” Kyle snipped.

“I want to know.” Will said. He sipped his coffee. “That’s all. What subjects did you do? I had Biology, DCG and Business.”

“How many points did you get?” Kyle asked.

Will tapped his fingers against his leg. He got shit-all points. Even passing most of his ordinary-level subjects barely gave enough for any course. “Enough for jam-making.”

Kyle’s lips twitched. There was the suggestion of a smile that was quickly straightened out. “How’d you get into college then?”

“Sports recommendation.” Will told him. “I play Volleyball for the Irish National team, so I got in through them. Do you do art?”

“So you’re a dumb jock.” Kyle said levelly.

Will didn’t flinch, but the statement felt like a slap. It wasn’t often he was called dumb straight to his face, no matter how often his despairing teachers may have wanted to utter the word. Will wanted to get up and leave, but he remained. He looked once more at Kyle’s scrawny form that boarded on skeletal, he reminded himself that Kyle was in this program the same reason Will was—a gap where family support should be.

“I’m pretty bad at academics,” Will shrugged the comment off. Kyle’s eyes narrowed.

“Why go to college at all then?”

Will sipped his coffee again. He figured out an answer that wouldn’t be made fun of. “To get a job, I guess.”

Kyle was looking around the cafe now, eyeing up the exit.

“So,” Will tried again. “You do art?”

“Do you know much about Laragh?” Kyle ignored the question and changed the subject.

Will relaxed back the book and took a long draw of the coffee. It was empty, and he nodded to the waitress for another when she met his eyes. “She’s a nice lady.”

Kyle snorted.

“She’s helped me out a lot. And is trying to do the same for you, I gather.” Will said.

“She’s sleeping with one of her patients.” Kyle revealed.

Will raised an eyebrow at him. “No.”

“She is. They were together before I had a session with her. Jamie Noble. She also slept with his dad. They used to date, even though he was like, sixty years old. Disgusting, right?”

Will’s stomach did curl, but not at the supposed things Laragh had done. Laragh had helped him out for a while now. She’d helped him come up with calorie plans and techniques to let loose about the strictness of dieting and exercise. She even tried to work through his personal issues around his family, working with as much as Will found himself able to share.

“She works as a therapist at a non-profit organisation.” Will said. “She volunteers her time to help people like you and me. She isn’t disgusting.”

“She—”

“Stop.” Will interrupted him. “We’re not here to bad-mouth Laragh.”

Kyle was caught with his mouth open. It snapped shut and his pale complexion reddened. He jumped to his feet and stormed out of the cafe. Will didn’t have the energy to be quite as annoyed about what happened as last time. He’d just tell Laragh that it didn’t go well, and this programme wasn’t right for him. The waitress came down with his coffee and took Kyle’s empty cup away. Will blinked, his gaze settling on the journal that had been left behind. He drew it across the table to himself, and glanced at the exit to see if Kyle was on the way back, ready to yell at him for touching it. There was no sign of him.

Will put it into his bag, downed the coffee and stood. The meeting had finished earlier than expected, and he made his way onto the next one of the day.

*

Will joined the project group in the cafeteria and put his research onto the table. He text Laragh about the journal Kyle left behind and told her that the meeting hadn’t gone well. Dune had left him a message about watching Netflix with Cassie and him later. Gabriel had also left a message about what he wanted for dinner—stir fry or ravioli? Will rubbed his mouth. Was it possible to do both?

“Will?” Veronica called.

He put his phone away. “Sorry, I’m listening.”

Veronica nodded to a new sheet that was in front of him. It was a ten-slide outline. Will scanned its contents. “Cool. Are we breaking up who’s talking into four? We each take two slides, then one person does the introduction and conclusion.”

Veronica bit her bottom lip hard and squirmed. Will saw the way her gaze darted to Stephen, who was obliviously reading the outline.

“If you don't want to speak, I can do your part?” Will offered.

Veronica beamed at him. “Really? That would be fantastic. I have no problem doing the work for the project, but as soon as I have to get up in front of an audience it’s like I forgot the entirety of the English language. Are you sure you don’t mind?”

“Yeah, public speaking doesn’t bother me.” Will shrugged. After playing matches for Ireland, it was tough to imagine a situation where there was more pressure on him than that. Speaking of, he also wanted to practice digs tonight. Vinny mentioned that he’d be around for that. Maybe—ah, no. Dinner and Netflix.

“Okay, so I can do the first half, Will can do the second?” Tara circled her plan and wrote it down in red-pen. She paused to look at Stephen. “Unless you want to speak for some of it?”

Stephen shook his head.

“Okay, so since we have it narrowed down and have each of our topics divided the only thing we need to do is…” Tara looked at Will, and held up his sheet of research.

“More?” Will guessed.

“No.” Tara inclined her head, her gaze dodging his. “I’d say… better? We can’t use sources from wikipidia. It needs to be academic sources. Check out the library for articles, or textbooks—anything you find there should be good to use.”

Tara handed the sheet back to him. Will looked at the page. Dinner, Netflix, Digs and Research? His phone buzzed. He hadn’t replied to anyone yet. He checked and found Laragh had messaged him back.

Will frowned as the message.

Laragh: I’m sorry to hear that. I’ve been trying to pair Kyle up with someone for so long, but he’s adamant to push everyone away. Thank you for trying. I’ll see you Thursday for the meeting.

Will squirmed. Had he really been trying all that hard to get along with Kyle? He didn’t like people even knowing about his eating disorder, maybe he should have tried being a bit more understanding about Kyle not wanting to talk about his… but he was being a brat. Will ruffled his hair.

Will: Maybe we could try meet up again? Maybe not at a cafe though. It’s hard to just sit down and talk with someone you don’t know.

Laragh: That would be great! Let me know what you want to do and I’ll set up the meeting!

“We’re going to the college bar for a few drinks,” Tara got Will’s attention. “You want to join us? Stephen and Luke are going to meet us there.”

Will’s two favourite people. Even if he didn’t have plans, he would have found some. “I’m meeting someone for dinner already, thanks for the offer though.”

Tara tapped the table. “You know Stephen did apologise, and I know that wasn’t cool, but he’s a bit…” she waved a hand, “he’s a bit high maintenance, to be totally honest with you. He’s got family stuff, and he’s kind of crazy, but he’s a nice guy once you get to the core of it all.”

“Have you known him long?” Will asked.

“Luke and I grew up with him.” Tara confirmed. “Him and Luke are especially close, their families are like, political allies.”

“Huh.” Will said. “Luke seems pretty sensible. Surprised he’d be close with someone so wild.”

“Stephen is wild to get his parents to take notice.” Tara sounded slightly exasperated. “But once you get to know him, he’s cool. So what do you say? Think you can give him another chance?”

Will acknowledged that he had overreacted the other day, so he put that dislike aside. “I can do that—but I’m serious about dinner plans. That wasn’t to avoid meeting him again.”

Tara nodded. “Okay,” She stood and got her things into her bags. “I was going to text Cassie to come out, do you know if she’s around?”

Will walked with her toward the college bar. “I know we were going to be meeting up for Netflix later.”

“Oh.” Tara sounded surprised.

Had Cassie already said that she’d go out with Tara?

“I thought you said you were gay?”

Will snorted. “I’m serious about meeting for Netflix. Dune will be there too.”

“Ah, Luke might cry about that.” Tara laughed to herself. “It’ll just be the childhood buddies so, I can work with that. I’ll see you tomorrow Will—if you need any help with the project, Luke tells me Dune’s a genius.”

“Your offering me Dune’s help?” Will grinned.

“I’m busy.” Tara called back. “See ya!”

Will got to the car and mulled over his options for the evening. Gabriel. Cassie and Dune. Volleyball. Schoolwork? He put the car into gear and found himself on the way to Gabriel’s house almost entirely out of habit. At a red light he told Cassie and Dune he’d join them after dinner.