CHAPTER TWO- Facing the Facts
It was disconcerting.
He'd not noticed at first, making his way up and down the field, sometimes stopping in the middle of the exercises to shout a suggestion here or there or to powwow with the coach. Rob didn't consider himself a particularly thick-brained fellow, but he'd certainly not seen her sitting there on the top tier of seats until one of his teammates nudged him with a sharp elbow during a break, a leer plastered across his muddy face.
"Hey, Wesley, looks like you've got yourself an admirer up there. She's got a notebook and everything."
Rob looked up at the bleachers in mid-swig, his eyes closing in a pained wince. She'd been over to the house, of course, with Genevieve; it had only taken him a few awkward encounters, however, to know Lucia Lovejoy wasn't the sanest of chits, and he'd studiously steered clear ever since.
She sat at the top tier, her skirt pulled demurely over her knees, her long, fine hair tossed into disarray by a breeze she didn't seem to notice
And oddest of all, when Rob met eyes with her, she didn't look away, wasn't a bit ashamed.
Rob jerked when he felt cold water trickle down his chest, and he jerked his water bottle away from his mouth and his sharp blue eyes away from the blonde in the stands. "She's a bloody loon, that one," he noted, feeling an uncomfortable itch between his shoulderblades when he turned his back to her. "All right!" he shouted, wanting desperately to be doing anything to occupy his mind. "Lap around the field, then back to the match where we left off!"
From her spot in the stands, Lucia sketched a lean figure in mid-stride and below it wrote "single-minded."
She'd recorded her first observation about Rob Wesley's personality.
She just had to get up the nerve to ask for an interview.
~~~
"You need to keep your friends under control." It had been nagging him for hours-which was how long the practice had lasted, from the afternoon until sunset, and Lovejoy had been there the entire time, sitting in the same position, scratching on her notepad. It was just… plain… dotty. He addressed Gen that evening around a mouthful of food, gesturing at her with a fork, flinging crumbs as he did so.
She didn't rise to the bait as he'd expected her to, though; she didn't even yell at him for tossing crumbs in her plate. No, Gen looked a bit perturbed.
"'Oi," he said, tapping his fingers on the table in front of her and earning a scowl from his mother. "Did you hear me? Lovejoy staked out football practice this evening. She was there the whole time. Go shopping or something."
"I have other things to do than fend off your female admirers," Gen said, balling up her napkin and tossing it at his head, laughing as he missed catching it by a good half meter. "Such the athlete you are, love." Her mind had been a million miles away, ruminating on things best left alone. Tutoring Drake Mallory shouldn't infiltrate into her family time, she judged, looking fondly at her brother as he nearly tipped his chair over trying to pick up the napkin.
It'd be a shame to miss these times together, and Gen honestly doubted she'd find as good a jester anywhere else.
~~~
"I've a question." Lucia looked at her father intently, watching as he shuffled through the incomprehensibly large pile of papers on his desk. She knew he wouldn't hear her the first time; he never did. She was just trying to figure out exactly how many times she'd have to repeat herself before he came back down to earth and acknowledged her.
"Whenever you have a moment, Father, I have a question," she repeated patiently, resisting the urge to step forward and brush his hair off his forehead, take the ever-present smoldering cigar from between his fingers, and push his glasses up just a little on his nose. It seemed as though he'd been harder and harder to reach ever since her mother died, but he'd been a perfect father, in Lucia's opinion. He just needed someone to take care of him.
Because she knew it would be another two minutes, at the very least, she sat down on the corner of his desk and read the papers he held, her eyes easily adjusting to the upside-down type. It seemed she'd read more often than not that way, a curious little girl always wanting to know what her father was so interested in now.
Luckily for her-and him, as well-she had also found the world of journalism and reporting interesting, and so the widower and the motherless girl had made quite a bond over words.
Exactly three minutes and fourteen seconds had gone by when Alfred Lovejoy looked up, cleared his throat, and jabbed a finger at the nosepiece of his glasses, missing altogether and making the gesture ineffectual. "Hello, love," he said, his brow furrowing a bit. Had she asked him a question already, or was she about to?
"I've an assignment for a personality profile," Lucia said, suddenly feeling foolish about even asking her father this. It seemed ridiculous, really, to ask your father how to speak with men. She should have learned it years ago, really.
But of course she hadn't.
"Good for you!" he said, patting her hand absently. She could see he was preparing to plow ahead in the article he was editing, his red pen poised, so she jumped back in immediately before he could forget she was there entirely.
"I have to interview a boy," she said, and at the raise of his bushy eyebrow, she corrected herself immediately. "A young man. A football player. Do you have any advice for me?"
There, that sounded normal… or as normal as any of their father-daughter conversations were.
He pulled himself to his full sitting height-still short-and pointed his red pen at her. "Don't… fall in love with the boy," he said with finality. "Reporters don't fall in love with sources."
Lucia jerked, toppled off the edge of his desk, then made a big show of straightening his paperweight. "Beg pardon, Da?"
He brows drew together and he sat back, slightly deflated. "Or perhaps it was that a doctor should never fall in love with a patient. Or a barrister with a client." He shook his head as though clearing it and smiled at her, a beautiful, loving, and completely present smile. "It's no matter. Was I any help at all?"
Too much help, she thought, but she stood and kissed him in the middle of his forehead. "Of course you were. Supper's at six."
~~~
It just took a little courage, she judged, and though she didn't really even have a little, she could certainly feign it. She'd been waiting all morning for him to call a halt to his solo conditioning, and now that he was done, there were only a few minutes left before morning bell.
Lucia knew she had to make the most of her time; she was a real reporter, blast it all.
Real reporters, she was sure, didn't pay so much attention to the way a football jersey clung to a player's chest.
Blast it all.
"Robert!" she called, jogging to fall into step beside him. "Do you have a moment?"
"Clearly you do," Rob said, resisting the urge to openly roll his eyes. She'd watched his entire morning of laps and exercises. He'd fallen twice, and he didn't really see anyone to blame but her. After all, he never fell when running laps any other morning. She'd just gotten his ire up, that was all. It was just irksome. It wasn't as though it was any big deal.
But now she was looking up at him with those wide, pale blue eyes, making him feel as though he'd already done something wrong, and it bloody well irritated him.
"What is it, Lovejoy?" he finally asked. "Have out with it, I'd like a quick shower before classes."
It was her reporter's mind, her visual, detailed mind that quite cheerily volunteered a mental picture of him slicked with water and soap, his red hair made auburn by the water, the freckles on his shoulders-
"Oh!" she exclaimed, jumping a little and garnering a suspicious look from the older boy. Oh, God, she moaned internally. He thinks I'm completely mad. "Well, it's just… it's that the headmaster, Dumbledore-I mean… Dunmore!" She was going to absolutely bite her own tongue out once this encounter was over. "He wanted me to do something with you. For you! About you."
Rob goggled at her, his own expression comical as she quickly shifted prepositions. What on earth was wrong with her? "Have you taken something, Lovejoy? Perhaps something illegal? Do you do marijuana?"
"I'm just writing an article," she said crossly, suddenly and uncharacteristically embarrassed. "There's no need to be a prat."
Rob felt his own face turning red under the freckles. "Why don't you write that down on your little notepad, then. 'Rob Wesley is a big prat.'" When she didn't say anything, he heaved a sigh. His mother would absolutely blister his arse if she knew he'd been so rude. "Look, it's flattering or whatever that you want to do an article on me for the newspaper, but… I need to take a shower."
Somehow, that sounded extremely lame coming out of his mouth.
But she seemed to take it for an excuse, her lips pressed together into a thin line, and she nodded once and turned on her heel to walk away, her hair bannering behind her.
Of course she was angry.
He'd gotten her thinking about that buggering shower again.
~~~
She managed just fine for the first half of her day, letting herself daydream her way through her classes, taking notes
on what she already knew about Rob Wesley. If he didn't want to cooperate, she'd write an article around him.
It was what a good reporter did.
But then there was the whole matter of what Lucia had mentally termed "the problem."
No one else knew about the problem, no matter how many times Lucia had been tempted to confide in someone. Her only choice for confidant was Genevieve, and she was hardly an intelligent choice. After all, what was Lucia supposed to say? That she was infatuated with Genevieve's brother? Gawky, wide-eyed, Lunatic Lovey had a bit of a fascination?
It even seemed ludicrous to her own ears, to her own mind.
But she was thinking of him as she walked into the commissary with the pineapple she'd snagged from the fruit bowl at home, wondering if he'd be in there, eating with just a few mates, never with scads of people around him as the other athletes did. She saw a flash of red hair and for a moment, she started to smile…
And saw it was Genevieve, sitting with Connor and arguing none-too-quietly over Drake Mallory.
It was an easy enough topic, a good topic, really, to set her mind apart from Robert. If anyone in the school were his complete opposite, it was Drake.
"You know," she said of Drake, speaking quietly so as not to jar either of them, nor to give away any of the jitters she'd felt at the possibility of encountering Robert. "He'd be quite handsome if it weren't for that scowl and those clothes and the attitude…" she thought about what she was saying, realizing she knew more about the infamous Drake Mallory than she did Rob. It irritated her, and for a moment she forgot what she'd been saying. At Gen's look, she shrugged a bit. "Hm. I suppose I've nearly named everything, haven't I?"
"Lovey!" Connor elbowed her, and she looked at him assessingly. He wasn't difficult to talk to at all, so what gave with the football star? After a moment's observation, she turned back to Gen.
"Hello, Genevieve," she said. Now girls were another story-a bit dotty from time to time, but on the whole much easier to approach than boys.
"Lovey, don't tell me you're here to get a scoop for the school rag, too?"
Lucia nearly jumped at the question, intuited she'd read far too much into it, and smiled casually. "Of course not. I'm reporting on Robert." There. It sounded natural, as though she hadn't a giant, idiotic yen for the boy.
"My brother?" Gen asked, raising an eyebrow at Lucia. "You'll never get anything useful from him. An interview with him would make nearly as much sense as two rocks banging together."
"Less, I warrant," Connor laughed.
She shouldn't have been irked; after all, she barely knew Rob, and what she did know had given her no reason to think favorably of him.
But she really didn't think she could listen to them insult him anymore.
"My father says Drake Mallory's father is a thief," Lucia stated matter-of-factly. "I wonder if that car is stolen." She wanted to slap her hands over her mouth for the perversely purposeful non sequitur, but she didn't move. If she said it, she'd stick behind it.
Gen rolled her eyes and tossed the remainder of her sandwich on Connor's plate, effectively signaling the conversation was at an end, much to Lucia's relief. "I've things to do before class."
"Hm," Lucia said, both worried and guilty about her friend's sudden departure and feeling even guiltier because she'd been too self-absorbed to notice what was really going on. "I believe Genevieve seems a bit stressed," she said lamely, and hoped Connor could tell her why.
But even as he made some little remark in response, her mind had wandered, and when Rob walked in a few moments later, she knew stress never lay its burden entirely on one person.