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14
Baxter’s bland speech isn’t enough to distract from Arabella breathing down our necks. Danny and I keep our mouths shut after that, but I wonder how much of our conversation Arabella overheard. She certainly seemed smug about something — does she know now that we’re all seeing each other? Did she pick up on the fact that Danny likes boys? If she did, it doesn’t seem to have affected her as much as Danny going eighteen years believing a megalomaniac is a type of dinosaur.
“Can’t believe this,” Danny murmurs, quiet enough so that only I can hear him. “Can’t even speak now without being terrorized.”
“I think we should talk. As much and as loudly as possible.” It’s a change of tune, but then not wanting to cow to Arabella is an excellent example of reverse psychology.
We don’t have much chance to talk, anyway, because the games soon begin. The first event involves lifting a particularly large and heavy stone, the kind of which it’s easy to imagine King Arthur’s sword being stuck deep inside. This stone is apparently hewn from the same ancient rock used to build Lochkelvin, and its massive bulk has already been positioned in the center of the green, where it glitters lightly in the sun.
It’s Rory who first strides across to it. There’s something about Rory Munro in a kilt instead of his tailored uniform that makes him look unexpectedly dangerous, somehow warrior-like. His white shirt hangs loose at the neck, exposing the top of his lean chest, his fair hair catching the rays.
“I mean,” Danny begins, and then stops. “I don’t know how—” He pauses, licks his lips and tries again: “Wow.”
Wowis the correct word. Especially when Rory steps forward, his expression as hard as the stone in front of him, and silently psyches himself to raise the boulder with his bare hands. He squats, his leg muscles bunching beneath the purple plaid of his kilt, and then grabs the stone by its sides. The stone is twice the width of Rory and yet, as he grapples with the impossible, Rory makes it look soeasy. The enormous gray rock is off the ground in seconds, and as Rory wrestles with it, raising it to his chest, there isn’t even the slightest trace of strain on his face. It’s like heavy lifting comes naturally to him.
“How strongishe?” I ask dumbly as the whole school bursts into applause. “That’s proper weight-lifting.”
“Lochkelvin stone, though,” Danny states in an offhand tone that confuses me, his gaze still focused on Rory. “He could have had his pick of any of the events today. Of course he chose the one that looks the most impressive.”
I turn to face Danny, which is difficult when Rory in a kilt is flexing his muscles right in front of me. “What do you mean, Lochkelvin stone?”
“Home advantage.” And, despite the confusion that must be all across my face, Danny leaves it at that.
Rory easily wins his category, as the gremlin participants following him struggle to even raise the stone an inch off the ground. One succeeds more than the other, and eventually he hauls the stone level with his knees. Rory shoots him an approving smile and leads the loud applause for the gremlin. I watch with interest as he wraps his arm around the stronger gremlin’s shoulder and talks in low, serious tones to him before patting him on the back. The gremlin beams brightly, like he’s been acknowledged by his idol.
Rory does the same with the other, younger gremlin, who looks genuinely upset by his performance. His face is tomato-red and he looks like he wants to cry. Rory steers him away to the very side of the stands, where the audience can’t as easily see him. It seems to me like he’s shielding the gremlin from the crowd — and the boy’s little face is so distraught that I reconsider my stance on calling him a gremlin, if only for a moment. Rory crouches down to him and again speaks at a low volume. Whatever he says must be encouraging, because the redness of the gremlin’s face gradually clears and he shoots Rory a bashful, toothy grin.
He’s motivating them, I realize in surprise. He actually cares about them.
Perhaps it shouldn’t come as a shock, given the amount of time Rory’s spent this year planning how to woo the gremlins to his side once and for all. The amount of time devoted to making fancy pastries for these — well, brats, I’d believed. But it’s clear from the quiet, fond way Rory talks to them that there’s genuine affection there — like an officer picking up his beleaguered troops. It strikes me that I’ve never noticed much of this side of Rory, that maybe it’s a part of him he tries to keep to a minimum in front of me, and yet what a natural he is as he looks after the younger students.
Peter Pan, I’d been reminded of once last year, as the gremlins in his circle had fawned over him. The only thing I hadn’t counted on was Rory encouraging them back. I’d considered his followers status symbols, a vanity project, not young boys with emotions who might cry in public after failing. Not something that Rory would care enough about to take the time to piece back together.
I’m dwelling on these epiphanies so deeply that I miss the next two events. Only when I spot Finlay taking his place in the middle of the green do I finally wake myself up. A giant log lies before him. Finlay rubs his hands together and blows out an extended breath, staring down at the base of the log with a determined expression. Two gremlins ease the pole at an angle, so that Finlay can crouch down and grip the thick pole at the base.
Everything about this event seems incredibly pervy, and it’s really not helping matters that Finlay’s kilt is splayed across his thighs, a huge wooden rod jutting out between his parted legs. Once he has a secure grip on the pole, Finlay briefly scans the faces in the crowd until he notices me and Danny. Finlay’s broad grin is infectious, and I find myself whooping as our eyes lock. He shoots me a wink before returning his attention to the pole.
“And here is our next contender,” Headmistress Baxter announces in her same bland tone to the crowd, “Finlay Fraser, looking to break his record from last year in the caber toss.”
I watch in awe as Finlay seemingly defies physics. He carries the giant log between his palms, his face frowning with sheer concentration as he wrestles with the heavy weight of the pole. He hoists the pole up into his grip until he’s holding it completely and the entire structure towers over him. Finlay takes a series of small staggered steps forward — and then launches it from his arms and into the green beyond.
Time freezes for a moment. All eyes are on the very tip of the wooden pole, the angle of which narrows the faster the pole crests toward the zenith. Finlay stands with his hands behind his head, the sunlight casting off his back and turning him into shadow. He gazes ahead with cool anticipation, a gentle breeze playing at the hem of his kilt. Finlay’s focus is so intense, his face deadly serious. Only in the brief instance when the pole is vertical, before it proceeds to plummet on the other side of him, does a wide, winning smile break across Finlay’s face.
The pole crashes to the ground like timber, and the vibration runs up my body. Cheers erupt around the bleachers. Finlay punches the air, victorious.
“And that show of strength safely sees Mr. Fraser’s record broken and him today’s winner of the caber toss.”
Finlay’s never looked more delighted. He meets my gaze again, his smile a broad, beautiful thing, as he soaks up the whoops from the crowd. Dancing into the sidelines, he takes his place beside Rory, who gives him a look of approval that Finlay doesn’t fail to notice. If anything, his grin grows impossibly wider.
The final event of the day is the hammer throw, and I sense agitated movement from Arabella behind me before I see the participants take to the green. Luke, it turns out, is one of them, and this doesn’t amuse Arabella atall.
“What’s he going to do to win, d’you reckon? Make up the result? Enter as a girl?”
Luke, in comparison to the others, actually seems nervous. He avoids looking at the crowd entirely, ignoring the scattered applause. One section seems like a gremlin stronghold, and they’re particularly enthusiastic about letting Luke know just how much they support him. But it’s one section of a whole school, and the rest of the audience is significantly more subdued than in any other event. Luke’s presence, it seems, is not wholly approved of.
No wonder he doesn’t look at the crowd, I reason. To have so many pairs of eyes staring at you, thinking you don’t belong here and willing you to fail… The level of scrutiny he’s under would drive anyone mad, even a chill guy like Luke.
“Next up, it’s Callum Wells with the hammer throw. Take it away, Callum.”
A gremlin steps forward — at least, I think he’s a gremlin as they’re all highly interchangeable. He walks into a fenced-off area, where a gunmetal-gray ball attached to a long stick awaits. Without being prompted, he lifts the heavy ensemble, still facing the wire cage, his back to the crowd. He’s hunched over at first, like he’s steeling himself, before he draws himself up to full height.
The instant I know something weird is happening is when the gremlin beside Luke takes a large, deliberate step backward, leaving Luke alone on the green. Everyone else seems to be concentrating on the gremlin with the hammer, who projects it above his head like a metallic lasso, his hips shifting from side to side as the spinning object gathers momentum.
And then, the instant the hammer is unleashed from his hands, the object turns into a weapon. Despite facing away from him when it launched, Callum’s hammer appears to have the sole aim of seeking Luke. It all happens too quickly — by the time Luke realizes it’s soaring straight toward him, he only has time to take a few steps backward. The hammer collides with a sickening clunk to Luke’s side before landing squarely on his foot, and Luke crumples to the ground at once.
“What the fuck?” I’m standing as the crowd erupts with the noise it had suppressed when Luke had initially appeared — cheering, laughter, gasps and booing. I feel like I’m too far away. I want to leap through the crowd and go over to Luke right away. Thankfully, Rory and Finlay are already dashing over to Luke; meanwhile, Callum stands frozen still in the caged area, his face perfectly composed and blank.
