THE private EDGE

“Now what you need to do is move the Denominator next to the Numerator and subtract six from both sides...”

I’m not listening, I can’t, I mean, how can you? This is ridiculous!

Force it out of your head, I told myself, just breathe. No, there is no breathing; I have to get out of here. My bladder will only hold so much and right now and it’s about on maximum. But
I have to stay, I have to know this, my mum will kill me if I fail one more test.

If I choose to leave I can’t exactly just get up and sprint out, not that I could handle moving so fast right now. I’d have to ask first, I risk a glance around the room, crap, if I ask I’ll probably end up making some involuntary sound that won’t go down so well with this class.

I drag my eyes back to the front of the room where I noticed that Mr. Mason was starting to head in my direction, he always does that; I suppressed a groan and gritted my teeth. His eyes briefly skimmed over the books as he continued to re-describe the formula on the board. I studied the lines of writing and the diagrams, none of it processes, I can feel that as soon as I leave this room it will be erased from my memory.

I clenched my fists in frustration; my body began to ache, firstly because I went for a run with my dad the previous day to ‘improve my circulatory system’ and the need to pee has past the stage of uncomfortable and is now hovering on desperation. A plump body stopped in front of me, my sight shots straight to his face.

“You’ve missed a question, Simmons.” His raspy voice curved around my name.

I faught rolling my eyes and whispered that I have to ‘go’. Amusement played in his expression and I realised that he’s not going to let me go; apparently this is his version of revenge on students. If there weren’t so many kids in my class I would’ve slammed my fist into his face. My body went stiff when someone knocked on the door; drawing Mr. Mason’s attention away.

A small boy walked in and handed the teacher a small blue note. He grunted and placed it
on my desk. I immediately shoved all my books into my bag and swung it onto my back; I picked up the note and examined it as I stalked out the door. I headed straight to the bathroom and pushed to the front of the short line to relieve myself; my body went light as I climbed up the stairs to the principal’s office.

I stop at Reception and handed Ms. Helen my note.

“Not setting a very good example for yourself, Riley.” She reached over and pressed a buzzer that notified the principal that I was here. “Just have a seat.”

I ambled over to the inviting soft-leather couch. I closed my eyes, hoping that I could be at home. I sunk further into seat enjoying the comfort. The double doors to the Heads office opened, Mrs. England marched out, her elaborate crimson hair fell over her shoulders in heavy waves, her dark suit had no creases and not a speck of dust.

“Riley Simmons. This way.”

I sighed and pulled myself out of the seat, as I walked into the Head’s office I was greeted with the strong scent of lavender and Kayla Corvorskii’s warm smile. I dropped my bag at the door along with my best friend’s and sat in the waiting seat next to her.

“Hey, Corvorskii, what’s happening?”

“Hey, Ry. Same old, same old.” Kayla’s bland expression told me that we were going to be here for a while. Her medium brown hair was tied into a loose pony, her blue eyes shone as she shot me questioning glance.

“Ok girls,” Mrs. England began. “This is the third time this week that you’ve been in here. And each time we’ve had the same conversation, so now you’re going to tell me why you’re in here.”

“Um, is this because of the pool die?” No answer.

“The dead lawn in the boys block?” I volunteered. No answer.

“The missing satellite dish on the teacher’s dorm?” Kayla was treading on dangerous ground. Mrs. England’s eyes grew dark.

“No, no and no,” she snapped. “But I would appreciate it if the satellite dish was returned.”

“You are here because of a complaint that was made against our school this morning. Where were you both last night?”

Crap. “At a small party.”

“Small, Miss. Simmons, is your current understatement of the year. The club your small party was held at rang me this morning, very displeased about damage control, the amount of people that attended and the state it was left in.”

“It wasn’t our party,” Kayla retorted.

“Oh, really?” She shot me a look. “He also mentioned that you two were the main attraction.” We remained quiet; Kayla probably couldn’t remember last night any better than I could.

“I should have you both immediately suspended, so consider yourselves lucky that I’m in a good mood today.” When it came to our punishment she was always in a good mood.

“And while we’re on the topic of parties,” she continued, silently telling us that she was nowhere near finished. “I caught some boys that said you two were in the boy’s dorm last week.”

Air caught in my throat. I glanced at Kayla; she was rooted in the seat, her eyes widened at the mention of the boy’s dorm. Yea ok, we were in there last week for a get together...several times. But like we were going to admit it.

“Any comments?” Mrs. England pressed. She sighed when there was no reply. “Girls I give you two a lot of leverage when it comes down to it, I would appreciate a bit of responsibility and honesty in return.”

She was right, we did get away with some pretty messed up stuff, just because she was in a ‘good mood’. When it’s bad though she does suspend us, give us clean up duty or detention. I took a deep breath, Kayla sensed my change, she turned to me with pleading eyes. Someone had to fess up and she didn’t want to do it.

“Yes we were there. It wasn’t a party, just a casual get together, no alcohol, we stayed clean and sober. And we were only in one room.”

“I thank you for your honesty, Riley. Now how long were you there for?”

My body stiffened, we might just get suspended after all. “The night.”

She reached forward and pressed the buzzer to reception. “Bring in the boys.” I couldn’t hide the grin growing on my face. I knew very well who the boys were and so did Kayla. I leaned forward as the boys entered, I looked behind me to find Andy and Kane stroll into the office and slump down in the two remaining seats next to us.

Andy sat on Kayla’s side and Kane on mine. Andy and Kane had the signature I-just-got-out-of-bed hair style, other boys would attempt it but none could pull it off so well. They were our first and foremost best friends from the Other Side. Andy had the classic dark brown hair, much like mine, and Kane had the fair, light brown hair. Nearly everything we did, we did it with them. Except for the pool thing, that was purely feminine adolescents at work.

“You four are always in this together, huh?” the Head smiled. “Well you’re going to have fun cleaning the hall together aren’t you?”

“What-” Andy began to protest.

“Want to make it the dorms as well?” No answer. “Thought so. Your duties begin in the morning. You’re dismissed.”

We all gathered our bags and headed out, Andy said he had Biology studying to do and Kayla offered to help, I stayed with Kane and we made our way to the boy’s dorms despite previous warnings. It began to rain lightly as we reached the back door. He led me inside and we crept up the stairs to the second floor, neither of us daring to use the lift.

Once safely inside Kane and Andy’s dorm room I tossed my bag and shoes to the side and did a run up to one of the double beds on the far side, I crashed into the awaiting pillows and knocked them everywhere. Kane chuckled from behind me, I turned to find that he’d had changed out of his uniform and into a loose pair of jeans and a shirt that informed me to remember his name because I would be screaming it later, charming.

“Pizza?” he offered.

I nodded and grinned, it was our Friday afternoon ritual, when school had finished all four of us would meet up at either dorm, order pizza and watch movies until the night appeared day then we’d have to sneak back to our dorms at five am, fighting lying down and sleeping the whole way.

I turned over and pulled off my school blouse, I threw it on the floor next to a stack of DVDs; our school uniform was pretty awesome, the main colours of the school were dark blue, black and various shades of purple. Boys had to wear dark blue shorts or pants with a white shirt with a purple emblem of the school and a black blouse/jacket/jumper that had light purple and dark purple patterns around the collar.

We girls got to wear pleated black skirts that had a tartan pattern of dark blue, white, dark purple and light purple. Our shirts were the same as the boys and so were our blouses. And it was compulsory for all students to wear a school tie, which consisted of various designs. The main ones were a plain striped tie with blue and purple stripes, or a plain black or blue tie with the emblem in purple.

We were allowed to dress it up by adding any shoes, belts or accessories we wanted which was the best part. While Kane ordered the pizza and told Andy and Kayla that we’d already ordered food without them I explored the boy’s WIW to see if I could find a pair of denim jeans that I’d left there on our last visit...which was last night. I grunted in satisfaction when I pulled them out of one of the drawers. I unzipped my skirt, slid it off and reefed on the jeans. As I walked back out to the main room peeled of my tie and took my hair out of the bun that I wrestled it into this morning.

I slid onto the couch next to Kane and watched him play Halo 3. That was what was so adorable about these two; they did whatever they wanted before Kayla and I had come here. When we had they took us in and made us one of them, we weren’t like everyone else. All the girls that followed all the fashions and had to have the latest trends didn’t know the half of life. And all the boys who thought they were untouchable had no idea what it was, the thought that girls dig deros and badass boys when in reality only the desperate girls did and all the decent ones just thought they were idiots.

Its funny how life can get, some people didn’t like us, some did and some got weird and liked us too much. But that’s life as a teenager I guess. My thoughts ran off track when Kayla bounded through the door with Andy at her heels, I smiled at the two and jumped over the seat.

“Do we really have to give that satellite dish back?” Kayla complained as she pulled her new jumper from Jay Jays on.

“Yes, you heard her; we get away with way too much shit for it to be even considered fair.”

“But we get twelve extra channels now,” she wined in her best sarcastic tone and pulled a face.

“Then ask Ms. Mackenzie for a new Foxtel modem. I’m sure she’ll be happy to assist you.” Ms. Mackenzie was as mad as a hatter; she’d go ballistic if we asked for an upgrade.

“You’re. So. Funny, Riley. Why didn’t I ever think of that?”

“Kayla quit pouting, you look like a fish.” I threw a pillow at her face; she caught it inches before impact.

“Oh, no you didn’t.”

“Oh, yes I did,” I challenged.

I ducked down by instinct; Kayla instantly began convulsing in so much laughter that she had to sit down. Andy watched us patiently, eyeing us both as the play fight grew on. I glanced down at Kayla worried, she had strange laughs at times but all it was this time was laugh, choke, gasp, laugh, gasp, choke, laugh etc...

“Corvorskii are you ok?”

“I’m. Fine...stop looking. At. Me. Like. Imma. Retard.”

Kane came up beside me and nudged my arm, I looked at him; he held a dangerous grin. My body tensed by instinct, something you gain when you become best friends with these two, he only directed his attention to Kayla, he studied her hysterics then held her nose for three second, she stopped laughing and gawked at him. As Kane rose he raised his eyebrows at me then returned to the couch.

I pulled Kayla up and stood next to Andy while she raced over to where Kane was sitting and joined him in playing Halo.

“He’s different.”

“I know.”

I glanced at Andy’s soft brown eyes, noticing that he was watching Kayla. I sighed, this was when it got complicated with having two girls friends with two boys. It’s happened before, though none of us did anything about it. It passed eventually; the feeling either disappeared or was silenced. Kayla has always had strong feelings for Andy, she’s ignored them mostly, I admire her for having so much strength. She ends up mad at him because she can’t stop thinking about him at times. She goes off at Andy for the smallest things, it hurts him but I
really didn’t know if he felt the same.

I rested my hand on his shoulder, his eyes met mine. He shook his head and walked over to his bed. I let my hand fall to my side. I felt a pang of claustrophobia; I escaped the room by going out to the porch. Kayla followed me out, girl thing.

“Hey.”

“K, Andy’s worried about you.”

“Figured,” she mumbled. I turned to her in time to catch her tight embrace. I hugged her back.

“We need something to do, something that’ll make us smile.” I saw the ideas form in her head; they passed her face as she analysed which one she wanted to do.

“We’ll we could ‘accidently’ pour a whole bottle of bubble bath into the water fountain filter out the front of the Reception office. By the time someone notices it it’ll be too late,” she was already smiling. “And we’ll get it done in time to get back before the pizza arrives.”

“Smart thinking Corvorskii,” I winked and examined the sky, dark clouds were rolling over the last lights of the sun, the rain was becoming heavier. “And there’s going to be a storm soon.”

We rushed back inside and tore apart the boy’s ensuite; once we found the bubble bath we bolted back out, to where the boys watched us with amused eyes, as we left the dorm room without another word. We were laughing and giggling the entire way down the corridor.