American Royalty

“I thought you threw away that sweater.”

I hold up the piece of clothing in question. Wool, Fair Isle pattern, warm and thick. “It was a gift from Aunt Gertrude. And what’s wrong with it?”

Sonya, a determined twelve year old with impeccable brows and a fiery determination, crossed her arms and scoffed. “Nothing, except for the fact that it makes you look like a freaking grandma. I can’t believe Aunt Getrude gave you that, the old cow.”

“Don’t badmouth your elders, Sonya. It’s rude and disrespectful.”

“Disrespectful my ass. Aunty Gee was being disrespectful when she gave you that freaking sweater. See, by giving you that sweater—and fully knowing that you’ll wear it—she is subjecting you to broken bones and a black eye or two. But because you actually seem to want to wear that crap you call ‘clothes’, I’m starting to think that you’re a masochist or something.”

Sonya’s good with words, really good, actually. They just weren’t nice words at all.

“You got that word from Twilight,” I mumbled, pushing my glasses up my nose and frowning at my sister. “Go eat breakfast.”

“Go burn that sweater,” Sonya retorted, disappearing out my bedroom door. “Your face is fugly, by the way.”

Thinking a good five minutes about ‘should I wear the sweater and make Aunt Gertrude happy’ or ‘conform to society and not wear the sweater which I cannot for the life of me figure out why it is a violence magnet’.

I put it on.

“Eat breakfast, Tobias! You’re not going to school with an empty stomach.”

Downstairs, and the family’s at the table. Mom in an apron, Dad with reading glasses and a newspaper, and Sonya at the table poking some black fuzzy wand in her eyes.

“You’re not going to school with that sweater! Jesus Christ, Toby! Why don’t you take my advice? I’m trying to not get you psychologically scarred!”

“Stop the dramatics, Sonya.” Scolds Mom. Fierce woman, I tell you. She once attacked me with a spatula when she was baking mud cake. “Eat your virsli, boy.”

Dad looked up from his paper, barely smiling. “Excited for your first day of school, Tobias?”

I shrugged, reaching for some scrambled egg. Apparently poached is healthier, but what’s the fun in safety? “Sure, I guess. Do you suppose they have good academics there?”

“Why not? You do well at calculus, huh, Tobias?”

“Of course!”

“Not like you’ll do well at making friends, anyway.” Sonya snickered.

------

“Hey.”

I looked to my right. Precalculus, four white walls covered with mediocre posters, sleepy kids, some blonde with bedroom eyes, smirking lips and tanned arms glancing at me.

Ignore her, what my dad would say, she’s just some other teenage alcoholic whose hormones got the better of them.

It’s kinda hard to ignore her smile though; no matter if she was secretly three months pregnant after a rather raunchy night in some stranger’s bedroom. It was a real great smile.

“Hey,” I breathed, suddenly absorbed in my book.

“You a smart one?” she raised her eyebrows for the slightest millisecond.

I shrugged. “Suppose so.” Don’t be modest about your intelligence Tobias, another thing my dad always tells me. “I mean—yeah.”

“So are you trying to be some sort of homo-hipster with that sweater of yours or some shit like that?” she asked bluntly, all pearly whites and killer smiles.

So this was what Sonya was trying to tell me. Well, I’m not feeling psychologically scarred with this girl’s insult. What the hell is a hipster, anyway?

I shook my head, opening my pencil case and taking a 2B pencil. “I… don’t think I am.”

“Christ,” she laughed, looking me down head to toe in my chair. “You’re pretty brave, kid. What’d you say your name was again?”

“I didn’t,” I said, holding my hand out to alcoholic blondie. “Toby Székely.”

“Is that Jewish?” She said and completely ignored my outstretched hand, eye fixed on me.

“No.”

She smiled at the slight tone of indignity in my voice. “Ah well. Awesome meeting you, smart kid Toby. I’m Andy.”

“It’s a pleasure to be of your acquaintance, Andy.”

Snorting as the bell went, ‘Andy’ stood up and slinked out the classroom. “All mine, Toby. All mine.”

I stare after her back, brown and freckled with summer days most likely, retreating down the hall way just a blur of golden hair and bedroom eyes.