Glitch (boyxboy/android)

Chapter 13: Hear me out.

"Bro, whatever floats your boat."

☆

"WHAAT?" The shout is returned from Enzo's pristine bedroom.

Leo hurriedly opens his bedroom door and barges into Enzo's room, the door swinging open, banging on the bookcase behind it. Enzo doesn't even get a minute to think before he is being dragged out of his room by his wrist, the gaming headset being pulled from his head in the process, left abandoned on the deflated bean bag. "Woah, get off me!"

Leo doesn't let go until Enzo is in Leo's room, swung round and made to look at The PT, standing quite happily by Leo's desk.

"What's this about?" Enzo asks in annoyance.

Leo jabs a finger into Enzo's shoulder as he speaks. "Care to tell me how my tutor just managed to give me a massage?"

Enzo just snorts a laugh at this. "Bro whatever floats your boat." Earning himself a slap on the arm from Leo.

"How did you afford a download huh? Have you been stealing?"

"Relax." Enzo holds out his hands in order to calm a fractious Leo down. "Jojo found a cool hack."

"He did what?" This news clearly is not calming Leo down one bit. "You could have blown it up!"

"But I didn't, so it's all ok" Enzo replies, still not getting phased by his brother's clear outrage.

"Enzo, it could pick up viruses or go nuts or something. Mum and dad are going to flip when I tell them." Leo begins to head for the door, but on hearing this, Enzo hurriedly steps in the way.

"Wait...just wait!" He says, holding his hands out in front of him, slightly pushing Leo back. "Let's just think about this for a minute."

"There's nothing to think about. You clearly didn't clean your room, the The PT did." Leo tries to get past his brother but Enzo just strengthens his stance.

"Come on Leo. Think about it yeah?...Think about how nice it would be for the guy to help you out a little better. Trust me. Use the right words and it will do your bidding." Enzo feels Leo's determination to leave, ease a little, allowing him to lower his hands a fraction.

"What do you mean?" Leo asks, this point actually interesting.

"Watch this." Enzo replies, moving over to Leo's desk. He picks up the algebra textbook, flicking to a random page of sums. "Um. Tutor...Leo has just been telling me he doesn't understand how to work out X here. Do you think you can demonstrate?" He looks at the tutor, then at Leo.

'Is this true Leo? Are you struggling with this equation?"

Enzo looks at Leo intently, urging him to play along, "Uh...yeah. I think I need you to demonstrate it please."

"Ah, certainly Leo." The PT settles on the swivel chair, pulling the notepad and pen towards it, before beginning to explain the property of X in detail, whilst working out the equation. "The letter "x" is often used in algebra to mean a value that is not yet known. It is called a "variable" or sometimes an "unknown". In x + 2 = 7, x is a variable, but we can work out its value if we try. A variable doesn't have to be "x", it could be "y", "w" or any letter, name or symbol..."

As the The PT continues to work out and ramble on, the words going straight over Leo's head, he looks back at Enzo, who's smug expression conveyed that he really was onto something.

"...So you see, X here, is in fact 18." The PT stops talking and places the pen neatly back on the desk. To his surprise, Leo sees a page of completed sums before him.

"Oh...th...thank you PT. I completely understand now." He lies, but at least his work was done. Leo pulls Enzo over to the other side of the room, out of earshot of the Tutor. "That shouldn't be so easy. There must be a flaw in the download."

"Well if that's a flaw, then it's a good one right?" Enzo argues. Leo looks back at The PT, sitting neatly at his desk.

"I guess." Leo responds.

"So...you're not gonna tell mum?" Enzo says, still a little apprehensive.

"No." Leo mumbles.

"Good, Enzo smirks. "You owe me." He adds with a cheeky raise of the eyebrow.

"Don't push it you little shit." Leo says through gritted teeth, with Enzo managing to avoid yet another slap across the arm as he hurriedly leaves the room, returning to his own safe haven.

Leo is left staring at the back of the tutor's head. His mind now a concoction of thoughts of what he could get The PT to do for him. Then his mind settles back on the mounds of homework he's got to attend to. "Hey tutor." Leo says, pulling out another textbook from his bag, this time, chemistry. "Can you just show me exactly how the atom can be split?"