The Numbers on Our Arms

Chapter 17

The knock rattled out on the oak door and the door slipped open to reveal John. Remi ducked under his arm and skipped past him

"What?" he exclaimed with his eyes trailing behind her.

She clicked and pushed open the door to Blyke's bedroom and smiled when she saw him sitting on his bed, one of the English book's in his hands.

"Remi? Can't you knock?" He scowled, snapping the book closed, and she took a seat next to him. She threaded her fingers through his so his hand clasped hers.

"How are you?" she asked, leaning over to him. Her eyes glinted.

"Um... Better to be back here," he replied, looking away from her. Blood rushed to his face. "I guess I am no longer grounded; my sister decided to come back from university just then with such brilliant timing, and it wasn't fun. But now I have to share a dorm with John and it makes me miss being grounded with my sister in my hair. I still can't believe he wasn't expelled."

"Seraphina says he's better now," she replied.

"Isn't she bias though?" he questioned.

"Yes, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't give him a chance," she replied. She dropped his hand and flattened out his shorts as they rode up her thighs. "According to John, a lot of people in the Safe House didn't deserve a second chance. Or fifth chance. At least, that's what he made it sound like and that was a decent part projection."

"So you're saying to give him a second chance?" He raised his eyebrow.

"Give him a chance, that's what I mean," she replied, a small smile on his face as her eyes strolled around the room. "I don't know what happened to him, so..."

"He hurt you," he replied. His fist tightened against his thigh.

"And we hurt him too."

"Directly and indirectly are different things," she stated, crossing her arms over his chest.

"Well." She reached out to place her hand on top of his. His fist uncurled beneath hers. "That's not what I came here to talk to you about. You know how we were talking about a club before you were suspended." He nodded. "Well, afterwards everything started calming down relatively quickly as Seraphina and Arlo stepped up, so I had time to talk to Vaughn about it – that's what I texted you about. However, it took so long with so many meetings with different members of staff that I started to lose hope. And I was right. He said no."

"He did?" he questioned, raising his eyebrow. He stared at her. "Why would he do that? That makes no sense?"

"Apparently, it's too soon for a non-competitive club," she explained. "Technically he specified sports and chess but I think there are other clubs that could fit along those lines. Though, I still don't get why. He did go on to suggest other options though."

"How are there other options?" he asked. His eyes wide.

"Stuff that doesn't need permission for. They can't prevent us from making organised outings," she replied. "But we can't need school permission for it. It means that money may be a problem, so we can't stay overnight anyway and that also severely limits where we can go – probably a two hour journey by bus. Then there's whether the place will cost money to enter or what about food. It's just so much."

"Does it matter if it costs part of our own allowance as long as its not too much?" he asked.

"A number of the Safe House members are scholarship students and don't have much money to spend elsewhere. It could severely limit where we can go depending how many students there are and there allowance. If it was one or two, I'm sure they could get paid for but we also can't burden anyone with that so it can't really be done."