Theo sat in the hundred-year-old library, where the smell of old books danced up his nose. Hunched over his geography textbook, he folded his slim, toned arms and became engrossed, keen to learn about how the earth’s crust, its shell, was divided into tectonic plates and how they’d shifted over the last two hundred and fifty million years to form continents and mountains. It was incredible, a reminder that his place in the world was as nothing by comparison.

‘Two hundred and fifty million years...’ he whispered.

He ran his finger over a map showing the edges of the shifting plates and realised it made sense that this was where there were more volcanoes.

A scream of laughter came from behind him, breaking the silence of the library. He looked round quickly to see Wilson, now in the fifth form, with his cronies Helmsley and Dinesh on either side, chatting to the fourth-form girls. It appeared to be the same interaction, as ever, Wilson leading the pack and the girls flicking their long hair over their shoulders and gently thumping him, a chance for contact. Theo hated the way Wilson had grown his fringe, trying to look like Simon Le Bon, he hated his cockiness, and he hated his friends; in fact he hated most things about him. This had been the case now for the last seven years, ever since Wilson had singled him out in his first weeks at Vaizey College. Theo had learnt to ignore him and continued doing his best to remain invisible, as instructed all that time ago by Mr Beckett, but it wasn’t always easy.

Mr Porter reminded him regularly that people who were mean like Wilson had something dark growing inside them and were to be pitied. Theo tried, he really did, but he couldn’t help wishing the dark thing growing inside Wilson would just get on with it and suffocate him, anything to get him out of his life and ease his torment. At the start of each new school year, Theo prayed that Wilson might back off, get bored or, shamefully, find a new victim. His bullying was relentless, and Theo had to be permanently on guard. It was exhausting and distracting.

At fourteen, Theo had lost his gangliness. He was tall, slim rather than skinny, and muscular thanks to his running and gym regimes. Everything about him was well proportioned, and with his square jaw and thick hair it was clear he was on the way to becoming a handsome young man. Not that he saw this. He avoided mirrors and kept himself to himself, preferring a quiet life. He was a loner and could only see himself as the weedy boy with the nervous stutter and pallid complexion. Outside of studying, his sole preoccupation was to try and keep his weirdness at bay.

‘What are you looking at, Montgonorrhea?’ Wilson fired this latest moniker in Theo’s direction, before looking at his group to make sure his comment had been properly appreciated.

Theo hadn’t realised he was still looking in their direction. He redirected his gaze back to his book, his pulse racing. Closing his eyes, he offered up a silent prayer that they would leave him alone. This he did without conviction; if prayers were all it took, his torment would have abated long ago.

‘Quiet, please!’ The elderly librarian looked up from her desk and put down her mug commemorating the engagement of Prince Charles and Lady Diana.

‘Sorry, miss, it wasn’t us, it was Mr Homo here.’ Theo glanced up as Wilson stood and pointed in his direction. ‘He’s making a proper racket and we’re trying really hard to study.’

Theo felt the burn of several pairs of eyes fixed on him and a hot prickle spread across his skin.

The girls placed their hands over their mouths to stifle their giggles.

The librarian stood up. ‘Right, Mr Homo, gather your books and leave!’ She seemed oblivious to the snickers that rippled around the room. ‘I will not have disruption in my library. There are people trying to work. Off you go!’ She made a shooing sign towards the door.

Theo knew there was no point protesting and, besides, he wanted to be as far away from Wilson as possible. He gathered his books, as instructed, and made his way along the corridor, walking slowly down the wide stone stairs, trying to kill time, practising the art of hiding in plain sight. Even so, despite his best efforts at purposeful dawdling, he arrived at his English class ten minutes early.

He hovered in the classroom doorway and leant his palm on the frame, content to stand and stare. For sitting in the seat next to his was the most beautiful girl he had ever seen. She seemed to be whispering to herself as she ran her hands over her skirt. Her thick flame-red hair hung around her face and her peachy skin was dotted with adorable freckles. Her eyes were green and her nose was tiny and snub. He looked around the classroom to see if it was a set-up, another joke at his expense, but she was alone.

Theo walked slowly forward, mindful that he had only minutes before his classmates arrived and introduced him as the school weirdo.

He pulled out his chair and tried to order the jumble of words flying around inside his head. But before he’d had the chance to construct a comprehensible sentence, she spoke to him.

‘Hi there, I’m Kitty.’ She smiled warmly and waved at him, even though they were close enough to speak, and he liked it. It was the nicest welcome he’d received in a long time.

‘I’m Theo.’ He sat down and stared at her face.

‘Well, you’re going to have to help me out here, Theo. You know when a girl is a million miles from home and is smiling as though she has it all figured out but is actually just very scared, wondering how to fit in at a new school this late in the term?’ She dipped her eyes, her tone sincere, her Scottish lilt most attractive.

‘Uh-huh.’

‘Well, I am that girl.’ She laughed softly and leant in closer, laying her fingers briefly on his arm, with the lightest of touches.

Theo’s limbs jumped and a jolt of pleasure fired through him. He wouldn’t have been surprised to find that her fingers had burnt right through his flesh.

Kitty continued, whispering now. ‘Actually, that’s not strictly true. I’m a warrior like my mum and that means I can get through just about anything.’ She sat back in the chair and rested her hand on the desktop. Theo had a strong desire to place his on top of it. Kitty the warrior carried on. ‘Mr Reeves told me to sit here and then left me all alone. He seemed a bit odd.’

‘I guess.’ Theo nodded. ‘And people fear people who are odd, weird. They think they’re toxic, contagious.’ He blinked.

‘I suppose we do.’ She gave a small laugh and it was abundantly clear that this beautiful, confident girl was not one of life’s weirdos. ‘I was going to give it five more minutes and then run and hide somewhere, but then you turned up. You just might be my knight in shining armour.’

He liked this idea very much. ‘I’m not usually this early. I was working in the library...’ He let this trail, not wanting to recount or even recall what had happened only minutes earlier. ‘It’s a coincidence, really. Out of all the people that might have turned up early... I’m a Montgomery, so you must be...?’

‘Oh! Oh, I see!’ She smiled when she caught his thread. ‘I’m a Montrose. So that explains the seating.’

Theo loved that she was smart.

‘I think I can get through this, Mr Montgomery, with you by my side. What was your first name again?’ She was so close now that tendrils of her thick hair were brushing his shoulder, vivid orange against the navy of his V-necked school jersey. It took all of his strength not to reach out and touch them.

‘My name’s Theodore, but everyone calls me Theo.’ Not that they call me anything really, as no one talks to me, but I don’t want you to know that and right now you don’t and I feel like someone else and that’s brilliant.

She twisted her head to look at him. ‘Theodore? Let me guess... after Mr Roosevelt? I must confess, I can’t think of any other Theodores right now!’

‘Actually, no.’ His face broke into a wry smile, but he made sure his lips covered his teeth, which he had neglected to clean that morning. ‘I was named after Theobald’s House. My father was a Theobald’s boy and my grandfather too, in fact all the men in our family came here, but I think my mother drew the line at Theobald and so Theodore was the compromise.’

‘That’s crazy!’ She put her hand to her cheek and he noticed a kink in her left forearm, a slight bend that meant her hand curved ever so slightly to the left. Imperfect and therefore, to him, perfect.

She continued, either unaware or uninterested in his scrutiny. ‘So your family are, like, Vaizey College through and through?’

‘I guess.’ He shrugged, pleased to have impressed her a little and sad that it was based on a lie. It might have been true that in the past the Montgomery men were Vaizey to the core, but his hatred of the place meant that line ended with him. It felt to Theo as if his awkwardness at the school was like a loose thread and that each time it got pulled it left another little hole in his father’s reputation as well as his own. It was a huge weight to carry. ‘I sometimes wish I was named after Roosevelt instead.’ This was as close as he could come to admitting how he felt about the school. ‘It would be easier and quicker to explain.’

‘And is that a Rudyard Kipling novel I see in your bag?’ she asked in her soft voice as she peered at the green cloth spine.

‘His poetry actually. For prep.’ Not that he’d started it yet. He was, in truth, dreading it. I mean... poetry? What’s the point?

‘We have a lot of it in the library at home, you must know some of it already?’ Her eyes blazed with enthusiasm.

He looked at her and in that moment wished beyond everything that instead of maths equations, tectonic plates and the properties of light, all the things that had held his attention over the last term, it had been the poetry of Mr Rudyard Kipling that he had studied. To have been able to recite just a single line from one of his poems would, he knew, have made the greatest impression on Miss Kitty Montrose. And he wanted to impress her. He wanted that very much. Instead, he hesitated and confessed with a flush of embarrassment to his cheeks. ‘I’m afraid not. I haven’t really read any yet.’

Her smile faded a little and her brows knitted. But she quickly regained her equanimity. ‘Well of course, why would you? My boyfriend is the same. He only reads comics, if you can believe that!’ She shook her head and reached for her textbook.

Theo felt his stomach bunch as if he’d been punched. This was the very worst news imaginable – not that Kitty’s boyfriend only read comics, but that she had a boyfriend at all. A surge of something thick seemed to clog his veins, making his limbs feel leaden and his head light. He hated the boy, even if he had no idea who he was.

‘You have a boyfriend?’ he mumbled weakly.

‘Yes.’ She nodded. ‘My cousins are already here at Vaizey – Ruraigh and Hamish Montrose...’

Theo nodded. He knew them of course and with this information came a sickness in his gut. Her cousins would no doubt fill her in on all of his quirks, laughing, probably, as they did so. And, just like that, the crackle of confidence that had flickered into life when Kitty had considered him her knight in shining armour, was now extinguished. He watched her beautiful mouth move and half listened to the words that came out.

‘They always bring their friends home for the holidays, and he’s one of their gang, so we kind of met a while ago. He’s a fifth former,’ she said with pride. ‘Angus Thompson, do you know him?’

Theo could only nod as he pictured the confident, athletic Thompson, a full two years older than him, good-looking in a New Romantic kind of way, and captain of the 1st XI. His heart sank. He stared ahead, almost unable to look at Kitty. I wish I was Angus Thompson. I wish I was anyone other than Theodore Montgomery.

‘Are you sporty?’ she asked, as if she’d read his thoughts.

He shook his head. ‘Not really. Are you?’

‘Swimming, that’s my thing. I love to swim. My dad always says that one day I’m going to develop gills behind my ears!’

Theo watched, fascinated, as, at the mention of her dad, her eyes narrowed and for a split second there was a look of longing on her pretty face. Could it be that she too came from a home where she felt like a guest and with parents who made her feel like an encumbrance? Oh, to have someone to discuss this with – it would make things so much easier to bear.

‘I’m finding being here harder than I can say,’ she said.

Theo’s heart lifted. ‘I understand that.’ And he truly did.

She sighed. ‘My mum and dad are my best friends really. God, I know how naff that sounds, but they are. We do so much together and I would rather be with them than do anything else. Do you know what I mean?’

He nodded vacantly. Of course she’s not like you, idiot. He cursed the very idea. Look at her, she’s perfect.

*

The moment the bell rang at the end of class, Theo gathered up his books and headed off to find Mr Porter. He knew the man’s routine as well as his own and figured that he’d be up at the cricket pitch on this sunny day.

‘Now what’s that face for?’ Mr Porter placed his hands on his lower back and stood up slowly from where he’d been crouching. He made his way to the other side of the crease, where he bent down again and with his little white dabbing stick filled in the gaps in the line.

Theo sighed and began stripping the bark from a twig he’d found on the path. ‘Do you know any of Rudyard Kipling’s poetry?’ He thought it might be easier to learn a poem off Mr Porter than try and find an appropriate one in the book he had in his bag.

‘Can’t say as I do.’

‘Dammit.’ Theo tutted.

‘I see someone’s got a cob on today.’ Mr Porter laughed. ‘Poetry’s not really my thing. I might have recited the odd ditty to my comrades during the war, but none that’s fit for your tender ears, Mr Montgomery.’

For the umpteenth time that afternoon, the name and image of Angus Thompson came into his head. A fine name for a fine scholar and sportsman. ‘I wish I wasn’t named after Theobald’s House, a place I hate. It annoys me.’

‘Well, don’t let it,’ Mr Porter said, keeping his eyes on the white line as he continued dabbing it with paint.

Theo huffed. As if it was that easy.

‘When you met Mrs Porter, did you like her the first time you saw her?’

‘Ah, so that explains the face.’ Mr Porter rocked back on his haunches and looked away to the horizon. ‘Yes, I did. I liked her the very second I saw her and I loved her until the very last.’ His eyes crinkled in a smile.

‘Did you tell her you liked her?’

‘Oh no. Not at first. That’s not how it’s done. You have to be subtle, get to know a lady and win her over.’

Theo snorted. He had never won anything in his life, let alone a prize like Kitty Montrose. ‘I just wish...’ He kicked at the ground.

‘You just wish what?’

‘I wish I could be someone else.’

‘And who would you like to be, might I ask?’ Mr Porter’s knees creaked as he stood up. He looked Theo in the eye, easy now they were of a similar height.

‘Anyone,’ he said quietly.

‘Here’s the thing, Mr Montgomery. There isn’t a single pupil in this school, or any other, come to think of it, who hasn’t wished for the same at some point. Everyone wants to be taller, thinner, smarter, funnier, faster, less afraid, you name it! I’ve known you for a very long time and I can tell you that you are one of the best people I know. You have heart!’ He placed his fist on his chest. ‘And if you can find the confidence to follow your heart, which one day you will, you will be happy and that’s the greatest gift you can give yourself.’

‘How do I win a girl over?’ he asked. These life lessons were all well and good, but time was of the essence.

Mr Porter reached up under his cap and scratched his head. ‘Well, it depends on the kind of girl she is. You might be able to impress her with gifts and expensive treats, but therein lies a problem, because if she’s the kind of girl that’s impressed by gifts and expensive treats, the kind of girl who won’t pay her own way, then I would say she isn’t the girl you want, even if you think you do. But if you can make her laugh and she can make you laugh in return, oh boy, that’s the nicest way to live.’ He gave a small chuckle.

‘Did you and Mrs Porter make each other laugh?’

‘Every day, Mr Montgomery, every day. Spending time with her...’ He looked into the middle distance, his expression wistful. ‘It was like the sun was out, even when it was raining. She was my sunshine.’ He chuckled. ‘It’s important, those little things that bind you, and they’re often found in the mundane. There are some men, Mr Montgomery, who are like a glass of champagne – exciting, glamorous – but you don’t want to be a glass of champagne.’

‘I don’t?’

‘No. You want to be a cup of tea.’

Theo stared at Mr Porter. ‘I think I might like to be a glass of champagne!’

Mr Porter shook his head. ‘No, you don’t. Champagne is for high days and holidays – people don’t always have a fancy for it. But a good cup of tea? There isn’t a day in the year when it isn’t the best thing to have first thing in the morning. A cup of tea warms your bones on a cold day and can bring you close together as you sit and chat. You want to be a cup of tea.’

Theo smiled at him. ‘You sound mad. Going on about tea and champagne when all I want to know is how to make a girl like me!’

‘Aye, maybe so, but love makes you mad, that’s a fact, and when it comes to affairs of the heart, I know what I’m talking about. Merry was...’ He paused. ‘She was perfect and yet she picked me.’

‘Because you were a cup of tea.’

‘Exactly.’ He winked. ‘I was a cup of tea.’

A burst of laughter filtered across the grass. It came from behind the wide oak tree, where a gaggle of his peers were sitting chatting, flirting and studying, enjoying the freedom of being fourteen and with only a couple of weeks left on the school calendar.

‘Why don’t you go and sit with them?’ Mr Porter asked.

‘Are you joking? They hate me!’

‘They don’t hate you! And if they do, then it’s because they don’t know you. You should give them the chance to get to know you and you can only do that by going and saying hello.’

‘Mr Porter, I’ve been in their classes for seven years and they haven’t once shown any sign of wanting to get to know me. And I know why – it’s because I’m weird.’ He held the twig in both hands and pushed on the middle with his thumbs until it snapped.