The Peculiar Predicament of Maximilian Hawthorn - Prologue. Prologue

The headmaster's office smelled of old leather, furniture polish, and the faint desperation of a man who had seen too many schoolboys in his lifetime. Mr. Weatherby, a man whose jowls seemed to have their own gravitational pull and whose waistcoat strained valiantly against the forces of gravity and good nutrition, sat behind his imposing oak desk and regarded the weeping figure before him with a mixture of sympathy and profound exhaustion. The grandfather clock in the corner ticked with the solemn gravity of a funeral march, each second stretching into an eternity of discomfort.

"Mister Simms, we need to talk about the bullying in your class."

Mr. Simms, a young man of twenty-three who had made the catastrophic error of believing that teaching would be a noble and fulfilling profession, dabbed at his eyes with a handkerchief that was already sodden with tears. His glasses had fogged up, and his tie—a hideous paisley affair that looked as though it had been designed by someone who had never seen colour before—was askew. He had the general appearance of a man who had been through a war and lost.

"I know it's horrible!" he wailed, his voice cracking like a boy's on the cusp of adolescence. "I've tried everything. I've been firm. I've been understanding. I've tried—" he choked back another sob, "—I've tried reasoning with him!"

"How long has this been going on?" Weatherby asked, though he already knew the answer. He had been headmaster at St. Bartholomew's Preparatory School for thirty-seven years. He had seen bullies come and go. He had seen teachers come and go. He had never, in all his years, encountered anything quite like Maximilian Hawthorn.

"Weeks!" Simms wailed, his voice rising to a pitch that suggested he might actually shatter the windows with the force of his anguish. "He picks on me! Every single day, he picks on me!"

"Now, now, there there," Weatherby said, patting the air ineffectually with his pudgy hands. "Don't cry. Max isn't that bad—"

"He's a horror!" Simms's voice rose to a crescendo of despair. "He's mean! He's a prepubescent boy that makes twelve-year-old girls look cuddly! I don't know what to do!" He collapsed into fresh sobs, his shoulders heaving with the force of his emotional breakdown.

Weatherby sighed and reached for the crystal decanter on his sideboard. He poured two fingers of amber liquid into a glass and slid it across the desk. Simms looked at it with red-rimmed eyes.

"I don't drink," he said miserably.

"You do now," Weatherby replied. "Trust me. You'll need it."

Simms took the glass with trembling hands and drained it in one gulp, coughing as the liquid burned its way down his throat. He set the glass down with a clatter and looked at the headmaster with the desperate eyes of a man who had seen the abyss and found it populated by an eleven-year-old in a school uniform.

"What am I going to do?" he whispered. "He corrected my grammar in front of the entire class. He said my pronunciation of 'schedule' was 'quaintly colonial' and then he did a dramatic reading of the dictionary definition to demonstrate the correct enunciation. The children laughed. At me. Their teacher!"

Weatherby nodded slowly. "Yes, he does have a way with words."

"A way with words? He's a terror! He's a menace! He's... he's..." Simms searched for the right word, his face contorting with the effort. "He's smart. Too smart. Smarter than me. He knows it. I know it. The whole bloody school knows it."

"Now, now, language."

"I'm sorry, sir. I'm just... I'm at my wit's end. He's making my life a living hell, and he does it with such... such politeness. He smiles at me while he dismantles everything I say. He offers to help me with my lesson plans. He offers to teach the class. Last week, he brought in a PowerPoint presentation on the correct method for teaching quadratic equations. He'd made it himself. It was better than mine."

Weatherby leaned back in his chair, which groaned in protest under his considerable bulk. "What would you have me do, Mr. Simms? The boy's academic record is impeccable. His parents are generous benefactors. His mother is a prominent barrister and his father is a surgeon. They are not the kind of people who take kindly to their son being disciplined."

"He's not being disciplined! He's the one doing the disciplining! He's the one who—" Simms stopped, took a deep breath, and seemed to gather himself. "I'm sorry. I'm not helping. I just... I need something. Some strategy. Some way to get through to him."

Weatherby studied the young teacher for a long moment. Simms was not a bad teacher, really. He was earnest and well-meaning, the kind of man who had gone into education because he genuinely wanted to make a difference. He just hadn't counted on the fact that some students were less interested in being taught than they were in turning the classroom into a personal fiefdom.

"Have you tried," Weatherby said slowly, "talking to him? As a person? Showing him some... respect?"

Simms blinked. "Respect? For an eleven-year-old?"

"Mr. Simms, Maximilian Hawthorn is not an ordinary eleven-year-old. He is, in many ways, more intelligent than anyone in this building. He knows it. He has always known it. And I suspect that somewhere, deep down, he is profoundly lonely."

Simms stared at the headmaster as though he had just suggested that the moon was made of cheese.

"Lonely? The boy who runs a black-market homework empire? The boy who has negotiated better lunchtime privileges than the prefects? The boy who—"

"The boy who, despite all of that, spends every single lunchtime with the same two friends. The same two friends he's had since he was six years old. The same two friends who, I might add, seem to be the only people in this entire school who can actually tolerate his company."

Simms was quiet for a moment, processing this information. "Billy and Wesley," he said finally.

"Yes. Billy and Wesley. William Pennington and Wesley Grant. Have you noticed them?"

Simms frowned. "They're... they're best friends, aren't they? Inseparable, really. Always together. It's quite sweet, actually. They hold hands sometimes at recess. Very proper. Very... wholesome."

Weatherby nodded. "They're more than just best friends, Mr. Simms. They're his anchor. His connection to the world. Without them, he would be a truly formidable force. With them..." He paused, searching for the right words. "With them, he's still a nightmare, but a manageable one."

Simms stared at the empty glass in his hands. "So what do I do? Befriend his friends?"

"No, no. Heaven forbid. No, what I'm suggesting is that you try to see him. Not as a problem to be solved, but as a boy. An eleven-year-old boy who happens to be intellectually gifted and socially... challenged. Talk to him about something other than schoolwork. Ask him about his interests. Show him that you see him as a person, not just a clever student."

Simms looked sceptical. "And you think that will work?"

Weatherby shrugged, a gesture that seemed to require considerable effort. "I have no idea. But it can't be worse than the current situation, can it? At the very least, it might stop him from making you cry in front of me again. That's not a good look for anyone."

Simms coloured slightly. "Yes. Right. Of course. I'll... I'll try. I'll try to be... better."

"That's the spirit," Weatherby said, though his tone suggested he had heard these promises before. "Now, get some rest. Drink some water. And try not to think about the fact that tomorrow you have to face him again."

Simms rose on unsteady legs, looking like a man who had just been told he had to climb Mount Everest in his pyjamas.

"Thank you, Headmaster. I really appreciate this."

"Don't mention it, Mr. Simms. And Mr. Simms?"

"Yes?"

"Watch your back. He's cunning."

Simms nodded miserably and shuffled out of the office, leaving Weatherby alone with his thoughts and the increasingly empty crystal decanter.

The playground of St. Bartholomew's Preparatory School was a sprawling expanse of asphalt and ambition, divided into roughly three distinct zones: the football pitch, where the jocks competed with all the grace and subtlety of angry hippos; the chess tables, where the intellectuals plotted their moves with the intensity of Cold War strategists; and the corner near the old oak tree, where Billy and Wesley had staked their claim years ago and had never once relinquished it.

Currently, this corner was hosting a hostile negotiation.

Maximilian Hawthorn, his pristine school uniform somehow even crisper than usual and his shoes polished to a mirror finish, was standing over a terrified eighth-grade prefect named Jenkins.

"I'm just saying, Max," Jenkins whined, glancing nervously over his shoulder. "A fiver for a single bag of Skittles is extortion."

"It is basic supply and demand, Jenkins," Max replied smoothly, adjusting his cuffs. "Headmaster Weatherby has instituted a strict, school-wide ban on refined sugars. I am assuming the considerable risk of providing a vital public service. You want to taste the rainbow, you pay the toll. Alternatively, I suppose I could mention to Mr. Weatherby who precisely orchestrated the great fire alarm incident of last Tuesday—"

Jenkins paled, thrust a crumpled five-pound note into Max’s hand, snatched the brightly colored contraband, and fled toward the safety of the gymnasium.

Max smirked, folding the note precisely in half and slipping it into his breast pocket. "A pleasure doing business with the intellectually stagnant."

He turned back to his friends, ready to launch into a monologue about the fiscal viability of expanding into fizzy drinks. However, the words died in his throat. He stopped dead in his tracks. His expression, usually a mask of smug superiority, dissolved into something completely unreadable.

"Max?" Billy asked, not looking up from the intricate arrangement of sandwiches he was laying out on a napkin. "You've gone quiet. Did Jenkins drop a dime on you?"

Max didn't answer. He took a sharp, jagged breath, his eyes locked on something in the distance.

"Something has happened," he said slowly. "Something unexpected. Something that has... disrupted my equilibrium."

Billy and Wesley exchanged a glance. This was serious. Max didn't use words like "equilibrium" casually. He saved them for moments of genuine crisis.

"Is it your parents?" Billy asked, his voice softening. "Are they—"

"No, my parents are fine. They're as insufferable as ever. Mother has taken up pottery and has insisted on showing me every single piece she's made. Father has started a podcast about the benefits of minimalism, which is ironic given that he owns seven cars."

"Then what is it?" Wesley asked, setting his book aside. "What's wrong?"

Max took a deep breath, the kind of breath that people take before delivering terrible news. Then he exhaled slowly, his eyes fixed on something in the distance. Billy and Wesley followed his gaze and saw what he was looking at.

On the other side of the playground, sitting alone on a bench near the rose garden, was a boy they had never really noticed before. He was small, with dark hair that fell across his forehead in a way that seemed almost accidental, like he hadn't bothered to brush it that morning. He was wearing the standard school uniform, but his tie was slightly undone and his blazer was draped across the bench beside him. He was drawing something in a sketchbook, his brow furrowed in concentration, his tongue poking out slightly in the way that people do when they're focused on something they love.

"Who is that?" Billy asked, genuinely curious.

Max's voice came out as a strangled whisper. "That is Gabriel. Gabriel Morris. He's been at this school for three years. We've never spoken. I know everything about him."

Wesley raised an eyebrow. "Everything? That seems... thorough."

"I did a research project. It started as a way to understand the social dynamics of the lower fourth, but then..." He trailed off, his face colouring slightly.

Billy and Wesley exchanged another glance, this one longer and more meaningful. They had never seen Max like this. Max, who could negotiate his way out of any situation, who could talk circles around teachers and students alike, who had once convinced the headmaster that he needed a personal laptop for "academic enrichment" and then used it to run a betting pool on the results of the school's cricket matches.

Max, who was currently staring at a boy he'd never spoken to, like he was the most fascinating thing he'd ever seen.

"Oh no," Billy said slowly, a smile spreading across his face. "Oh, Max. Is this what I think it is?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Max said, but his voice had gone up an octave, and his hands were sweating visibly.

"Max," Wesley said gently, "are you... do you have a crush?"

The word hung in the air between them like a grenade with the pin pulled. Max opened his mouth, closed it again, and then opened it once more. No sound came out. It was, perhaps, the first time in his life that Maximilian Hawthorn had been rendered speechless.

"I don't have a crush," he finally managed, his voice strangled. "That's a juvenile concept. Crushes are for people who haven't achieved emotional and intellectual maturity. I'm above such things."

"Your palms are sweating," Billy observed. "And you're breathing really fast. And you just used the word 'juvenile' in a sentence. You only use that word when you're trying to sound sophisticated because you're actually panicking inside."

"I don't panic. I plan. I strategize. I—" He looked back at Gabriel, who had just turned a page in his sketchbook and was now drawing something with renewed intensity. "—I need to go over there."

"What?" Billy and Wesley said in unison.

"I need to go over there and introduce myself. It's the logical next step. I have data on his interests, his academic performance, his family background. I know his favourite subject is art, that he takes extra tutoring in mathematics, and that he has a dog named Bumble. I have everything I need to begin a successful interaction."

"You have a dossier on a boy you've never spoken to?" Wesley asked, his voice tinged with something between horror and admiration.

"It's not a dossier. It's a... a collection of information. Gathered through observation and careful inquiry."

"That's the definition of a dossier, Max."

"Semantics."

Max started walking toward Gabriel, his steps determined but slightly uncoordinated, as though his legs had forgotten how to function properly. He had a plan. He always had a plan. He would walk up to Gabriel, introduce himself, and then engage him in a conversation about something intellectual and impressive. Maybe art history. Maybe the Renaissance. Gabriel liked art, so that was a safe starting point.

Except that when he got within ten feet of Gabriel, his plan completely fell apart.

Gabriel looked up from his sketchbook and smiled. It wasn't a big smile. It wasn't a flashy smile. It was just a small, soft, slightly embarrassed smile, the kind of smile that made people feel like they had just been let in on a secret.

"Hi," Gabriel said. "You're Max, right? The one who runs the homework empire?"

Max opened his mouth. Nothing came out. He tried again. Still nothing. His brain, which had never once failed him, had completely short-circuited.

Gabriel tilted his head, bemused. "Are you okay? You look like you've seen a ghost."

"I—" Max managed, his voice barely audible. "I—yes. I'm fine. I'm very fine. I'm fine in a way that has never been fine before. I'm—"

He stopped, realising that he was rambling. Ram. Ble. Maximilian Hawthorn, who could deliver a thirty-minute lecture on the fall of the Roman Empire without taking a breath, was rambling like a complete idiot.

Gabriel laughed. It was a soft, musical laugh, the kind that made Max feel like he was standing in the middle of a sunbeam.

"You're really weird," Gabriel said. "I like that."

And then, because Max was completely and utterly lost, he did the only thing he could think of: he turned around and walked away.