Few things that were more aggravating in the morning than the voice of Jimmy Hopkins. Especially before Gary had smoked the first cigarette of the day.
"Well look what the cat dragged in," he leered as Gary emerged from his room, blurry-eyed and only half-dressed, gripping his sweater in his hand and rubbing sleep from his face. "Good morning, sunshine."
"Shut up, Jimmy," he droned, still clinging to the haze of sleep. He had been happy to wake alone, well-rested from the deepest sleep since he'd returned. Lola had done just what he wanted her to – put him down then disappear. Jimmy was going to ruin his buzz being this obnoxious at such an early hour.
"What are you so cranky about?" Jimmy taunted, clearly revelling in some sort of post-coital triumph of his own – like the achievement of orgasm with someone was a commendable act. While they were squabbling Pete rolled up from his own room. "Didn't last night go well?"
"Mind your own business," he replied grouchily. He had scratches that still stung to move, but letting Jimmy know would be giving into his idiocay.
"It went that badly?" he baited with a sick grin.
"What are you talking about?" Pete interjected, and Gary gave an impatient sigh.
"You tell me," he retorted, and grabbed the back of his collar to hike up his shirt, airing out a back full of the only proof he hadn't dreamed it all, while Jimmy let out a long whistle.
"Holy heck," he hissed. "Are you sure it was a girl?"
"I did wonder about the whiskers," he remarked dryly, and Jimmy snorted. Gary resettled his clothing just as Pete was trying to strain into view.
"What is it?" he pitched. "Why-"
"Maybe when you're older, Petey," Gary chided, but Jimmy gave a dirty chuckle.
"Gary's just finally gotten over himself and thinks it makes him special," Jimmy commented.
"What does that mean?" Pete replied blankly, lost as a sheep at sea.
"Oh yeah," Jimmy murmured. "We didn't tell you about it, did we?"
"Apparently not," Pete said shirtily. Not that he was unaccustomed to missing the boat.
"Don't let Gary fool you, it was nothin' special," he observed. "Just snuck in some girls to celebrate getting back to school, if you know what I mean."
"What?" Pete shot.
"Don't go all head boy on us," Gary teased at his indignant look. "We can't take it back. Not literally at least."
"But then... who," Pete fumbled, staring at Gary like he was trying to find the right words for 'who in their right mind would fuck you?'
"Don't be an idiot," he slurred, and Jimmy chortled.
"Really, Pete," he commented. "There's only one girl loose and crazy enough to do him."
"Crazy keeps it fun," Gary retorted. "Keep all the boring sluts for yourself, Jimmy. Please."
"Surely not," Pete tacked on. "Not Lo-"
"Shh," Gary cut in. "There are people who can hear you, Pete. I don't like her enough to get the crap beaten out of me twice."
Jimmy was leading the way as they started from the dorm up to the main building for class, and Gary followed, eager to light his morning smoke into the cooling winter air. Why they were bothering to go together wasn't something he had thought about, but seeing as they were there he stuck around.
"Seriously though," Petey announced like the conversation had been unbroken by half of campus. They picked through students, the chaos noticeably calmer than when they were newly back. "I can't believe you... you know... with her."
"So?" Gary said, shrugging and pulling on his cigarette.
"She's got a boyfriend," he pointed out, and Gary nodded.
"Exactly," he conferred. "That's the best part."
"But... that doesn't make sense," Pete disagreed.
"Sure it does," he countered. "I wouldn't want to fuck her if she was single, eugh." That probably wasn't true, not for her, but it felt good to say it anyway. "Oh no, don't look at Jimmy for solidarity," he added as Pete looked around for help. "He cheats too."
"I don't," Jimmy denied gruffly.
"What about Mandy?" Gary posed, and Jimmy went quiet. Oh yes, he knew all about that as well.
"All right, except for Mandy," he conceded. "Speaking of which, you gonna talk to her or what? I'm sick of getting running practice just to get in and out of the gym."
"Soon," he accepted without fuss. "She'll like me better if she doesn't know about Lola anyway, best act before it gets out." Petey looked like he wanted to make a fuss about his feminist principles being offended or something, but gave up when he realised he was preaching to exactly the wrong audience.
They parted for classes, leaving Gary outside with the remnants of his cigarette, resolving how and when and why to speak to Mandy. Today felt like a good day. He'd make the most of it.
Although classes weren't better than they usually were, they certainly weren't worse, and he got through them without much issue. The real work was afterwards; Mandy came like a fish onto a hook following a well-worded note in her locker. He didn't take up much of her time, just enough to convince her into one of their customary sessions of secretive backchat. She didn't need much convincing, and he wondered if she'd even missed his confidence.
Within a day they were in Bullworth Town with a list a mile long about everything and everyone who'd got on her tits since Gary left. Chiefly was Ted ignoring her to resume bullying of the other cliques, and some throwaway remarks about Jimmy being out of line for what he'd done to Gary. Of course, she was never going to see issue with anyone hitting Zoe Taylor.
It wasn't especially hard to turn her opinions back over – he suggested that Jimmy wasn't worth the trouble of consideration, that he was in fact a waste of effort in hating, then how Ted was a far better guy than Jimmy was anyway. No need to fuss over the mongrel and neglect the pet she had waiting for her, he explained, and set her out to assuage Ted's fractured male ego.
As always, she took his suggestions like applesauce. Gary assured Jimmy it wouldn't be long before the results played out. Following the meeting, Jock testosterone levelled out considerably and Jimmy found Ted far more receptive to negotiations. Probably because he'd gotten laid.
By the end of the week, with a few arguments and only one very small fight, Jimmy and Ted had cut an arrangement – Ted and his boys would keep in mind who was boss, and back off the bullying around school, and Jimmy would keep his depraved self away from Ted's girlfriend. Which was fine, considering Mandy had been the one to pursue Jimmy and cause all the trouble in the first place.
Gary only watched that one play out from the sidelines, acting from behind the curtain, but it put him right next to his final goal. If he was lucky, he'd be able to achieve the rest in one leap. Pete, however, had other ideas – eager as he ever was with his beady little eyes, watching Gary like a sparrow on a hawk, wondering when he was going to turn next and go for him as the nearest piece of lunch.
"Gary," he inquired as they coalesced in the canteen for lunch one day. "Can I talk to you about something?"
"I'm sure you can," he answered obnoxiously, "as to whether you should, Pete, I can't say. Is it going to be stupid?"
"No... well, I don't think so," he moped.
"That depends on what it is, femme-boy," he declared, favouring the most food-like looking of the meal selections, and reminding himself that it was still a step above Happy Volts.
"Okay," he began hesitantly, speaking like his own voice made him uncomfortable. "I don't really think this is a good place for it. Maybe if we go somewhere quieter-"
"I see how it is," he cut in. "You want to get me alone, Petey? Is that it? I hate to break it to you, princess, but I simply can't fuck you unless you have a boyfriend already."
"Gary, be serious," he bit, and he let off an amused chuckle.
"You want me to be serious?" he echoed like a panto-audience. "With you? How can I be serious, Petey, when you're such a joke?" Petey huffed and puffed like he was intending to go and blow down some little pigs' houses; or as if he were intending to reach out and give Gary a slap, were he far braver and less wimpy, of course.
"Don't be a jerk, Gary," he nagged, and then it was Gary's call to heave a sigh.
"Oh all right," he consented wearily. "But only because you've caught me in a good mood."
"Could've fooled me," Petey mumbled, but Gary only gave a scathing laugh.
"Come on, Patricia," he coaxed sarcastically. "There's got to be an empty bench somewhere round here." They skipped out on lunch and went around school, taking a bench near the side, where Gary lit up to much-disapproving eyes. "So," he proclaimed, pulling on his cigarette and blowing the smoke in Petey's face. "What is it?" Petey eyed him as if he'd forgotten what words were for a minute. "Well?" he barked.
"I... just..." he started, fumbling for courage, or guts, or whatever it was he needed to be straight with Gary. "I want to know what you're planning," he ground out at last. "About Jimmy."
"Come on," he goaded. "We made that pretty clear, didn't we?"
"Your plan for him, not with him," he insisted. "What are you trying to achieve?"
"Well," Gary sighed, "I said I was going to run this place, didn't I? So that's what I'm going to do." This time he'd actually pull it off. Live and learn, he told himself. He wasn't going to repeat his mistakes.
"But Jimmy-"
"Is part of it," he finished for him.
"Seriously," Pete entreated. "What are you going to do to him?" With the look in Petey's eyes, Gary found himself wondering whether he and Jimmy would ever just get over themselves and do whatever it was Jimmy did with those smelly boys in his room, but he kept the remark to himself for once.
"Nothing," he answered purely, "that's the best part. Jimmy stays exactly where and what he is."
"I don't believe you," Pete accused. "You won't share power."
"Don't act like you know me," he snapped. "Jimmy suits his position. Every gormless king needs a crafty Lieutenant," he explained slyly. "Soon I'll be able to do anything I want in this dump."
"No," Pete denied fiercely. "Jimmy will-"
"Jimmy won't do shit," he retorted. "He trusts me, and nothing that you or anyone else say is going to change that."
"He can't," Pete denied, like he couldn't bear to hear it.
"Ask him," Gary challenged. He wanted Pete to, he wanted to eat the expression off his face when Jimmy turned and said he trusted Gary because they were the pair of Jacks who'd gone through the same shredder together. "I dare you, Pete. Just you ask him." They knew the answer both.
"Well... when you betray him again," he grasped for straws while Gary scowled, irritated at Pete's own low expectations of him.
"I'm not going to," he remarked. "That would be stupid."
"Well... wh-," Petey was gasping for breath like a fish in a pond. "Well what happened?" he asked at last.
"You have eyes" Gary answered caustically. "We're taking over."
"Before then," he corrected. "Something happened in Happy Volts, didn't it? It had to. That's why the two of you are-"
"Why would you jump to a stupid conclusion like that?" he butted in, bullshitting to the full limit of his capability.
"Because you both... it's like... and it's not just Jimmy, either," Petey fumbled for words that made any kind of sense. "He trusts you, but you don't just... it's like you... respect him, or something." Gary pulled a face, flicking ash into Pete's lap.
"Stop, you'll make me sick," he dismissed.
"You do," Petey protested. "You don't even really fight with him, just laugh it off... like... like you're friends or something."
"We're not friends," he hissed, but Petey didn't buy it.
"What went on? Did Jimmy do something?" Gary didn't like these suggestions any more. The oyster didn't want to be opened.
"Fucking hell, Pete!" he snapped at last. "If I wanted to sit around listening to useless chatter, I've got plenty of better options than this. What's your problem with me and Jimmy getting along? Is it that hard to believe, or do you just not want to believe it?"
"No, I-"
"Is it because you feel left out now you're not the special piggy-in-the-middle between us any more?" he slandered. "And what's so awful about me wanting to run this school anyway?" he continued to rage like a burst dame. "We'll do a better job together than either of us did alone." We, we'll, those words that crept into his vocabulary by mistake.
"There's no we with you," Pete argued, and Gary had taken enough of this.
"What the hell would you know?!" he snarled, bolting up in his seat and throwing away his still-burning cigarette. "You don't know a goddam thing compared to what you think you do, Pete. So just shut up and let me have what I want for once!" With a final cathartic shot of anger, it was gone, and Petey had eyes on him like he'd never thought of it that way before.
"What do you want, Gary?" he asked carefully. But for once he had the truth ready on his mouth.
"I want to live without taking shit from people like you all the time," he hissed, and there it was, soaked in blood. "You go on and on about right and wrong," he continued with a more subdued air. "So tell me, what is so fundamentally wrong with me?"
Petey clearly knew he was being backed into a corner, because he said nothing; not fool enough to try and suggest something Gary might do in power as evidence. There were plenty of things he could do that would ruin Bullworth, but that wasn't what the question was about. Pete knew that nice was just as much a setting as nasty, and he could likewise be a good ruler as well as a bad one. Give him what he wanted, he was suggesting, and he might elect to be a benign dictator.
"You know, I'm glad we had this chat," Gary remarked sardonically, patting him on the shoulder to resist the urge to slap him. "Really cleared things up. Oh," he added as he got up, "friendly word of advice, Pete. Don't try to get in my way."
"Or what?" Petey asked timidly, watching Gary leave.
"Moron," he derided. "Or you'll have Jimmy to answer to." It was a flat statement; no direct threat because he didn't need to make it that sharp, the flat of the blade would serve. Petey was going to have to deal with whatever teenage-girl issues he had with himself, because Gary was planning to run this arrangement for a while.
He'd resolved to himself that the best way to rule would be as the brains alongside Jimmy's brawn – as the right and left hand of his operation, where he made all the important decisions and gave all crucial advice, but didn't actually have to deal with the boringthings like people wanting his help. Jimmy knew too, and he accepted it. He seemed to, at least. Still at the back of his mind he held a little reservation, a last stronghold of defence. He would always be the one to turn first.
But Jimmy had been dependent enough on Gary's input through Happy Volts that by now he was used to taking his word. They'd had a whole pack of opportunities to stab each other in the back, and the only thing he had were scratches from the girl Jimmy had helped him sneak in – his cheap gesture of comfort, like they really were friends. Even if they weren't, they were cooperating, which was better.
Gary Smith wasn't stupid, and he wasn't going to ruin something that was working.
In fact there was just one clique left to pull back into line; the preps under the entitled brat Derby Harrington, and now he and Jimmy were about ready to get on the case. They'd sworn to handle it together – both practical and a final seal of cooperation on their pact. So one evening after school they stood side by side at the doors of Harrington House, preparing to storm the fort.
"You sure this is going to work?" Jimmy asked as they squared off at the doors.
"Don't you trust me?" he baited. "It'll work."
"I hope you're right," he remarked, and then with a true home-run arm he slammed a hand into the front door, which went flying open. The lobby was shocked.
"What are you two doing in here?!" Chad stormed first and foremost out of the rabble.
"We're here to see Derby," Gary announced, selecting a cricket bat from the wall and hanging it over his shoulder.
"You are not welcome here," Chad retorted, and then realised he was getting a none-too-sympathetic look from Jimmy, who had a bat of his own, which he was now swinging back and forth, as if to test the weight and velocity.
"Just tell him we're here," Gary insisted. "Or would you like your screams to serve as an alarm?" That hit home. Although they were deep into prep turf, it was late and half their ranks were probably in their Vale homes luxuriating in four-poster beds already. Not to mention all of them would have very vivid memories of being on the receiving end of what Jimmy could do with a bat or similarly-proportioned weapon.
Sure enough, Chad rushed off with a scowl, and whether it was to pass on the message or simply to pick up reinforcement, the result was that Derby soon came storming down a flight of stairs, Bif treading after him like he was playing grandma's footsteps.
"What is the meaning of this?!" Derby blazed. "You barge in here, make threats, acting as if you're-"
"Just getting your attention, Derby," Gary explained politely. "Would you have got here so quickly if we hadn't?"
"This is-" Derby started, but a sideways flick of the eyes from Gary and Jimmy stepped forward to take the stage.
"No, let me tell you something, Derby," he barged in, jabbing the end of his bat menacingly at Derby."Playtime's over. You get me?"
"I certainly do not," he replied haughtily.
"What he's saying, friend," Gary chimed in, not moving from the spot, but riveting his eyes on Derby's with piercing intensity, "is that you still get your little fiefdom, but it's time to remember who's on top."
"And that's you is it, Smith?" Derby accused sarcastically, but Gary's only response was a toothy smile, like a lion baring canines at the other cats. "Befitting, I suppose," the prep added, his eyes flitting back to Jimmy. "Two lunatics leading a ship of fools."
"You want to try it, Harrington?" Gary inquired frostily.
"Go on, Derby," Jimmy bit, glaring up at him. "Do it. Make my freaking day." There was Derby's problem, right in the tensing around his eyes, the slightly-intimidated squint that remembered Jimmy Hopkins had kicked his ass four ways to Sunday, and that Gary Smith had made him do it.
"It's simple," Gary cut in, before they reached the point of obstinacy where a fight was the only way of resolving things. "It's your last year here, Harrington. You don't want to spend it struggling to keep control over your clique, do you? Because believe me, that's what'll happen. As well as the beatings," he added, and Jimmy waggled his eyebrows suggestively.
"Ah... you know what? I'm sure... we can... resolve matters," he murmured uncomfortably, a touch of the begrudging in his tone.
"Yeah, we can," Jimmy explained. "You say yes boss, and make sure your boys don't go around getting into trouble they got no right to be in. Then we'll have no problems at all."
"Ugh," Derby groaned. "Do I have to?"
"Unless you'd prefer 'yes Jimmy and Gary sir'," Gary interjected in a derogatory imitation. Derby rolled his eyes, and glanced at the few allies he had with him.
"As if you weren't bad enough separately," Derby groaned. That seemed to be a popular observation these days. "Very well," he sighed like Bif had put his arms around his chest and squeezed every last puff of air out of him.
"Very well what?" Jimmy queried brashly.
"Feuds are off. There'll be no trouble unless someone else comes asking for it," Derby consented. "I was getting bored of it anyway."
"And?" Jimmy persisted.
"And... you're the boss," he relented, grinding through his back teeth, then darted his eyes at Gary. "Plural."
"Then we understand each other," Jimmy pronounced, stepping back away from Derby. "Evening, girls," he said by way of leaving, and they headed back for the stairs, holding onto the bats just in case. On the outside Gary was glowing with victory.
"See, Jimmy?" he gloated as they trotted up to the fountain. "Not one punch thrown."
"You say that like it's a good thing," Jimmy replied sourly. "I still reckon a beating would've done'em better."
"Patience and dispensation, Jimmy," he lectured. "Save the beating for the first time they cross the line. Make them hurt, and they'll behave again for good. They might be pedigree, but they can be trained like any other dog."
"You're saying I wait for them to have an accident and then rub their faces in it?" he surmised.
"Good, Jim," he slurred patronisingly. "I see the metaphor stuck. That demonstrates commendable memory skills."
"Get over yourself," Jimmy retorted, not taking well to the condescension. "Still a prick after everything I've done for you."
"Likewise," he accused.
"Yeah, well I think I'm just about used to it now," Jimmy declared nonchalantly, dropping his bat by the dorm steps and tromping up inside.
"You know, Petey's not happy," Gary added out of nowhere, and Jimmy turned and glanced at him, eyes off the dorm for a moment.
"He ain't? Why not?" Apparently his observational skills didn't reach that far.
"He doesn't like this," Gary replied, and Jimmy understood what he meant without need for further detail. "He thinks I've got something nasty planned for you."
"Have you?" Jimmy suggested.
"No," he answered, and slightly to his own surprise it was the truth. For now, at least.
"Good. I believe you," Jimmy accepted, and again Gary felt the sting of being trusted so freely. It was power, but it was also frightening. Except he told himself he didn't have to break it before it could take root, he could cultivate it. Take the sapling from strength to strength, then cash it all in on something really worthwhile.
"Jimmy," he started as they were about to part in the hallway. The air was unwelcoming and cold even inside – snow would be on the way soon.
"Yeah, man?" he replied unquestioningly.
"I like the way this worked out," he admitted, the sounds strange from his lips. Seal the deal, he told himself, it only felt risky because it was worth something.
"Uhuh, me too," he grunted, and that was enough.