The sixteen year old boy hefted the strap of his backpack over his shoulder, completely neglecting the second strap and leaving it hanging from one shoulder. The front gate swung on its barely attached hinges with a sickly squeak as it closed behind the boy.

Typical for the city of London, the sky was filled with grey clouds, threatening the chance of rain later, hardly unusual at the best of times. Cars driven by daily commuters passed by as ordinarily as the weather was at the beginning of a thoroughly plain and normal day for London citizens.

It was a brisk October morning, and the gravel and dirt crunched beneath the teenager's black lace up shoes as he trudged along the edge of the pavement towards the bus stop. No sooner had he reached it than the large yellow school bus drew up at the curb, its brakes squeaking and in clear need of a service, a less than reassuring thought in regards to a vehicle designed to transport school children.

The term was barely a month in and Enoch O'Connor had already had enough. It had become a chore already to drag himself out of his bed, into a uniform, and worst of all a tie, and onto the bus to his sixth form school and year twelve education.

The doors opened with a grind and Enoch stepped onto the bus. The driver paid him little heed as he did so, no more thrilled with his job than Enoch was about school. He cast a cursory glance around the seats, half full of boys and girls his own age before trudging down the narrow aisle towards the empty, furthermost back row. He dropped into the window side and set his backpack firmly beside him, a clear indication that he didn't care for anyone sitting beside him. Just as the bus began to move, Enoch pressed his headphones into his ears, turned up his music loud enough to drown out the dull chatter of the other students, and rested his elbow against the narrow space between window and wall.

Enoch was only stirred from his vacant staring out the window by a dainty hand with long fingers waving in his face.

"What?" He grumbled, impatiently tugging one head phone free from his ear and raising a dark eyebrow at the girl who had been trying to get his attention from the seat in front of him. The hand belonged to Olive, a fellow sixth former with red hair that fell just past her shoulders and a fringe that just covered her eyebrows. He hadn't even seen her get on the bus. She, unlike many of the other year twelve students he had anything to do with, had come from a different school before sixth form. He had only known as much as her name for a month and already, to his vague annoyance, she was far friendlier with him than he was inclined to be with anyone.

"I said, did you finish the maths homework for Mr. Barron? He'll have your head if you don't hand it in again, Enoch."

Enoch just stared at her, his nose slightly wrinkled as if he couldn't believe she'd even bother to ask him that. He voiced as much.

"'e don' like me anyway. Yes I did, what's it got to do wiv you?" He snipped, his Cockney accent leaking prominently through.

The girl flinched slightly at his tone and she drew back her hand where it had been resting on the back of her seat between them. Her blue green eyes lowered and she pursed her lips slightly before turning around and facing forward again. "I was just trying to be nice, Enoch."

"Whatever." Enoch rolled his eyes and without paying any attention to how her chin quivered slightly, plugged his ear phones back in and turned his music back up.

Enoch O'Connor had never liked school. He'd never had many friends throughout his years of schooling and his primary years had been far worse for him socially than academically. Evidently being the son of an undertaker and living down the road from the funeral parlour which his family had owned and run for generations, was not a conversation starter. As a young boy of eight or so, Enoch had been on the receiving end of many a schoolyard tormenting and more often than not had gone home with less in his backpack ,or far more bruises, than he'd arrived at the school with.

It had lessened in his teenage years, slightly, if only for the fact that Enoch had shot up in height and stature and developed such a thoroughly unpleasant attitude to other people. Now Enoch could give as good as or better than he got, he was much the subject of muttered jeers in the corridor and less the subject of schoolyard challenges and circles of chanting students.

So he spent much of his school day by himself, or occasionally in the company of Hugh, one of the few other boys his age he could tolerate the company of for any length of time. Hugh Apiston was a cheerful, albeit exceptionally stubborn boy whom the teachers had long since given up trying to make him remove the peaked cap he insisted on wearing despite dress code. He was reasonably loud, on the football team and was so good natured most of the time it was very difficult for anyone to dislike him.

xxxXxxx

"Nice of you to join us, Mr. O'Connor."

Enoch swore under his breath as he stepped into the classroom, five minutes after the bell hand rung to signal the beginning of the next period. Mr Barron was a tall, dark skinned man with little sense of humour and an intense dislike for tardiness. A few of the girls on the right side of the room as Enoch entered, giggled until the teacher shot them a look to silence the laughter.

"I was lookin' for mah pap-"

"Aha..." Mr Barron interrupted, and Enoch wrinkled his nose slightly in distaste as he rearranged his books in the crook of an elbow, standing awkwardly at the front of the class as the teacher hounded him.

"And what excuse do we have this time? A stray dog, perhaps? Am I close?"

"No..." Enoch ground out through clenched teeth, colour starting to flood his face the longer he stood and felt everyone's eyes on him. "I was lookin' through my bag, 'ere..." He pulled from between a textbook and an A4 binder, his slightly crumpled homework and dropped it on the teacher's desk before he could comment on its untidiness. While he thought he had a chance to escape further scrutiny, Enoch quickly started to weave through the rows of desks to a vacant seat at the back of the classroom.

"You could have had it ready you know?" Muttered the boy at the desk in front of him dressed in uniform that was so impeccably neat he could have ironed it at lunch and no one would be surprised. "That would have saved everyone some troub-ow! Sir, Enoch's kicking m-"

"Did not, 'orace is bloomin' clumsy, everyone knows it." Enoch retracted his foot from where he had aimed a well-placed kick at the other boy's ankle and shot him a filthy glare, practically daring him to try again.

"I think that's quite enough distractions for one lesson." Barron's booming voice silenced the argument as he fixed Enoch with a look that clearly meant he knew perfectly well that Enoch was the one at fault. "Now let's all try and concentrate for at least five minutes, shall we?"

Enoch glared at the surface of the desk and slouched down in his seat, spreading out his textbook and paper over the desk and keeping his head down. It wasn't that he particularly struggled with mathematics, in fact he was reasonably confident with the class, it was simply that he didn't care about how well he placed, or about handing in homework he deemed useless and unnecessary.

'Oi, Enoch!"

"Seriously, can't I 'ave five minutes today?" Enoch grumbled to himself, hoisting his bag further over one shoulder and determinedly trying to ignore the voice shouting his name behind him. The bell had just rung and the yard filled with students rushing out the doors and through the courtyard towards the school gates.

"Hey! I said wait!"

Enoch sighed and stopped halfway between the front doors and the gate. He turned slowly on the spot and raised a dark eyebrow. It had just begun to drizzle with rain so light it was barely noticeable. Hurrying his way between the rivers of other students towards him, was Hugh, his cap resting slightly higher on his brown waves than usual from the jostling.

"What?" Enoch asked bluntly, "It couldn't wait?"

"No, because you're here now, aren't you? It would do you a world of good to lighten up a little, ya know." Hugh clapped a hand on Enoch's shoulder and fell into step beside him as they continued towards the school gates.

"Oh thanks, I'd never 'eard that before, duly noted." Enoch replied dryly and rolled his eyes. His foot slipped on a loose piece of gravel and he barely caught himself tripping over his own feet. Muttering a curse under his breath, he glanced over at Hugh and shrugged one shoulder. "What d'ya want again?"

"Nothing, we're just going the same way."

"You don't take the bus."

"Okay fine, I missed the biology homework."

Enoch stopped dead in his tracks so suddenly that the blonde haired girl behind him from their biology class walked right into him. He didn't spare so much as a glance in apology as Emma scoffed and side stepped around them.

"Know ya audience, what makes you fink I care?"

"Because you're good at it."

"Don't mean I listened any more than you. This ain't homework is it?"

Hugh's ears suddenly burned a violent pink and his eyes drifted behind Enoch to the school bus as it began to pull up at the curb. "Okay fine." He lowered his voice and crossed his arms over his chest, which only made Enoch raise his eyebrows even higher. "Fiona asked me for help this afternoon and I wasn't paying any attention at all. Come on, mate."

The yellow bus squealed to halt at the bus stop and Enoch let out an exaggerated sigh of exasperation. He stared at Hugh, who was clearly thoroughly embarrassed at having to ask and after a long moment, slid his backpack from his shoulder, unzipped it and pulled out his textbook.

"It's in there." He muttered, tossing the book at the other boy and pulling his bag back over his shoulder. "I want that back in the morning."

Without so much as a word of goodbye, Enoch marched off towards the bus, jumping onto the step the last of the passengers.

By now all the seats at the rear of the bus were full and he cast a displeased gl ance around for options. There were few free seats but he chose the lesser of the evils and made his way down the aisle towards the middle of the bus towards the vacant spot beside a blonde boy and opposite the one occupied by Olive and Emma.

Whack. His foot collided suddenly with something and Enoch barely caught the edge of the seat in time to avoid sprawling into a pile on the floor, his knee smacked hard into the pole and someone snickered behind him. Enoch turned his glare onto a pair of twelfth year boys the row behind his back in time to see one not so subtly drawing his foot back in.

"Nick off." He growled, and dropped heavily into the free seat, rubbing his knee and facing the aisle rather than the student beside him as the bus lurched and began to move.

"Are you alright?" A soft voice made him look up and Enoch's grimace of annoyance and pain rapidly turned into an impassive mask as he looked up at Olive's concerned face. He didn't need anyone to ask him that, of course he was fine. Why should anyone care when he didn't?

The boy merely grunted and drew his long leg back into his row as he turned to face stoically forward, rummage through his pockets and plug himself back in against the world.

xxxXxxx