Out of School Lessons (Niah & Bevatoria)

"But you already have money!" A disgruntled voice whined through Ally Michaels' cellphone. She was currently stepping outside of her front door, intending to head towards her first tutoring session. Her best friend Miranda was currently trying to talk her out of it, but to no avail. "No, I have my parent's money! This is earning my own, which I can then use how I like. Plus this will look great on my college applications. It shows initiative, responsibility, entrepreneurship and lets people know that I care about helping others." Ally replied defiantly. "Since when Mother Theresa?" Miranda responded. "Since always... and you know... since... I was told to up my out of school and extra curricular activities to impress more schools." Ally admitted. "And there it is." Miranda replied with a satisfied tone. "Shut up! It earns me money, helps me get into college and stops another kid from flunking out of school. I don't see how you have a problem with this." Ally said as she began to skip down the steps that led up to the entrance of her house. "My problem is that I have my dad's credit card and no one to go shopping with!" Miranda began to whine again. "What happened to your card?" Ally asked as she walked down the circular driveway and towards her white Audi TT. "Got cancelled again." Miranda replied nonchalantly. "You know you have a problem, right?!" Ally said as she clicked the button on her keys to unlock the car. "I know! So how about you come teach me the value of money, instead of some loser high school maths!"

Slipping into the car, Ally shook her head and placed her work folders onto the passenger seat. "The most distinguished scholars in the world couldn't teach you the value of money Miranda. Best advice I can give is; try not to get your dad into debt and don't buy anything with rhinestones on. Makes you look like a cheap stripper imitating a disco ball, love you." Ally ended, before hanging up the phone and placing it into her handbag. She rolled her eyes a little, clipping herself in and then starting her engine. The address that she needed was already programmed into her GPS and so finding her destination shouldn't be a problem. The young woman had decided to try her hand at tutoring, as the deadline for college applications was due to rear it's ugly head this year. She had excellent grades and didn't see why she couldn't try and impart some of her knowledge onto students that weren't doing as well. So she had approached her principle with the idea of starting up a school tutoring program. The tutors would still get paid and be expected to teach their clients in their free time, just like adult tutors. However it would be organised through the school to ensure safety. After all; you didn't want complete strangers trying to convince teenagers to visit their house in order to tutor a child that might not even exist. This way the school could vet everyone involved and make sure that those asking for tutoring were genuine.

Last week she had been informed that a couple had been in contact on behalf of their son. Ally had yet to meet the allusive boy himself though, so today would be their first encounter. She didn't know much about him, other than his grades needed picking up. Pulling away from the large European style manor that she called her home, Ally began the twenty minute journey to his house. Needless to say that Ally led a very privileged life. The eighteen year old's house was positioned in the most upper class part of town and her parents both held jobs that earned a substantial amount of money. Her mother in the world of politics, her father CEO of his own self made company. The girl wanted for nothing and it showed. Growing up around such successful parents only pushed her to try and reach the same level of success. She was destined for an ivy league school and her determination to get there was fierce. Her parents had raised a very strong willed, no nonsense type of young woman.

The end of her journey landed Ally in quite a nice, average suburban neighborhood. Which didn't necessarily surprise her, after all; if you can afford to get your child a private tutor, then she supposed that you'd have to earn at least a somewhat decent wage. Though it was still quite small compared to her own upbringing, not that this bothered her in the slightest. Parking up, Ally grabbed her folder and walked up the pathway towards the front door. It was quite a nice day and so the young girl found herself wearing a white, see-through, lace shirt dress accompanied by a white under dress. It was accessorized with a brown belt, matching ankle boots and around her neck was a low hanging, turquoise, beaded necklace. She had a few top buttons undone so the necklace could be seen clearly, however her chest was completely covered and so she was still left looking modest. Her long brown hair had been allowed to remain loose and flowed past her shoulders, as she allowed a friendly smile to come across her face when kocking upon the door. Good first impressions and all that, she didn't want to start off on the wrong foot.

"C'mon, man. Your folks might be willing to put up with your shit, but I'm not. You know you don't have any money."

With a sigh, Chase Holtz let the silence linger before responding. For all of the things his parents couldn't get him to do, his best friend, Daniel, was very able to get through to him.

"I'm not saying you have to go along with it." He continued. "Just do the minimum to avoid getting tossed, and then once this year is done then you can figure your shit out."

"Yeah, yeah." Chase responded. For as much as he was pretending not to listen, the fact was that Daniel was one of the few people he respected. "Listen, I'll handle it."

"Aight. Later." With that, the conversation ended, and Chase flopped down onto his bed, muttering expletives under his breath. Fucking school making me get a fucking tutor. He was sure he didn't need one. Not really.

But his parents had insisted. And when he'd responded with his retort - "I only have to listen to one of you." - his Dad has told him to get the fuck into his room and wait.

He'd been planning on doing that anyways.

******

The person who answered Ally's knock, Julia, opened the door with a resigned look on her face, instantly turning to a small smile when she saw who it was. "Hello there. You must be the tutor the school has sent for us." Opening the door wider, she ushered the new guest in. "I'm Julia." After a beat, she spoke again, softly. "That's a lovely necklace you're wearing."

The older woman was dressed simply in a red blouse and dark shorts, with the hint of a matching tank top peeking out underneath.

Turning inside, she raised her voice. "Michael? Can you let Chase know his tutor is here?" A somewhat older, gruff voice responded, and soon a taller, dark haired man bounded up a set of stairs visible from the entryway, and only the sound of a couple of knocks on the door were heard downstairs as Julia led Ally into the kitchen.

"Do you need anything to drink?" She asked. "Water, juice, anything like that?" Soon afterwards, she led her into the study, which had a table set up with a couple of chairs, as the older blonde woman grabbed a laptop computer and folded it closed.

"I...don't know how much the school told you, but Chase will be very resistant to the idea of being taught by someone his own age." She tried to smile as she continued to clear things off, eventually placing several pens and some paper on the table, along with an overstuffed backpack that clearly wasn't hers. "Still, despite what he'll try to impress upon you, don't be fooled: he is a very...bright boy."

Bright, and resistant to being scolded by someone who wasn't his mother, she thought to herself.

A moment later, Chase was led into the room, his gaze downcast and defiant as his father stood behind him with his arms folded. Julia attempted to keep up the pretense of a 'happy' family. "There! Chase, this is Ally. Allly...." He motioned to him. "Chase."

The disgruntled high school student scowled before looking up at her. For a moment, his eyes had something resembling interest, and he sighed. "Fine. Can you guys bail so we can get this over with?" Julia bit back a sigh and left with a sad look on her face, as Michael - clearly the father - put his hand on Chase's shoulder.

"Remember what we talked about."

Soon, the two 'students' were left alone, and Chase scowled, settling into one of the two chairs as he went through the motions of opening his backpack. The moment the door shut behind them, he smirked a bit, settling his eyes on Ally.

"Well, at least you're hot." Chase was wearing a short sleeved denim shirt - unbuttoned to reveal a white tank top underneath. Clearly the denim shirt was some misguided nod to modesty as the exercise shorts he was wearing with it didn't exactly go with the denim...but it did show off a very fit, strong body which was now settling into the chair, slouching as he looked at Ally.

The older woman who answered the door was very pretty, at least in Ally's opinion. At first when approaching she hadn't looked particularly happy, however there was an attempt to brighten up as she smiled slightly. "Hi, Mrs. Holtz is it?" Ally replied pleasantly and took a step inside. Her hair fell across her face somewhat as she looked down towards her necklace, giving it a quick touch. "Oh thank you, always nice to have a little something with colour." She replied, pushing her hair back to it's original position. Never get a teenage girl started when it came to fashion, Ally could probably fill an hour long conversation just with accessory anecdotes.

She followed her host into the kitchen, "oh no, thank you though." They then continued into a modest sized study and Ally glanced around as Mrs. Holtz gathered up a laptop. "You have a lovely home." She told the woman politely, Ally always made sure to mind her Ps and Qs around adults. It was especially important with the upbringing that she had, as the majority of adults that her parents would introduce her to were often influential and powerful.

As Mrs. Holtz continued to speak, Ally couldn't help but notice a hint of sadness within her words. A slight feeling of uneasiness crept up on the young woman, turns out Chase didn't want her here. What made things worse is that according to his mum, even though he was failing most of his classes, he was actually quite smart. So... why was Ally here? If the guy had the ability to pass his classes, why wasn't he doing it?

Her feeling about the entire situation deteriorated even more as Chase came in. He stared at the floor like a bratty child as his father stood behind him with his arms crossed, looking as if he had, had to frog march him down the stairs. "Hi" Ally gave a slight wave as the two were introduced. He scowled before pretty much telling his parents to get lost. It was an act that obviously hurt his mother, going by her expression as she left the room. Mr. Holtz then seemed to have a stern word in his son's ear, before exiting also.

To be honest Ally was tempted to leave right then and there. She didn't sign up to be involved in some family soap opera and Chase clearly didn't want a tutor. The only thing that made her stay was the thought of how unprofessional it would be to quit on her first day. This was, after all, an attempt to showcase herself in a positive light for potential colleges. Quitting this early in would only give the impression that she was immature and hadn't thought her little business plan through well enough.

She stayed silent as the male continued to scowl, only replacing it with a smirk once his parents were completely alone. His next sentence simply caused her to roll her eyes, she was rich and pretty, this wasn't exactly her first time dealing with a creep. Though he was considerably better looking than most of the cat callers on the street, she still decided on not rising to the bait. "Hooray for me." She simply replied in a stale manner, glancing Chase up and down in a way that showed she clearly didn't think much of him.

Ally placed her folders on the desk and opened the top one on up, flipping through the pieces of paper that were inside. She leaned against the desk slightly, reading everything over. "We have several units to get through, any preference on which you wanted to start with first?" No point messing around with small talk and false pleasantries. She was here to tutor, so she might as well just get on with it.

Chase shrugged, as if it didn't matter to him where they started even as the fact he answered at all gave away that it did, in fact, matter where they started. "Physics." He hated the sciences, and so had chosen the one he figured would have been easiest for him to just fake his way through, or at least the one with the prettiest hotties. Not only did it turn out to probably be the hardest of the science classes, but the girl he'd expected to be in the class hadn't turned up.

Which, to be honest, matched him much of the time these days. No mother ever wanted to admit that their child wasn't the best of the best, but Julia was simply indulging in the sin of every well meaning parent. Naivete, blindness to her son's sins and faults. To some, it would have seemed like an attempt to compensate for the fact that Chase was not her son. As she quietly cleaned up in the kitchen, leaning in to accept a kiss on her forehead from Michael, she could only silently ruminate on the fact that Chase was all too much his father's son.

Michael had often talked of the troublemaker that he had been in high school, and that going in to the army to serve for four years had been a great thing for him. It was something Chase had expressed no interest in; if the young man had any thoughts for a single day outside of the current one, he certainly had not betrayed those to his parents.

Chase watched Ally as she moved about, placing the folders and papers on the table. It would be hard to tell if he was smart or bored, as his eyes continued to dart back at the pretty young woman as she moved about. Her attractiveness drew him in, sure, but the young man saw something else in the way she carried herself, too. Something unfamiliar to him, certainly from the company he usually kept. Ally seemed so well put together, graceful, deliberate.

"So, Ally...." started Chase, grabbing a couple of pens out of his backpack, getting ready to take notes and/or advice from his would-be tutor. "Are you going to try to teach me everything I need to know?"

An early smirk betrayed the immature response coming, although the steel behind his words would show something else. "Because I'd like to teach you a thing or two, too. Once we know each other a little better." Satisfied with his little poke, for the moment, he leaned in to try to listen - and leer, of course.