Steep Air
by SMYGO4EVA
Raf rubbed his eyes and read the same sentence for a third time, looking for errors in his biology report, trying not to think about that fact that he was alone with Miko in her room late at night.
He had been alone with her in her room before – plenty of times, when they were little and he and Jack had come over to hang out. But that was before all the stuff with the Autobots alongside puberty, school, and now sitting this close to Miko took on a whole new meaning.
Miko, meanwhile, stringing her electric guitar, was too absorbed in her task to notice the way Raf kept glancing over to her. Raf felt his hands become clammy and he then adjusted his glasses. He was never good at reading signals, even from his closest friend. He found himself analyzing her behavior to the point of becoming creepy, looking for hints about whether she liked him the same way. He never got anything definite though.
Miko was strumming her hands on the guitar strings, humming a tune in her mind. Bringing her guitar was her idea, as Raf was perfectly content to stick to research and writing. Now, however, he couldn't concentrate, because he was too busy watching Miko push a stray lock of her hair out of the way, as it kept falling from behind her ear and into her face.
There was something entrancing about the way she played with the lock, first just pushing it behind her ear, then twisting it into a rope, and then just leaving it alone.
"Hey dude?"
Raf snapped out of it. "Y-yeah?"
"How's your report going?"
"Oh!" Raf looked down and saw that the first two thirds of the page were covered in neat, handwritten comments in red pen. Raf was merciless in revising the paper, inspecting for even the slightest spelling or grammar error and tweaking every awkward sentence or phrase. As time had gone on, however, the notes had trailed off; right about the time he noticed Miko was playing with that stray lock of hair.
"Uh…well, it's going good. I just need to finish this paragraph and – Miko? "
"No, go on, I'm listening," Miko had placed her guitar next to the desk and flopped down on her back onto her bed, legs hanging over the side. "I'm just lying down here for a sec; all of this stuff is giving me a headache." She groaned and rubbed her head.
"Oh. Okay. I think that's enough work for now." Raf realized that he really did have an awful headache – throbbing against his forehead.
"Well you can lie down here then," Miko said.
"What?"
"Dude, you can lie down on the bed next to me and take a break. It won't be awkward or anything."
Oh yes it will.
"Uh…okay." Raf walked over to the bed and laid down on it, trying to keep a reasonable space between him and her.
"Ugh, I knew this would happen." Miko's eyes were closed. "I lie down, and now I don't want to get up again."
"Yeah, same here."
Raf may have been a mechanical genius, but this was beyond his understanding. It felt like he was in steep air with her now.