Relax
By: Riley
Summary – 'You need to relax'. Cody was always hearing that, especially when his school work was concerned. It's too bad that he actually took that suggestion to heart.
"Are you done yet?"
"One minute."
"You said that about a half hour ago, Cody."
Cody Martin made a light humming sound out of the corner of his mouth as he continued to scour over the textbook pages in front of him, his hand rapidly shifting a pen back and forth against his notebook as he took notes. It wasn't until he heard an exasperated sigh to his right that he leaned his head back and shifted his attention toward Rhuben Jackson, as she sat curled up in the corner of the couch, looking pointedly at her phone.
"Did you want something?" He asked sarcastically.
She turned her attention from her phone and feigned innocence before shaking her head, a playful smile tugging at her lips. "No, I just liked asking you questions over and over again to get on your nerves." When Cody lightly rolled his eyes, turning his attention back to his textbook, she sat up. "No, seriously, Codes, I like doing that." She reached out and poked him on the cheek. "Your face turns red and that vein in your neck that usually only throbs when Zack is bugging you starts to go crazy, yeah?" She sat up straight and rested her hands in her lap.
"Yes, well, apparently neither you nor Zack seem to understand the importance of homework," Cody remarked. He made a show of licking his thumb, placing it on the corner of his page, and tuning the page over. Then he was back to pressing his nose into the book, studying the physics material as quickly as he could. Out of the corner of his eye, he watched as his girlfriend spun her phone around her hand and between her fingers with ease, much like a drumstick. "Yes, Rhuney, what is it?"
"You don't know how to relax," she commented.
"I know how to relax," he replied. "Bubble baths, mediation, massages, rubbing my temples, locking Zack out of the suite, those all relax me." He turned and pressed his pen into the tip of her nose. "You usually do, but right now you aren't."
"Because I'm asking you a question? Because I want to spend time with you?"
"Because you won't let me finish reading this book. One I'm done with this then we can—"
"Sit here and watch as you move on to your history homework?" She leaned back against the arm of the couch, now bringing her knees up and resting her arms on them. "I can tell its killing you, Codes, that I'm stopping you from working." She squinted an eye, turning her head to the side. "Has anyone ever told you that you care too much about school?"
"Only Zack, but he's pulling straight D's so who knows how valuable his opinion is," Cody dismissed her. She laughed and he leaned in and gave her a quick kiss. Leaning back, he flicked his hair out of his face, trying to get back to work, and then stopped as he felt a wave of irritation roll up his spine. As much as he loved his girlfriend, she had an unmistakable way of getting to him that could be very annoying. Especially with how perceptive she could be. "There's nothing wrong with wanting to make sure my future is laid out for me."
"It becomes a bloody problem when it's all you care about, yeah?" Rhuben pointed out. She examined her fingernails before lowering her hand and looking hi in the eye. "You nearly kill yourself every time there's a test coming up."
Test? All of a sudden the hairs on the back of Cody's neck stood up as he wracked his brain, trying to remember something. Eyes widening, he lunged forward and grabbed onto his backpack. Rhuben got there first, ninja-rolling off of the couch and grabbing onto it before quickly backing away. "Rhu, give me that!"
She held a hand out and pressed her palm against his chest, extending her other arm to keep his backpack away from him. Despite the height he had over her, he knew she wasn't going to allow him to get to the backpack anytime soon. "Is one measly little test so aggro? Anything under an 'A' is really going to make a difference to your grade point average?"
"Yes!" Cody declared. He faltered for a second. Saying it out loud did seem a bit ridiculous to him, but it was something he enjoyed doing. He liked studying and learning everything he could with any subject that caught his attention. Did doing that with nearly everything that came his way really come out to be such a problem? "Rhu…"
"All I'm asking is that you take some time off to relax," she said, slowly moving the backpack to her front and hugging it to her chest. "To realize that there are more important things in life than getting to the top of the class. Like having fun." She emphasized the last word by slowly holding his backpack out to him. "Which I thought we were going to have today." She ran a hand through her hair, turning to the side so that he couldn't see the frown that tugged at her lips.
Now Cody felt guilty as he reached out and took the backpack. He gazed at his girlfriend as she placed her hands on her hips and gently rolled her head to the side, looking at him meaningfully. This was the girl that had become his friend so easily when she first moved to the Tipton hotel, defended him from Zack and his bullies' constant torment of his being a nerd, and embraced his nerdiness all at the same time. At the same time, she dealt with her own problems with grace and dignity, helping him with his al the same. The light smile on her face caused him to let out a sigh through his nose.
"I'm sorry," he apologized. "I know I invited you here to the Tipton so we could hang out…especially because your place is so crowded," he added, referring to her siblings and cousins who all lived in their house with their uncle. Despite that, their large group of friends did make it hard to have some time to themselves ever now and then, just as he had promised for their date that afternoon. "But I really thought I could get this homework done. Give me another ten minutes and then we can go to the pool or the game room or something. Zack got us banned for a while, but I can get us back in."
Raising an eyebrow, Rhuben looked amused for a minute. "That sounds like fun, but I have to get home. It's my turn to make dinner." She went over to the couch and grabbed her backpack off the floor and slid it over her shoulders. She then went back over to Cody and stood on her tiptoes, giving him a quick kiss on the cheek. "I'll see you tomorrow, yeah? Just, please don't burn yourself out on this stuff." She gently grabbed the front of his shirt, pulling him against her before releasing him. "It's not going to kill you to take a day off." She started to walk backwards towards the door, brushing her purple strand of hair out of her eyes. "But I might," she added mysteriously before leaving the suite.
Cody waved and closed the door behind her. He let a light sigh escape his mouth before going back to the couch and gathering his books. Balancing them in his arms, he went into the room he and Zack shared and dumped his belongings onto the bed. Hearing a clattering sound, he realized that his calculator—the expensive mathematic-scientific one his mother had gotten him for his eighteenth birthday—and hurried around the side of the bed to retrieve it. Inspecting it for damage, something brightly colored caught Cody's eye. Reaching under his bed, he pulled out a Nerf Gun and held it in his hand. A light smile came to his face as he remembered the days he and Zack would run back and forth around the Tipton hotel in a massive Nerf Gun war that managed to irritate Mr. Moseby to no end, as well as encompass most of the Tipton staff to play along every floor of the hotel.
One of the best times Zack and I had in this place, Cody thought, running his hand against the plastic. Then a thought entered his head as a sly smile filled his face. Setting his calculator aside, Cody got down onto his stomach and started to search under his bed for ammo.
Rhuben glanced at her phone one more time, checking the text that Cody had sent her to meet at the Tipton hotel after school, before approaching the front steps. She smiled at Norman the doorman as he moved to open the door for her.
"Thanks, mate," she said to him. "You haven't seen Cody have you?"
"He arrived about ten minutes ago," Norman replied. "He told me to tell you he has something waiting for you with the concierge."
With the concierge? Her eyebrows furrowed together as she turned on her heel, calling a quick, "cheers," over her shoulder before heading over towards the desk that sat directly to her right. The concierge, Irene, smiled as Rhuben approached and leaned to the side of her seat. She picked up a package off of the floor and handed it over to Rhuben with a note on top. "Thank you."
Taking the package, Rhuben turned and moved out of the way of the desk, reading over the note that was on the front. In Cody's neat handwriting she could see he had written a quick message: Here is your weapon. I have one too. Good luck. Xo, Cody. Now very curious, Rhuben unwrapped the package and raised an eyebrow when she saw the Nerf Gun that rested in her hand, seconds before she felt her head get jolted to the side as something struck her in the side of the head. She cast a dismissive glance down at the yellow dart that sat harmlessly on the ground. Then she felt four more hit her on the side of the head in rapid succession, before Cody's laughter reached her ears.
"For a dancer it's interesting to see that you have such slow reflexes," he commented as he popped up from behind the couch. With a smug smile on his face, the blond picked up the darts that lay on the ground and reloaded his gun. "Then again, Australians do have the habit of being laid-back so maybe that has something to do with this?"
"What's this?" Rhuben motioned to her gun as she turned towards him.
"You said I had to relax right?"
She let out a sound of recognition, a mental light bulb going off, as she crossed her arms. "You don't ever take anything at face value do you?" She then lightly bopped herself on the forehead with her gun. "Silly me, this is the guy that wants to do every experiment that's possible. There's no such thing as face value with you."
"I'm sorry; I thought you were the one that liked to do things to annoy me." He pretended to think, pressing a finger to his chin. "And over the years there have been a lot; dressing me up like a girl, convincing me to make all those cookies for that dentist convention, daring me to go into suite 613—"
"—that was Zack," she protested.
He ignored her. "Telling me to tell Agnes that I didn't want to date her, like that worked out for any of us. Trading places with that prince from Ishkabar, working in the daycare, running for school president, signing up for woodshop—"
"Are you done?" She ran a hand through her hair. "And I did all of those things to make you…stand up for yourself a little bit. To prove that you're more than just a guy that likes academia and studying and learning."
"I know." Cody gave her a meaningful look, taking a step forward and taking her hand in his. "And I can't thank you enough for that." The Australian teen gazed back at him in confusion. "Rhu, without you pushing me to do all of those things, I would probably be in some sort of a…germpaphobic bubble with nothing but the promise of flash cards and pop quizzes to keep me entertained. But you've made me a better persons sine I've met you. I've made some mistakes…" the two exchanged a knowing glance before he continued. "And so have you, but we still managed to work our way back together right?"
Lowering her head a little, Rhuben nodded. Flashes of their past arguments worked through her head, the little reasons that had piled up enough to cause their breakup when they were just fourteen years old. Him being too nice, there for her a little too much, all to overcompensate for the bad past that had still haunted her once she arrived at the Tipton hotel. Despite him showing her the world wasn't out to get her and that she was indeed worth of a good life, by doing his best to be a good boyfriend he became so overzealous, along with the things she needed to work through, wasn't a good fit for them to be together. Though she always continued to care for him the same way she always had, the same way she always would.
"Right," she agreed.
"And despite that you're still there…you still care about me and I take that for granted sometimes," Cody said. He then laughed lightly. "Even though you do understand that it is sometimes hard to get my attention away from my studies."
A mischievous smile slid onto her face. "But I have fun trying."
"So I thought I could take your advice." He lifted his Nerf gun and pointed it directly at her forehead. "And thought I could relax a little bit." He suddenly appeared stricken, almost shy in a way. "If..If you want to, I mean. I don't want to push you into anything you don't want to do."
"The only thing you'd be pushing me into," she started, her voice suddenly growing cold. "Is your quick defeat." She motioned to the gun in her hands. "And I don't think you want that?"
"Really?" He pressed his finger into the trigger and Rhuben gave him a cold glare as the dart stuck against her forehead.
"Cody." She stopped as she was shot in the neck this time. "Stop that."
"I have about three bullets left and more ammo scattered all around the Tipton hotel. I could go all day." He lowered the gun and shot her shoulders and her stomach before Rhuben tilted her head back, laughing. Then she walked into Cody and wrapped her arms around his neck and he instinctively moved his arms around her waist.
"You know what I like most about you, Cody?" She asked. He shook his head, looking down at her. "That no matter what comes your way; you don't just do things for yourself. You always bring other people around you, into your life. When you found out what Robert was doing to us, to me…you could've just turned your back and pretended nothing was going on. But you didn't do that. You tried to understand what it meant to be neglected and what the lasting effects of the abuse and worked around that. You were patient and very understanding…even when I broke up with you because there were still things I needed to deal with…and because of the way you started to treat me." She lowered her chin then so that she could gaze at her feet for a long moment, and then looked at her boyfriend one more. "You were still there to help me out, just like I was for you. I'm glad you're still letting me do that."
She stood on her tiptoes and gave him a kiss, feeling his shoulders relaxing underneath her arms. He smiled and kissed her back before pulling an arm's length away.
"Uh, you're welcome?" His face screwed up for a moment before he pointing back and forth between them. "But just so you know, in war there's no peace, just two sides fighting until one gives in. Which'll be you because I know everything about military and medieval tactics." Rhuben reached out and shoved him hard on the chest, causing him to wince. "Watch it, you know I bruise easily." He rubbed his chest as he gazed at her shyly from underneath his fringe. "So…do you want to play?"
"Just one thing," Rhuben said.
Cody watched her, his eyebrows twitching with confusion and curiosity as she brought her hand out from behind her back. He blinked in surprise, head jerking back as he was suddenly hit directly in the middle of the face, then looked down to see she had a miniature Nerf gun in her hand.
He smiled and laughed.