Side Note : Sorry if you hate the teacher's name- I know sometimes it's bothersome reading some of the names people give the characters. Or it that just me? And also, I don't take Geometry until this upcoming school year, so sorry if this is inaccurate. I just needed the subject to go with the fanfic ^_^ Enjoy!
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Benny was ready to choke out his math teacher. Or himself. Or Rory.
Or maybe all three- his brain was too fried for him to be able to tell for sure.
But what what he did know was that Geometry was taking way too long to go through the seventy plus minutes each class ran for. The gangly teenager was aware that, yes, math was "important" or whatever bullshit the faculty was set on cramming down their throats, but there was a limit as to how much math one could take. And Benny was at that limit and borderline pushing himself over behind enemy boundaries.
If he heard even a fragment of the word proof one more time that class period, he was going to flip a table and make a show about storming out of the classroom.
And the blonde vampire-ninja sitting next to him was doing nothing to help his frustration; Rory, more dense than ever, seemed to be set on making Benny crack without even noticing what he was doing. First it was pencil tapping, then scribbling obnoxiously all over his arsenal of paper, and now it was pretending he was in a band, knuckles pounding out some sort of obscene rhythm underneath the table. And what little brain cells Benny had left from all of the supernatural beatings he had taken over the year were about to dry up and fall out of his ears- along with the skullbone he had been crunching up by massaging his temples.
But at long last, the teacher glanced up at the clock, and sighing to herself, she recapped her marker and announced that they could pack up for the day. The class sighed in unison out of relief, and taking their homework assignments as they were passed out, they crammed them into their backpacks and jumped to their feet as the bell rang.
Tasting freedom on his tongue, feeling it fill up his lungs like the first real breath of spring, Benny practically skipped to the doorway.
"Mr. Weir, could you stay after for a moment, please?"
Benny deflated like a week-old balloon; so much for freedom.
Albiet reluctantly, Benny turned around and walked over to his teacher's desk, his shoulders slumped forwards rather dramatically and his lips pursed in a pout.
"Yes, Mrs. Elliot?"
The thirty-something year old teacher set her notes aside to look up at Benny, her eyes gleaming with a combination of amusement towards his defeat and scorn.
"Benny, I'm sure that you're aware that you're pushing your grade in my class towards failing, right?"
Groaning internally, the boy nodded. He could already tell where this was going.
"Yes."
Mrs. Elliot cocked a blonde eyebrow. "And you've neglected to ask me for help?"
Blushing, Benny chewed on his lip and shrugged. "Yeah, I guess so."
"Why?"
"I guess it's just kind of embarrassing tell your teacher that you get none of the stuff they're talking about. I try to pay attention, I swear, but I-I just don't get it."
Some of the irritation towards Benny's lack of math skills melted away from Mrs. Elliot's usually kind face, and but she didn't lose the stern curling of the corners of her mouth.
"Well, that's what you're supposed to do, Benny. That's what I'm here for- to teach you math."
Benny sighed. "I know, I know."
"Good. We're on the same page then. I'm guessing that I don't need to draw you out a picture to let you know that if your grade doesn't improve, you'll be here this summer, right?"
Benny nodded solemnly.
Mrs. Elliot smiled and folded her hands together. "So you're going to need a tutor."
At this, Benny did, in fact, groan out loud.
"You can't be serious, Mrs. E! It's one thing being a block-headed football player, needing some help in math, but it's humiliating having to ask another geek for help when you're one yourself."
Mrs. Elliot chuckled, letting her angry facade slip away, and she held up a hand to gesture for Benny calm down.
"Relax, Benny. I was going to suggest that Ethan Morgan help you out, since it's clear to everyone in this school that you're best friends."
The brunette blinked slowly at her. "Oh."
She tucked a piece of hair behind her ear, looking back at the gradebook on her computer. "He's got a terrific grade in my class- he should be able to help you out well enough."
Benny nodded, taking in a breath of calmness.
"Sure thing, Mrs. Elliot."
The woman smiled at him again, turning back to her notes in a sort of dismissal. "I better not regret this, Benny, or I'm assigning you to a college student who dislikes high school students."
Benny was already halfway out of the door, and turning back to call over his shoulder, he shouted:
"No worries, Mrs. Elliot! I've got this under control!"
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Benny did not, in fact, have this whole thing under control. If anything, it was less out of control than to begin with.
Ethan flopped backwards onto his bed, rubbing his eyes tiredly. "Benny, has anyone ever told you that you kind of suck at math?"
Benny was unamused. "I've heard."
The smaller of the two looked up at him from his spread-eagle position, flinging a hand out wildly to point at his Geometry book. "And if you don't fix it, you'll be hearing that all summer, dude."
Ready to throw either something hard and breakable or himself out of Ethan's bedroom window, Benny acknowledged this for what must have been the fifteenth time that afternoon.
"Yes, Ethan, thank you for that reminder."
"I'm just saying."
Benny ignored him and pulled the book closer to where he sat at the head of Ethan's bed, and reading over the same paragraph again, he tried to make something, anything, about proofs stick to his head. What he needed was some damn velcro or Gorilla-Glue.
"So, what exactly are proofs, again?" Benny dared to ask, and he wasn't surprised when Ethan had to count to ten to keep from throttling him.
"A geometric proof involves writing reasoned, logical explanations that use definitions, axioms, postulates, and previously proved theorems to arrive at a conclusion about a geometric statement." Ethan explained slowly- again.
Benny resembled an owl. "O-kay..."
"You write explanations."
Laughing sarcastically, Benny threw his hands up in the air. "Well thank God for mathematics, then. I've got an explanation- I suck at math and this shit is worthless!"
"No, Benny, it's not. If you don't use it later on in life, then whatever, but for right now you actually need to try, okay?" Ethan gave him a look that conveyed concern and shockingly, patience. Benny was surprised that Ethan hadn't just given up on him yet, but the revelation was enough to make him put his anger away enough to try and concentrate. "I don't want you stuck in summer school. Neither of us will have anything to do."
Benny chuckled. "You won't be the one at Whitechapel High against your will with math, math, math all day and every day."
"In case you haven't noticed, I spend all of my time with you. If you're at school for the entirety of summer, then I might as well be, too." Ethan raised his eyebrows, almost making them disappear behind his shaggy hair, before turning back to the book and looking over what Benny was working on.
He nodded to himself, and began talking, but the words were falling onto deaf ears; Benny had checked out once more, but this time it wasn't because he was tirelessly bored with math.
Ethan was enrapturing- not by the things he was saying, but by the way he looked when he was saying them. He looked comfortable with the subject he was teaching Benny about, speaking quietly, but clearly, with a carefree face and a sort of happiness twinkling in his eyes. One that the taller boy could see every time Ethan glanced up at him, smiling softly and in turn converting that softness over to his best friend.
And the sunlight filtering in from outside was doing nothing to help; it lit Ethan's skin on fire to a golden color, turned his hair into soft, chocolate-textured waves, and animated him in a way that even Marvel couldn't.
Benny thought that he looked beautiful. And that he was incredibly fucked, because all of this just proved that he was in love with Ethan, something he'd been mulling over inside of his head for months now.
He smiled wryly to himself; there was a proof he understood. The proof of attraction.
Ethan looked up at him, again, still talking idly about Geometry, but Benny heard nothing of whatever he was saying. Instead he saw and felt and tasted the warmth in his eyes and expression and body language.
"You would make a great teacher." Benny blurted out, hardly noticing that Ethan hadn't stopped talking.
Ethan paused mid-sentence, taking a breath to go on, and he looked up at Benny in startlement. And then mild irritation.
"You didn't listen to a word I said, did you?" he asked, flaring his nostrils cutely.
Benny shook his head honestly. "Not really. I kind of understand what you mean by getting proof for something, though."
"Oh really?"
"Sure. When you come to a conclusion, you need evidence to back it up, right?"
Ethan thought about this. "Right."
"Well, there's proof for a lot of things not Geometry. There's proof that Star Galaxy takes place in space because, the title, duh, and there's proof that so and so murdered so and so on those crime shows because the Forensic Scientists gather up facts and solve the puzzle. There's proof that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west because we have compasses and windows and we can check these things daily. And there's proof that I'm in love with you because every time you talk I get butterflies and watching you get excited about stuff makes me feel weightless and I want to do nothing more than kiss you right now even though I'm sure that you're going to punch me in the face when I finally stop talking."
This whole tangent just sort of spilled out of Benny's mouth like lava out of a volcano, because he never could stop himself from talking and blurting what he wanted to say out loud. He didn't try to take it back, though- it would have been pointless because even though Benny annoyed Ethan to the point of no return some days, he listened to every word the older boy said and took it in with rapt attention.
And that moment, in Ethan's bedroom, with Benny pouring his heart out like syrup over pancakes and butter melting on the top was no exception.
Benny watched with a combination of terror and delight as Ethan's rich brown eyes widened in shock, and surprise, and disbelief, and hope, and Benny could hardly take any of it before-
Oh.
Throwing the book aside, Ethan leaned up, and tangling his fingers into Benny's somewhat untamable hair, he brought his friend forwards and kissed him softly.
And though Benny's heart was pounding in his chest, and his palms were sweating and he was scared out of his mind, he cupped Ethan's face in between his large hands and kissed him back. Ethan was as warm as he looked, and tasted as sweet as he made Benny feel, and Benny was kind of glad that he never had much control over his mouth.
When they released each other after one or three more kisses following the first, Ethan grinned stupidly and bumped his forehead with Benny's breathing in a lungful of air through his nose.
"I have a proof of my own." he said at last.
Benny played along. "What's that?"
"I'm in love with you, too."
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When Benny aced his next Geometry test, Mrs. Elliott was delightfully surprised.
"I assume that Ethan's a good teacher, then?" she asked Benny after class, grinning up at him with as much sun in her expression as her hair coloring.
Benny grinned back.
"You could say that."
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A/N: I really have nothing to say for this xD Just some shameless fluff that I've been planning to write for a month now. I've been have a season one marathon since yesterday and thought, "Eh, why the hell not." Sorry if it sucks. I was just in the mood to write something and this was born. I hope you liked it!
