Altair probably should have been paying attention to his class, an art history class that focused on the the North African Moors and other various Medieval Islamic art movements. It was totally over specific but it was one of the only Near East culture classes Altair's school offered along with an anthropology class or two, and a basic language class. So here he was. And he really should have been taking notes for his flash cards. But he wasn't. Instead he had his half sized sketch book out and his pencil with the red lead he liked and was doodling his classmates.

Or rather, he was doodling one of his classmates. Just one. He doodled them every time they had class together, and they only had this class together. He was an Arab boy, probably Muslim, with a strong face and thick eyebrows, and a full mouth Altair just couldn't… get right. His hair was always messy and he had wide shoulders and was sort of built like a barrel, but didn't have a 'gut' so to speak. He was just a thick guy. He wore a perpetually confused look on his face, but Altair thought that had more to do with the fact that he didn't understand the material than actually being perpetually confused.

Altair knew, from role call, his name was Malik, but he couldn't remember the last name. And more than half of Altair's daily drawings were dedicated to doodles of Malik. Realistic portraits and cartoonish caricature and Altair trying to picture what Malik would look like smiling. He'd never seen Malik smile in class, so he had no idea. He knew it was probably super creepy, to just draw his classmate without his permission obsessively.

He drew some of his other classmates yeah but none of them were as interesting. There was a Muslim girl in a hijab who was sometimes interesting to draw because of how she wore her scarf and the layering of the fabric was a challenge. But most of Altair's classmates looked like they'd come straight from the 'white people mill' as he'd liked to describe high school preps. Girls with their perfect flat ironed hair and just enough makeup to look like they weren't wearing any and boys with the 'bro' hair cuts and in Ts and jeans like they wanted to be Abercrombie and Fitch models. They were the general mean of what white college people looked like and Altair drew enough of those people in figure drawing class. He wanted to draw ethnic people, or not classically pretty people.

Which is why he drew Malik a lot.

The teacher was talking about a mosque/cathedral in Spain but Altair wasn't listening. He kept glancing up at Malik trying to get the shape of his mouth right. He scowled when Malik moved and he started drawing this new angle, Malik slumped in his chair, mouth pinched over to one side, arms folded across his chest. Once he was satisfied with that he let himself doodle little caricature of some of his classmates, though still mostly Malik.

"And that wraps it up for today's class," the teacher was saying, startling Altair who might or might not have been trying to figure out through just the way Malik's shirt clung to his body, what he looked like shirtless. He squiggled it out, embarrassed, and then closed his sketchbook. Altair put his things away, tucking his red lead pencil into his pencil case and pulling on his coat. He left in the herd of the rest of his class.

He had fifteen minutes before his next class and he was hungry. He could go to the cafeteria and grab some quick food, or he could overpay at a vending machine for some quick snacks. He contemplated it before heading for the cafeteria.

He grabbed a pre-made thing of sushi from a fridge and a bottle of water and got in like for the registers. He was thinking about his next class though. Drawn to Life. A pretentious name for a not so pretentious class which, when weather allowed, pertained to going outside and drawing people and things and landscapes. Or when it didn't going and sitting in the atrium or around the school and drawing the interior. His teacher loved Altair's drawings of Malik, who Altair lied about and said was just his roommate to not make it weird that he was totally creeping on the boy in one of his classes. It was nice out for April though, so they'd probably go outside, people watch, and draw. He was looking forward to it.

He got to class with plenty of time to spare and

Where was his sketch book?

Altair ripped apart his back pack. Where was it?! He couldn't have just lost it! He took it everywhere with him! Altair checked and rechecked his backpack, but it wasn't there.

He must have left it at his last class.

Altair didn't run, but he did walk quickly. His homework from the entire semester for all his art classes was in that damn sketchbook, as was all those obsessive drawings of Malik. He hoped the teacher had just picked it up. Oh god what if he lost it? He didn't even want to think about that. His panic made him walk faster.

The classroom was empty save for the teacher, who was still working on something on her computer, but the door was locked. He knocked rapidly and she looked up. She opened the door him. "Everything all right?" she asked.

"Uh, I think I left my sketch book in here, can I check?" he asked. She let him in and he scoured the room. "You didn't like… pick it up did you? Or see anyone take it? Its about this big," and he showed the size with his hands.

"No. I haven't seen it," she said, "and no one turned it in."

"Oh…" he said just felt actual fear. That was his personal sketch book as well as his school sketch book. Mainly because he was a poor art student and couldn't afford to buy a million sketch books. It had grocery lists and important information in it and now it was gone. Oh god. "Thank you," he muttered before leaving and went to the cafeteria. It wasn't where the sushi was, or the registers and it hadn't magically appeared back in the classroom either.

Altair knew there was nothing he could do. It was probably gone, vanished into the fucking aether. He wished he'd put his phone number in it now, or at least his email. But nope. Just his name, like that did any fucking good.

He bought a new sketch book at the school store, overpriced though it was, so he could continue to do his work. Nothing he drew turned out good though. He wanted his old sketch book back, not this new one.

It was officially the worst day of the year.

When Altair got home he face planted right onto the couch.

"Yo, what's eating you?" Desmond asked, he was sitting at the table typing away on his laptop. He and Desmond lived in the guest house at Desmond's cousin's house (mansion). They didn't have to pay rent but they had to pay for electric, water, cable and internet. It was a pretty good deal. But they also lived in close proximity to each other and days they didn't act like best friends they wanted to murder each other and often ended up in wrestling matches on the floor that lasted until one of them yelled for mercy.

"I lost my sketch book," Altair said miserably.

"Seriously? Where?"

"If I knew that it wouldn't be lost!" Altair snapped.

"True. Where do you think you left it?"

"My art history class," Altair said miserably.

"You mean the class where you draw stalkerish pictures of that boy you have a crush on but have never talked to because you're a giant weenie?"

"Deeeeeesmond," Altair complained loudly, Desmond just laughed.

"So is that a yes?" Altair just whined into the couch. "Well, could be worse. I mean he could have found it, right?"

Altair sat up abruptly, "Don't even joke about that!" he cried. "I would literally die if Malik found my sketch book."

"Other than your stalker pics anything you want to confess too?" Desmond asked, practically leering at him over the top of his computer.

"Uh…"

"What did you draw?"

"Nothing!" Altair said too quickly.

"You totally drew Malik porn that is so fucking weird dude-

"I did not," Altair said. "Just him shirtless and… stuff," he admitted.

"But he doesn't have it, so no need to worry. Now is your existential crisis over I still have this term paper," he pointed at the screen.

"Yeah," Altair groaned and went to his room and grabbed his own laptop and sat at the table with Desmond. He opened his school email and was surprised that amid all the bullshit he actually had a real piece of mail from some kid named Kadar.

The message was short, 'I think you lost this' and then a picture of Altair's sketch book.

Altair may or may not have totally screamed in delight, startling Desmond so bad he nearly fell off his chair. "What the shit man?" he asked.

"Someone found my sketch book!" Altair cried. "Look, look," and he turned his laptop around so Desmond could see.

"Well I'll be damned, miracles do happen."

Altair wrote back a quick burst of text. 'Omg! You found it! Thank you thank you thank you! I was so afraid I'd lost it. When can you give it back?'

He waited impatiently for a reply after that. He caught up on his YouTube, scrolled through Tumblr, Facebook, and Instagram for a bit and was about to go find his tablet in his messy room when he checked his school email again. He'd been checking it obsessively since he'd sent that reply, and now it paid off.

'Next time at art history? I don't come into school again till then.'

Altair groaned. Of course. He'd have to go the weekend without his sketch book since that art history class met on Monday and Thursday. This was going to be complete and utter torture. But it was that, or nothing. 'Okay. Thanks so much again. I'll see you on Monday.'

Now all he had to do was wait for Monday.

The weekend was torturous. On one hand he wanted to do all his drawing homework, on the other he didn't want to start a new sketch book when he'd be getting his old one back. He hated starting new sketch books when he hadn't finished one. So he just used his tablet and worked on his casting homework even though he was an absolute terror when it came to visualizing things in three dimensions. And of course he worked on his non art homework.

Monday finally came and Altair couldn't wait for art history. His sketch book was sitting at the table he usually sat at, at his usual spot, waiting for him. He grabbed it up and very nearly hugged it. He checked to make sure nothing was smudged or torn and then got out his things for class.

About half way through the class, as usual, Altair got bored. He flipped open his sketch book to the first empty page and then went one back. He'd seen something. The page was different than he remembered it. He'd mostly squiggled out the, slightly embarrassing, picture of Malik shirtless. But, in incredibly neat block print, was a note that said 'more like it' and an arrow pointing at Malik's abs, which he'd kinda bull shitted and barely even put any lines there except to mark that they were sort of there as a four pack.

Altair flipped to the first page of his sketch book, his pulse starting to quicken. The first few pages were just school work and were untouched. Then he came to some of his more detailed figure studies he did of Desmond and his cousin, and like the scribbled out picture of Malik there were little notes next to some of the images, all in pencil, and a fair space from the images to not touch them.

'Boyfriend?' next to a picture of Desmond.

'Boyfriend material' next to a picture of Ezio. They were fairly mundane and then the last picture of Desmond (Altair's sort of obsession (mainly because they lived together and was just around) before Malik) it said 'lols, never mind. So not boyfriend.'

The next pages were a mix of school work and Malik. He felt his face heat up since someone had made little notes next to every single one. Things like 'my nose isn't that big' or 'I do smile thanks!', 'my arms are bigger than that', 'I looked really good that day', 'this is clearly my good side', and 'I'd tap that… oh wait'. Somehow Malik had gotten a hold of his sketch book and seen all his sketches of him and Altair literally couldn't deal with all his little notes. On pages where there was no room for notes he didn't write anything. He seemed really amused by the cute, cartoony, versions of himself Altair drew. And when he drew Malik as he imagined shirtless he'd write things like 'I totally have a harrier chest .' and 'I don't have a six pack' and then on the next page 'or an eight pack omg you are generous' and then right after that, on the same page wrote, 'you think so generous of my other parts?' which literally made Altair blush.

His entire sketch book had those little notes in the margins or crammed into corners or along the contours of drawings. Normally he was furious if anyone drew, wrote, or looked in his sketch book without permission, especially because it was full of semi creeper pictures of Malik. But he didn't mind this. In fact, he sort of… liked it. Malik didn't have a bad thing to say about any of the images , and if anything seemed terribly flattered.

Then, on the last page, with the scribbled out Malik, he saw another note he'd missed. It was circled and underlined so Altair would notice it. 'See me after class?'

Altair's heart went straight into his throat.

Altair closed his sketch book hastily and actually tried to pay attention to the rest of class. It was, of course, utterly impossible. He kept thinking about the last note Malik had left him. Clearly he wasn't mad, but what was he supposed to do with something like that? Was it really just going to be that easy? Could he really just… make it work?

All too soon the teacher was saying class was over. Altair very purposefully put his sketch book in his bag and slowly put the rest of his stuff away too. He was the last one to leave.

He wasn't expecting Malik to be waiting in the hallway for him. "Hi," he said when he saw Altair. Altair forgot the entire English language and he was just glad his mouth was closed. "You okay?" Malik asked, amused.

"Please stop being cute," Altair said in Arabic before he could stop himself. He'd gotten good at the whole English brain to mouth filter, but since he used his native language far less he didn't quite have a handle on that filter as well as he should have. Oh God he hoped Malik didn't know Arabic, he'd just made a complete fool of himself.

"Sorry, I can't help it," Malik said and Altair was mortified. Fuck Malik did know Arabic, but it was different from his. Like the difference between Mexican and Spanish Spanish or something. "So, uh," Malik started, "you're really good at drawing," he said.

"Uh, yeah," and god bless he remembered at least something about English. "I uh," words Altair, use your damn words you fucking moron! "I'm an illustration major," he said and at last he got an entire sentence out.

"Really? Cool. I'm doing telecommunications," he made a face, "this semester at least. I still can't decide."

And then his mouth, once again, betrayed him, "You don't mind I draw you a lot?"

"Well you're not doing anything weird with them are you?" Altair shook his head quickly, no, only maybe fantasized about what you looked like shirtless and being woefully awful at depicting it on paper. "Not really," he shrugged. "I mean, they're really good. Why would I be upset?"

Because its creepy maybe? Altair didn't say that thought. Brain to mouth filter saved him on that. "Well I never asked and I just thought… well…" he sort of didn't know where he was going there.

"I don't mind," Malik said, "its nice to know someone thinks me attractive enough to draw so much. Do you have a class later?" he asked.

"Not today," Altair said, his art class was only once a week and usually after art history he went home and did homework.

"You wanna go get lunch?" and Altair didn't trust himself to speak, so he just nodded. "You're funny, Altair," he said.

"Sorry I just-" nope, nope, don't say something stupid. Brain to mouth filter. "I'm nervous around new people," he said instead.

"Oh? Well then lets make me a not new person then," and Malik grinned. "Maybe you'll get to make an accurate shirtless sketch too," and Altair's face turned a bit red. Malik's grin turned into a smirk and Altair hated him so much. He also wanted to kiss his big, dumb, smug, face. He'd do that later though. First, lunch.