In Quieter Moments
/
They didn't even flinch when the door slammed open.
The few scattered inhabitants of the rec room ignored the disruption with practised ease, continuing seamlessly with their board games and air hockey. Sissi, hand still placed flat on the door she had just swept dramatically through, cast a cursory glance around before storming to a table in the corner.
Hervé barely flinched as she approached. Nicholas cracked one eye open, closing it again almost immediately as he retreated back into the music blaring from one earphone, the tangled white cord of which trailed unnoticed down his front.
Sissi was mid-rant even before she reached them.
"... so Hertz finally hands me my assignment back and I'm thinking she's finally gonna let me go when she starts on the whole 'your grade in this class is abysmal, I doubt your father would be pleased if you had to retake the year' speech and then, and then -" her face blazed angrily, rendering her usual blush useless - "she says I'm wearing 'far more make-up than is appropriate for school hours' and she actually makes me take it off!"
Hervé and Nicholas just had time to exchange a brief glance, shrugging slightly, before Hervé moved his textbook to accommodate the pink bag thrown with undue rage onto the table.
Rant over, Sissi sat down, heaving an irritated sigh that lifted a strand of dark hair clean off her flushed face.
Hervé and Nicholas blinked at her.
"Hi Sissi," Hervé muttered quietly.
It was only then that Sissi seemed to actually notice the two boys properly. She forced a stiff nod of greeting and without another word her make-up case was snapped open as she began to reapply the recently removed layers.
She always made a point to sit as far away from them as possible, removed from the pair but still at the same table. As far as Sissi was concerned, this was her table, had been since the rec room was introduced to Kadic, and she wasn't going to be the one move even if it was to avoid the two of them. She supposed they were relatively harmless and they did wait here until she was let out of detention, or maybe that was just because the weather at this time of year always made Hervé's acne break out.
Tap tap tap-tap-tap tap tap.
The drumming began, a rhythm playing itself out relentlessly under Nicholas' practised hands, in the snap of twin pencils against the edge of the low desk. Hervé bent over his textbook and only the slightest irritated twitch of his left eyebrow belied his concentrated expression. So they sat in relative quiet; preening, studying, drumming.
"How was detention?" Hervé asked conversationally when he deemed Sissi calm enough to approach.
"Wonderful," she snapped.
He shrunk back automatically, a flower wilting beneath the sudden absence of sunlight, and rubbed an uncomfortable spot where the bridge of his nose pinched beneath his glasses. Another few moments of silence which allowed the tension to ebb away once more, Hervé seeking solace from the sting within a paragraph on planetary nebula.
He was reading and brooding when he felt eyes on him, and glanced up cautiously to see Sissi peering over from the corner of her eye. He frowned slightly in a silent question, and she shrugged. In the background, there continued the tapping.
"Was that homework we had to do?" she asked.
"Uh, well, I'm just doing some extra reading but we did have an assignment-"
"Can I take a look at yours?"
She fixed her eyes on him, wide and beautiful and brown flecked with hazel, and her lips curved into a winning smile even as Hervé felt his heart skip, almost in time with Nicholas' improvised drumbeats. Part of him knew it was just Sissi's please-do-whatever-I-want smile but part of him treasured it anyway. At least she wasn't shouting, which was more than could be said for most days. All things considered, she had switched almost instantly to a good mood now that she was no longer cowering sullenly beneath the wrath of their Science teacher.
"Sissi, uh, if you're really failing Hertz' classes then maybe you should-"
She scowled and Hervé immediately hunched his shoulders up in a defensive gesture.
"You can look at mine!" he added quickly. "I'm just saying, if you need any help studying then-"
"Nah. I don't need to study. So long as I know enough to pass the exam, it's fine."
With a triumphant nod to herself, Sissi swept a clean space on her side of the table and pulled out a nail file, examining her hands with more concentration than Hervé had ever seen on her face during class. He sighed to himself. He'd only be letting Nicholas copy anyway. What could one more person hurt? And what were friends for, after all?
The steady, sharp scrape of the nail file stopped a few minutes later as Sissi spoke up.
"That thing's pretty."
"W-which?" Hervé stammered.
Sissi was impatient, and didn't seem to notice.
"The purple glowy thing."
She jabbed at the glossy image on the page before him.
"Oh! That!" Hervé exclaimed. "It's a nebula. An interstellar cloud of all different ionised gases, hydrogen, helium..."
Three words in, she'd switched off. Maybe she'd be inclined to listen if the lecture wasn't delivered in Hervé's stupid nasally voice. Maybe Ulrich should just teach all her classes. She might even get an A for once. Besides that, Hervé was giving her far more information than she'd asked for. She'd only wanted to know what it was called, for goodness' sake.
God, he's so annoying.
"Hervé, you're so annoying."
His jaw instantly snapped shut and there was silence as even Nicholas stopped his tapping for a moment. She waited for either of them to snap, or at least say something.
Neither did.
Pushovers.
Sissi opened her mouth to say as much, then decided against it and paused, pursing her lips in irritation. It was nice to always have her own way, but Nicholas let everything sail over his head and Hervé practically bent over backwards to please her. It would be nice to be challenged for once. They were so boring sometimes.
Oh well.
Hervé remained silent, directing his gaze downward once more, and as he did so he caught a glimpse of himself in a small circular mirror that had slid along the table from Sissi's side. He stared critically at himself in it, upside down, and the glare on his face did nothing to appease the sight of waxy, acne-ridden skin, lank hair and dorky glasses. He prodded a particularly nasty spot, wincing.
"You know, I have some cream for that," Sissi said.
Hervé's head snapped up and he shot her a glare, temporarily forgetting his constant desire to appease the principal's daughter in his indignation.
"I'm not using girls' stuff!" he practically yelled. "What do you take me for?"
"Fine, geez. Whatever."
He didn't see the slight smirk on her lips beneath a newly-applied lip-gloss layer.
But perhaps she'd like him more if it wasn't for the acne, Hervé mused as he craned his neck over the table to catch one last masochist glimpse of his reflection. Was it really just a nice face that separated him from Ulrich? The Stern kid was kind of a jerk, thought Hervé, in many ways. Sissi deserved better. Or was it just some kind of unspoken law amongst female-kind that they always pursued the most awful guy possible?
It was something he'd have to ask Nicholas about, put casually during a round of late-night video gaming in their dorm room. Nicholas would no doubt give some dumb yet well-meaning advice and pretend not to know that the hypothetical situation Hervé put forth was about him and Sissi. Hervé would roll his eyes, thank him for trying anyway, and change the subject. Bad advice or no, Nicholas was actually pretty good to talk to if you wanted to just get something off your chest.
Speaking of Nicholas... the sound of pencil-drumbeats had etched itself into his consciousness and now a rhythm throbbed annoyingly at his temples. Sissi seemed to grow aware of it at the same moment, inhaling deeply in irritation. Finally, as one, they turned to the other boy with joined shouts of,
"NICHOLAS!"
With one last tiny rebellious tapping, the drumming stopped. Sissi and Hervé heaved exaggerated sighs of relief; Nicholas simply dropped the pencils and tapped out a softer rhythm of palms on knees.
"Well," Sissi said as she suddenly stood up. "I guess I'll see you two losers later."
The insult glanced off them like water and instead they both looked up to ask as one,
"Where are you going?"
"Movies," she replied in an isn't-it-obvious voice, and they thought of course, because it was Thursday and more specifically the third Thursday of the month, and they didn't mess with the unspoken routine, established and maintained diligently since the start of the eighth grade. Automatically the two boys rose as well, patting their pockets to double-check wallets and phones.
"What are we seeing?" Hervé asked.
Sissi crossed her arms and sneered at him. "I don't know about you but I'm going to see A Heart's Embrace."
Hervé couldn't help but groan. Sissi had the worst taste in movies - it seemed to him that if it didn't have a hot guy playing the male lead and the most predictable romantic plot ever, she didn't think it was worth watching - but he was already following her out of the door. Without looking Hervé knew that Nicholas was just behind them.
So long as it had a good soundtrack, Nicholas wouldn't care. Bonus points for something with fishing in it. The guy wasn't too hard to please.
It was cooler out now, and they pulled their jackets tightly around them as they walked.
Sissi stalked ahead as usual, flicking through her phone with feigned nonchalance. Hervé watched her, only half-listening to the rather one-sided conversation that Nicholas was striking up.
"Listen, Hervé, my dad says he's going to take me fishing during the half term. There's this lake a few miles from our house, the trout there are the best ever and-"
Hervé nodded in all the right places, paying attention just in time to excuse himself from coming on the excursion. He just didn't understand the appeal of fishing; all he knew was that it was nothing short of a miracle that it made Nicholas so talkative. He also knew more random facts about fishing than anything else. If he could take his exams in music and fishing alone, Nicholas would be top of the class.
Hervé just didn't get it.
True to form, Nicholas was now continuing a spiel of random facts that had no place on anything other than a daytime television trivia show.
"-Did you know that some types of fish migrate between different types of water? Like, they might live in freshwater then move to- oh, hi Sissi."
Suddenly the girl was between them, brushing hair out of her face. She seemed to lack the energy to distance herself from the other two like she usually did and made no effort to speed up again, so now as they continued they walked side by side.
"Hey," she said absently.
"So Sissi, I was just telling Hervé about these certain kinds of fish-"
Sissi bit her lip. She caught Hervé's eye and the two of them grinned grins that nevertheless vanished almost instantly. If there was one thing they could agree on, it was that poor Nicholas was incredibly weird sometimes.
They had reached the road. In one fluid moment Sissi and Hervé shot out their arms, grabbing the back of Nicholas' collar. Yanking him sharply back onto the pavement, they caught him just before a car rushed past, with the traffic lights still on green.
"Idiot," Sissi mumbled under her breath. Hervé rolled his eyes, and Nicholas gave a slow, sheepish grin as he wriggled out of their grip. It was almost guaranteed that he would forget to look where he was going at least once. Sissi and Hervé were used to casually saving his life on a regular basis.
"Sorry."
The other two shook their heads at him and waited for the red light.
/
The movie was as bad as Hervé had anticipated. He rushed from the room as soon as the credits began to roll with Nicholas strolling casually after him, ambivalent as always. Sissi followed a minute later with a dreamy smile on her face.
"I just love a good romance," she gushed, to no one in particular.
"Then why did we go and see that," Hervé replied without thinking. A few passers-by who were evidently in agreement laughed loudly. Hervé ducked in anticipation of a venomous reply but Sissi remained surprisingly subdued, amused even.
"Oh shush Hervé. You just don't understand romance." Sissi pulled a face at him. "You liked it, didn't you Nicholas?"
"...Huh? Oh, uh, I dunno."
Sissi threw her hands up despairingly.
"You two are useless."
Hervé bit back some scathing comment about how Ulrich would probably have hated it too, and she was definitely not choosing next month's movie (though they all knew she would), and they trailed out of the theatre in their usual formation; Sissi striding ahead, Hervé and Nicholas trailing behind.
The sky had grown darker. Following a path forged of habit, they made their way to the usual post-movies café and took seats on white-painted wicker chairs around a circular lace tablecloth.
They remained safely within the routine. Sissi claimed it was because she liked the smoothies here, and Hervé liked the romantic atmosphere of the little place (not that he said as much, but he always imagined he'd take Sissi here on a date one day) but they all knew it was the easiest place to eat, what with Nicholas' allergies and all. They'd been studying menus out of habit for little more than a minute when a waiter arrived.
"Hello! May I take your order?"
"One strawberry smoothie, two hot chocolates – one with whipped cream, one without – one chicken salad sandwich, one cheese and tomato and one minestrone soup," Sissi reeled off without a hitch.
The waiter was gone, and Hervé knew with fleeting disappointment that he'd never eat egg salad here again, not after the complaints Sissi made about the smell last time. Still, it was a good order, and they so waited.
Hervé and Nicholas talked. Sissi chewed on her straw as she looked out of the window. It was almost peaceful.
Neither Hervé nor Sissi opted to tell Nicholas about the smudge of whipped cream that had somehow made its way onto his forehead, until even he had begun to notice the looks from others at the café. He was frowning deeply as he tried to figure out what they were staring at and Sissi felt a reluctant laughter bubbling in her throat.
With a sudden choking sound she dived beneath the tablecloth under the pretence of rummaging in her bag, but although her face was once again a scowling mask when she emerged, her chest heaved with the remnants of laughter. It was strange, the inconsequential things that amused Sissi Delmas when she was in the right mood; not even Hervé and Nicholas could guess them.
Hervé smiled apologetically as he passed his best friend a napkin. Nicholas, easy-going as he always was, took no offence, only the offer of the napkin as he dabbed away the offending smudge and smiled back.
/
The gates of Kadic came into view just as their watches signal curfew. Hervé felt something nudge his shoulder, so slight it could have been an accident, but he turned immediately and followed Nicholas' gaze into the woods by the park. Two shapes raced through the trees. One was indistinguishable but the other, an eyesore of purple, made both their identities obvious.
Stern and Della Robbia. Headed out on some unknown mission after curfew. Interesting.
They glanced to their rivals, then back to Sissi.
She hadn't noticed.
Subtly Hervé and Nicholas steered her away, focusing her attention with some inane rambling on the bright lights of the academy, until Hervé looked back and saw with satisfaction that the figures had vanished.
"Hervé? Nic?"
"Yeah?"
"Do you two ever shut up?"
In unison: "Sorry."
Behind her back, they nodded to one another. It wouldn't do her any good to worry about them, not on a day when the girl had been almost amicable for once. Even if it was only that she was too tired to pretend not to like them sometimes.
It had been a good day. One a little less lonely for the three of them walking together.
In moments like these, it was something they could almost appreciate.