Disclaimer: I don't own RENT.
Author's Note: This is a pretty standard amount of time for an update of this story. It will be about a week, give or take a couple days. And they're long chapters. Yay.
This story will contain a female OC. She will be a main character. She also will not be "involved" with either Mark or Roger. Ever. She's there to bring them together and be cute. Seriously, we promise. She won't boink the boys.
I Found a Reason
ChapterTwo – Paper Airplanes and Geometry Proofs
Mark's POV
I head into the locker room alone after I don't see any sign of Roger Monday morning, XTC blaring through my headphones. I carefully shove the Polaroid into my bag, still holding a fresh picture with my thumb and forefingers. I lean against the lockers for a few minutes, watching the picture develop and letting the song finish. When the bell rings and the others start to filter into the locker room, I stuff the picture in the front pocket of my bag with the others and put both the bag and the Walkman in the bottom of my locker, and taking out my gym shirt. Pulling my shirt off knocks my glasses sideways and I frown and fix them before tugging the gym shirt over my head.
Out of the corner of my eye I see Roger coming through the door and I wave absently in his direction. He saunters over in his too-tight blue jeans and faded band t-shirt, studded belt slung low around his hips, blond hair gelled to perfection and an expression of immediate disappointment.
"Aww, you're gonna do shit today?" He slumps against the lockers, crossing his long arms across his chest and watching me unfurl my gym shorts. "You should just walk. You don't have to get dressed."
"Good point." I muse, tossing the shorts back in my locker. I take my glasses off before I pull the gym shirt over my head. Roger reaches into my locker and takes out my Walkman.
"What do we have today?" He opens it and pulls the tape out slightly to read the print, smiling to himself a moment later and singing something under his breath.
"You like it?" He asks a few moments later, flipping the tape over to read the other side. I find myself grinning rather stupidly when I toss my gym shirt back in the locker.
"Totally. Thanks for suggesting them. I bought it over the weekend." I hook a finger through my lock and twirl it over my finger, leaning against the locker next to mine. He puts the tape back and sets it down next to my bag in my locker.
"You've got good taste." He tells me, tilting his head and grinning absently. "Different than mine usually runs, but still pretty wicked."
I shrug, threading the lock through the hole and giving it a tug to make sure it's locked. He pushes himself away from the lockers and I fall into step beside him, putting my glasses back on. Roger hums to himself as we walk out to the track, eventually slipping into lyrics and then he's singing softly under his breath again. He stretches his arms above his head, his shirt riding up to show a inch of two of skin low on his stomach and revealing his sharp hipbones.
"Are you going to be able to walk all period with pants that tight?" I tease him. He smirks, dropping his arms and looking down at himself.
"I don't know… Are you usually able to keep your head up with glasses that thick? Or do you think you'll need a breather?" He grins, reaching over to slug me in the arm. I shrink away and block him, rolling my eyes.
"Hey, I saw the pictures from the show in the paper on Friday." He says suddenly, like he'd just remembered. "They were pretty killer. Do you have any left over from that roll? We could use some pictures for publicity and stuff."
"Oh yeah, sure. I'll get you the extras, if you want. How'd the show go Friday night?"
He nods, rubbing his hands together. "It was alright. Not our best, really. Great crowd, but just sort of lacking, you know?" He laughs. "Well yeah, I guess you do know."
"It's not you that sucks, you know that." I tell him again, feeling the need to reaffirm the positives of our discussion about his band last week. "And you really need to seriously rethink a lot of the covers you do."
He's nodding again. "What do you think of the guitarist?" He questions, crossing his arms over his chest.
I frown. "He's not terrible, but his rhythm is just off sometimes and…"
He laughs suddenly. "Mark, I've seen your concept of rhythm… it's not really on target. Tell me something else."
I blush, knowing he's probably right, but shrug it off. "Well he's alright, but I think you could do a lot better. Getting out there and finding someone better would probably really benefit your sound."
He claps his hands together. "I knew it. You know, I play guitar. I'm really fucking good too. I keep trying to convince them, but they were all together before I got there. It's not really my place, you know?"
"Oh, you joined their band?" I ask him, intrigued.
"They advertised looking for a singer. You really don't think he's all that great?"
"Well I've never heard you, but I guess I can take your word that you're better."
"I am, really." He assures me. "You know, I've been talking to our drummer. Me and him should really split off. If I can convince him his buddies just really aren't all that great, we could find ourselves a bass player and fix ourselves up real nice…"
He's off in another world at the moment, thinking out loud. I fill in a couple obligatory affirmations as he goes along. Finally he shakes his head and grins down at me, nudging my shoulder.
"Aww, you know all about me now. Tell me something about Marky Cohen these days. You and all your cameras, huh?"
I nod. "Yeah, I don't know. I like taking pictures of things." I shrug. "Not much to tell."
"Hmm." He studies me for a moment, making me uncomfortable under his gaze until he rolls his eyes. "C'mon man, tell me something. I feel like a jerk talking about my band that you hate all the time. What are you going to do with those cameras? Are you gonna be a photographer?"
I shrug again. "I don't know. It's just something I like to do."
He nods and lets it go. There's quite a lot dealing with photography I could gush to him about, but even I don't know what I'm doing with it. I love taking pictures of everything, and I love spending all the time developing rolls of film in the class and getting to know more about it, but even with all my interest it's just a hobby. It's not something I could say I identify with or would want to do with my life. It's so close but there's something missing from it.
"Hey, Roger." Two girls edge up beside him and his shoves his hands in his tight pockets after throwing me a very clear look of irritation.
"We saw you Friday." The other girl says. "It was great."
He smiles feebly, though it comes out more like a grimace. "Thanks uh… Karen?"
She frowns. "It's Kathy."
I snort and he throws me another look, before shrugging innocently. "Sorry Kathy. And um… well I don't think I've ever seen you before."
The girl practically throws herself at him, extending her hand. "I'm Emily. We have history together."
"Oh. Well, that's nice." He says awkwardly, looking over at me again.
"So when's your next gig?" Emily asks him, moving closer to his side. "Because I'd really like to get to know you better."
Roger turns his head quickly, taking in her overly done up face, tight clothes and mousy hair and coughs.
"Well actually, um, I'm sort of into celibacy these days." He nods at their surprised faces. "Yeah. It's really spiritual and shit."
The girls sort of back away from us, disappointed and annoyed. He rolls his eyes at me. "Fucking dammit. I hate people."
I can't help laughing at him. "That was surprisingly polite for you."
He frowns, his eyebrows knitting together. "Well, I figure I needed to stop being such an asshole to fans, you know? I mean, someone has to come see the band. If they all think I'm a jerk they're not gonna go. I know that one girl has gone to a lot of our gigs. Karen or Kelly or whatever her name was. And she brings a lot of people every time. So yeah." He shrugs it off, rolling his eyes and giving up on the act. "Who am I kidding, it's just PR. I'm still an asshole."
"I'm glad fame hasn't changed you." I mock him as the bell rings.
Chemistry drags by, while we take notes and stare indifferently at the periodic table. My notebook is starting to look less legible as the period stretches on and my notes are reduced to symbols and letters stuck together into long strings of nonsense. My head is getting heavy resting on my hand. My eyes are about to close when something hits me in the side of the head. I scowl down at my desk and notice the paper airplane. Across the room Roger winks at me, gesturing to the paper and turns back to his notebook. I roll my eyes and open it up.
Why are helium, curium and barium medical elements?
I stare down at the words in Roger's less than legible handwriting. I look over at him. He makes a turning motion with his finger. I flip the paper over.
Because if you can't helium or curium, you barium.
I don't get it at first, still not understanding that it's a joke until Roger coughs into his hand and raises his eyebrows. When I don't respond he makes a face and turns away. I stare at it again and finally get the joke, however lame it is. I think for a minute, tapping my pen against the table and scribble down:
Why do chemists like nitrates so much?
They're cheaper than day rates.
I wait until the teacher turns around and fold the airplane back up and throw it to Roger. Some other kids glare at me. I pretend not to notice. Roger looks delighted when he receives the paper, opening it up and covering his mouth to stifle a laugh. He turns the paper over and writes down another before he throws it back. I have to reach out to catch it before it hits the floor.
What would you consider a doctor who didn't believe in anesthesia?
I turn it over to read the other side and barely catch sight of the answer (propane) before I notice the teacher is staring at me. Roger is really laughing now. Asshole. She comes over to my table with her hand held out and I hand her the paper. She reads through our jokes and her face twitches as she tries to hide a smile. She hands it back to me and shoots both of us each a look.
"Pay attention. You can have fun with the material when you learn it."
Roger grins at me from across the room. I cross my arms and turn back to the front of the room and to my notebook. The first period of Chem ends and we work on our lab, another easy waste of time, finishing fairly early. Roger starts to fold a piece of paper, ripping off a section to make it a perfect square and then folding it several more times.
"Now what?" I ask him, checking over our lab worksheet, and tossing all our materials back in the box they came in.
"My little sister taught me how to make these. I'll tell you your future." He says, pulling out a pen and unfolding part of the paper to write on.
I sigh, watching him write. "You have a sister?"
"Mhmm." He nods. "Two. They're still little, but they're gonna be great girls some day. Here." He holds out the paper. "Pick a colour name."
"You're kidding." He doesn't respond so I sigh again. "Alright. Blue."
"Pick a number."
"12."
"One more number."
"Roger, you have a fraction in there. How do you do a fraction with that thing?"
"Oh, I just switch it to decimal form and then round it."
"Fine. 4."
He unfolds the paper thing and turns it to read.
"Mark wets the bed." He announces with a smirk. I feel my ears burning.
"That's not a fortune." I tell him, but he's halfway through figuring out his own. He unfolds it again.
"Roger is a sex machine." He nods, looking modest. "This thing is good."
"That's not a fortune either! Give me that." I take it from his hands and open it up to read through the rest of his fortunes.
"You can't do that, Mark. They won't come true then." He steals it back, getting up from the table and picking up his bag. "It's not my fault fortune is on my side."
Roger gets himself into an argument while we're going over our homework in Geometry. Some smart kid named John is drawing up a proof on the board and Roger snorts as he writes out his tenth step in the two-column proof. John frowns and turns around, glaring at Roger who is staring hard at the proof with his brow furrowed.
"You're wrong, you know." Roger says. "You can't just assume those are right angles. They're only right angles because you don't know how to draw. Those lines don't intersect and they aren't labeled right angles."
John looks back at the proof. "It said it in the book."
Roger rolled his eyes. "You're trying to prove that the triangles are congruent or similar or whatever. But they're not right triangles. It tells you that angle ABC and angle DEF are congruent. And then…"
"But they're right angles, then, if they're congruent."
"No they're not, dumbass." Roger says. At this point the teacher cuts in for a moment.
"Mr. Davis, we don't insult our classmates." Both of them ignore him.
"Don't call me a dumbass because you don't know what the fuck you're talking about." John says, frowning. "The rest of the proof is right."
Roger smirks. "Not really. And you could have saved yourself about half of those steps if you'd done it right in the first place."
"But the book…"
"Mark, give me your book." Roger demands, grabbing it off of my desk and flipping it open.
"Roger has a point." I say, not really having any clue what I'm talking about. Proofs are not my strong point. "There's, uh, congruent angles with, uh, lines. And then the lines are congruent because of the well… well that's what the book said. And I guess that means that…"
"It's alright, Mark. I got it." Roger waves me away and I back off, pushing my glasses up on my nose and slouching in my chair. At least I know who to ask for help with proofs later.
"See, look." Roger says. "You also forgot to draw in the dash marks on the lines. And then you can use side angle side."
"But you can't have that without a right angle!"
"Boys…" The teacher tries again, since John is starting to yell.
"Look, John." Roger sighs. "You're getting upset over nothing. Just look. You just read it wrong, okay? Settle the fuck down. It's an easy mistake. This is so dumb."
"Fuck you, man. You don't know what the fuck you're talking about. Fucking stupid."
"Language!" The teacher shouts, but he's ignored.
I hear a loud pop across the room and when I look over I see a blonde girl tapping one pink pump against the leg of her desk and pointing down into her book. She looks up, exasperated.
"John, Roger is right. Look, just go with side angle side and you can solve it really quick. Simple stuff. No reason to get your panties in a bunch. Just finish it the right way and get over it."
Roger looks pleased with himself and backs off while John scowls but erases his work and finishes the proof out the right way. I cross out a good deal of my own answer on my homework and try to copy down the solution on Roger's paper. He catches me looking and pushes it over to the edge of the desk.
"I'll help you later, Mark. It's all logic, it's easy."
The teacher, annoyed with all of us, launches into a lecture about not using profanity and showing respect in his classroom, though he was excited that we were passionate enough about Geometry to be in a full-fledged argument over something so insignificant. That earned me an eye roll from Roger and another pop of gum from across the room.
During lunch I head outside with Roger, intending on sitting near the building and making him teach me Geometry. To give him the general idea I take my book out of my bag and hold it, flipping through the pages absently as we walk. He watches me, his hands shoved deep in his tight pockets.
"I don't see what your problem is." He laughs. "Just look at what the book gives you, and what you need to prove. It doesn't matter how prove it, you just need to prove it. Here, come here, we'll go by the tree. It's shady."
He takes my book from me and flips through the review section of the chapter, nodding over some problems, singing to himself as we walk. We approach the giant willow tree and Roger starts to walk around it to the other side.
"Oh, hey." He grunts, stopping. I follow his gaze to find the blonde girl from Geometry with her back against the tree, a comic book in one hand and a half eaten green apple in the other. She's dainty, her hair styled into a shaggy bob, and big brown eyes. She smiles warmly, taking another bite out of the apple.
I wait for Roger to say something, but he's buried in the textbook.
"So uh, thanks for siding with us in Geometry." I offer, nudging Roger. He regards her closely, narrowing his eyes for a moment in thought before sighing, his eyes still wary.
"Yeah. Thanks, I guess."
She sets her comic book down, taking another crunch out of the apple and smiling again. "Well, you were right." She looks up at Roger with his textbook. "Still studying?"
"Mark needs help with his proofs." Roger tells her. I shrug helplessly.
"I'm Violet." She says, before biting into her apple again.
"Mark," I say, pointing to myself. "And Roger."
She smiles and holds up a hand, I assume to be helped up. I take her hand but instead of pulling her up she pulls me down to the ground beside her. Roger looks up when I go down, frowning slightly, but absently holding out his free hand to take her other one and join us. He drops the book in front of the three of us and pulls out a spare notebook.
"Here Mark, copy number 4. We'll help you."