A/N: Hey guys! Wow, this chapter has been a LONG time coming! But, y'know, work and volunteering and family issues. :/ Thanks so much to everyone who reviewed/favourited/followed the story so far! It means a lot to me that I'm getting any recognition at all! :) I dedicate this chapter to you, loyal readers!
Maka's essay writing and test-taking the next morning had been a success. Even though her friends were never surprised at her high grade point average, Maka always felt relieved to see a high number on a test paper or words of praise on an essay. It was the one thing she knew she was really good at, and she loved it.
At lunch that day, Liz decided to skip the next few periods with her newest boyfriend and suggested Maka join them.
"For the last time, Liz: no! N-O!" Maka was actually forced to look up from the book she had propped up against the edge of the cafeteria table so she could eat and read at the same time.
"Come on Maka!" Liz let her face fall from the hand she was leaning it against and onto the table dramatically. Patti giggled and tapped her big sis on the top of the head jovially.
"I have no idea why you continue to ask me." Maka's boredom had her eyes falling slowly towards the open pages again.
"They just want you to broaden your horizons, Maka." Tsubaki gave her a warm smile and patted her lightly on the shoulder. Maka smiled genuinely at Tsubaki, who seemed like the only one on her side a lot of the time.
"If by 'broaden her horizons' you mean 'get her to have a life' then yes, that's what I'm trying to do." Maka's dirty blonde pigtails swished against her reddening cheeks as she lifted her head quickly to glare at her friend. Liz only gave her a cold glance before sitting up again. "Well all of you goody-two-shoes are boring me to death. Patti? Wanna head out?" Liz's younger sister stood quickly and gave her older sibling a flamboyant salute.
Tsubaki waved at them as they left but whispered to Maka. "You know they just want you to be happy. They mean well."
"I know they do. But can't they see that I'm happy enough already? I've got good grades, a place on the cheer squad, a roof over my head, food to eat…and a friend like you." Maka gave her best friend an over-the-top wink and Tsubaki giggled.
"I know Maka. Just…" Tsubaki sighed and stood up "Try to let other people in sometimes, okay?"
Maka nodded and stared up at her friend. "Where are you going?"
"Black Star's got football practice and I said I'd watch him." Tsubaki's blush spread quickly across her whole face and Maka rolled her eyes, smirking.
"Okay, fine. Tell him he's getting harder to cheer for the more times he makes us lose."
"Very funny…" Tsubaki waved over her shoulder as she exited the cafeteria. After Maka finished the chapter of her book she checked her cell phone for the time. Only 12:30? She still had half an hour left of her lunch period.
Maka decided to ditch the cafeteria and find a quiet spot in the hallway to sit and study, which is what she normally did when her friends weren't around. Wandering around the corridors and looking for the most secluded spot with the least noise in a school like that was quite a feat, but Maka managed to do it. She relished her alone time, but she realized that Tsubaki had a point, apart from her dad and the girls on the cheer squad she didn't really make the effort to talk to anyone. In fact, she regularly avoided talking to her dad as much as possible. Ever since her parents got a divorce and her mom had to travel to the Middle East for work, Maka had to live with her least favourite caregiver. She resented the fact that even though he broke her family apart by cheating on her mom all the time, Maka's dad still tried to act like he was a perfect father and that they were the happiest family ever. Just thinking about it increased the length of Maka's strides and made her countenance more forbidding as she traipsed down the hall.
She settled down on the floor in the Music Hallway in a huff, trying to get her mind off of her dad and Tsubaki's advice. Maka decided that retreating into her studies to get her mind oriented again was the best option to calm her down.
However, not 5 minutes into studying, the sound of a piano being played began to echo through the hallway. Maka rolled her eyes and closed her book. Not surprising, she thought. I should've expected that, sitting in the Music Hall.
As she was beginning to head towards the next accessible hallway, the swelling music and despondent melody of the piano caught Maka's attention and made her head towards the source of the music instead. Her brain kept scolding her for getting distracted from her very important study time, but the lure of the music had an almost hypnotic affect on her senses, heightening them so that she couldn't ignore the pull she felt towards the open practice room door. As Maka silently pushed open the door and peeked around the corner, the first thing that caught her attention was the messy, white hair of the pianist in question. Her heart stopped, and then her blood boiled. Flushed with embarrassment at her discovery, Maka burst into the small room unceremoniously and yelled as loud as her surprised and humiliated voice could carry:
"IT'S YOU?!"
To which the player slammed his fingers roughly against the keyboard and screamed in an equally high manner:
"What the HELL?!"
Immediately following this, he proceeded to fall over the back of the bench and land square on his back. He tilted his head back to look upside-down at Maka, who was still seething. Soul sighed loudly and rolled his eyes to look up at the tiled ceiling. "What was that about, bookworm?"
Even after I startle him that badly he still manages to be so chilled out? Is this kid part robot or something?!
Maka now turned an even brighter shade of pink, realizing that the intensity of her outburst was wholly unnecessary. Maka put her most perturbed look on her face and planted her hands on her hips.
"I was trying to study, Soul." She put as much venom and abhorrence into his name as possible, as if just saying it left a bad taste in her mouth.
If he understood her implication, he didn't show it. Soul proceeded to sit up and cross his legs underneath him like a primary schooler, but gave her a look of annoyance that was anything but juvenile.
"You must be damn insane if you think that the Music Hall is a nice quiet place to study."
His tone of voice got under her skin again and her stance became even more guarded. "It normally is at this hour."
"So what, you were coming in here to tell me to shut up?" Soul rolled his eyes.
"No, I…" Maka reluctantly realized that she would have to pay him a compliment in this situation if she wanted to explain why she cared to look in the first place. She took a deep breath and tried to talk to him like he wasn't an infuriating boy, but one of her friends, like Tsubaki or Liz.
"Soul…I actually thought that your playing was really good. Beautiful, actually." Maka awkwardly tugged at her pigtail as Soul's eyes widened in shock.
"You're serious."
"Yeah…" Maka smiled, finding herself becoming more relaxed. "I've always loved the way the piano sounded. My mom used to play a lot… It's just really calming."
"Same goes for with studying, I take it?" Soul flashed her a smile and she was again taken aback by the unnatural sharpness of his teeth.
"Yeah, I guess… Wait, how do you know that?"
Soul chuckled; a deep sound that made Maka's skin tingly in a different way than he normally made her feel. "Because that's all you do. Well, that and read your freaking 500-page novels!"
Maka's blush returned and she looked down at the tips of her sneakers. "You notice?"
"Maka, I think everyone notices… and when you haven't got your face in a book you're so uptight!"
"What do you mean?!" Her tone was becoming accusatory again.
"I mean…" Soul walked forward until he was directly in front of her and tapped her on the head with two fingers. "You can't turn off that big brain of yours and just relax. You always have to be doing something."
Maka backed up and glared at him, feeling her emotions harden against him once more. "Are you, for real, stalking me?"
"No…"
"Then how do you know so much about me?!"
There was that smirk she loved to hate. "Let's just say I can read you like a book."
Maka's resolve crumbled a little and her face fell. She was totally predictable. Not only her friends, but even this relative stranger was telling her to let others in; to loosen up…
Maka squared her shoulders and looked Soul in the eye. "Soul, if you wouldn't mind playing that song again, I think I'd like to study in here for the rest of lunch period. You're calming music will help make me less uptight, don't you think?" She smirked back at him before she turned to retrieve her bag from the doorway.
Soul chuckled again and turned to the piano, resuming play almost immediately.
Soul's music continued playing for the rest of the period while Maka sat in a chair in the corner of the room, idly turning the pages in her Biology textbook. And for once, none of the words on the pages were sinking into her mind in the slightest. Only the sound of the piano, and the smile of its player.
A/N: Since I'm going on vacation this coming week, I'll hopefully have more time to write the next few chapters in advance so there won't be as long of a wait time! Stay awesome, everyone! :D
