[6]

Awakenings and Calculus

Arya

April

Senior Year

Six Years Ago

"You look like someone punched you in the eyes." Came Gendry's remark as Arya walked inside the auto shop, bringing a paper bag of takeout Dim sum from Red Lantern. He was wearing those blue overalls again which was provided by the shop for its employees, his white t-shirt peeking out from his unbuttoned top. "That, or I'm beginning to think that you suddenly want to turn into a panda so badly." He sardonically added, methodically wiping his grease-stained hands with a damp washcloth.

"I wouldn't mind turning into a panda. Pandas are the most adorable creatures on the planet after all." She retorted, trying to subdue the seriousness of the subject by masking her apprehension.

It was true, though –pandas were indeed the cutest animals. But what's truer than pandas at that moment were the prominent dark circles underneath her eyes.

Gendry's keen observations weren't exactly inaccurate. In fact, those dark circles were evident because she'd been having those nightmares again. And they're not getting any better either. Whenever she'd wake up in the most unholy hours of dawn, she could no longer find it in her to get back to sleep. It had been an issue to her ever since she started having those dreams last year and she hated it because they were already affecting her daily life and her health.

He raised an eyebrow at her before crossing his arms. "Oh yeah? Why not tell me the truth and get it over with?"

God, he was good at reading her. A year into their friendship and he made it seem like they'd already spent a lifetime with each other.

"Isn't it obvious already that I wasn't able to get any sleep?" She countered, plopping herself on the clean side of a bench that had a small clutter of tools and car parts.

"Why the fuck didn't you get any sleep?"

Fixing her features to emphasize her nonchalance, she answered, "Been studying for finals week."

Gendry snorted incredulously. "You don't study, Arya." He deadpanned.

"Then what are we doing later? Isn't tutoring counted as studying? Because I'm obviously here so that you can tutor me for my trigonometry and calculus exams, right?"

He huffed a sigh as he sat beside her on the bench, moving further aside the clutter of random tools.

"Arya, you can always tell me anything, you know. Is there something bothering you?" He looked at her seriously, raking her face for any other emotion she was trying to hide. "And don't tell me it's nothing because it's not just your panda eyes I'm noticing… You're also losing weight, did you know that? You're literally wasting away, for fuck's sakes."

Arya's eyes widened in real surprise.

"I lost weight? Really? Well, my mother actually thinks otherwise. She said that I need to minimize eating because I'm getting fat."

"Are you fucking kidding me right now?" It wasn't difficult to read the growing irritation on his face.

"No. I'm telling the truth, Gendry. She even hired someone to get me into following a strict diet plan." She replied.

"Your mother clearly needs to take a closer look at you right now, Arya. And why she's even subjecting her high school daughter to go on a diet is already beyond me." It was pretty much obvious from the start that Gendry had never been a fan of her mother, especially if she meddled with her life like this. Although Gendry hadn't really been blatant about his outright disagreement to what her mother regarded as proper or not, Arya knew that deep inside Gendry had been simmering with disapproval with regard to how Catelyn would subject Arya into fitting in to their social circle.

Running his hands over his already disheveled hair, Gendry continued, "You know what, screw that ridiculous diet plan. You obviously need to eat more. And since when do you follow your mother's orders, anyway? You can practically eat anything you want for all I care."

If only Gendry knew that Arya didn't really have a choice in that matter right now because her obedience was her ticket to freedom after high school. She just needed to do a little more sacrifice and that was to follow all her mother's wishes at the moment.

And one of those wishes was to keep herself from getting fat.

A lady like you should learn how to control. You can't just eat whatever you see at the table just because you like it, or you'll get fat and it won't look good. You don't want to ruin your image in front of everyone in society, do you? Mother had explained to her one time as they were on their way to some boring ladies' social function along with her socialite sister Sansa.

But that's the problem. She was already losing her appetite as it was mainly because of the nightmares she'd been having almost every night, and yet, her mother still failed to notice that, thinking she's still too fat for her liking.

Narrowing his eyes at her, Gendry felt the need to ask again, "What's really going on, Arya?"

She shook her head, making herself hold his scathing gaze to make it look like everything was alright. "I'm fine, Gendry. I'm just worried about my grades, is all. You know I can't afford to fail or I will have to repeat my senior year, then my parents will never ever allow me to move out for college."

That was her other ticket to freedom: passing all her subjects.

She definitely ought to pass senior year because she could no longer stand staying for another second in her school. Although she got more than satisfactory grades in most of her subjects, she still needed to fix the barely passing grades she received in math, which was why she was seeing Gendry that afternoon.

Failing that subject was not an option. Not when she'd been planning in the past months to move out of their family penthouse and rent a smaller one-bedroom apartment just a floor below Gendry's place. It had already been prepared for her by her parents on the condition that she'd enroll into any pre-med course (and following her mother's wishes to go on a diet).

She really had no choice but to agree with their terms because she didn't want to risk having anyone else at home hear her screaming in her sleep at night.

When Gendry learned of her plans to rent a place on the same apartment building he was staying, he was more than overjoyed, which was why he also offered to help her ace her math exams by tutoring her.

Arya's father didn't have a problem with the arrangement and she wondered if he only ever trusted him because of his instant affiliation to Uncle Robert.

It was her mother who had qualms at first about Gendry tutoring her and Arya wondered if it was because she still looked down on Gendry for being a bastard the way she regarded Jon as one, or if it had something to do with Gendry's filthy, vulgar mouth. Arya, for one, didn't give a single fuck about Gendry's most colorful picks of the foulest words because she herself had a more vivid selection of crisp expletives.

Her mother had just always been so particular about social standing and how to behave in the eyes of the public that it annoyed Arya on a daily basis. But knowing her mother to think like that, Arya also used that to her advantage by letting her mother think that she had already been completely "reformed" by her new school.

The trick to getting around her mother all these years was by learning everything she liked and disliked and playing along those lines just to get her to think that her daughter had been very obedient of her in all means.

If only her mother knew that Arya was just playing along.

She hoped to whatever god there was that her mother wouldn't be able to see through her masks.

"Alright. You promise?" A worried Gendry was endearing, Arya realized.

"Promise." She lied, cementing it with a forced smile.

He finally eyed the paper bag on her lap, a smile escaping his lips. "Do I get first dibs on whatever is inside that takeout bag, then?"

She smiled back at him as she handed him the entire bag. "That's all yours, actually. All your favorites from the Red Lantern." It came as a surprise to her that he also loved Dim sum as much as she did. Well, except for the red bean buns that tasted weird.

He almost stuck his face inside the paper bag as he peeked through its contents.

"Holy shit. You even got me these buns even if you hate them." Taking a huge bite, he added, "Thanks. I'm really hungry." His words were muffled by the food stuffed inside his mouth.

"When was the last time you ate? You look like you haven't eaten in a week." She remarked, noticing his mop of unruly obsidian hair and the greases staining his arms and clothes for the first time.

"This morning? I don't know. I can't even remember because I was busy upgrading the engine of a Skyline from 2.5 to 3.0, which had to be done by the end of the day." He explained before filling his mouth with another huge bite of the red bean buns.

God, she could see the veins on his neck bulging every time he chewed his food which only heightened up her lecherous imagination.

She painted her face with excitement to rid those thoughts away and focused on how she was always amazed by his job as a mechanic at the shop. "Really?" She asked, standing up. "Is it this one?" She pointed at the cobalt blue car in front of them with its hood still open.

He nodded silently as she walked toward the car only a few meters away from the bench.

Bending over to have a closer look at the newly attached 3.0 engine, she carefully observed Gendry's intricate work. He always worked with precision, making sure that everything, even the most minute parts, always had function and relevance.

Every little thing about cars and engines was indeed his very expertise.

She wasn't really a huge fan of it herself but she already had a basic knowledge of cars from her older brothers who loved to race as much as Gendry did.

A few seconds had passed before she felt a soothing warmth on her back as Gendry stood almost directly behind her, his large, rippling arms leaning on the open hood above her.

He was practically towering over her petite frame.

"What do you think?" He rasped almost immediately after she straightened herself. There was something about the tone in his voice that she couldn't place. What's more was the way his sapphire eyes were looking at her darkly.

If she so ever moved just even an inch backwards, she was aware that her back would already literally be touching his broad chest, enclosing her completely in his warmth.

Swallowing an invisible lump in her throat, she gathered all her strength as if to act calm around his intimidating presence, keeping in mind that her best friend was a sex god first and foremost, hence that unexplainable effect on her.

"I think your work is very neat." She almost stuttered.

He flashed her a feral smile as he moved closer, his lips ghosting over her ear. "Do you want to know what I think?" He whispered tauntingly.

"What?"

She could feel her heart beating a faster rate now that he was positioned directly behind her back, feeling the heat radiating off the rigid planes of his body.

"I think that if I were some other guy out there, I would already have taken you right here, right now with you bent over like that because those sexy black lace panties you are wearing are just so inviting." He paused as she felt the hand leaning on the open hood travelling down from the small of her back to the hem of her short skirt. She thought he was about to touch her inappropriately, but realized that he was only fixing the skirts of her uniform.

"But since I'm not like one of those fucking assholes out there, then I would highly advise you to always watch over your uniform especially if it rides all the way up to your thighs like this because there are sick assholes everywhere trying to get their hands on you just because they think they are entitled to touch you, thinking that you're inviting them to. And trust me when I say that I wouldn't really hesitate to beat the bloody shit out of them if they for one second touch you without your consent." He explained, the sudden intimate tension between them slowly dissipating.

She'd been so engrossed with the work he'd done on the car that she didn't even notice that her skirt was already riding up to the top her thighs.

Nevertheless, a sense of relief washed over her face as she understood what he meant.

Gendry was right. Those assholes were indeed everywhere and no matter how much she believed that what she was wearing wouldn't really matter, there would always be someone who would try to sexualize every exposed part of her body, be it accidental or not, and blaming her for her choice of clothes and telling her she was asking for it.

With Gendry, she wasn't entirely worried about him harassing her because she could tell that he respected women of all forms and he was well aware of his boundaries. Even if he was a serial dater and slept around casually, he still asked for their consent and he'd never force himself on them.

As for Arya and Gendry in the course of their friendship, they might often be exchanging subtle suggestive innuendos here and there, but never for once did Gendry try to take advantage of her, much less attempt to talk her into sleeping with him.

He was a feminist in his own ways and she liked that he considered women as equals.

"Oh. Sorry." Was all she said as she finally fixed her skirt for good measure, feeling her face turn the brightest shade of crimson the moment it dawned on her that Gendry had just actually seen her panties.

He sauntered back to the bench to grab the rest of his stuff before he informed her, "I'm just going to change and then we'll go." He was already about to walk inside the locker room when he paused, turning back to face her again, "Oh, and before we head to my apartment to study, I'm going to have to feed you first. You'll be needing all your energy for what I have in store for you tonight." He winked.

Somewhere inside her imaginative mind, Arya wished that it would involve taking off their clothes and exchanging body heat.

But so much for wishful thinking.

Because going beyond the line of platonic friendship was already an impossibility, especially when it had been established that he'd only ever seen her as a friend.

Sweat slowly dribbled from her forehead down to her temples. Aside from that, her dark hair was already a bundled mess on top of her head with small wavy wisps stuck to the sides of her neck. Heat flared off her body as she continued to pant from the on-and-off exertion she'd been doing in the past hour and a half.

Her left hand already felt like falling off and her legs were already shaking from the weight she put on her feet. She might as well be executing those high-intensity physical exercises her sister had been doing to maintain her sculpted runway body because she felt like she'd been doing the exact same thing.

Fucking Gendry and his fucking teaching strategies, Arya cursed internally. She badly wanted to strangle the living daylight out of him for putting her in this exhausting position. Her mind was literally drained from answering extra difficult equations here and there, so was her physical strength that she badly wanted to throw herself on the first bed she could find, which would probably be the huge king-sized bed inside his bedroom, anyway.

The alarm that suddenly blared through the rest of the apartment startled the shit out of her.

"Time's up." He informed her from where he was comfortably seated on the couch. But stubborn and frustrated as she was, she continued scribbling the rest of the difficult equation on his blackboard. Yes, her best friend had a fucking blackboard almost the same height as the wall inside his living room. Actually, the board was attached to the rustic brick wall dividing his living room from what he considered was his makeshift study area slash mini-library.

Having an eye for art, she actually loved how the interior of Gendry's apartment was designed. It had a modern yet rustic-industrial feel to it which really suited his personality. And apart from the superb design, it was also pristinely neat. He was always sort of OCD when it came to his stuff, which was what made her like him even more.

She was crushing on her best friend so bad, that sometimes she just wanted to—

"I said, time's up!" His voice cut off whatever lecherous thoughts were beginning to worm their way inside her head. His voice was much louder, more domineering and nearer this time. And before she even realized what was happening, the chalk on her left hand was suddenly snatched away from her.

Finally resigning in defeat, she moved a step back from the blackboard, only to land snugly on a broad, hard chest.

"Hey, easy..." He told her, tentatively placing his large hands on her hips to steady her.

Blushing furiously at their sudden yet scalding contact, she immediately moved away from his intimate space before she could act on her impulse of jumping at him and do gods know what to that rippling body of muscles she'd been dying to explore.

Instead of muttering an apology, she glared at him murderously to hide her flustered state. "This is fucking ridiculous. I'm already bad at math as it is, how much more if you put me into a time-constrained problem-solving exercise that's even harder than my actual exams! I'm just so tired as fuck, Gendry. Please, just end my suffering." She whined frustratingly, finally plopping herself unceremoniously on the grey plush couch, making her uniform even more crumpled. She was down to wearing just her short, pleated skirt and the white button-down that came with her uniform, and it only made her look like she'd been to the underworld and back.

He stood before the blackboard with his hands on his hips as he started going over her lengthy equations. It was as if he was trying to decipher her impossibly bad handwriting with the way he was squinting his eyes. She couldn't help it, it wasn't her fault that she was born with the worst handwriting that looked entirely like a whole new kind of font. That's how bad it was.

"Some of these are actually correct, Arya." He noted, his eyes never leaving the board.

She ran her hands all over her face before ruffling the already messy bun on top of her head as if she was a mental person. "I don't even know what's wrong or right anymore, Gendry. I'm a fucking hopeless case."

He finally faced her this time, handing out a chalk to her.

"Come over and do the checking yourself. In that way you would know which parts you got wrong and which ones you got right. Looking at your equations the second time actually helps you with realizing your earlier mistakes." He coached.

Arya stood up once again, albeit begrudgingly, and pulled out her hair tie in the process, her wavy tresses falling down the sides of her face.

Looking back at the equations she'd done on the board for a few minutes, she finally understood what Gendry meant. She started making the corrections while Gendry was standing only a few inches behind, coaching her every now and then.

"There. Is everything finally clear to you now?" He asked her after everything had been thoroughly explained and counterchecked, the timbre of his deep voice dangerously making her shiver. The nearness of his lips to hear earlobe made her core tingle with need.

She made the mistake of turning away from the blackboard only to meet with his intense, expectant eyes that instantly rendered her speechless.

She only nodded her head in response, her parched throat bobbing up and down.

Raising his hands to the level of her face, he began to brush away the stray strands of her hair. Just when she thought that he was about to kiss her, a mocking frown slid on his face. "You look like you've been to the seven hells and back." Then he sniffed at her.

Sniffed.

"And you smell—"

"No, I don't!" She defensively said, pushing him away with all of the force she could muster. She could've sworn that a million liters of blood was already pooling at her cheeks that moment.

Gendry tipped his head back in a guffaw.

"Why are you being so defensive? I was only about so tell you that you smell absolutely divine…" He told her mischievously, making sniffing gestures as he sauntered back closer to her. "Your perfume smells like vanilla." He drawled dangerously closer this time. "Delicious."

She crossed her arms, already feeling terribly self-conscious of herself. "I'm sweating. I might as well smell like Satan's armpits right now."

Another laugh from him.

"No, you don't. And you can always borrow a shirt from me, you know. If it makes you more comfortable." He offered, shrugging.

"Yeah, I should've done that before we even started." She mumbled more to herself than she could let on. "We're done for tonight, right?" She added.

Gendry grinned knowingly, "Not quite. I'm still cooking us dinner."

Her eyes widened, and as if on cue, she also felt her stomach rumbling as the word 'dinner' slipped smoothly from his lips.

"Oh my god, that sounds great. Because I'm really starving." She admitted, touching her stomach in emphasis.

"Good. It means that your appetite's still functioning. That way, I could feed you anytime I like." He winked, grabbing her hand and leading her to his now familiar room that smelled just like him. Like musk and Old Spice.

Gendry's bed was the first thing she saw when he turned the lights on, and she badly fought the strong urge to throw herself and fall into a deep, dreamless slumber on its soft covers.

She always loved his room. It might not be as big as the rooms in their penthouse apartment, but it was cozy, and she liked how consistent he was with his neatness. There was barely any clutter in his place since he only kept the most basic things he needed.

"Like, are you an anal person?" She had once word-vomited on that question upon noticing his tidiness the first time he'd brought her inside his room. It wasn't like they were doing something gravely scandalous at that time because Gendry had only offered to let her use his bathroom when she'd told him she'd wanted to pee so badly in the middle of their first movie marathon a year ago.

Gendry had almost choked on the soda he was sipping when she'd asked him in that manner.

A sly smile had crept on her face at the innuendo he was thinking. "I didn't mean it that way, Gendry." She'd explained knowingly.

"I know what you mean, Arya." He'd rolled his eyes defensively after his retort.

"Then I don't see why you'd choke on your drink with that question." She'd challenged.

"Whatever. And yeah, I like to keep my stuff in order, so I guess I'm anal." He'd responded, emphasizing on the last word as he'd equaled her innuendo.

Going back to the here and now, she continued to eye his bed longingly as he rummaged his drawer for a spare shirt he could lend her.

"Here." He said, finally handing her a black band t-shirt that was a million sizes larger than her. Raising an eyebrow, he added, "You look like you could drown in my bed for eternity with the way you are staring at it. Do you feel tired? Do you want to take a nap while I cook us some dinner?" Came his tempting offer.

She almost succumbed to the temptation of his welcoming bed but she remembered that she couldn't just sleep anywhere that's not her room or else someone like Gendry could see her having those nightmares.

Shaking her head and slowly unbuttoning her shirt, she replied, "I'm fine. I'll just help you with preparing dinner."

He only shrugged casually before leaving her to change into his comfortable shirt that smelled exactly like him.

If only she could take his shirt home and never return it.

Gendry

April

Six Years Ago

There was definitely something wrong with her. Gendry could just feel it. And it wasn't just because of his gut-feeling, but he also couldn't help but notice how she was slowly fading away. Fading in a manner that her truest identity was being stripped off into pieces little by little.

Although he could factor in the apprehension she was feeling for their upcoming final exams, in addition to her concern for her grades in math, still it wouldn't really sum up to the drastic difference he'd been noticing in her whenever they saw each other.

Those dark circles underneath her eyes and her noticeable weight loss were literally sucking the life out of her system and Gendry was afraid that if it went on, he would eventually be losing her.

And he couldn't afford to lose her.

Not when he'd already found a genuine friend in her.

He was driving back to his apartment after he'd sent her home following their intensive tutorial sessions when all these thoughts suddenly came pouring down like the goddamn rain.

He knew he shouldn't be this affected after he'd taken her word for it but not worrying about her also didn't seem right. And he couldn't even begin to explain why her mother, of all people, would fail to notice these obvious changes in her daughter.

He was honestly livid when Arya told him she was put under a strict diet plan.

Catelyn Stark got her youngest daughter on a diet just to keep a pretentious façade, an "acceptable" image to society. Fucking pathetic.

Bloody highborns and their bloody standards. He shook his head, cursing internally.

It's not that he hated Catelyn as a person, but what he couldn't really stand was how she only cared about social standing to the extent that she'd force her daughter to behave in a certain way just to avoid staining their family name. Even if Arya clearly resented behaving like a proper lady. Her mother was practically trying to turn her into a socialite like her sister and Gendry knew that it was only making his best friend lose herself in the process.

Thoughts like these always bothered him. They're slowly eating him to the point where all he could think of was Arya and her welfare. It was already obvious enough that he cared for her. The problem was, he seemed to care for her a lot that sometimes it might even be too much already because he'd always place her on the top of his priority list.

But he couldn't really help it.

She just meant a lot to him.

Because she's your best friend, was the reminder he kept telling himself time and again, and that it had to be the only reason why he cared.

But it's as if it had always been a battle between the justification of pure friendship… and something else entirely that his heart, and his body, was still refusing to admit.

Especially when he saw that scrap of lace she was wearing underneath the skirts of her uniform.

Fuck. He cursed, his cock beginning to stir in his jeans at the rate of where his imagination was taking him.

The sight of her bent over the hood of the car caused all of his blood to travel down south, his thoughts jumping to overdrive at the number of things he could possibly do to her in that position –with her legs partly spread, her arms clutching to the hood for support as he stood there behind her back, his straining cock mere inches away from her.

But just like he told her that moment, he wasn't like one of those assholes who'd feel entitled to touch her just because of her inviting position.

He still valued consent more than anything else.

And just like what he kept telling himself, they were friends.

A long sigh of frustration escaped his lips.

He badly needed a distraction. Just so that he could control these unknown feelings that were only growing stronger.

With final resolve, he made a short stop on the side of the road. Reaching for his phone in the center console, he punched the numbers he knew so well now.

There was an instant answer after the first ring.

"What's up, Waters?"

"Hook me up with a race tonight. I badly need one." He told an old friend on the other line.

"Come over, then. You're just right on time for the next race."

"Good. Be there in five."

Gripping the wheel tighter, he revved up his car for a couple of times before finally stepping on the accelerator, driving along the solitary highway toward the race area with the speed of one hundred eighty kilometers per hour.

This was the kind of distraction he needed to flush out those unbidden thoughts away –unrelenting speed with a dose of raw adrenaline.

And when it was all over that night, he went home to his humble apartment with a hot blonde girl around his arms. It wasn't anything serious, though. It was just one of those casual, rough hook ups with no commitments and no strings attached. Just for plain pleasure and instant gratification.

Fighting the urge to succumb to sleep, where he knew he'd only be dreaming about another girl with brown hair and stormy eyes, Gendry fucked the girl in his bed to oblivion the entire night with only a single thought inside his head.