Beep! Beep! Beep! Beep!

Eyes still closed, I sleepily reached my hand out, in a quest to mute the intolerable alarm clock. Finding it, I pressed the off button, and sluggishly rolled out of my bed. Being it a Wednesday, I had no classes until 5:00 PM, which gave me quite a while to do whatever I wanted. However, I had set an alarm because I wanted to finish the majority of my homework.

Fixing my bed head, I opened my door and walked into the kitchen to find Toris already up and eating a bagel with cream cheese. "Good morning Tino!" he replied cheerfully.

I smiled and repeated the greeting, while making my way over to the coffee pot. "You seem a lot happier than last night."

A sheepish look appeared on his face. "I'm sorry for last night and the…awkwardness that came from it."

I shook my head. "Oh, you're fine. I just…" I paused for a moment. "I'm just a bit curious. I didn't know Feliks was your boyfriend."

"I don't have a boyfriend," he responded. "Lately, I had been spending more time with him, after school and such. He told me he doesn't have a car, so I became his 'personal' chauffer. We didn't do anything special, just go out shopping or eat at a restaurant. I thought him as a friend, and nothing else."

Oh, so that's what Toris had been doing all this time.

"Well, apparently, he somehow got the idea that I was…into him," a deep blush spread over his face at this, "and last night, when we came back to my dorm to watch Project Runway, he suddenly…well…that's when you and Berwald walked in."

"Are you not into him?" I asked.

"Well, I'm not into guys. I'm straight…at least, that's what I thought when I first came to this university."

"And you're not now?" I asked again.

"I…I don't know. I mean, there's this one girl—Natalia is her name—and she's super pretty! She lives right down the hall, and sometimes she behaves like a crazy psycho ready to kill me, but if you look past that, she's amazing!" Toris suddenly burst out. "But then," he paused for a moment. "Feliks is different from another other guy I've ever met. And, well, there's what happened last night…"

Silence filled the room. "Well," I began, "Running after Feliks last night has to say something, right?"

He shrugged and leaned back in his chair. "I don't know." He suddenly looked at me. "Tino, I…have a personal question."

"Shoot!" I replied, smiling.

"I don't want to pry, but, what sexuality are you?"

He must've mistaken my silence for expiration, for he quickly said, "N-Never mind! I'm sorry if I upset you! You don't have to answer if you don't want to!"

I laughed quietly and shook my head. "I'm not upset; I'm straight," I responded.

I could've sworn that a look of disbelief or confusion came over Toris' face for a split second, but it was replaced with his normal, slightly nervous smile. "Ah, I see!" he replied. I must've imagined the doubting expression.

Toris suddenly stood up. "I need to get going, my trigonometry class starts soon." With that, he began walking to the door, which reminded me of something I wanted to ask him.

"Oh, Toris!"

He turned around with a kind smile. "Yeah, Tino?"

"I was just wondering…did you happen to catch Feliks yesterday night? You know, when he ran out the door?"

His eyes turned sullen, and his expression became so blatant that I already knew what his answer was. "No. I tried following him, but I lost him in the mob of people in the cafeteria."

"Did you try texting him?"

"Yeah. He hasn't responded." He sighed and his shoulders slumped just a bit.

"Well, I'm sure you'll see him today, and talk to him!" I said, trying to lighten the mood a little.

"We'll see." A corner of his mouth rose in an attempt of a smile. "I should be going." He looked down at his watch and his eyes widened. "I should really get going."

After both saying our goodbyes, Toris walked out the door, leaving me alone in the dorm. I immediately got started on my homework.


I won't write about doing my homework, unless you want to be bored to death. After study history and answering questions for about two hours, I decided to take a break and stretch my legs. An idea suddenly popped into my head, and I gasped excitedly. "I could go visit Hana! She's probably hungry, the poor thing!" After heating up a waffle and grabbing a bag of pretzels (thankfully Toris had gone grocery shopping), I headed out the door to the gazebo.

After taking the first step outside, I immediately wanted to go back inside the building. It was already the middle of November, and the weather was cold. Snow wasn't expected until December, but it was still freezing. Thank goodness I had remembered to wear boots and a heavy jacket! I walked down the path Berwald had showed me yesterday, and passed by the quaint cottages. To my surprise, a few students were already out.

I only knew one student who was outside, and that was Emil, who was currently sitting on a low brick wall. Beside him was a male student with choppy dark brown hair. They didn't seem to be talking, and as I neared them, I realized that they were both playing Pokémon on their own separate Nintendo DS.

Wanting to be friendly, I called out, "Hello Emil!" However, he didn't seem to hear me, for his head remained down and he continued pressing random buttons on his DS. I quickly passed by them, feeling a bit foolish.

Two girls were sitting on a porch outside of a cottage on my left. The first had long, brown hair, with a wild curly strand sticking out on the right side of her head, and wore a peachy colored dress. The second girl, like the first, had long brown hair that was slightly wavy at the ends. To my surprise, it was the same girl who had been chasing the albino student with the frying pan the first day I came to campus. As I passed by them, I caught a few sentences they uttered.

"When are Pasta Boy and the German going to hook up? They were totally fawning over each other last night!" Frying Pan Girl exclaimed.

"Are you serious?! They're my otp! Where was I?!" the second girl squealed.

"You were discussing the latest chapter of Shingeki no Kyojin with Kiku," the first said without skipping a beat.

I had no idea what they were talking about, so I continued walking towards the gazebo. I walked further and further away from the cottages, and neared the clearing, and as I turned the corner, I discovered that I wasn't the first to visit Hana that morning.

Berwald sat on the bench next to the little dog house, and the puppy happily danced around him in circles. To my surprise, I also heard faint music coming from the bench that Berwald was currently sitting on, which sounded very familiar to the music that was coming from his room a couple weeks ago.

Realizing that he might turn it off when I approached him, I quickly jumped behind the nearest cottage. Miraculously, he somehow hadn't seen me, and I peeked out behind the building, straining my ears for a simple lyric of the song.

Mamma mia, here I go again

No.

My my, how can I resist you?

No.

Mamma mia, does it show again?

No. There was no way that big, scary, intimidating Berwald Oxensteirna was listening to ABBA.

My my, just how much I've missed you

Yes, Berwald was most assuredly listening to Mamma Mia by ABBA. Unable to control myself, I covered my mouth, trying to stifle my laughter. I never expected that Berwald, with the piercing glare and the deep voice would be caught dead listening to ABBA while playing with a puppy. Controlling my laughter, I peeped my head out again. Berwald had now moved from his position on the bench and was now sitting on the grass, petting the puppy, who was laying on her side. A smile had also appeared on his face, and I had to admit, he looked very cute doing that.

What?

I pulled my head back and rested my back against the building. Cute? Where in the world had that come from? Had I just really called Berwald cute?!

Don't get me wrong, I acknowledge actors like Benedict Cumberbatch or Chris Evan being handsome. There's nothing wrong saying that someone looks good; I just hadn't ever thought of a guy as cute before…

I shook my head, a bit confused where that had come from. I mean, I wasn't into guys; I had just told Toris this morning that I was straight. I wasn't into guys. I wasn't into guys. I wasn't into Berwald.

Still trying to shake my head of these thoughts, I walked back through the way I had come, making sure to stay out of Berwald's sight, my now-cold waffle and pretzels long forgotten.


For the remainder of my day, I had resided in my room, contemplating what on earth I had been thinking. After a couple of hours, I had gone back to Hana's dog house and had fed her my pretzels, trying to clear my mind. When my five o'clock art class came along, I had cleared my head and was ready to learn.

My art class, while very small and smelled of too much paint, was extremely important to me. It was a place where I could let my imagination run wild, and do what I loved – to paint. Occasionally, my art professor would have us sculpt or draw, but painting beat them both by far.

My art professor was an eccentric man who was very much like art itself. At one moment, he would explain something so meaningful and poetic, like a dignified portrait or beautiful scenery. At the next would become so hyper or passionate about something as if he was a crazy piece of modern art. His appearance was just like his personality; most of the time he would show up in a suit, but there were some days where he would come wearing a cowboy outfit, or a pirate's costume. Strangely, he also had two wild curls in his hair.

What was it with weird hair curls at this school?

"Halt, who goes there?!"

It seemed as if he had gone with his 'crazy' personality today, for he wore a Roman gladiator suit, complete with a spear that looked pretty real. It also was pointed straight at me.

"Uhm, Tino Väinämöinen?" I squeaked.

"Oh, then come on in, soldier! Take a seat!" he boomed, then let me pass through the door.

I took the seat in the back of the classroom and looked around. I wasn't exactly social in the class, so I hadn't really bonded with any of the students there. Feeling a bit more outgoing than usual, I turned to the student on my right. "Hello!" I exclaimed.

The student turned around, and from the looks of him, I knew he would be a colorful character indeed, for his feet were currently resting on his desk, and was munching on a big, red tomato.

"Eh? What do you want?" He grumbled, still chewing his tomato. His eyes were the color of a bright peridot stone, and he had dark brown hair, with a strange, long curl, almost exactly like Feliciano Vargas, the student who worked at the Italian food stand on campus. Actually, his whole appearance looked a lot like Feliciano. However, his demeanor said, "I don't give a damn about anything."

"I was just saying hello!" I replied. He 'hmphed' and got back to eating his tomato, thus ending the conversation. So much for being social.

Luckily, the class got underway, and the professor began the class. Art never seemed long to me, since I enjoyed it that much. The class wasn't out of the ordinary; we learned about the under painting of portraits and other aspects of the sort. However, near the end of the time period, the professor proclaimed,

"Now, let's start talking about the semester project!"
Semester project? Oh, those are always fun. Can you detect my sarcasm?

"I want you to create a piece of art. It can be a painting, a drawing, a sculpture, a picture, anything!"

I immediately perked up at these words. I could paint whatever I wanted for a project?! This was awesome!

"However," he continued, "this piece of artwork has to mean something to you." He began strolling through the classroom until he stopped in front of the student I had been talking to before class, who was on his sixth tomato. "For example," he gestured to the student, "Lovino Vargas cannot paint a tomato simply because he enjoys eating them."

A few snickers broke out in the room, and Lovino glared up at the professor, blushing madly. "Vai a farti fottere!" he shouted.

I was expecting the professor to yell back at him, but he just replied with, "Non dimenticate che io parlo italiano," and with that, continued with his lecture. "While food is important to you, people should be considered more." It was at this point that he shot a tender glance towards Romano. "So I want to see some emotion in this project. Friends, family, pets, significant others, you get what I'm saying."

The bell rang, and the students began piling out of the classroom. I finished packing away my various things and exited the classroom. I began walking back to my room, wondering what exactly I was going to do for my art project. There was no doubt, I would be painting, but I had no idea what exactly I was going to paint.

Deep in thought and keeping my head down, I wandered down the hall, heading to the cafeteria. Suddenly, I bumped shoulders with someone heading the opposite way of the corridor and looked up.

"We seem to bump into each other often," I replied, smiling up at Berwald.

He nodded and held up his phone. "S'rry. I was t'xtin' and wasn't looking where I was goin'."

I shrugged. "It's nothing! My head was looking down as well." I was suddenly reminded of him sitting with Hana listening to ABBA and to my horror, I could feel my face getting hotter.

Trying to hide the blush that I knew had formed on my face, I gestured towards the cafeteria. "Have you already eaten yet? I was just about to get some dinner! Would you want to come with me?"

He nodded his head. "I'll come with ya."

I smiled and began walking towards the cafeteria, just a little further ahead than Berwald, so that he wouldn't see my now fading blush. Why had that image suddenly popped into my head?

We ended up getting food from the Mexican stand on campus, and sat down at a table. There was hardly anyone in the cafeteria at the time. Feliciano, who was working at the Italian food stand, was currently talking to a big, burly blonde student who looked like he could beat someone to a pulp in no time. Three students sat at a table on the other side of the room, and were extremely different from one another. The first I recognized as the dramatic thespian from a couple weeks earlier and the second was the Albino student who was chased by the frying pan girl at the beginning of the school year. The third had slightly curly brown hair, and tanner skin than the other two, and had a pile of tomatoes sitting in front of him.

We kept up a conversation as we ate concerning how our days went. However, every twenty seconds or so, Berwald's phone would buzz, which was most likely receiving a text. "Who are you texting?" I wondered aloud, smiling softly.

He quickly looked at his phone and put it in his pocket. "It's Mathias." He seemed like he didn't want to continue the conversation, so I moved on to a different subject.

"So Berwald, what kind of music do you like?" I asked, trying to sound casual.

"All s'rts of music. I like Sw'dish House M'fia," he murmured.

While this wasn't the answer I was hoping for, I nodded. "What other kinds of music?" I tried again, still trying to sound curious.

It was his turn to blush, for a light pink dusted over his sharp features and he scratched the back of his neck. "You'd l'ugh."

I shook my head. "I promise I won't. You can tell me anything," I added, smiling at him.

"I re'lly like ABBA. A lot," he blurted out all at once. The blush deepened and he looked away, most likely embarrassed.

I had expected this answer, but played it off like I hadn't. "Really?! I do too! What's your favorite song by them?"

The look on Berwald's face was priceless. Apparently he hadn't expected my reaction, for his eyes were wider than I had ever seen them, and his mouth was slightly open.

I would've been lying if I had said that his look didn't affect me, for my heart flip-flopped in my chest and then began racing. I bit my lip, trying to hide the giddy grin that had formed on my face.

"Y' can't just pick 'ne song. There's s' many amazin' ones," he finally seemed to have come over his shock, and for the next half hour, we discussed their different songs, and both expressed our dream of ABBA reuniting. To my surprise, Berwald wasn't just a normal fan, he was hardcore fan. He knew every single song they had ever come out with, along with their lyrics, and the year every song had come out. I was impressed, to say the least.

After telling the other our favorite song from the popular 70's band, Berwald's phone went haywire, suddenly buzzing every two seconds or so. His normal, glaring expression turned into an annoyed one as he looked up at his phone.

"Is it Mathias again?" I asked, giggling at how absurd he was receiving messages.

"Yeah." Evidently he had had enough, and silenced his phone. "He's been t'xtin' me nonstop f'r the past c'uple days."

"Why?" I asked curiously.

He shrugged. "'bout tips on woodshop. N'thin' much."

After finishing our meals, we headed back on up to our rooms, partly because the trio in the cafeteria had begun a singing competition that would've made someone's ears bleed.

Right before we both entered our separate rooms, Berwald suddenly pulled his phone out and faced me. "Do I h've your number? We seem to be seein' each other 'ften."

I tilted my head. "No, I don't believe you do."

He stayed still for quite some time, and after a moment or two, raised his eyebrows. "Hm?" he grunted questioningly.

"Oh!" I exclaimed, astonished at how slow I was. "Are you asking for my number?" I asked him, a slight smirk plastered on my face.

Berwald nodded with a sheepish grunt, and I, in turn, gave him my number. As he put the numbers into his phone, I couldn't help but mutter, "I can't believe I didn't catch your drift. I'm so slow." I laughed quietly.

Berwald suddenly stopped, and looked down at me. "Don't s'y that. You're not sl'w."

I smiled lopsidedly up at him. "You don't think so?"

"I think you're the f'rthest thing 'way from it. And I mean it."

My blush made a grand reappearance, and my heart probably started beating a million times a minute. I didn't quite know how to respond to a compliment like that, so I just uttered a, "Thank you," lamely.

He began opening his door, until I stopped him. "Wait!"

"Hm?" he paused.

"It wouldn't be right unless I got your number too!" It only was fair that I got his number as well. It would be pretty awkward for only him to have mine, and he did have a point: we were seeing each other pretty often. While I was still close to Toris, I had been spending much more time with Berwald, and if I had to pick a closest friend at the moment, it probably would've been Berwald.

After giving me his own number, he said our goodbyes and headed into our separate rooms. After closing the door, I leaned against it, much like the night before. However, unlike yesterday, my face was contorted into a confused scowl in absolute dubiety. I debated in my head what to do next, and the next thing I knew I was calling for my roommate. "Toris!"

Toris came walking in the kitchen, with a bowl of ice cream in his hands. "Oh, hello Tino! I was expecting you a bit earlier…" he suddenly noticed my expression. "Is everything okay?"

I sighed and dropped my backpack near the door. Realizing that I probably still looked a little angry, I smiled lightly. "I just…need your help with something. I'm just a little…confused."

A puzzled look appeared on Toris' face, and there was just a tinge of alarm in his viridescent eyes. "Is everything okay, Tino?"

"Everything is fine," I assured him. "It's just…have you ever called another male cute?" I blurted out.

"Um, no I haven't," he responded, his bowl of ice cream completely forgotten. "But one time I did call Feliks cute when he tried on a skirt at Forever XII."

"But you normally don't call someone…a male…who is listening to ABBA and playing with a puppy cute?"

Toris paused for minute, his eyes narrowing just a hint. "Not really…" he responded. "Unless," he continued, "you're into that certain person."

No.

No.

No.

I was so screwed.


A/N

Hello! I'm back!

I'm super sorry this chapter is a bit later than usual, but I bet you all enjoy it!

And if it wasn't clear before, Tino and Lovino's art professor is Grandpa Rome.

Oh, and before I forget, I have a beta! Check out LeaveMeWithMyShips! She's an amazing author and you should all check out her stories!

Once again, thank you all for reading!

Review?


Continued in the next chapter..