Finals were dangerously close. Obviously that made it even harder to study in peace, especially at school.
Stephanie sighed in irritation as, for the fourth time, someone left the classroom after asking whether she was leaving soon. Why couldn't they just go home? Stephanie had a good reason for staying late at school to study: people were going over to her house to have it re-furnished. She knew from experience that the noise would make it impossible to concentrate on her work. Surely she was the only one with this sort of problem? Stephanie buried her nose once again in her history notes (it was her worst subject). When did Louis XIV officially become the king? He was seven year old... No, no, five...
"Françoise-Athénaïs, marquise de Montespan..." Stephanie muttered to herself. Who was she again...?
"That was one of Louis XIV's mistresses."
Stephanie looked up, startled, to find Nathaniel peering down at her. She frowned up at him.
"Don't give me the answers!" she pouted, to which Nathaniel smiled in amusement. He sat down next to her, and skimmed over her notes quickly.
"You're studying the reign of Louis XIV," he confirmed.
"Yeah, I'm bad at history..." Stephanie admitted. Nathaniel shuffled through the notes, then pushed them towards her.
"Look over them for a few minutes, and then I'll quiz you," he explained.
"I-...You'd do that?" Stephanie asked hesitantly. At her old school, no one had bothered trying to help her for exams, not even some of the teachers. Nathaniel rolled his eyes (did he just roll his eyes at me?) and answered:
"Would I be offering if I didn't want to?" Stephanie smiled in gratitude, and started looking over her notes. She's so cute, Nathaniel thought, watching her attentively as she bit her lip and creased her brows in concentration, How can she not realize it? I want her to myself, all to myself...
Nathaniel snapped out of it, shaking his head slightly, trying to rid his mind of these insincere thoughts. He had no right, she didn't like him, there was no point.
"Okay, I think I'm ready," Stephanie said finally, handing Nathaniel her notes.
"Who was Louis XIV's eldest daughter?"
"Marie... Uh, Marie-Anne... de Bourbon?" Stephanie answered hesitantly, to which Nathaniel nodded in affirmation.
"Who was his first wife?"
"Françoise d'Aubigné?"
"No, that was his second wife. He was first married to Maria Theresa."
The pair continued like this for an hour, maybe two. The sky was turning dark when they finally decided to pack up.
"I really can't thank you enough, Nat," Stephanie repeated for the third time. Nathaniel waved his hand dismissively for the third time.
"Well, so long as you have that stuff painted on the inside of your brain," he replied, and Stephanie cracked a smile.
"With the history, definitely," she said, "But there's still physics that I'm sort of bad at..."
"Do you need help with that, too?" Nathaniel asked immediately, despite the fact that they probably couldn't stay at school much longer. I would stay two more hours with her if I had to. I'd stay three hours, four; I'd stay the whole night just to be with her. I'd-SHUT UP NATHANIEL.
"If it's no trouble, then that would be great," Stephanie nodded, smiling, "Are you free this Friday after school?"
"I think so," Nathaniel answered thoughtfully, then frowned, "Though I'm not sure my parents are okay with bringing someone over on a school night. But if it's for studying..."
"Oh, that's fine, we can go to my house," Stephanie cut in before she could stop herself. Danger, her mind warned. Dangerous territory.
"Are you sure that's fine...?" Nathaniel asked as if reflecting her mind's hesitation. Stephanie paused. What was the harm? It was just for the evening, and just to have a quick study session. It would prepare them both very well for the exams. And hasn't she been trying to deepen the bond between her and her friends? Before she could stop herself, Stephanie found herself saying:
"Sure! Bring your notes and stuff, and we can study at my house."
"Alright," Nathaniel nodded, also smiling. Stephanie made her way home, the smile never leaving her face. She could introduce him to Auntie: she was sure they'd get along great! She'd have to clean up her room, though...
Stephanie knew that a part of her, a rather large part, really just wanted Nathaniel to come over. She wanted to spend some more time with him, and not just studying. Maybe he could stay for dinner... And then they could watch a movie, or just spend the evening talking about the most randomest things. Maybe, just maybe, he would notice the amount of notebooks that decorated her shelves, and would ask what they were, and Stephanie would divulge, a bit shyly, that she wrote stories, and then Nat would ask to read them, and Stephanie would let him, albeit a bit hesitantly...
She daydreamed like this until it was time for bed, and then she started to truly dream, of Nat smiling at her kindly, of him hugging her, of them kissing tenderly, of them cuddling on her bed, simply enjoying each others' presence. Dreams of complete trust in one another, of a nearly unbreakable bond, of a repetitive exchange of "I love you"s.
...
"Um, wait... what's the formula for the atomic bomb again?" Stephanie asked for the fourth time that evening as they sat on the floor in her room, surrounded by notes. Nathaniel sighed, and repeated:
"The formula is just plain uranium-235. Lots of it, in a very small space. A basic design is taking two half-spheres of U-235, each about 70 kg. Slam them together at high speed, and then you have an instant nuclear explosion."
"Okay, okay, I got this..." Stephanie mumbled, writing down notes furiously, then re-writing them on a different piece of paper. It's how they taught us to learn poems in elementary school, Stephanie had explained when Nathaniel had asked her about it, You basically re-copy whatever you want to memorize over and over again, until you can write it down without having to look back at the other pieces of paper for help. I've found that it works well for studying, too. And, besides, Stephanie's writing hand was very experienced, so this made things that much easier.
Nathaniel seemed to be gaining some from the study session as well: His worst subject was math, something that Stephanie excelled in. She wrote down random problems for him to solve while she worked on the physics practice problems he'd written down for her. They then exchanged papers, corrected them, and worked on the things the other one didn't know very well. They were focused, not easily distracted, though once or twice Auntie popped her head into Stephanie's room to bring a snack for the two of them.
"I'm so happy you two are studying seriously," Stephanie's aunt said blithely, nodding with approval at the scattered notes. "Nathaniel, you make sure to work Stephanie hard, alright? She will get a perfect score on her exams!"
"I'll try my best, Miss Agatha," Nathaniel chuckled, to which Stephanie's aunt waved her hand.
"Oh, just call me Agatha, please. Well, then, have fun you two!" she chirped, but as she was leaving she poked her head back into the room and added: "No funny business, either!"
"Auntie!" Stephanie sputtered as Agatha closed the door, laughing. She didn't dare glance at Nathaniel, too embarrassed to do so, but if she had looked up she would have seen that he was profusely flushed in the face.
Ignoring the elephant in the room, they continued studying, until, finally, Stephanie looked outside her window and realized how dark it had gotten.
"Wow, it's late!" she commented: Nathaniel shot up suddenly, looking outside worriedly.
"Oh, God, my parents are going to be so mad!" he hissed, fishing around in his pocket for his cell-phone and quickly dialing a number, pacing the room carefully so as to not step on the notes. Stephanie listened attentively, feeling slightly guilty for possibly getting Nat in trouble by forgetting about the time.
"Hi, hi, Dad? ...Look, I'm sorry, we were studying, and I completely lost track of time... Yeah, I know... I know, I'm sorry... It won't happen again... Yeah, yeah, I know... Sorry... I-what? ...A friend of Amber's? ...Yeah, yeah, I understand that, but... But Dad, I can't just ask them to let me stay over...!"
Nathaniel looked over nervously to the side, where Stephanie was waving her hands around, flashing thumbs-ups, nodding her head vigorously. Did that mean he could stay over...?
"I, um, yeah, I think they're okay with that... Yeah, yeah, sure, Dad... Yeah, okay, bye."
He turned to Stephanie, who was smiling at him brightly.
"So, uh... Amber has a friend over, and they obviously don't want me around, so, I guess I'm spending the night here... Is that okay?" he asked nervously. Stephanie laughed.
"Of course, silly! I'll go tell Auntie right away so that she can make extra food for dinner! I'll be right back!" she explained, leaving the room wearing a huge smile on her face. Nathaniel was happy to see her smile like that: it felt good to know that he was the reason for that smile.
They didn't study for the rest of the evening: they knew everything by heart now, anyway. They ate dinner together with Auntie, telling jokes and sharing opinions, like a happy family. And that's exactly what it felt like to Stephanie. She felt buoyant, like she was walking on air, or maybe sunshine. She and Nat sat on the couch, flipping through channels until they found Animal Planet, which they watched for three hours straight. Neither noticed that they had inched closer to each other until Stephanie rested her head on Nathaniel's shoulder comfortably, and even then neither minded. It felt so right, just sitting there together, there bodies barely touching, watching something they both enjoyed.
It was past eleven o'clock when they decided it was probably time to go to bed. Stephanie helped Nat set up a mattress with pillows and blankets, and it looked so cozy that Stephanie nearly wanted to sleep in it herself.
They crawled into their respective beds after having changed into their sleep-wear (Nathaniel had borrowed one of Stephanie's overly-large sweat-pants), and said good-night before turning the lights out. Though there was plenty of space between them, the two felt close, connected in some way.
Stephanie was the first to fall asleep. And then, almost immediately, the nightmares started.
A/N: OMG I'M SO SORRY I DIDN'T UPDATE LAST SATURDAY I AM SO SO SORRY HONEST!
I was camping and rafting on Memorial day weekend, and when I got back I had piles of homework to do! D: I'm really sorry, but here's your chapter! It's a really busy end of school year for me (I end on June 13th), so I'm sorry for any delays in the updates. But please enjoy this short chapter, and get ready for a longer one next week (I hope...). Thank you for reading, and please review! :D