Call the parade for-hire, it's another drabble!

Let's see how long I can keep this up! I've just finished the big first scene to the next chapter of "Notebooks" (yes, the cliffhanger's unhung!), and now I'm having lots of fun writing up all the juicy mischief that Usagi comes up with while she's, well, you'll see. I also have the next drabble under revision, so look out for that sometime soon!

And oh, in the meantime, enjoy ^^

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100 Themed Drabbles

Ala Verity

38. Studying (Word Count: 566)

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Mamoru loved studying.

In fact, he loved it so much that he could never be found without a book on those sunny Tokyo afternoons, tucked away in his trusty corner booth, in perfect view of the front entrance. It was his "life-leeching, all-consuming obsession," as Motoki so delicately put it.

Mamoru preferred to call it a "healthy outlet."

The subject of his studies, oddly enough, never changed, no matter how long or how hard he studied. Sure, every afternoon would introduce a different Physics chapter, a new Calculus textbook. But if you looked closely enough, you would notice that his eyes never moved, even after his hands automatically moved to turn the page. He never seemed to register the words, and he only stared at the bolded headings about the Cold War as long as was necessary to convince the other customers that he was reading.

He was, in a way, too busy studying to study.

Instead, he studied the way an automatic smile graced a certain girl's lips when one of her friends joined her at the table. He studied her fingers, which splayed themselves out on the counter like a delicate feather fan when she ordered a drink from Motoki, that lucky bastard of a friend who chatted with her as easily as if the world didn't depend on whether or not she spoke to him that day. He studied every minute detail of her face, memorizing the smooth curve of her jaw and the very curvature of her thick, full lashes. He studied the way her features seemed to radiate as she walked over to him, her hips swaying from side to side in mesmerizing metronome, and murmured to him…

"Are you done with that, Mamoru-baka?"

"Huh?"

Usagi huffed and jabbed an impatient finger at something in front of him. "I said, are you done with that textbook? You've been sitting here for the past half hour not turning a single page, and Ami wants to know if she can borrow it for a day."

"Oh." He blinked and looked down at the pages that he had stopped noticing for the past thirty minutes, then looked up again. "Yeah, sure, you can take it, Odango," he shrugged, pushing the book towards her.

"Okay. Thanks."

Mamoru's mind worked furiously to come up with something to say to her before she could take the textbook and leave. "You just caught me off guard because I thought for a moment that you wanted to read it, Odango," he finally drawled, leaning back with a smug smile on his face, "and we all know that the day you ask to read a textbook is the day when the world goes up into flames."

Usagi's hand froze mid-reach. Her eyes went wide, first in surprise, then with unmistakable fury. "I don't even know why I bother!" she screeched, throwing her hands up in the air and spinning around so quickly that her heels left scorch marks in the tile. "You're just so—argh! Ami!" he heard her squeal as she marched back to her bemused friend sitting at the counter, "Next time, you get your stupid books yourself!"

Mamoru chuckled and pulled his textbook closer to himself again, skimming through the sections without any effort now. She might be the worst student in the world, but somehow studying with Tsukino Usagi always made things so much more interesting.

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So what did you think? I'm trying to kick my butt back into gear with these little snippets, so definitely feel free to leave any feedback or criticism that'll get my very rusty writing hand back in shape! Rotten tomatoes and tomato omelettes welcome (hey, I'll take what I can get!). And thanks as always to everybody who's sticking with me despite my, erm, lack of consistent dedication—I'm working up back to weekly updates, I promise!

See you in a bit! Review!