To Give
To Give

By Port


Disclaimer: I disclaim nothing. It's all my fault!
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"I just trod over the pansy bed, didn't I," Noin said.

A man setting up a lawnmower on a nearby patch of grass looked up when she spoke. She was walking through a garden from the dorms, on her way to the cafeteria for breakfast. She had one stop to make, but after that she could sit down to her first relaxing meal in weeks. The man with the lawnmower looked at the pink pansies she'd ruined. He frowned and Noin flushed.

"Sorry," she breathed, and walked faster.

So she was a little off her game today. She would feel better after a cup of coffee and a plate of eggs. Finals week always made everyone harried and stressed.

Last night, she'd completed the last exam of her final year at Lake Victoria Academy.

Noin smiled, but her face didn't feel as though it could hold the expression for long, so the smile was brief.

She neared the edge of the sculpture garden and could see the cafeteria on the far side of Tesha Square, which she looked out at from the shaded space between two tall classroom buildings. A crowd of students was standing near the bulletin boards in front of the cafeteria. She heard excited voices and recognized the face of every person she saw, but felt more interested in the grades posted behind glass on the boards.

Test results.

The two class buildings blocked sunlight from the alley they made, and she reached the darker space faster than she thought she would.

"Grades, then breakfast, just as planned," she murmured, and saw a tall figure walk from the boards. The crowd parted before him and closed up behind him, like a knife wound knitting itself together. Long white hair hung gloriously across the man's shoulders, and sunlight glinted off the mask that covered half his face and head. The sunlight stopped reflecting from it when he entered the alley.

"Noin," Zechs said. He was smiling so naturally, and Noin so loved to see him smile that she felt her face light up. The corners of her mouth rose higher and stayed that way.

"Morning, Zechs," she said. She liked to say his name. It had a certain ironic meaning to her because he had told her his real one, the one he kept secret from everyone else. Also, saying his name sometimes made her stomach feel fluttery. It was like zero-gravity.

His smile had widened, and before she knew what he was doing, he leaned down and kissed her on the mouth.

It was an aggressive kiss and as eager as she'd ever hoped his kisses would be. She felt one of his hands grasping her shoulder and the other very lightly on her cheek, and the kiss ended.

Before she could say anything or lean forward and continue, he said in a low, seductive voice, "Thank you for what you did, Noin. My grades are the highest ever recorded at Lake Victoria, and yours are second."

He had taken her right hand in both of his and now squeezed it. "Come on," Zechs said. "I'll show them to you."

He still had her hand in his, and all Noin could do was follow woodenly at his side and a little behind him. They walked into the sunlight in Tesha Square.

Her mouth open a little, still tender from the kiss, and her stomach leaden, Noin found she didn't care about the grades anymore, and she certainly didn't feel like eating. She'd done all she could for Zechs, more than anyone else would have. So why did she feel like a whore?


End.