Penny and Vijay work out the particulars of how to do their project for psych.
Distractionship
Never pick a research topic just to annoy your sister. That's when fate will decide to drop a cute boy in your lap and laugh.
Sometimes fate was your psychology teacher. At least for Penny.
Having a project together did give her an excuse to give Vijay her number though, so it wasn't all bad.
"When do we have to present this?" Vijay asked, ears and cheeks still very red.
"Two weeks," Penny reached back for her bag to dig out her planner. She opened it on top of her binder. Hiding all of her notes for the project did not make them go away, but it did mean the word 'sex' wasn't staring back at them in six different colors as they talked.
Vijay copied down the date of their presentation. Along with a few of the exam dates for their other classes that were the same week.
Penny cleared her throat, leaning forward slightly to prop her arms up on the table, "We could pick a different topic, if you want."
"No changing topics, Penny."
Penny jumped at her teacher's voice. So did half the class. She had a way of sneaking up on... well, everyone.
Dr. Harris was smiling down at them as she walked behind their table, footsteps quiet. She chuckled, "Once you make a decision, you stick to it in this class. You know that."
"Is that another rule?" Vijay asked, eyes narrowing on Dr. Harris as she continued to circle the classroom.
"Guideline," Dr. Harris walked backwards for two steps, tilting her head to the side as she blinked slowly at him, "I only make exceptions when students break rule numero uno." She held up a finger, waved it back and forth, and then she it at pointed at them, "It comes with a grade penalty, if you're that dedicated to a change."
"No." They said it at the same time. Penny cleared her throat again. Vijay coughed. They both turned their heads away.
"Good, I'm sure you two can make it work." Dr. Harris smiled and started walking again. She gestured wide and dramatic, exaggerating the shrug, "Whatever the topic is."
She circled the whole room one more time, confiscating Liam's phone when he tried to text again. She sat on the edge of her desk reading his messages. Whatever made Dr. Harris start laughing had Liam groaning at his desk.
"I think I might genuinely be afraid of her," Vijay whispered and Penny nodded.
Good-lucking *and* smart. Rare combo. Penny liked it.
"I have a bunch of articles I downloaded from JSTOR, I haven't finished them all," Penny tapped her pencil on the desk, avoiding eye contact as she closed her planner.
There was no reason to keep it out now. None. Which meant her notes were now blantantly existing in front of them again. Sex in six different colors. Unblinking.
Vijay reached for her binder, head tilting as he tried to decipher her words. Her handwriting wasn't bad, per se, it was just small. And she had a habit of writing in multiple directions so she could fit more information on a single page. She also liked to use multiple colors, each one for a different part.
Judy had called it 'rainbow word vomit.' Multiple times. Her mother just called it messy.
"These are the articles right?" Vijay pointed to the section of her notes in green along the bottom.
Penny startled, eyes fluttering. She leaned forward, "Yes."
He bit his bottom lip, face inching closer to her binder as he read the titles, "The ones with the check mark you finished?"
"Yes," Penny nodded, tucking her hair behind her ear. Her hands twisted together in her lap as Vijay hummed. He was leaning in front of her. His arm had moved to the back of her chair.
They were exceptionally close. A breath apart. Inches. Centimeters. Not enough room for the holy spirit.
"There's six articles, we can each read three and then summarize them," Vijay suggested, drawing back to sit up slightly. He leaned on the table, one arm folded against his side as the other remained draped across the back of her seat. With a shrug, he added, "I can take the longer ones, if you want, since you already read two. And found them all."
"Sounds perfect," Penny squeaked, cringing at how high her voice went. It was dumb! He was just a boy!
A cute boy, but a boy nonetheless.
It shouldn't matter that he was sitting so close to her. That his body heat was wrapping around her like a warm hug.
This was not a Disney movie and she was not going to be distracted.
"I have them on my computer at home," Penny shook herself internally, leaning back in her chair. Vijay didn't move his arm when her back made contact. She flushed, "I can email them to you, or... you can come over to read them. Whichever."
Vijay blinked, eyes fluttering as he narrowed them on the ceiling. He bit his lip. Then his forehead wrinkled, "My house is kinda full of boxes... so, yeah. If you don't mind, I mean..." He stumbled over his words, fave warming before her eyes.
"Do you have anything after school today?" Penny offered, possibly too quickly. But the wrinkles all over Vijay's face were smooth and he was smiling at her, so... Penny decided it didn't matter.
It was a very nice smile. There were teeth and everything.
"No, I'm free, my parents are both working."
Penny chuckled, shifting in her seat as she tried not to think about the warm arm pressed against her back, "Mine too."
Okay. So. Still not a Disney movie, but... the distraction ship had definitely sailed.
-.-.-
There's nervous, then there's sitting on a couch with a girl when her parents aren't home nervous. Vijay was now intimately aware of the difference. His skin was on fire and it felt like there were a thousand needles poking at his lungs.
Penny sat beside him, legs curled up and head bowed over her tablet. Her knees were just barely missing his thighs as he propped his legs up on the ottoman to hold his laptop. She'd emailed him the three longest articles once they'd sat down. Vijay was, theoretically, reading one of them.
In reality, he was watching Penny out of the corner of his eye. At school he hadn't given a single thought to what Penny was wearing. Now his entire focus seemed to be on the clingy sweater and how it hung on Penny's frame.
Very nicely. That was the polite way to put it.
Her expression was somehow even more captivating. Eyes wide, thumb pressed to her bottom lip. Whatever she was reading at her full and undivided attention.
Just like the article on the endorphins of sex should have his.
That fact that reading about sex wasn't enough of a distraction for Vijay to stop looking at Penny did not bode well for the rest of this project.
"Are you aware you haven't moved on from the abstract yet?" Penny asked him, head falling to the side to rest against the couch.
"Yes," Vijay shifted, eyes flicking back to the computer. He rubbed sweaty palms over his thighs and shook his head, "I was just thinking."
Penny arched forward, knees bumping against him, "What about?"
There were many ways he could answer that. Honestly was not one of them.
"It was an eventful first day," Vijay settled on something truth-adjacent. His head fell back against the top of the couch. He stared at the ceiling, blowing out a breath as he tried to focus on something, anything, that wasn't Penny.
"Yeah, kind of a weird time to drop in," Penny hummed as she set her tablet to the side. She turned. Her back hit the sofa and suddenly every inch of their sides was touching. "Why'd you move now anyway?"
Vijay blinked, throat bobbing, "My mom's a marine. The navy said move. We moved."
"Ha," Penny snorted, "Well, that I understand. It's been a while since we had to move though. My dad's MOS is only stationed here."
Well. If staring at the ceiling hadn't sobered up his brain, realizing Penny's dad was a SEAL certainly did. Sorta.
"What's you mom do?" Penny asked, head tilting so she could face him.
"Logistics," he mirrored her, lips twitching up, "That's what she says when I ask anyway."
Penny smiled, cheeks dimpling, "You don't know her MOS?" He shook his head. She laughed, head ducking to rest against his shoulder.
"In my defense, she doesn't really talk about work except when she's about to deploy," Vijay found himself chuckling, lips pressed firmly together to keep it in.
It didn't work.
He closed his laptop and stretched his legs out. Penny pulled her knees up to her chest.
"To be fair, I don't really know what my mom does either," Penny admitted, nudging him slightly as she turned herself diagonal to face him. She squinted at the wall, "Aerospace engineer, for NASA, but... not for shuttles. Something theoretical I think."
Vijay listened to her, gaze grazing over her face. Her lips were plump. Her eyes soft.
"And she actually does talk about it, like... all the time!" Penny ducked her head again, smile splitting her face. Her eyes met his and the smile softened, "What?"
Staring was rude. Vijay was aware of that. He didn't really want to stop.
Obviously, the answer was to kiss her.
Penny gasped lightly when his lips touched hers, but her hands reached for his face. She pulled hims closer. Their lips molded together. Soft muscles, firm pressure.
Tilting his head, Vijay lifted one hand to her neck. His tongue darted out to swipe across her bottom lip. His fingers slid into her hair.
A click from the front door as it opened pulled them apart. Vijay was blushing brightly as he pulled his laptop back onto his lap. The flush that covered Penny all the way down her face and neck was not helping Vijay kick his distraction.
He watched Penny shuffle herself around the couch, settling in almost the same position as they'd started. Tablet and all.
"Hey Penny, who's your friend?" the man who walked into the living room, eyes barely flickering over Vijay before glancing back at the mail in his hands, was unmistakably Penny's father. And not just because they had similar bone structure.
Vijay had spent enough time around his mother's coworkers to recognize the way a military man stood. The needles poking at his lungs rose higher to stab at his throat. Breathing was now his main focus as Penny stood up to kiss her father's cheek.
"This is Vijay. He just moved here. His mom's a marine."
John Robinson looked up at him again. This time, it wasn't quick. He was pined down by the man's gaze as Penny rambled on about their project for psych without actually mentioning the topic.
"Nice to meet you Vijay."
It was not nice. It felt very not nice. John Robinson wasn't glaring at him, but it definitely felt like the man could read his mind.
"You too."
Reading the article for their project was difficult for a whole new reason now.
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