XVIII. Adam, September 28 to 29

Adam was sure he had never felt this way before about anyone. He had thought about girls, sure—what teenage boy hadn't? But this girl—this Belle—she was different. He felt nervous around her, but that didn't stop him from wanting to be around her all the time. He couldn't figure out when this feeling had started—they hadn't known each other for very long, and he had resisted her friendship for the most part—but it was a Tuesday morning when he first realized how he felt.

Belle had chosen him as a partner again—as she did whenever working in groups was required—in their Senior Lit class. Adam could not understand why she was being so kind to him. He had been nothing but rude to her when class first began. It was sort of his form of a defense mechanism. He was used to being picked on, being the brunt of the more popular kids' jokes. So when a pretty girl started talking to him and seemingly trying to help him, he couldn't help but assume that she had some kind of ulterior motive.

Maybe she was making fun of him, he thought. But at this point, he couldn't see why she would keep it up if she had malicious intent. She was not only kind, but patient, and he was actually learning quite a bit from her.

They had never spoken about the day three weeks ago when Belle had seen—and presumably heard—Adam practicing guitar and singing in the chorus room. Belle never mentioned it, and Adam was embarrassed about the whole thing and hoped it could just be forgotten. It didn't stop him from going down to the chorus room almost every day that the chorus didn't have after-school practice, but he had a strong feeling he wouldn't see Belle down there again. Something about the way she had disappeared as soon as he saw her suggested that she was about as embarrassed as he was.

"Adam, what do you think the answer is?" Belle asked, pointing to the second question on the grammar worksheet Mrs. Tremaine had handed out.

"I don't know," Adam said, rubbing his eyes.

"Come on, you have to at least try," Belle said, but her voice was sweet and encouraging. "It's not too hard, you just—"

"Why are you helping me?" Adam asked, letting his arms fall loudly onto the desk. "Why are you being so nice?"

His voice sounded almost like a growl, and Belle looked surprised. He hadn't intended to sound so harsh. She blinked at him and didn't say anything for a moment.

"Well, if you don't want my help, you can just do the assignment on your own," Belle said, beginning to move her desk away from Adam's.

"Wait," Adam said, reaching out and grabbing Belle's arm. "Don't… I'm sorry."

Belle looked perplexed, but she pushed the desk back up against Adam's and sat down. She began to explain the question and Adam was honestly listening, but he couldn't help but be a little bit distracted. Why hadn't he noticed how beautiful she was before? Well, maybe he had noticed, but he hadn't allowed himself to think about it. Her smile was the best part. He wished she was smiling now. Maybe she would be if he hadn't been such an ass.

"Do you understand?" she asked.

"I think so," Adam said. "Um… is it B?"

"Yes, it is," Belle said, and she smiled.

Adam found himself smiling back as he circled the correct answer. He decided he would try harder, if only for Belle.

"Belle," Adam said, clearing his throat quietly. "Why are you helping me—really?"

Belle looked up, not looking as appalled by the question when it was said in a far nicer tone.

"Because I like you," Belle said matter-of-factly, as though the answer should have been obvious.

"I… I like you, too," Adam said, not being able to think of any other response—although he wasn't sure if they meant "like" in the same way.

Adam lied down on the highest riser in the chorus room, setting his guitar on the second riser down just below him. He didn't know what to think—or what to do—about his newly realized feelings for Belle. He had never had a girlfriend before, not because girls didn't like him. Sure, he wasn't a magnet for girls, but the lonely brooding musician gig had a few fans. But he had never been interested in a girl before. He was a loner and he liked it that way, or so he had thought.

He sat up and rubbed his face with his hands. He pulled his hair back into a ponytail with the elastic he had around his wrist, and picked up the guitar. He plucked a few notes of the song he had been working on. The lyrics were all wrong. They were shallow and meaningless. He wanted to write about something else—something more meaningful. He wanted to write about Belle.

"Hmm hmm hmm…" Adam substituted humming for missing lyrics, "…something there that wasn't there before."

He put the guitar to the side and pulled out a notebook. The lyrics to the song he had been working on were written there. He ripped the page out and threw it in the trash and began writing new lyrics.

Wednesday morning, Adam chose his clothes more carefully. He wanted to impress Belle. Unfortunately, most of his wardrobe was rather unimpressive. It was filled with ripped jeans and faded band t-shirts. He finally found a plain dark blue t-shirt and dark, clean-cut jeans. It was simple, but it would have to do. He pulled his hair back into a loose ponytail. There wasn't much that could be done about the tangles, but at least he could get it out of his face. He hoped Belle would at least notice the effort he'd made.

He arrived at school pretty early and went right up the English classroom and took his normal seat. He was one of the first to arrive, but Belle didn't show up until the room was about half-full. She walked in reading a book and didn't even look up as she made her way to her seat and sat down. She was pretty engrossed in the pages and Adam thought it would be rude to interrupt.

"Did you see that?" Gaston scoffed. "That's not even one of the books we're supposed to be reading. I already knew that girl was crazy when she said she didn't want any of this, but this just proves it."

Belle didn't look up, but Adam could tell she was listening from the way her face changed. She furrowed her brow and her lips formed a thin, straight line. She didn't say anything, though, and pretended to stay focused on her book.

"What's wrong, Belle?" Gaston teased from across the room. "Nothing to say? Maybe she's deaf, too."

"Shut up, Gaston," Adam said as harshly as he could manage. "Nobody likes you, especially Belle—maybe you should just leave her alone."

"And who the hell are you?" Gaston asked, unfazed.

"I'm… I'm her friend," Adam said, standing up and trying to look intimidating.

"Her friend," Gaston laughed, and a couple of others laughed as well. "You must be as crazy as she is."

"I told you… leave her alone," Adam said as he walked closer to Gaston so the two were near each other.

Adam was taller than Gaston—in fact, he towered over him—but Gaston was not intimidated. The smaller boy snorted, stifling a laugh, and smirked up at his challenger. Still, Adam felt adrenaline pulsing through him and he felt invincible. Gaston was a bad guy, after all, and bad guys couldn't win.

"Or what?" Gaston asked.

Adam raised his fist to punch Gaston in the face, but Gaston just reached forward and shoved Adam, who fell to the ground. He should have known better—he was just making a fool of himself in front of Belle, not to mention everyone else. Gaston was the strongest football player at WDHS, except maybe Hercules, and Adam was just a scrawny musician. Completely hopeless. Adam tried to push himself up off the ground, and then he saw that Belle had come and was crouching by his side.

"What are you doing?" she whispered.

"He was disrespecting you," Adam said quietly. "I couldn't just… let that go."

"Look at that—two freaks," Gaston said, smiling deviously. "They were practically made for each other. It's too bad such an insane girl had to have such a perfect body."

"That's enough!" Adam said, standing despite the pain he felt from landing so hard on the ground. "Belle is a beautiful, intelligent girl and you're only doing this because she's too good for you and she knows it."

"You should take that back if you know what's good for you," Gaston said, his expression contorting into one of anger—clearly he knew that what Adam was saying was true.

"Never," Adam said, preparing himself for however Gaston's wrath would manifest itself.

He saw Gaston's fist hurdling towards him, and then nothing.

Everything was a blurry combination of white and bright lights. Adam couldn't tell where he was but he slowly began to feel himself and he realized that everything hurt. His back and his chest ached, but his face was the worst part. He reached up with his right hand and felt a bandage over his nose. It was tender and even pressing on it lightly made him cringe in pain. And then he realized that there was something in his left hand. No—someone was holding it. He looked, blinking and squinting.

"Belle?" he murmured, and his voice cracked.

"Yes, it's me," she said quietly.

"Wha—what—"

"Gaston punched you in the face, knocked you out," Belle said. "Mrs. Tremaine walked in right then."

"And she let you come with me to the nurse's office?"

"No," Belle admitted, and held up two slips of paper. "Monday detention slips. One for you, for engaging in a fight, and one for me because I told her I was accompanying you to the nurse and there was nothing she could do about it."

"I hope Gaston got a detention too—hopefully not the same one?" Adam said, imagining how hellish it would be for the three of them to be in detention together.

"Rumor has it he got suspended," Belle said. "If so, it'd be the first time justice was ever implemented at this school."

"Thank you," Adam said.

"For what?" Belle asked, looking at Adam as though maybe his head was not yet quite clear.

"For coming here with me," Adam said.

"What you did was very stupid—"

"I know."

"But it was also brave," Belle said, giving his hand a squeeze. "No one's ever stood up for me quite like that before."

"What about Shang?" Adam asked, remembering that day when he first noticed Belle.

"Well… what he did was nice, of course," Belle said. "But it was a different situation. Shang did what he did because he was sort of on an equal plane with Gaston and it was the right thing to do. Shang knew Gaston wouldn't beat him up or try to retaliate. And he didn't even really know me, he just did it out of… I don't know, chivalry or something. You… Well, no offense, but I don't think you could take Gaston in a physical fight. And… I don't even know quite why you did it."

"Because you're my friend," Adam insisted. "Because I care about you and I couldn't listen to that brute say those awful things about you."

Belle looked down at Adam's hand in hers, "I didn't know you felt like that."

"I know I've been rude in the past," Adam said. "But… I just didn't understand why you were being so nice to me. It was a stupid thing to do, and I'm sorry."

"I think you've more than made up for it," Belle assured him. "Do you think you can sit up?"

Adam nodded, and Belle helped him sit up with his back against the wall that the cot was pushed up to. She went to the sink and poured some cold water into a small, disposable cup and brought it back for Adam. He took small sips from it and looked around for a clock.

"How long was I out for?"

"It's third block," Belle said. "I think you should go home, or to the hospital—I mean, what if you have a concussion?—but the nurse insisted you'd be fine and that you should go back to class when you woke up."

"Well, I'm up now," Adam said.

"Yes, but as long as the nurse doesn't know that, we can stay," Belle smiled.

As if on cue, the nurse stepped out of her closet-like office just then.

"I see Mr. Desrosiers is conscious," the nurse, Mrs. Dear, said. "Are you feeling alright?"

"Yeah, I'm okay," Adam said—he was feeling pretty far from okay physically, but the fact that he was at an emotional high point made that not seem to matter so much.

"Alright then," Mrs. Dear said. "I think the two of you should probably head back to your classes, then. I'll write you both passes."

She wrote them little slips of paper to bring to their teachers, and Belle handed Adam his detention slip. He figured detention wouldn't seem so bad if Belle was there with him.

The song Adam had started to write was coming along nicely now. He had been scribbling lyrics down during the classes he did wind up being able to attend and most of the lyrics were pretty well fleshed out. He would never be able to show them to Belle, of course, but it was nice to be able to express what he was feeling through song. He was playing the song with the newly written lyrics when the door opened and Snow White stepped quietly in. He hesitated.

"No, no, please continue," Snow insisted.

Adam hesitated for a moment, and then continued singing a bit more quietly, though he felt awkward doing so with another person in the room. When he finished the song, he put the guitar down and waited for Snow to speak first.

"It's a lovely song," Snow said with a sweet smile. "Is it for Belle?"

"How did y—"

"I heard about what happened this morning," Snow said, looking down at her hands and smiling—although something about the smile looked almost sad. "It was very brave of you to stand up to Gaston like you did. I don't think anyone who's not on the football team has ever done that."

"It… it was nothing," Adam said, feeling embarrassed by the attention.

"No, it wasn't nothing," Snow said, and she came over and sat next to Adam, taking his hands in a friendly, almost nurturing manner. "If everyone started to stand up to Gaston like you did… Well, there wouldn't be a Gaston anymore. He would be nothing without his petty insults, and his rudeness, and the way he… objectifies women. What he does is wrong, Adam, and what you did was right. And I'm sure Belle sees it."

"What… I don't know what you mean," Adam said.

"I can tell how you feel about her," Snow said. "The song is very beautiful. I think you should sing it to her—I'm sure she'd like it."

"I… don't think so," Adam said. "Belle is perfect, and I'm… hideous. I'm lucky she even looks at me."

"You're not hideous," Snow said. "I don't know you, but you're clearly a wonderful person. I'm sure Belle sees that."

"Well… thank you," Adam said, although he wasn't sure he believed what she said.

"Of course," Snow said with a nod as she stood up. "Will you be at the dance this Saturday?"

"No," Adam said. "It's not really my thing."

"Too bad," Snow said—she looked like she was about to say something else for a moment, then she just smiled. "I'll see you around."

"Sure," Adam nodded, turning back to his guitar. "Whatever."