Please go check out Shelter from the Storm And It's Not Rocket Science by my bestie! They are amazing works and you will love them if you like Jaciana! ASP is on the block next, thank you guys for reading.
Jace was feeling sick already, but he couldn't miss his first day. The course started at twelve thirty, but of course he'd been up all night, finalizing the syllabus, making a rules and procedures and policies slideshow, and printing off something for them to sign regarding each. What bothered Jace the most is that he couldn't seem to shake the image of the black haired girl from his mind. Something about her smile just imprinted on his mind. He didn't know how he was going to focus, and that was was making him so sick. Jace was the picture of a perfect student- driven, focused, brilliant. Maybe it was the fact that he couldn't focus that was the problem. He didn't like it, but he didn't want the images of her to leave, either. The curling feeling he felt down in his belly was a sensation he hadn't had such a long time. He was warm all over at the thought of her, but he tried- and failed to shake it off.
He was looking through his presentation for the class, desperately thumbing through Pinterest and TeachersPayTeachers for a closure, when out of no where, it came to him. It came to him like the vivid pictures of Liliana Vess in his mind's eye. It made sense to end it all on a writing prompt, it's was an English class, but Jace didn't know if he assigned it as homework if he'd be able to wait for the response. Responses, he chided himself.
"What do I want my teacher to know about me? Discuss. Three Paragraphs."
"Karen! Karen come on!" Liliana said, almost giddy with excitement. Karen, however was anything but. She wasn't fan of English, her mind was much more math and science oriented, which is why she had declared marketing to Liliana's English when it came time to pick majors. She didn't really want to work in the stock market but she was she would find a place somewhere within Rocket Cosmetics; even without the degree. Karen just didn't want to live at home with Giovanni and Silver anymore; she wanted to get away, and so did Lili. They applied at Furman as a joke, but they both got in and decided it was just far enough from their home in the rural town of Five Forks for them to be able to get away but still be able to go home if and when they wanted to. They were both close to their fathers and brothers, Liliana and Josu had even lived together for while when she was smaller, after the death of her mother. Silver had always taken care of Karen throughout school as well; they were all a close knit family, but the girls needed to breathe. Giovanni and Nicolai were happy for them; neither one of the boys had decided to pursue school, so they were glad that their daughters had decided to.
"I am not a fan of this class regardless of how 'hot' the new instructor might be, Liliana, I am not interested in men that are old enough to be my dad." Karen said, exasperated.
"He wasn't even that old, but Karen come on, you have to at least give this guy a chance so we can gush about how hot he is," Liliana said.
"You thought Silver was hot," Karen said, wrinkling her nose. "You have no taste."
"He's your brother," Liliana grumbled. "That's different. And didn't you think Su was hot when you were little?"
"That is completely irrelevant," Karen griped at her best friend. "The point is, why gush over a guy that you know doesn't want anything to do with you, that it would be completely unethical to even have a relationship with," Karen said.
"Maybe I'm interested in more than just my MRS degree, Karen," Liliana said, her voice haughty. "Maybe I'm interested in him as a professor," Liliana said, keeping a straight as possible face.
"Yeah, all you said was OHMYGODKARENHESHOTASFUCKTHISGUYTAKINGOVEROURCLASSOHMYGOD."
"Yeah well, he's cute, shut up. Remember that idiotic kid with the blonde hair with the fucking purple undertones we saw in the Caf earlier? The one who looked to be oh, about ten, the one you were gushing over?"
"Shut it, Liliana, he was hot, okay? And he kept looking over at you and I want to hit you for it," Karen said, still salty.
"Homeboy was not looking at me, Karen," Liliana said, an almost relieved look on her face. "Thank Arceus," she finished.
"Excuse you," Karen said, just as she took her seat at the back of the room. Liliana sat next to her, straightening out her purple-and-gold blouse, actually taking out a notebook and getting ready to do something.
"I didn't know you owned those," Karen snorted.
"I will end your life," Liliana snarled, a smile on her face. If she and Karen weren't jerks to each other, they were probably sick. No, they were definitely sick.
Jace looked around the back of the classroom before he stepped in. Don't trip, he breathed. She was indeed there, sitting with a girl that had hair that had obviously been dyed some sky blue color. Jace couldn't help but think of the rebellious phase his brother had to be going through to do something of that nature. Jace tilted his head, wondering if Liliana was finding a way to lash out through school. He pushed the thought to the back of his head, thinking that their talk earlier could have been enough. He walked down the stairs, laptop and tablet in hand; smiling at the blackhaired girl in the back row.
"Hi, Professor Beleren," Liliana said, smiling at him. "How has your day been," she smiled at the man.
"Just fine, Miss Vess, how about yourself? I like your zen doodles at the corner of the page, just don't draw in class," Jace smiled at her.
Liliana was impressed. Not many people even knew what zen doodling was. Karen told Liliana she needed to major in graphic design; but she didn't want her passion to become a job. Even though she would often take commissions from friends, that was the extent of it. She didn't mind doing it, she just wanted a degree in something that she liked, but not the one thing that she was passionate about. She didn't want the passion art gave her robbed from her.
"Yes, sir," Liliana said with a smile. Jace got warm under the collar. All of his students called him sir. This was the deep south. That was how students addressed their teachers. All of them.
Jace called the class to order. He really hoped that the meme presentation that he used wasn't outdated, but at least it would be a way to touch base with them with something they had seen before other than just a long, drawn out syllabus.
"Look, I know you guys can read, so I'm going to make this short and simple. Print off your syllabus, read it, put it in a tabbed binder. In the syllabus, you'll see that you need one of these to bring to class every single day. You'll need a tab for the following: prompted writings, Beleren bits, rough drafts and final drafts of turned in essays. Every formal essay you write will be preceded by a an outline that will count as a quiz grade, and we will have a quiz every Friday on that week's Beleren's bits as well as any required reading you have to do."
Karen raised her hand. Beleren bits? It sounded like he was talking about his junk.
"What are Beleren Bits?" Karen sniggered.
"Grammar Rules. Syntax, sentence structures, rules for writing and reading. This is English 101. You'll need them for the rest of your college career. That's the basic structure of the class. You'll have a weekly prompt, unless you have an essay due that week; in which case it will be rough and final drafts due. You'll have four major essays and then your research paper at the end of the semester. I also threw out everything that he graded. It's not fair, and I would have graded them much easier."
The entire class had let out a sigh of relief at this; twelve of them had been failing. The highest grade was a an 76, and Jace didn't think that was fair. All of them, including him, needed a clean slate. Those averages weren't fair to him either.
"I don't have a lot of rules, guys. The only few that I have are these: Come in prepared, or you're going to have a bad time. This means the binder, pencil, and homework. You have until the end of the day that it is due to get it to my office. Don't talk while I'm talking or while anyone else is talking. We will discuss a lot in this class and you all will be respectful of each other's opinions or I will ask you to leave. If you have a question, ask. If you don't want to ask in front of people, I'm usually here ten minutes early and I stay ten or so minutes afterwards. I don't care about laptops and tablets but keep your cell phones put up or I will ask you to leave. I'm excited to get started. I know that I've talked through pretty much the whole class period but it won't usually be like this." Jace said.
Liliana was fascinated by the way his lips moved and the way his voice sounded, but somehow got most of the words out. When she and Karen went shopping for this later, she was sure all she was going to do was blather.
"Remember that even this is 101, and probably the first college course you all have ever taken, I still expect all of you to act, read, and write like adults. If you need help, my door is always open. I'm going to leave you with your first assignment, though." Jace cleared his throat and took a drink of water from his bottle. "It's a writing prompt so put it behind that tab. Write the prompt at the top and then skip a line and begin. I'm grading this for content but I'm going to mark syntax and grammar errors. Three paragraphs. The prompt is: What do I want my teacher to know about me? If I could tell my teacher one thing, what would it be?" He totally just added in the last part after catching a glimpse of Liliana's sly smile. You have ten minutes- use it wisely.
Liliana slipped on her favorite dark wash jeans and black sequined tanktop and got ready to walk, arm in arm like always, with Karen to the commons of the dorms to go to one of the events that were being held. Both of their fathers insisted on them doing things like this, to get the full college experience, etcetera, etcetera. So they'd agreed to go, only because they had to have something to talk about this weekend at their family dinner. It was rootbeer floats and icecream, and if there was one thing that the VossVess girls loved, it was food. So they decided to go. Liliana could tell Karen was on the hunt, her post Grimsley dry spell was really starting to get to her, and she was hoping that the boy with the purple hair would be here. Liliana really didn't know if she was over Silver yet exactly, but she knew that she couldn't shake the visions of her professor from her head, though she knew that it was somewhere on the cusp of impossible and are-you-out-of-your-fucking-mind. But Liliana liked ice cream. Especially chocolate and strawberry mixed together. So she decided to go. There was a rumor there was going to be bonfires and smores too, so Liliana put her chin up, smile on, and accompanied her best friend.
There indeed was lots and lots of food, which made Liliana happy in her heart. She felt her phone vibrate in her pocket. It was her brother, checking up on her as usual. There was a picture of her newly born niece, Nova. Liliana smiled into her phone and showed Karen, who looked like she'd just gotten the same thing. They both agreed that the best thing about the weekend was getting to see her. Josu sent her pictures every single day so she didn't feel like she was missing as much.
Liliana parked herself on one of the cushy chairs and stared at a blank sketchpad. Nothing was coming to her and she was tired of zen rectangles, triangles, octogons, all of it. She placed a pencil to paper and started drawing the very thing that kept haunting her.
"LILIANA! Don't! You get so out of it when you get that thing out. we are supposed to be having fun?!" Karen moaned at her best friend.
"What on earth do you want to do, Karen? LOOK! LOOK who it is?!"
"I swear Liliana, if it's that professor, he might be stalking you," Karen said, very seriously.
"He works here just like we live here, plus that was one of the pluses of coming here, Karen, community," Liliana said, sarcasm dripping from the last word.
"Yeah, yeah, I know. But you know we could be having so much more fun downtown right now."
"Yeah. You figured out how to disable the tracker Gio put on your phone yet? Because you know it's gotta be there," Liliana said, very seriously.
Their fathers didn't play around when it came to their safety. Usually, since they were accompanied by either Silver or Josu and Kaalia, it wasn't a big deal, but now that they were just two eighteen year old girls, both Giovanni and Nicolai worried for them.
"No," Karen grumbled at herself. She excused herself to go get drinks and Liliana resigned herself to her sketchbook again, knowing how Karen could get sidetracked. The steady scratching of a pencil against paper was one of the most calming noises to Liliana, as she sat, intent on her work. She couldn't get the very distinct ferocity of his eyes right- there was a passion there that Liliana couldn't place, and maybe it's because she didn't know what caused it- but she'd never been more curious in her life. What could it be that got him so….happy? No. That wasn't the right adjective. Worked up? She didn't know. She breathed in and out again, wondering where Karen had went. Ten minutes, and nothing. Liliana's face colored a little in frustration, she actually was thirsty and it was really hot in South Carolina in late August. She felt a slight tap on her shoulder, a diatribe ready for her newly blue-haired best friend.
"Took you fucking-" Liliana started as she turned around. But it wasn't karen at all. It was Professor Beleren.
"Language," he laughed at her. "Want a coke?" Jace said.
"Please," she said, trying not to reveal that it was his eyes that she had been drawing. Calmly, she placed the sketchpad to her side and gestured to Karen's vacated spot. Jace popped open the glass bottle and handed it to her with a smile.
He'd noticed Karen had been gone and Liliana looking around for her about once every minute for a good ten minutes before he decided to go sit with her. It was his job as residence director to get to know the students and everyone else seemed engaged in conversation. He'd glanced around and seen Karen with Will, his younger brother, with an enthralled look on her face. Will could tell stories like no one else could, and it was then he realize that Liliana would be alone for quite a while. He pointedly ignored his little brother- this would be something that would go straight back to their mother, he knew, if he saw them.
"How'd you know glass bottles were my favorite," Liliana laughed, trying not to blush at him.
"Just a lucky guess, I guess." He smiled at her.
Liliana reached into her bag and pulled out the few pieces of the lemon and butter cake she had made from her mother's recipe last night and handed one to Jace.
"Are you trying to earn literal brownie points?" He couldn't stop smiling.
"No, I'm not," she laughed. "We scratch each other's backs, remember? What are you doing here?"
"I'm the residence director over these four dorms," Jace said. "It was my event. I'm just making the rounds."
"Oh, am I not interesting enough for you to just talk to? Karen thinks you're stalking me." Liliana said, her voice breathier than she would like it to be.
"I am fairly certain my brother is stalking her," Jace said.
"That's not wise," Liliana laughed. "She likes him, though."
"Why," Jace said, incredulous, but with a laugh. Will deserved someone who could see him for who he was, and if it took two strange hair colors to do it, then Jace would smile while telling Rose, too.
She'd never had a man look at her like this before. The light bounced off his eyes and straight back into hers like a prism- Grimsley had never looked at her like that, nor any of her other boyfriends, his voice was enthralling, she could just listen to him talk. She'd long since forgotten about the melting rootbeer float in her hand as she listened to Will spin a story about how life would be different if the Norse, Greek, Roman and Egyptian gods could compete against one another for devotion. Karen could care less about any of it, but he made it seem like it could happen, like maybe it was happening right then. When he started to walk away from the drink table amidst stares from those around them, Karen couldn't help but follow him. Liliana had her sketchpad, which made her happy anyways, she thought. So she and Will walked.
Around and around they walked and he talked and she just listened. Will needed that, really. Chandra, his sister was loud and Jace just spoke through writing, so he rarely had someone to listen to him. But her eyes were so enthused- and he had never had that, ever. He'd even had trouble making friends. A lot of that had changed with Dack, though. He, Jace, and Dack often were like three peas in a pod. And Dack made their sister happy instead of making her feel like a freak; and that was okay with Will.
Will and Karen continued to make their rounds, just listening, talking. Karen couldn't help herself- she grabbed his hand. She wanted to know what it felt like; and his stomach jumped into his throat when she did, but he couldn't bring himself to let go, either. Karen wasn't going to let him get away. She'd tried and tried and tried to make Grim see her worth but she couldn't; but she could tell from his eyes that he could see her- not just her body. He'd not once made her feel uncomfortable in her own skin; she had to let him know she was interested after the two weeks of sideways glances in the dining hall. They stopped shortly behind where Karen had left, and when Karen saw what she did, her only thought was about fifty red exclamation points.
"Karen needs someone like him to calm her ass down," Liliana said to Jace.
"He needs someone to pull his head out of lala land so they might be good for each other, then," Jace sighed.
"You have cake on your face," Jace said to Liliiana, and brushed it off with his free hand. Liliana felt her stomach jolt, she gripped the coke bottle harder at his touch. Jace just, her skin is so soft, he thought. You can't touch students, he then said to himself.
Liliana took her forefinger and put it right on Jace's nose. There was nothing wrong with her being playful, making a friend.
"Cutie," She laughed. "I like you. I think it's going to be a great semester. Professor."
"THAT CREEP!" Karen very nearly shouted. She saw Jace's hand come up to brush her face, not knowing that she had something on it.
"Heh," Will laughed under his breath. "Look at Jace."
"You know him?!" Karen said, eyes wide. "You're not in our class," Karen said, a slight pout to her voice.
"He's my older brother," Will laughed, the sound was literally the most beautiful thing Karen had ever heard.
"Well tell your older brother he's a lecherous nasty," Karen scoffed, "She's only eighteen. How old his he? Thirty-five?"
"He's twenty-nine," Will couldn't stop laughing. "He doesn't even talk to girls, much less his students," he said through breaths of laughter.
"This is like the least funny thing," Karen said, but she didn't want him to stop laughing. And if calling him out on his actions did that, she would, gladly. She would have, anyways. She squeezed his hand.
"Creep, creep, creep!" She said again, causing Will to tear up in a fit of the giggles. "Should I be scared?"
Will had to sit down, so much laughter had overtaken him.
Jace heard Will laughing, too. And even if it was at his expense, he was glad to hear it. And even though Karen had a point, he couldn't tear himself away from the Russian butter cake and the coke with the the girl that had already began to haunt him. Liliana couldn't stop smiling either, the touch had secured that for the night. She didn't want to get up. So she didn't.
Karen and Will decided to walk back up to the dorm, Will still laughing. When they got to the door, she took his phone and snapped a selfie; memoing it with her number.
"He likes her, I think," Will said.
I know, Karen thought. And it's dangerous. But she kept it to herself. Besides, the butterflies that had taken up residence in her stomach made it hard to speak. She didn't know what to do for the first time in her life; so she just kissed him on the cheek, murmured "text me," and walked into her dorm. Karen Voss peeked out the window, her best friend still sitting down there with Professor Beleren- Jace- Will had called him. She was scared, for the first time. Because Lili couldn't get hurt.
Her phone lit up, Will's face brightening the screen. She flopped down onto her bed, fright replaced with anticipation as she shut the blinds, leaving them to their own devices. Worry would overtake her that night, but right now, Karen just let herself feel the happiness bubbling up inside her.
Because Liliana Vess felt the same thing. A happy balloon that felt like it could never be quashed. And Jace Beleren's fears were being erased with every word that she spoke.
Tonight, smiles overtook frowns and laughter overtook sadness.
Que será, será.
Whatever will be, will be.