Page 39 of Don’t Forget Me

“Hello, Van…” I began. “Dorren? Correct?”

He nodded with a roll of his eyes.

“Sorry, I’m just not used to all the richness of old snobby surnames.”

“Ah, I thought we were past this,” he said with a slight frown.

“Apologies, I was joking.”

He furrowed a brow. “You have a strange… sense of humor.”

“I don’t have a sense of humor, to be frank,” I replied.

“That is horrid. Well, that’s all about to change now that we are friends,” he said.

Ezra sent me a narrowing glance, but I couldn’t help but notice the corners of his lips lifted most stunningly.

“Who said we’re friends?” I asked.

Although I wanted a friend. I needed one. I yearned for one. I was just testing him; would he give up too easily? Was he truly the embodiment of hope that I wanted him to be?

My suspicions about his radiant spirit had been confirmed when he smiled and leaned toward me. “Your word count suggests that you want to be my friend. But do not fret, I wish to be yours as well.”

“Hmm.” I nodded. “Very well. You mentioned yesterday that if I were to need assistance, you’d be able to help me study.”

There was a spark in his encompassing stare. I felt like I had been drowning within his gaze, so deep, so captivating.

“Of course. What classes do you need help with?”

“Do you happen to suck at Calculus?” I asked. “We have a big test coming up at the end of the month, but to be truthful, that is not a level I’ve ever reached before. Not even at my old school.”

“I happened to get an A* in Calculus last semester. How? Don’t ask me,” he said.

I snorted, “You nerd.”

“Who are you to even say anything?” he asked.

I remained silent, a questioning look on my expression. I was far from a nerd.

“You were accepted into a Scottish boarding school. Not just any academy, but the leading academy in all of Europe because of the excellence in our teachers, students, and curriculum. You enjoy learning about literature, history, and poetry more than your classmates do. You read books for the fun, and you are a poet. You are a nerd just as much as I am.”

I glared at him. “Then, I am an aesthetically pleasing nerd. Also, me being accepted into the school could have been a happy accident. Like my old school, the only reason it hasn’t been shut down yet is that there would be no other high school for the surrounding eight towns.”

The color left his face. If he’d been pale before, he was now ghost-white. “Eight towns? And only one high school?”

“Don’t ask. I don’t know how they make it work either,” I replied with a shrug.

Loud claps had echoed into my ears, snapping my attention in the direction of the sleazy professor at the center of the classroom.

“Time for our session to commence. We will be concluding the section on the societal regulations for ancient Greece and entering the beginning of the downfall of the Roman Empire.”

“When’s your test?” he hushed, eyeing me from the side of his vision.

“On Thursday,” I said.

He widened his eyes. “How does today at 4:30 p.m. sound? Classes end at 3 p.m., get some rest, eat some sustenance, then we can meet at the library again.”

“That sounds great. Thank you—” I found myself unable to say his first name. It felt too personal, almost as if I had been crossing lines and boundaries I wasn’t supposed to.