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“You’ll give your presentations the week after Thanksgiving. It sounds far away, but time is a construct that never works in your favor. So get to working right away.”
Well, he doesn’t have to be a ray of sunshine like this.
Max nudges me with his elbow, and I make the mistake of looking at him directly.
“Are you free sometime this afternoon?”
I’m conscious of the fact that there are words coming out of his mouth, but none of them register. The light from the windows hits his eyes directly, and I discover the most curious thing. I thought they were as true blue as our uniforms, but they’re lighter than that. Like pools of clear water from the Caribbean beaches my parents used to take us to when we were kids.
“Tinker Bell?”
The automatic gnashing of my teeth after hearing the nickname snaps me back to reality.
“Sorry, I was thinking of three different ways to kill you, so I didn’t catch any of that.”
“Oh yeah?” When he smiles, an almost imperceptible dimple appears in his left cheek. Only that one. What irritates me most about it is that I’ve only seen it appear when he’s making fun of me. “What are they?”
I shush him and look back at the front. “You’ll have to discover them yourself. And class isn’t over. Stop distracting me.”
“You do know that if you kill me with the first method, I won’t get to discover the other two, right?”
I press my lips into a tight line. The traitors want to stretch into a smile. Somehow, I’ve gone from being annoyed that he always has a comeback to finding it amusing. This boy is dangerous.
And I’m not the only one with the same idea. A couple of girls sitting in the row below have spent the entire class sneaking peeks at the insufferably hot guy. At least they’re blessed with not having seen him without a shirt. I haven’t recovered from that sight yet.
The second the lecturer finishes class, Max grabs the back of my chair so I can’t push it and get up.
“Schedule, now.”
I sigh. “Can’t we just, like, work separately?”
“When?” He starts nodding the second I don’t have an obvious response ready. “Uh-huh. Between class and training, we have only the time we make for this boring assignment.”
“You’re starting to sound like the lecturer.”
“Maybe he was right.” Max shrugs. “So, are you free or not?”
Let us not pretend like this is an invitation for a date, I tell my heart as it accelerates.
“Fine,” I grumble, checking my schedule on my phone. While our classmates trickle out, Cassiano and I look at the pockets of free time in our schedules and only find two matches. One is this afternoon, like he suggested earlier.
“Great. Then I’ll see you later at the library, Tinker Bell.”
My things don’t deserve the punishment they’re getting as I jam them into my bag with violence. “When will you stop calling me by that ridiculous name?”
Max shrugs on his backpack. A strand of his black hair falls over his forehead. The dimple makes an appearance again, and I brace.
“When you stop being so damn cute, Tinker Bell.”
I suck air between my teeth. The best I can do for myself is to wait until he’s out of the room to exit. I no longer have the capacity to put up with him without melting like a candle. How am I going to survive today’s study session?
I turn into a bundle of nerves the rest of the day. It’s even hard to eat lunch. Chelsea notes it right away when I sit at the cafeteria with the girls, just poking my food around the plate.
“What’s with you?” she asks.
JT peeks at my plate. “If you’re not gonna eat it, can I have it?”
I take a couple more bites and push the plate off to her. I check the time while she polishes off the food. One hour and twenty-four minutes before my study date with the enemy.
