C H A R L O T T E

If I hadn't mentioned this before, tests were the shittiest part of Tuesday.

Today alone, we had four different tests on math alone, not even including the english ones, and yet our teachers still think we're one big family in class. Donald Trump could make better claims than that.

One thing that was good about these tests though, was the fact that it gave me the perfect topic to start on with James. Call me lazy, ( and I would agree ), dumb, or unwilling to create ideas, but my mind was genuinely blanking, and in my defense, I only had a day to figure it out anyway.

So we'd stick with tests. If I even found a way to make it up the stairs in the first place.

Two minutes later, I had done it.

I was up the stairs.

Now, with my borderline social anxiety perking up again (even if it was just one person), I could only feel like my socks were basically glued to the watercoloured rug beneath my feet, and I was clutching the textbooks in my hands harder than I do with my cat when I'm having a panic attack.

Of course, it wouldn't hurt to just completely forget about this entire ordeal and jump out the window, but some kind of otherworldly voice kept whispering for me to just open the door in this annoying voice that sounded an awful lot like SpongeBob SquarePants.

Like that'd do me any good.

Two more seconds pass of me staring at the little white picturesque ship swinging on the doorknob.

I just open the door.

The first thing that occurred to my flurrying brain, was the fact that his room was in complete contrast to the way the rest of this batshit crazy house was, given that his room was so...sombre.

It was like walking home in the peaceful dark after a rambunctious party.

It was appealing, to say the least.

By the time these thoughts had fully registered in my head, he had already turned all the way in his gaming chair and was staring at me with the same amount of recognition as you would with a bug you thought you had killed twenty minutes ago but just appeared under your coffee mug.

His neat, but also bushy dark blonde eyebrows raised up in contempt, before settling down just above his eyelids, which then closed slowly in turn, and he turned back around in his chair.

Off to a great start, I suppose.

I gather my bearings and strut into the lion's den, hoping I'd come out alive.

"I can see you standing there." His voice interrupts me after half a minute, booming into my ears and vibrating in the air, his eyes flickering towards the reflection of me on his computer screen.

Jesus, I needed a makeover.

"I can see you sitting there. No harm in starting this shitshow on equal ground, right?"

His eyes reach mine, unamused.

I wanted to shove a hand down my throat and rip out my tongue.

James swallowed, placing two hands on his knees and standing up from the chair, a hand ruffling his own brown just-got-up-from-bed-and-i-couldn't-be-assed-to-do-anything-about-this hair, closing the door I had almost forgotten about in my fascination with his hair.

It was just hair?

I guess I could say it was this weird habit of mine to overanalyze normal things whenever I was nervous, and holy moly, was I nervous. He had these sort of big, wide-eyed, golden retriever turned human look that I couldn't help myself but look at, even though I knew he was anything but.

Focus.

"Are you going to say something or am I going to have to throw myself out the window like I was planning to before you just appeared?" James raised his eyebrows, turning off his computer and taking it off the desk, dumping it on his bed.

"No worries, you can carry on with the previous plan." I say in a scarily tiny voice, still leaning against the wall with my hands behind my back, as if I was paralyzed.

He huffs what I suppose was meant to be a substitute for a chuckle, walking past me and dragging a spare chair from the other side of the room, setting it up next to the one he was just sitting on, and I take a step away from the wall. "I'm not gonna bite you, you know?"

"Then maybe stop looking at me like that."

"Like what?"

Another step.

"Like you're gonna bite me."

"I'm not."

"I don't believe you."

Another step.

"You should."

"Why?"

"Because, I probably would have already bitten you by now, Charlotte." He says, and I realize I was already at his table, standing there ominously as he stared at me from where he was sitting.

"You look very ominous." A pen and a notebook appear on the desk, and he crossed his arms across the back of his head, a yawn almost escaping his lips.

"That's just what I was thinking." I actually sit down. I don't know what's the matter with me.

"Do you normally think so negatively about yourself?"

"Do you normally keep changing the subject to avoid anything school related?"

A pause.

"Yes, actually. You're lucky I haven't started bitching about how there wasn't enough space on the door for Jack to fit in or something."

I scrunch my nose, still wiggling about in the chair like I was expecting him to launch himself at me any moment now.

I kind of was.

"That's..a hot take, if I've ever heard one."

"You're a hot take."

"Is that some weird pickup line?"

His eyes meet mine again, the corners of his mouth twitching into a ghost of a smile. Why was he being nice to me?

Was this whole thing some kind of absurd, extremely impressive, well orchestated pickup line?

Am I on live television?

I drop my backpack on the table, the zip already opened from earlier, when I had refused to part ways with the wall, so the books in it basically spill out, and I can genuinely feel the grimace radiating off this guy.

That's not my problem though. I was here for one reason, and one reason only.

To get my precious cat to stop shitting all over my belongings.

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"What about the Pythagorean theorem?"

"What about it?" His voice barely sounding the same as it did when I came in.

We'd been going over some math topics he quite emphasized his hate on for the past, say, thirty minutes, and he genuinely sounded like watching himself choke to death in a mirror would be better than this.

"Is it easy for you? Or do you feel like throwing up whenever you hear of it?"

"I feel like throwing up whenever I hear math." He grunts, his face in his palms.

Like I said earlier, he's been relatively..nice to me. Dare I say, sweet to me?

For the past half hour, I've been bracing myself for a sudden backhanded compliment, or rave insult, or some other thing up his alley. Literally nothing.

"Listen, James, I know you think you're 'mathphobic' but just cause you-"

"Why do you keep calling me that?" He interrupted me, sitting his chin in his palms now, his eyes scrunching up.

I decided I could give him a break, so he doesn't like, die, or anything.

"Because it's your..name, dumbass?"

He raises an eyebrow, blowing a strand of hair away from where it had floofed down on his nose.

"No. It isn't."

"What are you talking about, everyone calls you that and-"

"Yeah, but it's not my name. Well it is, technically, but it's just my middle name. I actually hate it."

Oh.

"Oh."

"Yeah. I just go by it so I don't sound as dumb as I actually am." He's doodling on his paper now. Who even was this guy?

"That's..concerning. If not, then what is your name?" I ask, putting my own head in my arms, tilting my head in an embarassing attempt to look busy when I'm just staring straight on at his face.

What? He may hate me, but that didn't automatically disqualify him from looking..well, I'd say handsome?

To me, handsome wasn't really a word. Kind of.

It's more of a feeling. Like when you see a guy that obviously is good looking, but then there's just this thing that makes you think of him as handsome. Just my logic.

"The-o-dore." He says in three places, rubbing his left eye. "How didn't you know this, again?"

I shrug, my own hand now moving brainlessly on the notebook I had brought, like I had caught some kind of virus. "I guess I never paid that much attention. Hm."

Silence passes for a few seconds as our eyes meet briefly, before I break off to write down some math problems from the tests we had today straght from my brain on a fresh page of my notebook.

When I'm done, I tear it off, placing it in front of him. "Here. Just..solve a few of these. To cool your brain down a bit."

"This is what you consider cooling down?" He deadpans, face falling into his palms again. After some time, he starts solving the problems, and the room goes right back into semi-comfortable silence again.

There were so many questions on my mind as of this moment. Why doesn't he go by Theodore? Why is his house so normal, yet so outlandish? Why does he need a tutor if he's allegedly switching schools in less than a month? Why is anything?

Unfortunate for my burning curiosity though, I barely knew him enough to call him even an acquaintance, so there was no way in hell I would start asking all these personal all-in-your-face questions while he was solving math problems.

"Why did you actually agree to this?" He says out of nowhere, his voice slicing through the silence as he fiddles with the ballpoint pen in his left hand.

Yeah, he's also a leftie.

"What?"

"Why did you agree to doing this weird tutoring thing? It's obvious you think that I despise you."

What in the world was he going on about now? Why was he being so vague about the fact that this was an incredibly awkward situation?

Was this flirting? Am I just being oblivious to some kind of hate-flirting thing?

Was this a kink?

Okay, calm down, SpongeBob SquarePants.

"Erm," I start, sitting up, my sneakers shuffling against each other. "Correct me if I'm mistaken, but..don't you?"

Silence.

Shit, I knew it. It probably is a kink.

"What do you think?"

More silence.

I was the tutor in this situation, and now he's the one giving me food for thought?

I'm about certain this is just some weird fever dream and I'll wake up in a cold sweat  in the comfort of my own room.

"I don't know. Am I supposed to think something else? Is this some kind of QnA i'm missing out on?" I say, the silence in the room growing thick enough to suffocate a human being.

And he just shrugged.

What the shit is that supposed to mean?!

Why is he being so mysterious about.. everything!

Argh.

"I think we should start getting back to math." We both say at the same time, and, yeah. I think this is some kind of kinky hate-flirting bullshit. Because what?

"Yeah. Only an hour and a half left. And you have to get home before seven, right?"

"Yeah." I sigh, cursing inwardly in strict parents. "I wish I-wait, how do you know that?" I tilt my head, my hands going to play with the sleeve of my turtleneck again. Nervous habit. "Cause as far as I know, the longest our conversations has ever gone is 'Could I borrow a pencil?' and you going 'No.'"

The right side of his mouth quirks into a half smile, and gosh, if it didn't make my pupils dilate just this tiny bit.

"Sydney told me."

"What?"

"Sydney. She told me. Do you have a hearing problem-"

"Sydney? As in my best friend Sydney? As in blonde, completely and totally opposite of me in every single way, Sydney?" My eyes were as wide as saucers right now.

"Yeah..that Sydney. I think."

"OhmyGod, are you two..a couple?" I almost spit out. "You. And my best friend."

"Fuck no." He scoffs, pushing his hair out of his eyes, and I get a glimpse of his warm blue eyes before his locks fall back into place. "And what do you mean, your best friend. She's my best friend. Known her since kindergarten." His eyebrows furrow, like he's the one meant to be confused in this scenario.

Let me assure you, I'm the one meant to be confused here, and that's why my brain probably just melted.

author's note 💕💕

hihihi

how was it guys tell me in the comments!

finding people that actually want to read your book is so hard omg but the struggle continues!

#roadto1millionclub

I already love Theo omg he's literally my bf Ben but irl (notice a pattern in these)

love, kayla.