ryan

It was a Thursday evening. Leon and I were in my backyard, he was on the phone with his girl- Jenna while I was scrolling through Instagram.

After his call ended, he said "Jen just told me that we have some history project, dude. She wants me to do it with her so you might have to team up with someone else."

"Yeah, I already have a partner."

"What? Who? Don't tell me .. is it Lily? I swear to god if you said yes to her. The girl is untolerable."

"Nah, I wouldn't end up with her even in my dreams. What's her problem though? Has she never heard of personal space? She was all over me during our physics lecture and her perfume is so suffocating!"

"Damn, and here I thought that you were into her! Why do you act all sweet around her, though?"

"What do you mean? I always try to tell her to back off but she never gets the hint."

"She needs more than hints, Ry. Tell her straight up that you want nothing to do with her."

"That's kinda harsh, man. She would definitely not take it well."

"Oh, whatever. Forget about her. Who's your partner then?"

"This girl called Isabelle. I'm not sure if you've ever seen her."

"Oh so it's a she. A hot she?"

yes, extremely. I thought.

"You've got a girlfriend, mate." I told him instead.

"I'm not asking for myself," he said while wiggling his eyebrows.

I scoffed and said, "She's definitely not into that stuff"

"Well, you never know. It's usually the innocent ones who are up for the nasty stuff."

"Oh my god, shut up Leo. We are literally going to be doing a presentation about dead people. And how do you know that she's innocent? For all we know, she could be a part-time bartender"

"Are we talking about the same Isabelle?"

"I'm not sure, actually. Two seconds ago you were asking me if she was hot and now you seem to know everything about her."

"I wanted to know if you found her hot and as per my knowledge-"

"You've got knowledge? Now, that's a surprise!" I mocked him.

"Shut up and let me continue," he said while smacking my arm as I laughed at him. "Isn't Isabelle the brunette? She is always sitting in the front rows, making notes, right?"

"She does have brown hair. Brown eyes too. I haven't really seen her before if I'm being honest," I shrugged.

It's true. I think she's new, cause she mentioned not knowing anyone from class. But I'm disappointed in myself to not have noticed her earlier. She was gorgeous. Her hair looked so soft, I almost ran my hand through it. There were faint freckles peppered around her nose and under her eyes.

"Yeah," Leon said, breaking my train of thought.

"How do you know her?" I asked him, genuinely curious.

"It's a long story. Remember when we played with Josh and I bruised my knee pretty bad? Well, I was on my way to the nurse when Isabelle spotted me. I looked like a mess and had no energy to keep walking. She asked me to sit on the floor and offered me her water. Have you ever been to a desert, man? You know how we feel after drinking water after 2 whole days? That's how I felt after drinking the water she offered. I was so grateful, mate. She even wiped some of the blood from around my knee with her sweater and tied it around my knee to stop the bleed. She took me to the nurse too."

"You're such a pussy," I told him.

"Come on, you saw the wound, it still hasn't healed. Look at it," Leon stated, pointing at his knee.

I winced, he was hurt real bad that night. I felt guilty for not being able to help back then but was glad that someone looked after him.

"That was nice of her."

He nodded. "Yeah, I still have to return her sweater though. Never got a chance to. She looks so busy all the time."

"I'm meeting up with her day-after. Do you want me to give it to her?"

"Really? I'll give it to you tomorrow at school then."

"Sure," I agreed with the idea.

"Well, it's getting pretty dark. I should head out now. Good night, Ry.

"Good night, Leon," I said while walking him out of my house.

~next day~

"Lily, I already told you! I've got a partner."

"Leon can pair up with Jenna. Come on Ry, stop being so stubborn," Lily continued pestering me about the project.

"I'm not the stubborn one here, Lily. And Leon has already got Jenna as his partner."

I watched as her face morphed into a look of confusion. "Who's your partn-"

She was cut off when Arnold cleared his throat to announce something.

"Everyone, you will be sitting with your partners today and start on your presentations. I want it to be done by the end of next week. Please get seated and try to keep the noise levels down."

I stood up from my chair and tried to spot Isabelle. Our eyes found each others' at the same instant, causing me to signal that I'd meet her at her desk.

"You can't be for real," Lily said as she looked from Isabelle to me.

"Please let me be and find yourself someone else to work with Lily," I told her and walked towards my team mate. I could hear her scoff behind but was thankful that she did not create a scene.

I took a seat beside Isa's while she was trying to search for something in her bag with a pout. She looked adorable with that pout on her face.

"So, what are we doing?" I asked her.

"Hey. I'm trying to find my airpods, give me a second," she said as she opened another zip of her bag.

"You mean these ones?" I said while pointing at a tiny white box with an apple symbol on it.

She looked up and spotted what I was pointing at. She let out a sigh of relief and shook her head.

"I'm sorry, that was stupid," she said while zipping up her bag and placing it on the floor.

"Why are you apologizing?" I asked.

She took a moment and replied with a shrug, "If I'm being honest, no idea why. Just felt like the appropriate thing to say, you know?"

I shook my head and reflected the smile that adorned her face.

She cleared her throat and stated, "We should get started. Do you have any topics in mind?"

"Not really, do you?"

"Well, they asked us to choose our favourite moment in American history and I'm not a fan of history so I guess none of us has a topic," she said.

I smiled at her.

"What?", she asked.

"Nothing. For some reason, I assumed that you'd be prepared with half the slides and I'd just have to approve them," I told her. It was true, I did think that.

She frowned and replied, "This is the second time you've assumed something about me and been wrong about it."

"It's a good thing that I'm wrong. I like participating in team projects and hate to put my name on things that have none of my contribution," I told her.

She looked at me and said "Yeah, I don't like doing other people's work either so I'm hoping we will make a good team."

"We will," I smiled at her and opened my laptop so that we could get to work.

~⨯~