They planned to meet once a week, which worked for both of them. Makenzie had practice four days a week, so there wasn't really much of an option. They agreed to meet on Tuesdays. Ms. Williams was quite pleased that Lacey accepted despite her protests in the beginning.

At the end of math class on Wednesday, after they finished their work and had nothing left to do, Jonas began the interrogation. 

"So, who was it?" He leaned over his desk towards Lacey in gleeful interest.

"Makenzie. Makenzie Abernathy." Lacey clarified, assuming that he probably didn't spend as much time as she did paying attention to Makenzie.

"Oh wow! Makenzie? That's crazy. I've heard she's kind of... intense." He leaned back, letting out a low whistle. She tilted her head to the side for a moment, thinking of their meeting yesterday. Makenzie had been chipper and friendly, willing to help even knowing that she may not be able to. Intense was not really the word Lacey would have used to describe her.

"She's actually... not like that." She stopped herself before she called her cute in front of someone else, even though that's exactly what she meant. Regardless of the fact that it was Jonas. He nodded slowly, as though absorbing the information.

"So what is she actually like?" He leaned back in his seat, thoughtfully, "To be honest, I've never really spent any time around her, just seen her on the field," Jonas added on, before she could even try and answer his question.

"Very nice." she smiled slightly, thinking about their interaction. "She was very nice." Jonas narrowed his eyes at her.

"Very nice, huh..." He smiled as though he knew some secret that Lacey didn't. She knit her eyebrows together, but didn't say anything.

Tuesday seemed forever away, even by Friday evening. Lacey spent her evening pulling together worksheets to work on with Makenzie, basic pre-calc equations and questions to assess what Makenzie's strengths and weaknesses were in the subject. Sifting through papers on her desk, she barely noticed the small ping her computer made, signalling she had received a message on Facebook. She glanced at her screen, mostly planning to ignore it; she hardly got messaged from anyone other than her family sending her a link they thought would interest her. However, the name at the bottom of the screen was Jonas Evans. Lacey furrowed her brow before clicking on the message.

"What are ur plans for Monday?" The message read. Lacey was even more confused. Jonas hardly ever messaged her for anything more than asking about class. Maybe he wanted help after school or something?

"Outside of going to classes, I don't really have any." She typed as a reply. She turned back to the printouts in front of her, but hardly had a chance to look at them before another ping interrupted her. She pressed her lips together and moved the papers to the side, sliding her computer in front of her. She was determined to finished this conversation quickly to get back to her plans for the night.

"Tuesday is the tutoring stuff right?" Jonas had said. Other messages popped up quickly, before Lacey could even start typing out a reply.

"R u ready for it? Do u need any help preparing stuff? I'm in calc too, so maybe I could help u out!" Each sentence was in it's own message. Lacey groaned quietly. Jonas was a chatterbox, even in messages it seemed. Besides, she had to help him all the time, having him help with Makenzie would just make things more complicated. Not to mention that she would have to explain her deal with Makenzie to him and that would be embarrassing. No, it was better to meet with her alone, in the library, as planned.

"I'm fine, Jonas. Thank you for the offer, though." She waited a moment after replying to see if he would respond again, but after a minute of nothing, she assumed it was safe to resume her work. She kept glancing at the message chain. Had she been rude to Jonas? She really didn't need, or want, his help, but being rude to the one friend she had was not exactly the best course of action she could take.

At some point he opened it and she waited for a response, but, again, nothing. She shook her head, trying to clear away the anxiety. She forced her focus back on the sheets in front of her.

In calculus on Monday, Jonas showed up late again, meaning Lacey couldn't talk to him before class. Not that it really mattered, she didn't really want to bring up the messages anyway. If she brought them up and he hadn't thought anything of them, it would make her look obsessive. But if she didn't bring them up and he had been insulted by them, she would look uncaring. Lacey had no idea what to do. This is why she hated messaging over talking, at least on the phone, if not in person. Nuances were lost through texting or messaging, so being seen as rude was much easier than it might otherwise be.

As they were instructed to work on class work and the room erupted into noise, Lacey took the moment to turn to Jonas. A quick scan of his face before he turned around, but Lacey saw nothing. Things like this were not her forte. Jonas turned to her, smiling as their eyes met. They began working on the classwork and things continued as though the conversation Friday never happened.

Tuesday whizzed by. She sat in the library after class, waiting where she agreed to meet with Makenzie. She could hear the doors open and close, but was afraid that turning around to see if it was Makenzie would be weird. She, instead, buried her nose in her homework for other classes, finishing up what work she could do with a lot of distractions.

Finally, after what felt like an hour, but was only about ten minutes, a backpack was dropped on the table she was sitting at. She jumped and looked up, meeting eyes with an apologetic looking Makenzie. She had braided her hair this time, her dark hair complimented by the tanned skin and melted caramel eyes. Lacey sat up straighter.

"Sorry..." Makenzie apologized with a small smile, sitting down across from her. She shook her head with a smile.

"It's fine. I figured we could start with just assessing..." Lacey pulled the sheets she had prepared out of her bag. They looked over them and worked together to get an understanding of Makenzie's troubles. After about half an hour of working, they were finally satisfied with that portion of their arrangement. As Lacey passed the papers to Makenzie for study purposes, Makenzie examined Lacey's face. She felt it heat up under the other girl's eyes. She focused on the desk in front of her.

"So, confidence." Makenzie stated, though it sounded a bit like a question, still. Lacey nodded. "Why do you think you need to be more confident?" Makenzie's eyes bored into Lacey as she fidgeted with her nails.

"I just... This is a bit embarrassing saying this out loud..." She glanced up at Makenzie, who continued just staring at her. "I'm not exactly the best at making friends and things. I'm a senior and I've never dated or anything. I just thought, maybe if I was more confident in myself, it might make things like that... easier. If I liked me better maybe other people would too." Makenzie nodded slowly.

"Okay, so the end goal is to be better with people and, what? Get a boyfriend?" Makenzie drove straight to the point.

"Something like that." Lacey glanced back up at the other girl's face, not bothering corrected one of the errors in her statement. A boyfriend wasn't really what Lacey was into. Makenzie nodded again, slower this time. She looked away, thinking.

"Okay, so. Here's what we're going to do."

***

So, what do you guys think Makenzie's plan is?  

Please comment and vote; let me know what you think!