untitled - cole sprouse

[two]

[LUCY]

The class begins to filter out and everyone heads to lunch, Danielle - the last to exit the classroom (including Mr Benz), gives me a quick wink and closes the door behind her. Mr Sprouse is collecting his things, back faced towards the whiteboard. I roll up my skirt one more time and adjust my tie, school uniforms are hell. "So," Mr Sprouse turns around and faces me - lightly sitting on the table behind him, legs neatly crossed over each other mirroring his arms. "Lily."

"Lucy, my name's Lucy."

"Sorry Lucy here please, take a seat,' Mr Sprouse smiles towards a desk in front of him. The beat of my heart begins to quicken its pace against my chest as I walk closer to the attractive man in front of me. I don't speak while Mr Sprouse turns a chair around from the desk in front of me - demolishing any personal space I once had. "So..." He rests his hand's centimetres away from mine on the desk that we are now sharing. If I thought my heart was beating fast before I had no clue what awaited me. "You're a good student I hear."

I nod and keep my gaze securely on my hands, only looking up when absolutely necessary, "why would a student such as yourself, not do their homework, or do you just have everyone fooled." He laughs at this and I join in.

"No, trust me I don't think I could fool every teacher in this school for the past 5 years, I honestly just forgot we even had it, it isn't written in my planner and I'm not sure why."

"I see." He seems to think for a bit and as he breathes out his hand's touch mine. As cliche as it sounds, it's like time stops. Both of us are now holding our breath. Neither of us moving. Sitting there both of us wait for the other to break the connection first but the moment never seems to come. I lift my eyes from our hands - they are barely even touching, just my fingertips and his closed fist - just enough. I'm unsure of whether to make a move but I do anyway, it isn't much, but I shift the focus to what's under the table, sliding my feet closer to his, my right leg rests on him and he heavily breathes out.

Moments pass, and a short 30 seconds later Mr Sprouse must realise that what he is doing is wrong. Pulling his arms and legs in, as far away from me as possible, he continues, "Well, I trust that this won't happen again, as you and I both know it is wrong - all of it."

I know what he means, he isn't only talking about me not completing my homework anymore - we were acting inappropriately. "I can assure you that it won't sir."

"Good." I cough loudly at his words, a bright redness seeping onto both of our cheeks. I didn't expect to hear what I did but I liked it and I liked it a lot. Nothing goes unnoticed from here, not the way he reaches his hand behind his neck scratching lightly at the baby hairs. Not the way I tug on the bottom hem of my shirt and certainly not the way we both turn crimson.

"Well, I'll get to recess then." I say I can't bear to look him in the eyes at this point and keeping my head down I exit the small classroom hearing a faint 'bye' as I do so.

;

It sure is easy to say that I was not looking forward to Studio Arts Photography. Mr Sprouse recited his carefully planned out introduction of himself and the class got started. I tried my best to avert my attention away from him.

Pulling out my art folio I got straight to work, SAP was my favourite class of the day and it was even better considering that it was also the last. Flipping through the pages I began to fill in the blanks of where I hadn't written any annotations for my work.

Currently, I was working on an analogue piece I and shot on a film camera and developed in the dark room. "Hey, ruby can I borrow your rubber?"

"Yeah, no worries, here." She throws the rubber at me and I manage to catch it in time, looking over my shoulder and glancing at Mr Sprouse. His head was faced down and he looked to be filling out paperwork. I observe him as he lightly sucks on his knuckles brows furrowed in concentration.