mr. mara

•5•

(Kai's pov)

[1 week later]

The bell rings and I grab all of my things. Everyone leaves the room, but I stay back for a little bit.

"Hi," I say once everyone is gone.

He smiles, "Hey. Are we still on for tonight?"

"Of course," I say. "I'm excited to see where you live."

"It's not anything special," he says. "I'm just glad that we can finally get out of this classroom though."

"I am too," I say. "Hopefully it will feel a bit more normal. Having dates in a classroom isn't very normal."

"Well we made it our own type of normal."

"True," I say. "Tomorrow I think..."

I'm interrupted by our principal before I can say anything else, "Sorry to interrupt, but can I talk to Kai?"

"Go right ahead," Nick says. I look at Nick with panicked eyes as the principal walks out of the door, "It's okay. He doesn't know anything. Don't freak out"

"Okay," I say. I walk away from Nick and into the hallway.

"Kai," he says. "Your brother is in my office right now. I think you need to go calm him down."

"Why? Is he okay? What happened?"

"He got into a fight with a junior," he says. "I don't know exactly what happened. Neither of them will tell me, so I was hoping you could talk to Zion."

"Of course," I say. We walk to his office and I see Zion sitting alone in a chair. He has a few cuts on his chin and his lip is bleeding.

"I'll leave you guys alone."

The principal walks out and it's now just Zion and I alone. "What? He sent you in to give me a lecture or something?"

"No," I say. "He wanted me to come in and calm you down."

"I am calm."

"Then tell me what the hell happened."

"That kid," he says. "He was making jokes about you and Mr. Mara."

"What jokes?" My heart drops to my stomach.

"He knows that Mr. Mara has been tutoring you," Zion says. "So he thought you two were fucking. He was making all these jokes right in front of me and I couldn't handle it."

"You didn't have to get in a fight because of me, Zion," I say. "You know better than that. I can fight my own demons."

"It's my job. You're my little sister and I'm always going to stick up for you."

"I know," I say. "But none of that stuff is even true, so you shouldn't have got so mad at him."

I hate lying to him. Zion has always been my best friend and I usually tell him everything. I hate that I can't tell him everything that's going on between Nick and I.

"I'm sorry," he says. "I'll try and control myself next time."

"Good," I smile, "Now you need to talk to the principal about this and tell him what happened."

"Okay."

I lean down and I kiss the top of his head, "I love you, headass."

"I love you, shitface." We always call each other those names. Ever since we were about ten years old.

I smile and I walk out of the office. I walk down the hallway until I get to Nick's classroom. I stand outside the door and I watch him teach through the glass window that's in front of me.

I know that I should get to my next class, but watching him and seeing him comforts me in a way that I can't really explain.

Nick and I have only been doing whatever the hell this is for a week now. We hang out in his class every single night and we talk. We don't study, we talk. It's the best feeling ever, but I know eventually someone will figure it out.

"Kai!"

I turn around to see Maggie walking towards me, "Hey. Why aren't you in class?"

"Why aren't you?"

"Had to deal with Zion," I say. "Now I'm just chilling out here because I don't want to go to class."

"Ah," she says. "Glad he beat the shit out of that kid. Everything he was saying was bullshit."

"Yea," I say. "I'm sure it all was."

She smiles, "Lets head to class."

She starts to walk and I turn around one last time to see him at the board, teaching his class.

The bad part is that kid wasn't lying. We may not be fucking or anything, but we are something.

I don't know what it is yet, but we are something.