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ALL I DO { irl }
niola walks up to matt's locker, shutting it loudly. he jumps at the sounds before quickly putting his phone in his pocket and giving niola his full attention. she's holding a tote bag over her shoulder, full of novels and pencils. in her arms are a few notebooks of various colors and sizes.
"the bell just rang for lunch." she tells him, fiddling with the rings of the notebook she's holding in her arms. "do you want to come study with me in the library?"
"yeah, sure." he agrees easily.
the two of them walk to the library, passing the noisy cafeteria as they do. matt glances through the cafeteria doors and sees nick, chris, and camille sitting at their table. they seem to be looking around for him. part of him feels like he should tell them he's going to be with niola. but the other part of him doesn't feel like listening to them teasing him about his crush. so, he decides to just leave it.
they walk to their usual table in the corner. niola pulls everything out of her bag and sets down all of her books, sprawling them across the surface of the table.
"i forgot to grab my notebooks before agreeing to come here with you," matt admits, realizing he was so quick to go with her that he totally forgot to bring his materials needed to study. "can i borrow one of yours?"
"yeah," she says. she chooses a random notebook and slides it across the table to him. "this one should be completely empty."
"why do you carry around empty notebooks?" he asks.
she glances up at him with a raised brow. suddenly, his heartbeat quickens. just from the way she looks into his eyes makes him feel like he's going to have a heart attack. the sunlight from outside peeks through the window, making her dark brown eyes have a golden hue to them.
if he can't even hold eye contact with her, how does he expect to pretend to be her boyfriend?
he's not sure what it is about her that makes him like her so much. but whatever it is, he can't seem to shake the obsession away. his crush is like a tide — whenever he thinks its beginning to fade away, it returns again. no matter what he does, his feelings will never fade away. just like the tides, they'll always resurface and rise back up.
"matt?" she repeats, waving her hand in front of his face. matt blinks a couple times, refocusing on her rather than- well, her. "are you even listening to me?"
"yeah, of course i am." he lies. "what kind of boyfriend would i be if i didn't listen to my girlfriend talk?"
she rolls her eyes, "a fake one. because you're a horrible liar and an even worse boyfriend."
"excuse me?" he gasps, feigning offence at her words. "i'm a wonderful boyfriend."
she chuckles, leaning foward on the table. her face is now inches away from his as she thins her eyes at him. again, matt feels that tide-like pull towards her and he nearly goes into another trance. but she shakes his head, snapping himself out of it. its at that moment where he gets enough confidence to challenge her in return. he leans closer.
instinctively, niola flinches backward at the feeling of his nose brushing hers. the boldness of his actions take her by surprise and she looks at him with wide eyes. "as i was saying," niola changes the subject quickly as she clears her throat. "i need help."
"help?" matt repeats, suddenly worried about her. does she just need assistance with something or is she genuinely in some sort of trouble? "what kind of help? are you okay?"
"yes. yes, i'm fine." niola tells him, flicking her hand at him dismissively. "i just need your help with this whole fake relationship thing. like i said, i've never dated anyone before. so i don't know what is expected of us as a 'couple'. what can we do to make our relationship more believable?"
"well, what solidifies a relationship is our chemistry." he explains, picking a pen up off of the tabletop and writing something down in the empty notebook niola gave him. "everyone else needs to be able to tell that we clearly like each other. otherwise, people will start getting suspicious."
"okay?" niola nods, still not completely understanding. "but i still don't get why everyone cares so much about our business."
"that's the tough part, silvers." matt says with a chuckle. "but we're in highschool so our business is everyone's business. and not only that, but our business will be spread around like some contagious disease if anything bizarre happens."
as he finishes writing, matt clicks the cap of the pen back onto the top. he then grabs the notebook off of the table and holds it up to show niola what is scribbled down onto the lined paper.
nothing in highschool is private. everyone's eyes are on you 24/7.
"what is that supposed to mean?" she asks after reading the sentence and leaning back into her chair. matt grins at her confusion, ripping the page out of the notebook and folding it up into a small square. he grabs her hand and places the paper into his palm before wrapping her fingers around it.
"next time you doubt what to do or what to say, remember that we're not doing this for ourselves. you first said that we were 'dating' in order to make zade leave you alone, right?" he asks and niola nods. "well, that's it. ever since the very beginning, all of this was to please those around us and to make you feel more comfortable. just keep doing that and nothing will go wrong. keep trying to make everyone else happy regardless of your own feelings."
she balls up her fist, crumbling the paper and dropping it onto the table. "you're being sarcastic aren't you?"
he picks up the piece of paper and gently cradles it in his hands, "this paper represents everyone else's opinion. i handed it to you nicely and neatly — which symbolizes everyone thinking nicely of you. but what did you do as soon as you found out the truth?"
"i crumbled it up." she mumbles, realizing what matt is trying to teach her.
"yes." he nods with a smile. "as soon as you understood that i wasn't telling the truth, you got angry and ruined everyone's opinion on you. but guess what."
"what?"
"their opinion was already ruined ever since i folded the paper." matt whispers as though this were a huge secret. "before you even took the paper — a.k.a., before they even knew you personally — everybody already has a tainted perception of who you are. this is due to rumors. because of random people spreading shit behind your back and trying to fold the paper a certain way."
niola silentlt listens to matt's analogy, taking in his words and trying her hardest to put these puzzle pieces together to understand his message. "what're you saying?" she asks.
"what im saying is," matt begins before ripping the paper to shreds and scattering them across the tabletop. "no matter what you do and no matter how hard you try, people are bitches. they don't give a shit about your intentions or if you mean well. they believe what they want to believe. they fold the paper however they want — they pass the paper around and reword the message however they please. they don't care about who it impacts or if it even offends anyone.
"relationships are private affairs between you and your partner. silvers, you worry so much about everyone else. you need to start caring about yourself. not what anyone else thinks." he concludes. "fuck them."
niola smiles, her eyes lighting up with the knowledge of finally understanding what it truly means to be in a relationship. "you're right. fuck them."
.∘◦❀◦∘. a/n : this chapter had a shit ton of symolizing and a lot of hidden messages so i hope you guys understood everything and it's not too confusing 😭😭 trust me, there's a lot lying beneath the surface for this chapter 😏 id be surprised if anyone caught all of it tbh ◦∘.❀.∘◦
