𝐈 𝐎𝐖𝐍 𝐘𝐎𝐔

𝐕 | 𝐓𝐔𝐓𝐎𝐑

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The first half of the day before lunch dragged by slowly for (Y/N) despite those classes being the ones she excelled at. In retrospect, she excelled at every single subject except for chemistry. It was a blot on her scholarship that she desperately wanted to erase, but it was much easier said than done. In the five minutes before the bell rang for lunch, she propped her head up and stared at the clock, thinking about how she would now be tutored by Cage.

It was strange.

She had gone through her freshman, sophomore, and junior year without so much as looking at Cage.

But then there was senior year.

At the sound of the bell ringing, she packed up before making her way to the cafeteria. Cage didn't try to talk to her again, and neither she to him. No one else bothered her because of that. She realized that while she did wish for one or two good friends, she also liked to be alone with her thoughts. It was nice to be invisible when she wanted to.

Sitting down at her usual table in the back, she had just taken a bite of her sandwich when a hand fell onto the table top loudly.

She nearly choked on the bread.

"Fancy seeing you here," Cage smiled down at her, a few strands of his dark hair falling over his flawless face that he didn't try to fix since he knew he looked good either way, something he thought must be true from the way (Y/N) merely stared at him with a stupefied expression. "What? Is there something on my face?"

"No, you just almost killed me by making me choke on my sandwich," she stated monotonously as she pointed at said sandwich.

"That would've made my reason for coming over here entirely useless, then."

"What is your reason again?"

"I'm your tutor," Cage's smile widened. "You didn't forget now, did you, (Y/N)?"

"Oh... no," (Y/N) met his eyes briefly before averting them again, an action he frowned at. "I didn't forget. I just assumed that our lessons would be taking place later considering the switch was a bit last minute. You don't have to tutor me today, if you don't want to. We can meet Thursday at lunch in the library if that's more convenient?"

"Why not just go now?" He completely ripped apart her suggestion.

She glanced behind him to where he normally ate. His friends looked displeased at the situation while the girls looked downright feral. Standing up without another word, she collected her things and promptly left. Cage stared at the doors, baffled at what had just happened.

He couldn't help but laugh.

Shaking his head, he walked out the door and called out, "(Y/N), wait for me!"

Said girl blatantly ignored his voice that rang throughout the hall, only flinching when he caught up to her and threw an arm around her shoulder. She ducked away and then continued walking, looking completely unfazed by the entire thing. Cage merely smiled as he fell into pace beside her, slowly sliding his hands into his pockets once more.

"You tried to escape quite quickly," he then chuckled, his dark gaze sliding to the corner of his eye to observe her reactions. "We're supposed to go to the library for tutoring, though... for the whole lunch period."

"I was going to go crash in an empty classroom to sleep, so I'll have to pass," (Y/N) held up a hand.

"Should we hold our session at my house then?"

"Huh?"

"After school sound good?"

"Wait, uh—"

"I'm glad we could have that settled," Cage flashed her that charming smile of his before disappearing, leaving the girl standing alone in the middle of the hallway with a rather disbelieving expression plastered on her face.

He chuckled again at the thought.

He couldn't help it.

He had never noticed (Y/N) up until now, and that baffled him since she was hilarious to him.

Not only did she look perpetually tired, but she also didn't really seem to care about a lot of things. Sure, she hated being the center of attention—including being the center of his attention—and just interacting with other people, but there was this type of nonchalant air around her that Cage liked. He tapped a finger against his chin as he thought of the girl, tilting his head in the process.

He snapped his fingers.

That's it.

She reminds me of a cat.

Constantly tired and wanting to take naps, doesn't like excessive attention, and doesn't care.

A cat.

Turning around to walk back into the cafeteria, Cage easily slipped back into his friendly and easygoing persona as he greeted his group of friends just like any other day. His gaze wandered over their faces that held tight grins and rather clouded eyes, something so vastly different compared to (Y/N)'s. It was then that he rolled his eyes when remembering that all of these people wanted something from him when (Y/N) didn't.

    In fact, she wanted the very opposite: she wanted nothing to do with him.

    He crossed his legs.

    The longer he thought about it, the more he came to the conclusion that he had never met a person who actually didn't want anything to do with him. Those in the past who didn't immediately vie for his attention quickly changed their tune in only a matter of days when learning of his wealth and power—more so, his father's wealth and power. (Y/N) knew all of those things about him, yet still gave him that dead stare of hers like she couldn't give two shits about any of that.

    Pressing a hand against the lower portion of his face to hide his smirk, Cage tapped a finger against the surface of the lunch table.

    For the first time in a while, he was excited.

    I wonder...

    Will this be fun for us, (Y/N)?

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