Up in the Stars

Yield

It was taut with the concentration of holding back.

He was taking it easy on her and she still hadn't managed to escape until the very last round.

"What thoughts have you looking so pensive, little bird?" His fingers brushed a small curl from her cheek.

Her ponytail was in a state of disarray after all the movement.

"I'm terrible at this." Enid sighed, stretching her tired legs.

Dante shot her a look as he sat up and helped her stretch her sore limbs.

"You're a beginner. No one is perfect at anything right away." He smiled at her.

She sagged against him in relief as he began to message the tight knots in her shoulders.

"Well, I've got a great teacher, so I won't worry too much." Enid gave him an exhausted grin.

His lips curved into a satisfied, amatory smirk.

Enid returned to school two days later on a rather cold Wednesday.

The immortals had decided she needed some time away after last Thursday.

And with her Fridays free, the only school days she missed were Monday and Tuesday.

She could hardly believe it had been nearly a week since Thursday, time felt like it was both crawling and flying all at once.

Her days off had been quite busy, though.

Gun practice with Alexander and self-defense with Dante.

The time in between was spent with Alex in the music room, learning piano and practicing cello, or curling up in the library with one of their many books.

She hadn't seen much of Theodore apart from at dinner and in the evenings.

He had explained that a business-related issue had come up and was demanding much of his attention.

The expression on his face was enough to tell Enid she shouldn't question it further.

A curtain of mystery still surrounded these men that she was falling for.

But she trusted them.

Trusted them so deeply that she couldn't find it in herself to be worried.

However, Enid was quite worried about returning to classes.

It wasn't that she was behind on work, as the immortals had canceled their classes on Monday and Tuesday and retrieved the work she was missing from her other two.

It was the dark-haired girl she was walking toward that made her return feel so daunting.

Emilia was laying on their bench, headphones in her ears as she noiselessly sung along to whatever song was playing.

Enid approached her timidly, biting into the soft flesh of her lip.

She had received nearly a hundred texts from the girl over the past few days.

And she hadn't responded to a single one.

It wasn't that she had been trying to ignore her.

Enid had just shoved the entire situation into a box in the back of her mind and hadn't opened it since.

When Emilia's apologetic text messages had started flooding in, she had turned off her phone and shoved it into a drawer.

She felt terrible about it now, as she realized how she must have seemed angry to Emilia.