Reaching for the Stars

Chapter 04: German Homework

(Revised 03/08/2022)

This chapter contains cursing, lots of them.

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Max wasn't one to question his existence, but oftentimes, he felt insignificant. Compared to the rest of the universe, he was just a tiny, teeny lump of atoms who happened to be aware of himself and the small world around him. The thirst for knowledge was boundless, and even the tallest of the tallest was still unable to touch the heavenly dots on the night sky.

Do you remember that night
Upon the land of eternal snow?
It was a beautiful sight
Of people dancing in mellow
May we touch the sky
Lest we from heavens leave
Watching the burrows lie
On the land of fiery sheen

The dog closed the book he was reading. That was... interesting, sure, but that wouldn't help him finish his homework. The book wasn't about German grammar. Heck, it even had the English translation of the rhymes.

Wanting to continue working on his homework, Max pushed that book aside and stared at his German textbook instead. The questions looked simple, easy. He only had to do the four-part questions on this page.

Easy, his arse.

What was this declintation... declidation... thing? Why did they have so many words for 'the'? What was even the difference between 'zu' and 'nach' anyway?!

Defeated, Max leant back on the seat. Maybe it was his fault, though. The prof said that German and South Icelandic weren't very different. Still, not very different didn't mean the same, and merciful god was South Icelandic much easier than German.

He heard some noises and glanced up. There were some girls looking at him while shyly giggling to themselves. One of them waved at him, but he just smiled back. The girls giggled and went away.

He then saw Tom with a tray of books, putting them on the shelves with his tail lazily swaying in content as he did so. Max smiled as he watched the wolf. He really seemed to enjoy working here.

Sometimes, he thought Tom was cute. Tom was... unique. There was a small cut on the lower part of his left ear. That was interesting, but nothing overly surprising. Although his fur colouration wasn't that special at all—grey with a lighter grey on his face and inner arms, hand, and maybe chest, stomach, and legs—his eyes were. They were very light brown, almost red, and he'd be lying if he ever saw someone with that eye colour. His tail was also longer than other wolves he knew, too, and it looked downright fluffy.

Max smiled fondly. Tom seemed to have taken a liking to him, but only kept that to himself. Sure, he had people gawking at him before, even those who outright flirted with him in broad daylight, men and women, but the wolf didn't. He really appreciated that because while he wasn't against gays, they tended to flirt with him as if he were prey to be eaten. He also didn't want the details of what they said they wanted to do with him, thank you.

Somehow, he felt like he had seen Tom before, but when? Maybe just another grey wolf since there were lots of them. Yet, he felt like he had met him before somewhere.

Taking a deep breath to clear his mind, Max leant forward on the table. Wasn't the wolf's shift supposed to end soon? He glanced at the clock just above the wall of the entrance to the computer area; it was almost 17.20. It should've ended almost half an hour ago.

Letting out a sigh, his gaze went back to Tom. The wolf didn't seem to know that Max was sitting not that far from him, which allowed the dog to observe him more. Tom was one of the guys he appreciated for not glorifying him as "the football star". It had been almost two months, and the wolf looked at him as if he was just any other student. Well, he did catch him stealing a few glances here and there in the classes, but at least he didn't make any move to get 'closer'—as in 'get closer to the football captain so I can get more attention'-closer—to him.