“And then, he said he wouldn't have been able to do it without me. And he thanked me! Can you believe that, SpongeBob?” I echoed, voice washed in excitement.
“Yeah, I'm pretty sure I believed it the last fifty times you told me,” he quipped, lips upturned in a sly grin.
Of course, that earned him a playful shove, leaving him chuckling, with me echoing the sound.
“You know, this is the part where you say something like: ‘oh my god, Hawk, you're so smart. Your advice is unmatched, and your wisdom cannot be compared.’” He even added an exaggerated girly voice for effect, and I couldn't help but betray a smile at his antics.
After a few moments of walking in comfortable silence through the hallway, my voice broke through in a small: “thank you, SpongeBob.”
He threw me a smile in return, a mischievous glint in his eyes as his lips parted, probably in an attempt to make a playful remark. But whatever he had intended to say, never got out, as his attention was suddenly drawn to something else.
Or was it someone else?
I followed his line of sight, and sure enough, Ria Rolland was walking towards us alongside a girl from her study group. The both of them were laughing over something, with Ria, trying to balance the small pile of books in her hands.
They seemed like library books to me, so I figured she must have made an early visit to the library before the start of class.
I had to give it to her though. She came to school early just to visit the library? If only I could develop such love for studying.
Ok, who was I kidding? The only time I studied was during test and exam periods — and I wouldn't have it any other way.
I turned to Hawk, to find him with this half-dreamy, half-nervous look he had going on for him.
I snapped my fingers in front of his face, startling him and leaving me to chuckle at his expression. “Snap out of it, Romeo; you're drooling already.”
“What?" His hands immediately moved to feel around the corners of his mouth. But when he couldn't feel anything, he turned to face me, only to find me struggling to hold back a laugh. “There was no drool, was there?”
“Nope. But it was nice to see you nearly tear off your lips trying to find it,” I quipped.
“You,” he started, smiling lightly. But that was how far he got as he caught sight of Ria who was nearing us by now.
“She's heading over here now. What should I do, Brooke? What should I do?” He cried exaggeratedly.
“Well, for starters, no more asking ‘what should I do?’”
“Noted,” he said between titters.
“And just act cool,” I suggested.
“How?”
That was a good question. How did one act cool? People always talked about acting cool, but never really talked about how to actually do it.
To Hawk though, I gave an oh-so-casual shrug. “I guess, just don't do anything you normally would.”
“Well, ouch!”
I could only chortle in reply, but the sound of Ria's voice was soon to cut it short.
“Hey, Brooke.”
She maintained her signature tight-lipped smile as she turned to Hawk, saying a small: “hi.”
I doubted Hawk heard her, because he looked like he was in a trance.
This love thing sure had some major side effects.
“H-hey,” he finally managed to say, before going back to his trance-like state.
Knowing he wouldn't be getting any other words out anytime soon, I stepped up. “Ria, ‘sup?"
"I'm fine, thank you. And you?”
Wow! I was stunned — I didn't even realize people still said that. But trust Ria to still remember the rules of courtesy.
I, however, simply threw her a small smile in return, saying, “I'm good.”
She nodded, and giving us another dose of her tight-lipped smiles, she was heading off.
“She just said hi to me,” Hawk mused as soon as she was a good distance away from us — quite loudly if I might add. No kidding, he almost shut off my auditory system.
“Yeah, SpongeBob, I was here,” I sallied.
“Meanie," he retorted lightly, leaving us chortling.
With the decline of the throaty sounds, however, my voice sliced through. “Anyway, what's your game plan?”
“My what?” He echoed, his puzzlement clear.
“Your game plan,” I repeated. “I mean, we're making some progress with Jason, so we should also start trying to do the same with Ria.”
His mouth rounded in an “oh” at that. “So,” he started, face slightly sheepish. “Let's just say I may or may not have one.”
“Really?”
Seeing how he nodded, I let out a dramatic sigh. “Hawk, you know you can't just walk up to her and be like…”
I stopped then, clearing my throat softly before continuing with my best male voice impression. “Hey, Ria, so you know I'm popular now and stuff, 'cause c'mon, you even know my name. So, how about we date now?”
By the time I was done, he was already laughing to himself. Although, he was soon to add, “hey, that's not how I sound! You didn't capture my bass.”
“I didn't need to. There's no bass in your voice to capture,” I quipped between chuckles. And despite himself, he soon joined in — after throwing me a playful glare that is.
“But seriously, Hawk, you know you're going to have to do a lot more than being popular to get Ria to date you.”
“You think?” He questioned, suddenly turning thoughtful.
“Of course!” A mischievous grin found its way to my face as I added, “and maybe you could start by trying to make a coherent word when she's around.”
“That's not true. I make coherent words when she's around,” he said, doing that ‘chuckling through every word’ thing which only he could do so well.
But in the face of my cocked brow, he caved in. “Fine,” he sighed. “I try to make coherent words.”
And that left us laughing.
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“Love is beautiful.”
Oh here it goes.
It was like the universe just wanted to shove it in my face that I didn't know shit about love. First, it used Jason, and now it was an overly enthused Miss Green.
“However, in this assignment, I'd stand to put that reasoning to question.” She paused then, sweeping her hazel eyes through the class, with a content smile remaining on her face when she saw she'd fully captured our attention.
“Is love really beautiful?”
My eyes caught Jason's just then, and he threw me a small smile which I was quick to mirror. I didn't know about love, but Jason sure had a beautiful smile.
“Love in all its shades — dark, beautiful, happy, sad, heart searing and so many more. You take your pick. It's up to you to choose a perspective in which you'd capture the notion of love in relation to your assigned text.”
“That's easy,” Beck whispered from beside me, looking pretty pleased with herself as she added, “love is death.”
Ok, maybe Beck needed Hawk's help more than I did.
“Miss Green would probably have a heart attack if she heard that,” I whispered back, making us chuckle.
Although, it wasn't exactly a lie. Miss Green lit up like a Christmas tree whenever she spoke of love in class — which was basically every time. Even in the most depressing books, she still found a way to bring out the theme of love.
It was pretty safe to say she was a hopeless romantic. But with her bubbly personality and kind nature, it was easy to overlook her semi obsession with love.
“Feel free to go crazy with your ideas. I want to feel what you feel on your assignment pages.” She spoke with so much passion, I was beginning to think she wasn't referring to boring assignment pages anymore.
But that was just Miss Green for you. I doubted there was any other teacher in our school who loved their job more than she did — and it was clear in every Literature class of hers. Because she enjoyed what she taught, she made it easy for us to also do the same. And that was precisely why she was my favorite teacher.
Now, I could only watch as she spoke about the assignment with such great enthusiasm. She almost even made me feel excited for the assignment as well — keyword being ‘almost.’
“And I'd like you to work closely with your assignment partners on this one; rubbing minds together can be a great way of generating fresh ideas and perspectives. And you never know, you might just fall in love with your partner while working on this topic.”
She added a playful wink at the last part, while the rest of the class just erupted into “oohs” and chuckles, with Tom Holden saying if that was the case, he'd like Miss Green to be his partner.
She, however, simply laughed at Tom's playful antics. She started reading off the names soon after.
“...Sunny Rogers and Kent Thompson.”
Sunny and Kent did a little fist bump, obviously pleased with their pairing. Lucky them.
I wished I could also get paired with one of my friends.
“...Shay Callahan and Dan Hugh.”
"Oooh, Shay got your boo," I mouthed to Beck, who shot me a mock glare in reply, leaving me chortling softly.
“...Beckham Lee and Ray Flinch.”
Beck threw me a smug grin. And to be honest, I would have the same look if I were in her place. Ray Finch was like the smartest kid at our school — well besides Ria. He always strived for perfection in his school work, never wanting to leave any room for mistakes.
Thus, resulting in him always offering to take most of the work in any team project. And by most of the work, I meant about 90% of the work.
Now though, I was snapped out of my thoughts by the sound of Miss Green's voice.
“...Hawk Moose and Brooke Allen.”
I shared a small wink with Hawk, but shot a playful glare at Kent who was making heart shapes from beside him. But trust Kent to just chuckle.
When I looked back at Miss Green, however, I was surprised to find her smiling knowingly at me. And that was when it hit me.
Oh, sweet Miss Green.
She obviously knew that I was now ‘dating’ Hawk. And being the sweet person she was, had paired us together on purpose, probably thinking she was doing the ‘lovebirds’ a favor.
If only she knew.
But to her, I simply smiled back. It was impossible not to — her smiles were infectious.
“...Ria Rolland and Jack Newman.”
My eyes fell on Ria at the mention of her name, and I could have sworn she betrayed a tiny scowl when she turned to stare at Jack. But when she caught Miss Green's encouraging smile, she was quick to return it with a smile of her own.
Well, well, it seemed someone wasn't too pleased with their partner. Not like I blamed her though. Jack was the worst partner anyone could ever ask for — at least that's what everyone said. Shay got him as a partner last year, and needless to say, he nearly drove her nuts with how unserious he could be.
But I guessed Miss Green must have reasoned that being partners with Ria would be of help to him. Still, I was pretty sure Ria would kill to have another partner instead.
Wait a second…
My brain suddenly lit up with an idea. And as I thought of how to execute it, I felt my lips give way to a small grin.
Oh well, this was going to be fun.