[AN: Sorry to anyone who's been reading as I go, forgot to post this yesterday! So far I'm thinking I'll be able to post a chapter a week.]
Kurt was sitting in the usual spot with Kitty and Piotr when he saw Kerri, the real Kerri now, and not the creepy little kid.
"Zhat's her. Going to sit by zhe window." Kitty and Piotr looked over.
"She's cute!" Kitty said looking back at Kurt. She noticed that he was looking at the new girl, a little too intently.
"I thought you said she was creepy." she said teasingly.
"She vas!" Kurt said defensively.
"Not so much now?"
"Vell, not creepy now."
Kitty smiled and poked him in the side, "Oh, first crush, Kurt?"
"Vat?! No!" Kurt's hologram reflected the blush that spread across his face.
# # #
The next day Kerri ate lunch in the lunch room, looking out the window, wondering what Professor Summers was going to say to her next period when he saw her for the first time.
It seemed that he had been giving her a hard time on purpose. Maybe because of that first encounter, but maybe because of the way she seemingly refused to pay attention in his math class.
She wasn't trying to be difficult, she just knew the material already and ended up not doing homework or drawing all over it before handing it in half finished, but then getting 100 on tests. She didn't know if he understood that she was bored because she understood it all already, but it was ok, it gave her time to read her normal about a novel a day.
Kurt was watching Kerri stare out the window lost in thought when Kitty almost poked her finger in his nose. "Ah! Was ist lost mit dir?!" he cried out having not noticed that she'd slowly been moving her finger closer for about five minuites now. {What is wrong with you}
Kitty just laughed at him and Piotr ate his lunch. Kurt rubbed his nose and was back in the conversation.
"So should we go to the mall again this Saturday?"
Kurt decided that he'd rather stay here than wander around looking at clothes. "Neine, I'm going to vork out in zhe gym zhis veekend."
"Oooo, for someone we know?" Kitty teased, "or to get yelled at by Logan?"
"Neizher, I'm just going to vork out." Kurt said and suddenly turned his head back to the table from looking at Kerri again as she looked toward him.
"I'm suprised she hasn't caught you yet. What did you say she did to you in the grass again?" Kitty continued to tease.
"I don't know vhat you're talking about." Kurt refused to answer.
"Wasn't it that she'd sat in your lap and threatened to stick her face in your, uh..." Kitty trailed off elbowing him.
"I'm going to class now." Kurt said standing up and bright red.
"Ok see you later." Kitty called in a sing song voice.
Kerri watched Kurt leave and pondered. She could still see that something was wrong with how he looked, a blurry out line or something.
But she remembered the way he'd looked when he'd taken the hologram down, her heart started to beat faster and she involuntarily blushed, just as she had when she'd seen him yesterday... but when she'd looked at him in person just a second ago, nothing.
Wierd. Was it the hologram?
# # #
In math after lunch Kerri sat, drawing all over her homework page.
"Ah-HM" Kerri looked up to see Professor Summers looking down at her with crossed arms. "So, Kerri, I presume this is the real you."
"Yes." she looked up at him blank faced.
"I'm disappointed that your attitude toward doing homework hasn't changed as well."
She continued to stare at him blank faced.
"You should be doing homework, not drawing. Please try to remember this in the future."
Kerri just looked at him until he walked away, looking agitated. 'Too bad I don't have a mp3 or ipod to drown out the dull.'
After classes that day she hid out in the library and went to the gym, as was going to more or less become her routine.
# # #
"Seriously, Kurt, she's going to get a hole in her head if you keep staring at her like that." Kitty told him after she had gotten his attention by once again almost poking him in the eye so slowly it had taken about five minutes to get her finger that close.
"I don't know vat you're talking about. I'm just eating lunch."
"Kurt, you've been sitting there, biting your fork for the last fifteen minutes."
"I have?" Kurt looked at his fork. Definatly chew marks in it.
Kitty took pity on her friend, "Kurt, you've been staring at her for, like, two weeks. Why don't you just ask her to come over here."
"No, she, uh, still looks shy..." Kurt defended.
"Are you sure you're not the one who's shy?"
"Why don't you go sit by her, then." Piotr put in one of his too logical and right to argue with points.
"Uh, vell, I guess I didn't zhink of zhat." Kurt admitted and looked down at his food trying and failing to hide the blush that came at the thought of sitting by her. Why should HE be able to sit by HER? He'd noticed a couple of other guys looking at her, better looking than him. Normal looking.
Piotr warned, "If you don't take the chance first, someone else will." and went back to quietly eating his lunch.
"Pfff..." Kurt tried to make an uncaring as if noise, but was nervous at this thought. Someone else could take that seat, and be there before him. He was just too nervous to go sit down. Ridiculous.
"Ow!" Kitty cried as Kurt inadvertently hit her with his thrashing tail, "Calm down Kurt, just go over there!"
"I'm sorry Kitty, I didn't mean to hit you," He apologized remorsefully.
"I know Kurt, just go over there and sit down so you're tail can stop being a deadly weapon at my leg!"
"I, I don't know...."
"This is ridiculous, Piotr, will you go sit by her and show him how easy it is, please?" Piotr got up with his lunch tray and walked over to Kerri.
"Watch this, Kurt." Kitty leaned to him and half whispered.
Kerri was aware someone was walking right at her. A large someone at that. She tried to avoid looking or staring.
"Is this seat taken?" came the voice.
She looked up at him, "No..."
"Can I sit here?"
"Ok....."
He sat down. Kerri had no idea what his name was, but he didn't try to have a conversation, just finished his lunch.
Kurt sat, enviously watching Piotr eat across from Kerri. She was staring at him, seeming to be half confused, half curious, but she was looking at him none the less, and Kurt found himself jealous.
He hadn't found her looking at him in at least a week.
Piotr stood as he finished and said good bye, walking away, with Kerri watching him walk away. She shrugged and turned back to her food after he left.
"See how easy that is?" Kitty nudged him, "you could do that."
But the plan backfired, Kurt found out the next day.
As he stopped by the usual table and tried to will himself to go on, giving himself a mental pep talk and Kitty tried to encourage him quietly, another boy walked past, straight to Kerri's table.
Kurt heard him ask; "Is this seat taken?" Saw her shake her head no, and sank down at the same time as the other boy, but at his usual table, in his usual seat, not by Kerri.
"Awww... Maybe tomorrow?" Kitty said hopefully.
But tomorrow was the same.
And the next day.
And for a week.
"I'm going to eat lunch in the gym." Kurt told Kitty and Piotr as they stepped out of the end of the line.
"I'm sorry Kurt... If I hadn't..."
"It's ok," He told her, "I just vant to get a little more vork out in."
Kitty could see the lie, but nodded as he walked out.
Kurt got to the gym, and ate some of his food before tossing his tray and going in. He opened the door, eyes downcast, and saw a lunch tray, not touched.
Weird, food wasn't allowed in the gym, and Logan only brought booze in here.
He looked up to see Logan sitting in his usual spot, smoke in mouth, weight in hand, bottle on floor.
"Who's food is zhat?"
"Hers." came the gruff reply as Logan nodded back toward another figure.
Hers? Kurt thought as he looked in the direction Logan had nodded. His jaw almost fell.
Kerri was on the beam, on her forearms, one leg in the air straight up, the other poking out kinda awkwardly trying to keep the balance.
She was not wearing baggy clothes or long pants like she normally did, either. She had on a pair of skin tight purple capris and a skin tight tank top that was also purple, although not the same color, and with some green on it too.
Kurt was having a hard time remembering to blink so his eyes didn't dry out.
"Hey, elf. What do you want?"
Kurt felt embarrassed as he realized that he'd probably been staring at her for more than a minute. "I, uh, I came here to vork out."
"Then get to it." Logan replayed and Kurt wondered for a moment if it was the cigars, cigarettes and booze that made his voice so gruff, after, all he'd been doing that since before Kurt had been born. Or thought of. Or his mom. Or- anyway. Kurt wasn't sure what to do; he wanted to impress Kerri, but he was more agility, not weights, and she wasn't looking anyway. He looked around and saw the vaulting horse. That should be pretty distracting, she might look at him then. He went over and started kinda just messing around.
Kerri looked up and saw Kurt playing around on the horse and she all but fell off, managing to land in a sit on the beam.
She was too distracted and nervous to try and stand on her hands again, it was taking all of her concentration before to be doing marginally ok, but now, with him here, just not happening. She wasn't sure what else she could do on the bar today, so she decided to go on the spring board, that one was fun.
Kurt looked up from the horse as he heard Kerri running across the room. She launched off from the spring board and flipped through the air. He could see that she wasn't amazing, but then, he had his whole childhood at the circus to compare it to, and that probably wasn't fair.
As she came down Kurt thought she might not stick it, but as she landed he knew.
Kerri bounced then rolled to try and cut down her momentum as she landed wrong. 'Thank goodness for padded floors,' she thought as she laid on her stomach for a second to not be dizzy.
Logan looked over in time to see Kurt rush to Kerri and kneel down.
"Are you ok?" He asked, turning her to face him. It was a moment of pleasant shock for him and frustration for her when they found eachother's faces.
"Vhat?" He asked uncertain in the wake of her seemingly annoyed gaze.
"I- it's just so weird...."
"Vhat, zhat you fell down? Did you forget about gravity?" Kurt asked with a half chuckle then immediately nervousness sat in as he worried about how she'd take it.
"No, you." She said quietly.
"Vas?"
"You look weird with that thing on."
He rocked back, away from her as she said it.
"Sorry, I just.... It's true..." Kerri was smacking herself around in her head; 'Why did I have to be so rude?! Oh well, he probably doesn't like me anyway... being an ass and all...'
After a moment Kurt quietly said, "I could take it off."
"And just what are you taking off, elf?" they both looked up startled to see Logan standing over them.
The bell rang for class, breaking the silence.
"I have to get to class, see you later!" Kerri said a little too cheerfully and loudly as she jumped up and all but ran out to the changing rooms.
"Uh, heh?" Kurt stood up, "I'd better get zu die klasse too, spater!" {I'd better get to class too, later}