LIFE was all about treasuring the small things. Like the tanned, glistening skin of Tyler as he seemed to glide across the gravel track, lean muscles flexing from exertion, the glorious sunlight reflecting off his dark hair. The way his dark basketball shorts swished against his thighs.
"Are you drooling?"
I jumped with a not-so feminine howl at the sudden voice in my ear, a body materializing from thin air to go with it. My hands clutching tightly to my book, wide eyes absorbed the new figure next to me, belonging of course to the epitome of all bad energy in the world.
"Demon! Be gone!"
Reese shot me a blank look. "Is that the best you got? I don't really feel that compelled to leave."
I rolled my eyes, shifting back into the warm spot I'd created on the metal bleacher. "Sorry, forgot to bring my holy water to school, I'll definitely be more vigilant next time."
In response to my palpable sarcasm came the inevitable megawatt grin, infuriatingly pearly.
"So is this how you spend your time now, not so inconspicuously stalking Tyler?"
It wasn't really stalking. When Savannah had meetings with her fashion committee after school sometimes it was just coincidentally scheduled the same time that the track team had practice. I was just generous enough to wait for her. It was all crazy coincidence, and I also really liked sitting on bleachers and catching up on my stories. There was nothing inherently wrong with that.
I pushed the book higher towards his face, emphasizing its presence with a frown. "Reading," I corrected. "Innocently getting some light reading while the weather's nice. Sue me."
His eyebrow cocked in question. "Reading upside down?"
We both looked to see that he wasn't exactly wrong, as the book might have been what some may deem 'upside down', if you were really so pathetically bound to space and time. But yeah, it was upside down.
"I like to challenge myself, unlike some people I could mention. It's all about progress, man. Evolution. I am above you in the totem pole of life."
Reese snorted, shaking his head as a genuine grin stretched across his face, those proverbial dimples carving into his cheeks. Involuntarily I found my face mirroring his, but as he turned to me and our eyes locked, I immediately wiped the grin off.
"Anyway," I cleared my throat, scrunching my nose. "What's your reason for this?"
The point appeared to be well received as he gave me a weird look. "You're pretty mean to someone who currently has your diary and your deepest, darkest secrets."
I challenged his stare, but felt my scalp prickle at the awful honesty in his words. "I thought you were all, I'm too good for blackmail," I reminded him, eyebrow quirked.
"I am, but that doesn't mean I don't know that you've had some sexy dreams about Ryan Gosling."
I gasped in absolute horror, mouth wide and gaping in disbelief that he actually allowed those words to touch the light of day. I thumped him on the shoulder with my book. "Asshole!"
"Are you saying it's not true?"
"I'm saying that if you mention anything else, I am going rip out your vocal chords and use them to tie your limbs to two separate cows and then throw a firecracker in between them."
He smirked at me. "Always keeping it cool, Sandavol."
I shot him a deadpan look. Silence flooded between us, only filled with the buzz of outside noise from the track team below.
With only a grey wool cardigan to shield me from the weather, the strong breeze cut through to the skin every once in a while, and I pulled the fabric tighter to my body. Reese was wearing that camouflage jacket again and it looked ridiculously warm from my end.
"Fine, I'll let you stay and explain your presence if you let me wear your jacket for the time being," I proposed, holding out an expecting hand. "I'm chilly."
Reese blinked at me, those bushy brows furrowed. "But then I'll be cold...?"
I rolled my eyes, pushing my hand forward, unrelenting.
"Anyways," he completely dismissed me, and I threw my hands up in annoyance, wondering why I even agreed to this entire thing in the first place. Oh right, not-blackmail blackmail. "Figured out the perfect phase two for Operation: Love Master."
"Indoors?"
"Indoors," Reese confirmed, emanating the utmost confidence in whatever stupidity he had conjured this time. "It's literally the safest activity ever, there is no possibility whatsoever that you could get hurt."
Instinctively at his words my fingers lifted to touch the blotchiness that still ravaged my neck. While it had calmed down significantly in the past few days, it wasn't totally gone, just a faded memory of the excruciating pain. My forehead, too, was beginning to heal, although my sense of dignity was a lost cause at that point.
When I fixed him with a skeptical look, he shot me a reassuring grin.
"Right, remember when I told Wyatt you were helping me with physics? Well Tyler was complaining how he needed help, and then Wyatt mentioned how you were tutoring me, and then Tyler asked if you could tutor him too!"
He grinned at me, open-mouthed and clearly expecting a standing ovation.
"But I'm not tutoring you?"
Reese huffed, clearly unimpressed that I did not deliver roses for his supposed genius. "That's not the point, the point is we can put you in like a super sexy, intellectual teacher light and Tyler will be all over you. Total boner."
I frowned at him. "I am literally none of those things."
"That's why we make you look like it. Fake it till you make it, sort of thing. Just say some smart things, we'll put some glasses on you, it'll be fine!" He tried to dismiss my suspicions with a wave of his hand, apparently unconcerned with all my very reasonable concerns.
"I don't even wear glasses," I pointed out.
"Do you think every porn star pretending to be a teacher actually wears glasses? Stella, it's all about the illusion," he explained, shifting closer to me and gesturing towards the distance very Hollywood.
I rolled my eyes and shifted away, taking a deep breath in attempt to process the ridiculousness of the idea. "Okay, also, I literally know nothing about physics?"
"Didn't you take physics last year?" he asked without skipping a beat.
I shot him a calculating look, put off by how this information seemed entirely natural to him, when we'd never even acknowledged each other until a couple of unfortunate weeks before.
"Yes," I answered slowly, "How do you know that?"
His mouth curved into a smile. "The whole Peter Rot-"
"We do not speak of the Peter Roth incident," I interrupted before he could say any more, fixing him with a hard stare. There were some things that were meant to stay in the past, if I had any control over them, anyway.
Reese eyed me up and snorted, but relented nonetheless. "Anyway, you did, so just break out whatever you remember, and I'm sure it'll be fine, no sweat. Or are you not smart enough?" That impish spark returned.
I scoffed, a dry laugh crawling up my throat as I felt the burn of offense clearly taken in the pit of my stomach. "I am smart! Just in different things. Whatever, my grades are pretty okay and I'll have you know that I could bake a soufflé that would kick your ass, Powers. So let's not go there. Or I might also punch you in the face."
Plus, I was wholly convinced that physics was not actually meant to make any rational sense, and that it was all just a cruel joke no one let me in on. Because physics smart, well, that I was not. Although I wasn't about to admit that to Reese. Satan had his ways of preying on our weaknesses.
Reese chuckled under his breath, throwing his hands up in innocence. "All right, all right, I'll take your word for it. Don't worry, I'll help you with the physics, that's the easy part."
My gaze borrowed his in genuine interest. "Are you actually good at physics?"
In that moment I realised how little I actually knew about Reese, not that I was making a mission to find out more, just an interesting thought. Other than the obvious face value, and the fact that he was Lucifer himself, I really didn't know much.
Reese nodded, absolutely not shocked by this shocking revelation. "Hmm, yeah. I mean, it comes pretty easy to me."
I blinked, pulling back and eyeing him distrustfully. "Shit, I was right, you are some kind of demon."
A smile broke out onto his face. "The hard part is making you look like a sexy teacher, so we should probably focus on that."
"Okay, so, offense has been taken."
"Stella," he sighed. "If this is going to work, we're going to have to be honest with each other." There were the beginnings of a betraying smirk on his lips.
"Reese," I mocked, "How would you feel of this still working when you no longer own a penis?"
There was a beat of silence as we collided defiant stares, and then finally Reese broke. "All right, point is, here's how it's gonna go. We're gonna put some glasses on you, make you teach Tyler, Wyatt and I physics, and then Tyler's gonna wanna bone you."
"Wyatt?" I echoed with knitted brows.
"Oh yeah, he wanted to come too. He doesn't like to be left out. Don't ask. We're all pretty sure that the glue he ate through kindergarten is finally getting to him."
I barked out a laugh, evoking the memory of the cheeky blond boy and finding myself up unable to suppress a smile. It came with a wave of relief, knowing that from what I'd gathered of Wyatt so far it seemed like an awkward silence was absolutely impossible in his presence, and that was the one thing I was dreading the most. Problem solved.
"All right, okay, get some glasses, say some stuff, easy enough, I suppose. Hopefully I don't make a complete asshole of myself," I hummed, staring off into the distance where Tyler was now gracefully stretching.
The boy seemed to feel my stare as Tyler looked up, that charming smile breaking out on his face as he waved over to me. Or to both Reese and I, but I was pretty sure it was mostly me. With a similar broad grin, I waved back.
Did it really count as stalking if he was that beautiful? I didn't think so, at least.
"Too late."
My jaw clenched as I thumped Reese with my book again, glaring at his stupid face. "That's not very supportive language, coach."
"I thought we were all about honesty here."
"Ugh, I hate you Powers."
I ignored Reese's laugh and glanced down at my watch, finding that it was about time for Savannah's fashion committee to be over with, and a sigh built behind my teeth. Although, as I shivered again, I was welcoming the warmth of home right now, not that anyone in the near vicinity (Reese) cared. Grabbing my dilapidated backpack that had been abandoned by my feet, I stuffed my book inside and threw it over my shoulder.
Just as I stood, I saw Tyler jogging towards us, and I felt a knot of anticipation form in my stomach.
"Hey Stella, so you're cool with me jumping in on your study sessions?" he asked, a breathless quality in his voice that, admittedly, winded me a little.
I looked to Reese who was grinning with the utmost reassurance at me. Inhaling deep, I plastered on a similar face.
"Uh, yeah! For sure! Can't wait!"
Tyler grinned back, and my knees threatened to buckle. "Awesome, thanks again!"
"No problem!"
Now I just had to learn physics.
***
ALL RIGHT PHEW NOW WE'RE FINALLY GETTING SOMEWHERE
I'm sorry I love writing chapters of strict banter between them and I promise that THINGS WILL HAPPEN NEXT CHAPTER I WILL PROVIDE JUST STICK AROUND.
Also how cute is the cover above? Thanks to solidarity_ for that one!
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