"He made a new friend," muttered Caspian.
His phone had Fenton and Zenfred's image on it. Caspian stared at the dog, and he felt a sudden pang in his heart. He missed his own dog, Betty, whom he had to give up when he moved to a chosen city.
He enlarged the picture. The dog was wearing a red vest, but Caspian couldn't make out what it said. Having nothing better to do, he exited the picture and opened up Lacey's profile. There were a few pictures of Zenfred going back a few years.
A support animal? Caspian wondered what kind of disability Lacey had. Without the ability to stop himself, he had fallen down the rabbit hole. Looking deep into Lacey's past as well as into Albert and Rafi... Especially Albert. Who was he and why was he living with Fenton?
Caspian suddenly sat up from his reclined position on the couch. This wasn't good. He had promised himself that he'd ignore Fenton's existence, but only a day had passed before he was obsessed with finding out every little detail.
He couldn't put it off any longer. Caspian clicked "follow" on Fenton's page and closed True. The phone was tossed off to the side so he could drag his hands across his face. What was he doing with his life?
The rest of his evening was spent putting together a plan. If he was going to be Fenton's babysitter, he needed to be mentally prepared for it. He had to know his opponent. Get inside his head, and understand how he approached life.
During his morning day class, he was pleased to discover that Fenton had remembered to check in on his attendance. He was sitting in the same seat as last time. Caspian checked his hand. His otter was chilling on the back of it, ticking nervously, but much calmer than last time.
"I've been reading the class forums, and there were some excellent discussions in them," said Caspian as he addressed the class. "We're going to go over the best examples today and look at the solutions you've come up with. Before that, we're going to look at a real-life program that the city uses to plan their tram schedules."
All of the students received a video on their tablets. It was a mock-up of the city. The buildings were in boxes, the streets were lines, and there were little dots moving all around them.
"The city knows your work and school schedules," continued Caspian. "Each of these dots represents you going on your ideal day to day schedule. Every month, the city looks at this data and changes the tram schedule to fit your needs. We cannot always predict what the public needs, but we must be willing to adapt our products to fit them."
He continued on with his class. The awkwardness of the first day had been broken. No one brought up his partner or asked any personal questions. Finally, he was in his comfort zone. Where he could work smoothly and efficiently without unpredictable variables.
"And that concludes class for this week. Be sure to check in with the forums on Friday to see if there are any changes to next week's lesson plans."
Caspian's eyes followed his students for a moment as they began to get out of their seats. He quickly began to tap at his tablet. As soon as his message was sent, he sat down at his desk.
A beeping resonated from Fenton's bag. He dug around inside until he found his tablet, then checked to see what the notification was. It had popped up on his lock screen.
"Lunch in my office?"
Caspian kept glancing between his mark and his tablet. He was terrified that another student might catch on if they saw him even sneak a peek at Fenton right now. The otter was now spinning around his wrist in a pink blur.
His tablet beeped. "Alright," was all it said.
The hint of a smile hit Caspian's lips. His office was the wisest choice for their first conversation. Private, yet open. He had three aides that were in and out at different times of the day. It was intimate, but not so much that it could be considered a date.
Caspian put some time aside to clean up and order food. Most of his time was spent idling next to a printer. The university encouraged going paperless, but he loved the impact that physical documentation had.
Just as the last page fell out of the printer, someone knocked at the door. "Moment!" Caspian began to frantically look about the room.
Did it look okay? Wait, why was he freaking out? He was a professor. All he was doing was calling in a student in order to talk to them about an issue. Professors do this all the time.
You know... Hooking up with students.
Which was exactly the opposite of what he was planning to do, he told himself. He hastily lit a sage scented candle. "Enter!"
Time seemed to slow as Fenton opened the door. He looked around. Caspian's desk was in the corner. There was a larger table that had four chairs next to it and a large paper bag on top. The door closed behind him, but he didn't feel certain where he should stand or sit.
"My aides are out at the moment. We can use their table," said Caspian. "I forgot to ask you what you wanted to eat or how much time you had, so I went ahead and ordered two meals from Zeppeli's. Do you want the pasta primavera or the squash and broccoli lasagna?"
Fenton stepped in and stood next to a chair. Caspian hadn't made a move to sit, so he was remaining hesitant. "The lasagna."
Due to the unhealthy amount of internet sleuthing that Caspian had done, he knew that Fenton loved the food from Zeppeli's, but hadn't eaten there in a month. It was a perfect and logical choice. Caspian held out his hand, gesturing to a chair.
"Have a seat. I need to finish putting together a portfolio. It'll only take a minute."
Fenton gave a small nod and slid his bag off his shoulder. He sat down and looked about the room. There was a steering wheel and a wooden anchor hanging from the wall, and art was all nautical themed. What any of that meant, he had no idea.
Caspian picked up the papers from the printer and quickly punched holes in them so he could stuff them in a binder. He then went to the minifridge, where a white wine was chilling along with two glasses. The glasses were set on the table, and he poured each of them a glass.
"I'm not old enough to drink," muttered Fenton as he held up a hand.
"None of us are. Alcohol is banned in the city," replied Caspian. He then held up the bottle so Fenton could see the label. "It's non-alcoholic."
That made Fenton feel a little better. He watched as Caspian pulled out the take-out boxes from the paper bag, along with some wooden utensils. "I'm... I'm sorry. I should've contacted you first about our marks. It couldn't have been easy for you to know it was me, since it was in the middle of class..."
"You didn't submit a paragraph to be graded, nor have you commented on the forums yet," said Caspian as he sat down. He took a paper napkin and spread it on his lap.
Fenton's mouth opened and closed a few times as he struggled to say something. "I, uh... I had an issue come up. It won't happen again. I promise that I won't expect any special treatment."
It wasn't exactly his fault. First, there was his mark awakening with Caspian, then Lacey showed up and derailed his life. This was only Wednesday. His week was going terribly so far, but being able to talk to Caspian now... He was both ecstatic and on the verge of having a panic attack.
Caspian watched Fenton squirm in his seat. "I don't believe that these marks have anything to do with finding true love," he finally said.
Fenton was clearly confused by the statement.
Caspian's eyes fell to his wine glass, where the bubbles were slowly fizzing up and popping. "I think that they're an excuse that people use to make themselves feel happy. There is a person out there who is forever tied to me and I must love them unconditionally.
But... There are so many definitions of love and they all feel different. At the same time, I also have a mark." He unbuttoned his shirt and pulled it open, showing off the otter that had settled on his collarbone. "So I have no choice but to put my faith in you, Fenton."
Once again, Fenton didn't say anything. He had become fixated on the otter, which was now cleaning itself. Pink... It was pink. Marks were supposed to be the same color, why had Caspian's stayed pink?
His silence had Caspian worrying that Fenton was still not getting it. "I put my faith in you, Fenton," he repeated. "No matter what happens to me in life, I know that I can trust you. Not necessarily as a romantic partner at this time, but as a friend who I want to understand a little better. My hope is that you'll put the same trust in me and my decisions."
Fenton once again struggled to put his thoughts together. "Yeah... Uhm, yes. Sure. I trust you, Professor Song."
"Thank you," replied Caspian. He used his spoon to help spin a bit of pasta on his fork. After taking a bite, he began to mutter around the food. "And that's why I need you to drop out of engineering."