Leave it Unread

Chapter 10

When I walk back to class, everyone is settled in their seat waiting for Professor Michaelson to come in. It's about ten until class starts and my phone buzzes with what I presume to be a response from Ben to "Kathleen." 

I make my way to my seat, avoiding Ben's gaze as I open my laptop. It's an old one, passed down to me from my father after years of PhD work that he went through on it. It is, quite literally, a dinosaur. 

"Hey, Noelle, your dad teaches my microbiology class!" 

I look up to see Annalise, one of the few fiction writers in the class leaning over her seat to look over at me. With kind eyes, she gets up and comes to sit in the empty seat next to me. "He asked us what our majors were in class, and when I said English, your father went into a five minute rant about how English majors need to be taken more seriously. Inspired by his daughter, he said, so I put two and two together." 

"Yeah," my laugh comes out nervously as Annalise chuckles to herself. "He's kind of a dork." I think of my dad telling off Kathleen's mother when we were sophomore's in high school when she insisted that I take some business classes instead of burying my head in creative writing. She had stopped by with Kathleen for our neighborhood take-and-bake that my father hosted that year, which only left us with a headache from the lecture of "make money, honey" that Kathleen's mother was known for. She is a CEO of a major fashion company based in Belgium after all.

"He seemed really proud, so I just wanted to tell you." Annalise twists her braids in her hand before getting up. She hesitates before turning around and tapping her fingers on my desk. "We should hang sometime. I'm from Georgia, so I kind of have no one here. You down?"

I smile widely, for once feeling like there are no strings attached with someone. That no personal gain is seeked as I nod furiously. "Yes, yeah, please. Message me your number?" She smiles back and nods before heading back to her seat. She's wearing a jean dress over a long-sleeved pink shirt, her Doc Martens speaking for themselves as she nudges Cade on her way to the front of the class.

"Noelle," I hear Ben whisper, but before I can roll my eyes, Professor Michaelson walks through the door. He's smiling eye to eye as he sets his bag on his desk, clasping his hands as he looks at each of us.

"Alright, let's get into our peer-review groups. Please take 30 out of the 50 minutes we have in this class to come up with a list of no less than ten rules you will have for each other for the course of the semester. These rules are to keep each other accountable over the course of the semester so no student is left without feedback." He walks over to Kelly (the one who swooned over Ben's poetic remark on orientation day) and grasps the phone out of her hands, dangling it before placing it face down on her desk. "Leave your phones in your bags and go enjoy the nice weather. Be back at noon so we can discuss your first major assignment." 

I watch everyone excitedly get up as I feel frozen in my seat, closing my laptop slowly as I feel Ben tower over me. "Come on." He whispers, his notebook in his hand with a blue pen clasped to the front of it. I dig in my bag for my class notebook and grab a neon green pen before I walk towards the door, Ben following directly behind me.

"Listen, what I said was in the heat of the moment," he begins, trailing behind me as I walk somewhere, anywhere, preferably with people so I'm not tempted to murder him. "I was wrong, Noelle." He does the thing, the grabbing of my elbow so softly to turn me to face him. We hadn't even made it out of the building before he's grasping it like an anchor. My eyes shift from his to where he's holding me, like a promise of surrender we both know won't be met.

And here I feel small again, like the one constantly behind everyone else except this time, I'm front and center and still so invisible. If anything, I want Ben to be like Ethan from The Unhoneymooners, groveling in a Hawaiin button-up as he tells Olive he was so wrong--so brutally wrong.

The thing is, I could completely forgive Ben in this moment. I can tell him that he's an asshole and laugh off his dramatic shift from nice guy to Phi Gamma Jerk. But I want to win for once--I want to be the one feared, the one that doesn't trail behind but gets followed.

"Let's just do our assignment and get it over with, okay? We don't have a lot of time." I mutter, heading out the doors whether Ben follows or not.

***

We're sitting at a random outdoor table as Ben taps his pen on his notebook. Five minutes have passed as I write down random rules I have for Ben.

1. Don't be an asshole. Just fucking give me my feedback and fuck off.

Okay, so the first one was scratched out completely. I write down a few rules, like providing feedback on drafts no later than 48 hours after receiving it. To always let your peer-review partner know if you are unable to provide feedback and to seek out another classmate to see if they're willing to take their place. Before I can write the third one, Ben clears his throat.

"Aren't we supposed to be doing this together?" I look up and he seems surprised that I'm willing to meet his gaze. It's curious, amused, yet sort of tortured.

"I'll write down my expectations, you write down yours, and we'll compare." My tone is a bit snippy, which causes Ben to take a deep breath before he leans closer, his head in between his hands.

"Barrymore-"

"Don't." I hiss, glaring at him as he smirks and licks his bottom lip before taking my pen from my hands and holding it above my head. "How old are you," I spit, reaching for it only for him to inch it higher. "Grow up, Ben."

"I will when you talk to me like we talked two days ago."

"I don't know you, you don't know me." I watch his eyes darken as the smirk slightly falters, only for it to take its rightful position back. 

"I'm Brees, you're Barrymore. We got in a tiff and we're best buds again." I roll my eyes at how effortless it feels, like we've been friends for life, how Kathleen and I have been, and moments of pain can be settled with a brushing off of subjecting me to an automatically inferior position.

"One, we're not best buds. We're classmates." I remember Kathleen asking me if I had felt anything for Ben, which I quickly rejected. He's nothing more than a classmate. 

"And wow," I whisper, mirroring his smirk to hit him where it hurts. "You and Kathleen really are one in the same." 

I catch him off guard and grab my pen from his hands, avoiding the look on his face as I get back to writing.

"I have no idea what that even means, I barely know her." He spits out. "Come on, Noelle, you really want to act like you hate me? You do know we're partners all semester."

I look up and smile at him sweetly, the same kind of smile Kathleen gives when she's getting her way in the Chipotle line. "Extra guac, please?"  And they'll give it for free.

"Consider me as some football player on the most hated team by Iowa. We'll work together, yeah, but once the game is over, we go our separate ways."

His eyes move from bright blue, the sun showing the little golden flecks as if to say here, world, grasp this piece of rare beauty, to a dark navy again. 

"Fine. You want to play this like a game?" He uncaps his pen and makes a numbered list on the page in front of him. "You don't know what the hell you just got yourself into, Simmons." 

He leans back and starts writing as I consider all the ways I monumentally fucked up Ben and I's short-lived friendship. I could lie and say I did this fully for the reason of him shaming me when he saw me with Adam, or acting like a complete ass when he saw Kathleen, completely disregarding how we were "best buds." But overall, I do it for Kathleen. It's always for Kathleen.

He's just a classmate.

***

AN:

Hey y'all! I really hope you're enjoying the story so far! I know this is a super short chapter, but it's simply because I wanted the big bang (Ben's POV) to take over the next chapter. This bit of context felt necessary to be in its own chapter. Please vote, comment, share the story if you can! I promise Ben's POV will be uploaded soon! And let me know if you want to hear more of his side!