Rites of Passage | Damian x OC

31. Fair Games

Chapter 31: Fair Games

"I don't get it."

Jess's brows furrowed together as she stared at the graph notebook before her, eyes running over the math problem written in Damian's neat handwriting. The end of her pen made its way to her mouth, and then she was chewing on it in thought.

"What do you not understand?"

"Why is the first part of the sum '1'?"

"It tells you that 'k equals 0' here," he told her, pointing to the problem with his own pen. "Plug in '0' in this part of the equation, and...?"

Emerald greens watched her carefully; he could almost see the calculations in her head while she trained her concentrated gaze on the problem.

"Ohhh," Jess then said with understanding. "It's '1.'"

Quirking a brow, Damian prompted, "What would you plug in next?"

"Um, '2'?"

"And you'd get...?"

Silence, then a tentative "One-third?"

He nodded his head once. "Correct. Do that up until '5,' and you'll finish the sum."

A few minutes passed as he sat back in his chair and watched his friend scribble away at the page. They'd been doing this — getting together so he could assist her with her homework — for the first two weeks of school now. Here and there, they'd spent time in her dorm or at a coffee shop, but it seemed Jess was more comfortable being at the manor. Damian was not complaining though... certainly not. She wasn't difficult to "tutor" so to speak, although the girl did get frustrated easily, particularly when it came to precalculus and intro to physics. Luckily, those subjects were rudimentary to him, and while their time spent together might have been focused on her academic work, it was quality time nonetheless. As long as she was exercising patience, so was he.

"Okay, how about that?"

Next to him, Jess straightened up and moved the notebook towards him. One glance, and Damian was giving her a slight look of approval.

"Perfect."

"Finally," she sighed, dropping her pen on his desk and sitting back against the back of the chair. She stretched her arms upward while adding, "Just four more of these and I'm done."

"Are you staying for dinner?"

Jess lowered her arms and glanced at him, hazel irises bright. "I can if you want me to," she replied with a grin. "I mean, not like I have anywhere else to be, ya know?"

She'd been smiling more. That was a pleasant change he'd most definitely noticed, though it didn't outweigh other small things Damian had been paying attention to. At the moment, his friend was bouncing her knee under the desk, something he hadn't quite seen her do until recently. She spun that ring on her finger more frequently, even when she didn't seem to be anxious or nervous — when Damian had realized that, he knew there was something more to how she was feeling and what she appeared to let on.

Of course, it was clear Jess was in a better mood nowadays, adjusting to and becoming comfortable at Gotham Academy, her new home; she was typically excited to spend time with him or Misty (sometimes managing to get all three of them to do something together) and further explore her new, freer life.

Yet that didn't mean she was not still suffering from something such as withdrawals.

Damian had kept quiet so far, observing from his place and waiting to see if she would speak on it. Now, as he watched her cover her mouth as she yawned and moved her head side to side in order to stretch her neck, he knew she was still having trouble sleeping and that her body was exhibiting signs of stress through these new behaviors.