Nerds Are Lovable

2: Nerds Are Smart

I didn't even know this school offered tutoring. The library is sprinkled with nerds with their heads stuffed into books or beady eyes looking at computer screens. There's a group of boys in the corner with headsets on trying their best not to yell at each other as they sweat onto their keyboards. There was some sort of book club going on in another corner, Pride and Prejudice in everyone's hands. Since when did we have so many nerds at this school?

Having so many in one room gives me the creeps. It's like an uprising.

I see a boy in the back of the library, books sprawled on the table. He was doing some homework, waiting for someone to show up, getting volunteer hours as he did so. I'm a little proud at him for cheating the system like that, there's a little bad in every nerd after all. I walk up to him, confident as ever as the jaws of the nerds around me drop. They must be surprised to see me here, after school nonetheless. I'm surprised myself, but I need a phone.

"Jayden Monroe," I start, bringing him out of his intense thinking.

He has his pencil in his mouth as he furrowed his eyebrows at a problem. His earbuds are in but my loud voice seems to reach him anyway. He looks up at me surprised, a little scared, but takes his earbuds out and waits for me to speak up.

"Long time," I smile, sitting down, "Let's settle things."

"I'm tutoring."

"Oh, who?" I look around the empty tables that surrounded us, "Casper the ghost?"

"Yeah, he didn't get a long education."

I smile only slightly at his joke, the corner of my mouth just barely inching upward. Where's the scaredy-cat I met in the hallway this morning? He wasn't stuttering, shaking, or sweating. I could tell that he was nervous still, his eyes weren't meeting mine unless by accident and he'd brought his hands down to his lap, squeezing them into white fists every once in a while.

"So, about my phone," I lean forward, my weight on my forearms.

"I can't talk unless I'm tutoring you."

Umm.

Ah, so not really cheating the system. I smirk at the realization that he's truly a good nerd, studious and all. He didn't look like he was going to budge, so I whipped out my Algebra book and set it on the table. Taking out a piece of paper and a pencil, I look back to Jayden.

I decide to sit opposite him, not really knowing how this whole tutoring thing works. I'm not particularly what you would call studious. He nods, standing up and walking around to my side of the table. He sits down again, beside me this time, and pulls the book over to him. He looks at the problems in front of him, to me, and then back to the problems.

"Nice doodles."

"I get bored, math's not really my thing," I'm honest.

"R2-D2?" He points to the one at the bottom corner.

"You inspired me, your shirt, I mean."

He looks down to his shirt, seemingly forgetting what he was wearing. I, however, still had it memorized from this morning. My dad was a big fan of Star Wars. I won't admit it to anyone, but I am too. Seeing Jayden's shirt made me reminisce all the movie marathons we used to do when I was younger, the three of us.

Without another word on the subject he turns to the piece of paper and starts writing something down. Behind his glasses I can see a light pink tinge on his cheeks. Sliding over the paper he was writing on, he hands me the pencil he'd been using. Realizing I had my own already, he pulls away.