Mixtapes & Polaroids | Sam x Deena

15

Sam comes over every day.

They make a deal to work on the report, at least until the game on Saturday, which Deena is still kind of obligated to attend since she's in band and so Sam heads to Deena's the moment she finishes scraping benches with Kate, who has incidentally become her ride. Kate still hates how oblivious they both are, sometimes she wonders about pushing Sam out of a moving car and possibly hitting her head hard enough to see that nobody is that excited to work on a paper, let alone for the terrorizing class of Mrs. Burnhill but Sam was adamant.

"I just like to get things done." She says to Kate, one day as they're driving to Deena's.

"I'm too tired to deal with how stupid you are right now." Kate grumbles, and Sam tells herself she doesn't understand even when she does. Denial was just easier, it was safer for Sam so she stuck to it.

And Deena is trying really hard not to hope, because Sam keeps calling her a friend but looking at her like she put the stars in the sky and Deena doesn't really know what to think. She doesn't think at all, not when Sam holds her hand or lays her head onto her lap while they read through the book, which Sam was so adamant about picking because it 'seemed interesting' and even when Deena thought it might just be the longest, and most boring one on the list, she doesn't mind.

Not when Sam literally shows up the next day with two copies fresh from the bookstore and the brightest smile on her face, Deena kind of forgets her displeasure for the book when Sam was so happy to read it with her. Sam even bought new notebooks for them to match, and she made sure to doodle Deena's name on the very first page in big, bubbly letters. Y'know, just for the sake of it. Totally not because even writing Deena's name gave her butterflies. She even put little hearts around it, but Sam made sure she didn't use red markers.

Because red meant love and she didn't love Deena.

She totally didn't.

And Deena hates yellow, or anything bright really but when she flips the notebook open and sees the masterpiece Sam made in the middle of history class, Deena thinks she might have just changed her mind. She even adores the very badly drawn butterfly at the corner of the page, that really looks more like a worm that bled out a puddle, but she tells Sam it's so good she might just frame it and Sam doesn't believe her, but her heart flips anyways.

"Are you done yet?" Sam groans, poking at Deena's arm as they're sat on the couch on a Friday afternoon. Deena was still trying to get through a few pages, but Sam had gotten bored after about half an hour of reading so she was hell bent on making Deena pay attention to her.

"We've literally only been doing this for like... forty minutes." Deena sighs, looking at the clock on the wall before turning to Sam with an amused look.

"Yeah but... we have another week to finish reading it and an extra one for writing. We don't need to do it today." Sam argues, looking at Deena with her baby blue eyes and Deena is already lost, because how could she ever win when Sam does that?

"Do I need to remind you that you picked this book, but you're already bored and we're not even halfway through." Deena chuckles, effectively shutting the book and setting it down on the coffee table.

"I like it! A Tale of Two Cities is basically legendary, i'm just saying... since I have to be home in an hour that we can do something else instead of read." Sam hums, slumping back into her seat as Deena adjusts to fully face her.

"And what did you have in mind?" Deena asks, and Sam completely lights up. She's got an idea in her head, and Deena is starting to sweat because the smile Sam has on screams nothing but trouble.

And she's right.

"This is never going to work." Deena grumbles as Sam reads out the instructions on the side of the instant cake mix box, she's got a mischievous glint in her eyes while Deena was in distress, trying to whisk in butter she was sure was not enough.