REMEMBER THE NIGHTS | newt

six - stargazing

wc ; 1,480

School was starting to get on your nerves. The economics test you and the others had studied for last week was done and over with, which you were extremely thankful for, but your teachers had already started grilling everyone about midterms, which led to more pressure and more homework than you think you've ever seen.

On top of that, college admissions had opened up, and you were still unsure of where you wanted to go. There were good schools in the city, and for a while you had planned to go there with your friends, but now that you didn't live in the city anymore, you weren't sure. No matter where you went, you'd have to pay for a dorm room or an apartment, and that just meant saving more money than you thought.

Today, however, you were focusing on the subject you struggled the most with: chemistry. But you weren't doing it alone. Newt should be showing up any minute now, wielding his immaculate understanding of the science to help you with the ten homework questions you were doing. Normally, they would've been done during class or over the phone, but tonight's homework was too much for you to deal with unless Newt was here to show you.

Dinner had already been eaten and cleaned up, Thomas and Chuck retreating to the living room to play video games until the younger of the two would be forced to get ready for bed. You watched them intently as they powered through the levels, clearly used to taking out zombies on level fourteen.

When the doorbell rang, you all but jumped out of your seat. Thomas laughed, eyes glued to the tv as you invited Newt inside. His backpack was slung over one shoulder as he smiled at you, stepping inside the familiar home. He greeted Maggie and your dad happily before saying hello to Thomas and Chuck, who simply mumbled absent greetings back at him.

He followed you upstairs and into your room, where you kept the door open, a rule set by your dad when he heard about tonight. Like anything was even going to happen between you two.

"I don't get how you don't understand chemistry," Newt said, taking a seat on your bed.

You scoffed, dropping next to him and grabbing your textbook. "Says the guy who was named after Isaac Newton."

"One, remind me to smack Gally the next time I see him for telling you that," Newt said, rolling his eyes. "And two, Isaac Newton was a famous mathematician, not a chemist. You're thinking of Marie Curie."

"Oh, like that makes such a big difference," you dismissed, grabbing your pencils. "You're still named after a freaking genius."

Newt laughed, shaking his head before diving into the material. Half an hour passed with Newt explaining the material, but none of the information seemed to be processing. You'd only done three questions, and you were twice as frustrated as you were when you started.

"How do skeletal formulas even work? I don't get it." You groaned. "Just write out the damn formula, give me a copy of the periodic table, and let me figure it out from there."

Again, the boy in front of you laughed. "It doesn't quite work like that, Y/n." He said, writing something out onto his paper and showing it to you. "Writing out skeletal formulas is just taking an outstretched version of a full molecule and reducing it down to functional groups and carbon."

He began writing something on his paper, underlining the word '2-butanol' before getting to work, explaining as he went. "So, you see how I wrote out all the atoms, connected to one another? C is carbon, H is hydrogen, and O is oxygen, obviously. The lines connecting all the carbon together is the carbon skeleton, and the OH is a functional group, so it stays, along with the carbon."

He erased some things before the pencil hit paper again, drawing out something new. "Take out all the letters except for the OH, connect all the lines, and there you go," he smiled, "that's how you write out a skeletal formula!"

"Oh," you nodded. "I still don't get it."

Newt sighed, dropping his pencil. "Honestly, I'm starting to think you're a hopeless case."

"Maybe I am." You shrugged, before an idea came to mind. "How about we take a break, go do something else."

"Like?"

You smiled, nodding your head to the window across the room. "Wanna go look at the stars?"

Within minutes, you and Newt had pulled a blanket out to the porch roof, laying it out so that the shingles wouldn't snag on your clothes or be too uncomfortable. A breeze blew past you, and before you could lay down, Newt went back to grab his jacket from off your bed, and you to the closet to grab one of your favorite sweaters.

By the time you went through the window again, Newt was already lying down comfortably, hands tucked under his head. You took the spot next to him, eyes trailing up to the sky. Again, you were utterly mesmerized by the stars. Quiet settled over the area, washing away the frustration of high school chemistry and replacing it with the calm of the night sky.

"It's so beautiful," you muttered to yourself.

"Yeah, it is," Newt's voice nearly caught you off guard, like you forgot he was there. When you turned to look at him, his eyes were already on you. "I used to do stuff like this all the time when I was younger."

"I don't think I've seen stars like this... ever." You sighed. "Big city, light pollution, all that stuff. The sky didn't even get that dark at night. Not really, just sort of... reddish and stuff."

"Really?" Newt frowned. "I can't even imagine something like that. When I was young, I had this obsession with the stars and constellations. Every chance I could, I'd ask my mum to buy me books about them. I even learned how to point out the bloody constellations from my bedroom window."

And, for the next little while, that's what he did. Newt spent the better part of an hour pointing up at the stars, rattling off individual star names and the names of constellations that connected them. You watched him happily, occasionally glancing his way instead of up at the sky, which was the sight that had originally enamored you in the first place.

The slight cadence in your friend's voice was all too soothing, and the chill of the autumn air was settling into your bones. Before you knew it, you were on the verge of falling asleep, balancing on the very thin tightrope between conscious and unconscious.

When you finally found the strength to open your eyes again, Newt was silent, his eyes locking with yours, a playful smile stretching his face.

"Why are you looking at me like that?"

The boy laughed. "You fell asleep."

"I did?"

"Yeah, about twenty minutes ago," he shrugged before sitting up. "We might wanna get inside now. I've gotta go soon, and we still have work to do."

You groaned, watching Newt push himself to his feet before extending his hands to you. The slant of the roof must've made it awkward for him to stand like that, so you accepted his hands and got up, ignoring the fact that his hands were warm, while yours were like ice.

After you folded the blanket and went back inside, you did your best to finish the homework with the half an hour you had left until Newt absolutely had to go home. Most of that time was spent joking around about how you were surely going to fail, before you simply decided on hurriedly copying Newt's homework (again).

You walked him down the stairs at ten minutes to ten o'clock, the sound of the tv filling most of the open floor as your parents watched a movie before bed. You opened the door for Newt, leaning against the frame with one hand still on the doorknob as he stepped out onto the porch.

"Thanks, by the way,"

Newt turned to face you. "For what? Letting you copy my homework?"

"No," you laughed. "For teaching me something, at least. I might not quite understand the mystery of the skeletal formula, but I know more about the stars, and that's gotta count for something."

He only shrugged, another smile settling over his features. "No biggie. I'll see you tomorrow, okay?"

"Yeah." You nodded, watching him from the door as he got into his car and sped off.

Sighing, you stepped back inside and shut the door, resting your forehead against the wood. Despite the fact that it was just going to be another boring, nearly monotonous day, you couldn't help but be excited for tomorrow to begin.