Borrowed Time

Chapter Eighty Five

Chemistry class was the farthest thing from Juliette's mind even as she sat inside of it.  She was thinking about how hard it had been to sleep even in Esme's arms, she was too busy theorizing how long it would be before she could sleep without shooting awake in a cold sweat... It'd be helpful if that ended soon, she didn't exactly want to deal with that for very long.

It was a stupid side effect of trauma, one that she would do anything to get rid of.

"Hey..." Esme nudged her lightly with their foot, giving Juliette a worried look when she lifted her head. "You alright?"  They asked, and Juliette puffed out her cheeks... God, what a loaded question... She was fine, but her head was pounding from the temple hit, she was fine but she couldn't get the man's words out of her head.

She was fine, but she kept thinking about what would've happened if he'd pulled the trigger... Would he have killed her or would he have just left her lying there in pain?  There was no way to know what he really wanted, that was what was making her lose focus on anything else.

"Yeah, I'm fine." Juliette said, sliding her hand over to Esme, who pulled out a pen to start drawing on it instantly.  It was relaxing to have Esme do that, it felt like a return to the world of the normal, a return to what her life had been last fucking week... Which felt like it was an eternity ago at this point.

"You're not taking notes."  Correct.  Because Ms. O'Brian had stopped saying anything of substance the week before, and now it was just review, she could do that on her own... Or more accurately, she could do that with Shelby.

"I know.  Finals start next week, I'm not that worried." She insisted, and Esme frowned, not looking convinced as they drew a small dinosaur on right below Juliette's pinky... Cute.

"I feel like Shelby would say that this is the time that we're supposed to worry about it, you know... Like what's coming next is something that we're supposed to be preparing for with the notes that we took throughout the semester."  Esme mumbled, making Juliette roll her eyes... Shelby had so many rules for studying and for how to pass her classes... Juliette couldn't even keep up with them at this point.

"Actually, Shelby would've said that we should already have study guides written up by now and that we should be actively reviewing every single day." She clarified, and Esme nodded, like that proved her point... Hell, they were beaming...

"Right..."  Okay genius... She knew that Esme hadn't taken an actual note all semester and that the only reason they were passing was because of a mix of her tutoring them and Shelby tutoring them and Penny checking their homework... It was a delicate system, but if she didn't want it crumble, she should watch what was said.

"Okay, so if you're going to give me that look..." Juliette swiped their notebook with her free hand, watching them panic as they made a grab for it, but Juliette held it just out of their reach with a smile.  Gotcha. "How many notes have you got in that notebook, sweetheart?" She asked, only half teasing... She wanted to know what Esme wrote about.  She flicked open the notebook with one hand as Esme set down their pen, trying to lean over Juliette without smudging the half dried ink on her hand.

"No, come on, give it back-." Juliette slid it further away and opened the notebook with a small smile.  My heart, my soul... Forever mine... Evergreen girl... I became a lover... Titles of poems with little doodles in the corners of each page... She started to read one when Esme yanked her notebook back, looking thoroughly embarrassed.

"You wrote me more poems?" She asked quietly, feeling her heart squeeze as Esme's blush started to come to her cheeks as they tucked their notebook away.