ethan landry x reader oneshots

reciprocate

The soft blow of air conditioning and the soft shuffle of feet against carpet where the only sounds of the library at this time of day. The soft chill of the air raised goosebumps on your arms and made your body shiver. Your hands came up instinctively to your arms, trying to warm your skin up through your long sleeves.

You could hear the soft padding of footsteps approach your table and could see a figure grow near out of the corner of your eye. With a slight turn of your head and the movement of the chair beside you, you knew it was Ethan.

You let yourself focus on him for only a moment, eyes flickering back to the sprawl of textbooks and papers before Ethan's eyes could catch yours.

"Did you find it?" Your voice rang clearly yet quietly; it wasn't like there were many people in the library to complain, anyway. Your eyes glanced cautiously at the sleeve of Ethan's sweater; the dark blue one you thought complimented his complexion perfectly.

Ethan shook his head with a small frown. "I'll have to look for it some other day."

You turned towards Ethan, catching his eye with a smile. "So you're done for the day?"

Ethan give you something that resembled a laugh, quiet with a hint of a smile. "I didn't say that," he said lowly, turning his attention back to his laptop.

"Well, I'm pretty much done," you lied, quickly shutting the top of your laptop before Ethan's eyes could fact-check you. "Do you want to go somewhere else? Maybe get some food?"

Ethan shook his head before you could even finish, fingers typing on his laptop again. "No, that's okay. I have to get this done. But you go ahead if you're done."

A strained smile formed on your lips, though Ethan was far too distracted to notice. You'd backed yourself into a corner; you should've just kept quiet and kept working. "Yeah, okay. See you later."

"See you," Ethan called softly after you, half-distracted as you packed up your things and left the library with an embarrassed flush on your face.

「 ... 」

After that came the overthinking. The image of Ethan at his laptop, air conditioning softly blowing his hair, eyes stuck on his screen in focus. You held onto the moment for only a few seconds before the frustration began to brew.

You replayed Ethan's rejection of your invitation, his eyes barely flickering to you as he dismissed the idea. Did he really have more work to do? Or was he tired of hanging out with you?

Or worse... Was this his non-confrontational way of letting you down gently?

You let out an audible groan. You were running mental laps trying to figure this boy out, never knowing what it was he actually felt.

You were sure you'd made it clear you were interested without outright saying it. You'd done it all; eye contact, physical contact, always laughing at his jokes no matter how stupid (though there was always a smile on your face when Ethan was around).

Either Ethan wasn't picking up on your signals or he was gently rejecting you over and over.

Should you even keep trying?

You could give Ethan the benefit of the doubt; after all, this was all partially your fault.

You liked to describe yourself as friendly rather than flirty, though most of your friends disagreed. You argued that you just liked to make people feel special. Your friends agreed with this point, though they noted that maybe sometimes you made too many people feel too special.

Between interested, attentive eyes and constant smiles, it was easy to confuse your soft friendliness for something else. Chad even admitted he thought you were into him the first time you'd met.