INCENDIARY | ✓

dirt | bones

FOUR YEARS AGO

"You need to finish your share of the project," I rudely muttered, shoving his things to the side and slamming my books in their place. He had his headphones in, but he still raised his head up to acknowledge me- or so I thought. Instead, he raised his eyebrows, pulled his hood up, and looked back down to his phone, effectively shutting me down. He turned the volume up, rap blaring out of the pristine headphones.

"Don't ignore me, McDermott," I snarled. I had my hand on his shoulder, ready to shove him into listening to me when he glared at me, nostrils flaring. He flung my hand away, taking his left headphone out.

"Touch me again and see what happens." He simmered in anger, but I didn't back down.

"You're ignoring me when all I'm asking you to do is your part of the goddamned project!" I exasperatedly goaded him.

"I don't give a fuck about that," he sneered. "Leave me alone."

"I'm not leaving until you do your part," I shrugged my shoulders, looking for a spare chair to pull. He was sitting in the cafeteria, clearly cutting class, and I didn't bother to remind him we both had seventh period English. Typically, I would be in class, but the project took priority.

Finding a chair, I sat down next to him, hoping he'd take interest in finishing the project. In response, he put his headphone back in, and turned up his music again, the angry lyrics of some hip-hop artist blaring at me.

Thinking he wouldn't touch the project at all (I was right, he didn't), I pulled out my Algebra II homework to complete instead of wasting time. I saw him look at what I was doing from the corner of my eyes, but I ignored him- I wouldn't speak to him until he worked on his share.

Solve for all possible solutions: 4x^2-8x-12

There were many things I was great at; math, however, was not one of them. I knew this was a simple problem, I had learned it in class hours before, but the words swam before me and I was thoroughly lost.

I stared at the question for a good ten minutes when a deep voice reluctantly muttered, "You use the AC method on that."

I whipped my head to see McDermott chewing on his lip ring, the action bringing my attention to his lips. His eyebrows were furrowed in thought, narrowed at my paper, so he didn't see where I was staring.

As he studied my paper, I studied him.

Let it be known, that for all he was dangerous and bad, Harvey McDermott was not an unattractive human; in fact, it was the complete opposite.

His skin was pale, more pale than anyone I'd ever seen before. He had freckles sprinkled on the bridge of his nose, but they weren't girly on him; they looked good. He still had his hood on, but from prior experience, I knew his obsidian hair was kept in a short buzz cut. His lips were naturally red, round, and full, almost girlish, and his lip piercing was on the bottom right corner. I dragged my eyes from his lips up to-

I jolted back to my senses.

Harvey McDermott's silver eyes, framed by unfairly long eyelashes, were watching me with concealed amusement and slight exasperation.

He'd just caught me checking his face out, oh praise the Lord- my face flamed.

He raised his eyebrows slightly, and nodded to the paper in my fingertips, completely ignoring my flushed face.

"You use the AC method on that," he repeated and went back to his phone, and a light-bulb went off in my head. Murmuring a hasty thanks, I quickly scribbled my thoughts.