Dare You to Move (Punk Harry Styles)

Chapter Two

Our teacher Profesora Gomez announced to the class the next day that we were going to start a new project now and she’s already assigned us partners.

I crossed my fingers that Lacey and I get to be partners, but it’s doubtful since we were last time.

“Mark and Amy, Jared and Kent, Lacey and Courtney, Taylor and Luke, Harry and Selene….” She keeps going but I’ve stopped listening after she’s called my name. Of course she pairs me up with the last person I’d want to be with. Everyone got up to go with their partner and on her way to Courtney, Lacey gave me a sympathetic smile. I didn’t return it, turning when I saw someone had taken her seat next to me. Harry smirked at me, looking amused when I met his gaze.

“What’s wrong, Acosta? Didn’t want me as your partner?” He mocked.

“It doesn’t matter what I want, it’s what Profesora Gomez assigned us. I just hope you carry your own weight in this project,” I said firmly.

He scoffed. “Don’t worry. So are you free after school today so we can work on it?”

“Yeah, I just have tutoring until four but then I can come over—”

“You’re not coming over my house,” he cut me off, his voice becoming dangerously low and threatening.

I raised my eyebrows before I asked, “And why is that?”

“I don’t like strangers in my house,” he said evasively.

It was my turn to scoff. “We’re hardly strangers, Harry. But fine, come over my house around four or four-thirty today.”

He seemed to relax once I let it drop, his shoulders slumping in relief.

“Why weren’t you here yesterday?” I asked after a short pause.

“What do you mean? We had lunch together, or at least the beginning of it,” he said, looking confused.

“No, I mean you weren’t in this class yesterday. Where were you?” I clarified.

“Oh, I ditched,” he told me, shrugging.

“Why would you ditch?” It didn’t surprise me, but I never saw the point of doing it myself.

“I needed a break, so I left. Plus I needed a smoke, and you can’t smoke on school property,” he explained, gesturing with his huge hands.

I dropped the subject, thinking he probably wouldn’t care for me to tell him how bad smoking was. Profesora Gomez handed out a rubric for the project and her expectations. For the project we were to make a menu for a restaurant you might find in Spain. Harry and I discussed what kind of restaurant we wanted to be and we picked a casual one that served lunch and dinner.

“So do you do the tutoring or do you get tutored?” Harry asked after I finished writing down the outline of the menu.

“What?” I asked, coming back to focus on him.

“You said before you have tutoring after school. Do you tutor someone?”

“Oh, no,” I said, starting to blush with embarrassment. “I get tutored for geometry.”

“Ah, yeah math isn’t my best subject either. Hopefully it doesn’t have to do with the career you want,” he said. It sounded like a statement, but when he quirked his eyebrow up questioningly, I realized he was asking me.

“No, I want to be a writer, so math shouldn’t have much to do with it my future,” I answered, running my hand through my hair to get it out of my eyes. I wore it down today, the long blonde strands cascading down my back almost all the way to my waist.

His eyes followed my hand before his intense gaze came back to mine.

“Why are you being so… nice to me?” I asked him, genuinely curious. It wasn’t that I minded, I was actually enjoying our conversation. But he seemed to get bored easily and was indifferent with most people in the school, completely ignoring some of them. So why was he talking to me, why did he seem so invested in getting to know me? He could just be making conversation, I reminded myself, trying to squash the butterflies in my stomach that came with idea that I was possibly “special” to Harry.

He chose to shrug as an answer. “Who tutors you?” He asked instead.

I sighed, accepting I wasn’t going to get a real answer. “Erik Kidd. He’s in your grade.”

“Oh, him,” he said, his nose scrunching up in distaste.

“What’s that look for?” I asked, narrowing my eyes.

“Honestly? He seems like a total snob.”

The bell decided to ring at that moment and I quickly got up and grabbed my stuff. “Well he’s not! Next time get to know someone before you judge them,” I spat at him, storming off out of the room to my last class.