Dreamer

Adventure

n. an exciting or remarkable experience

Marion wonders why of all the projects the art board could have assigned, they had to choose the collaboration.

The yearlong collaboration.

Marion knows that she's just over exaggerating. Truthfully, it could have been worse. She is fully aware that Bishop Academy could have assigned an insane, elaborate, and naturally impossible project to its over achieving students.

However, Bishop Academy did assign its students this yearlong collaboration, which if Marion does not pass could cause her to not graduate (not that she'd ever give the project a chance to do that to her). But right now she has a more important problem at hand.

Marion cannot find her damn partner.

Really, how hard can it be to find a single person in a sea of eighty two students within a ridiculously large auditorium? Marion has just discovered that it's very challenging.

So, when she suddenly finds herself crashing into a chest, she is this close to exploding and giving the poor person a lecture about looking ahead.

Irritated, Marion takes a step back, and promptly catches her foot on a bag that she swears was not there earlier. As she falls backward, her mind barely has time to form a curse word when a strong arm pulls her forward and deeper into the chest.

A scent of vanilla wafts into Marion's nose, effectively calming her. As she stands in the embrace, inhaling the scent of vanilla, she can feel her mind clearing of its earlier frustration and irritation. Collected, she calmly stands there and closes her eyes for a second.

But after a while, the moment quickly transitions from calming and peaceful to awkwardly a minute too long. Wondering why she hasn't been released yet, Marion looks up, and her olive orbs catch sea blue ones staring at her. They widen and quickly pull away, along with the rest of the body.

Marion watches the boy in front of her as he runs a hand through his mocha hair and offers her a sheepish grin. "Sorry," he offers apolegitically.

"It's okay," Marion says. They stand in a rustic silence for a few seconds as she waits for the stranger to say something. When it becomes clear that he isn't going to respond anytime soon, Marion tries to excuse herself from this awkward mess.

"Well, I need to get going. Nice bumping into you."

"Wait!" the stranger sidesteps in front of her as she tries to walk around him. Marion stops abruptly in her tracks, trying to avoid another awkward collision, and gives the stranger a questioning look.

"Um, the art project," he starts, searching for a look of recognition on her face. Upon finding nothing but a raised eyebrow, he closes his eyes and lets out an exaggerated sigh as if disappointed.

"I'm Sawyer Henson," he finally says, extending his hand and giving her a bright smile.

Sawyer Henson. Her partner. The person she has spent the last few minutes fruitlessly searching for.

This coincidence is too coincidental.

Taking his hand, Marion attempts to introduce herself, "I'm-"

"The one and only Marion de Fiore," Sawyer promptly finishes for her, "who I have been given the honor of working with on this highly demanding yet exciting project."

Marion isn't sure whether his words are meant to be mocking, but the sincere, bright smile on his face tells her they're not.

Well, Marion knows from experience that smiles can lie.