Of Hotshots and High School

Chapter 18

Rory's POV

"Pfft!" Lena laughed at her phone before pushing her glasses farther up her face and shooting off another text. This had been the scene for the last hour, and I couldn't take it anymore. I dropped my calculator and pushed aside my math book, reaching across the table to snatch Lena's phone.

"Waaah-" she protested, reaching back for her phone that I now held out of her reach.

"You said we were coming to the library to do math homework, not to electronically flirt with Kyle."

"But I'm not—"

"Yeah. You kinda are." If I could paint a sunset with the color in Lena's cheeks you would've been able to feel a tangible heat radiating off the portrait.

"Okay, so maybe a little," she admitted sheepishly. "It's just, he's so smart and so funny and he's actually talking to me. To me! And I can't stop pinching myself because I'm constantly terrified that I'll wake up and discover that this has all been some cruel, elaborate dream, and—"

"Well it's not a dream. But I'm going to be wishing that the big fat 'F' I get on my math test tomorrow is unless we actually finish this last homework assignment."

"Oh Rory, I promise it's not that bad. Let me see what you've done so far." I put my assignment in her outstretched hand. As she looked it over a frown formed on her face. "Oh. Alright." She looked up at me. "So you're right, it isn't great—" and she must've seen my expression fall because she immediately brightened and tried to reassure me, "BUT, the good news is that it's an easy fix! And we've got plenty of time." She shot me a big smile and raised a hand. "No more Kyle. Gal's before pals."

"Nobody says that."

"Pfft! Of course they do!" And we both laughed.  I was so lucky to have her.

Even if she was practically twitching the entire time we worked as her eyes kept straying to her phone in the center of the table.

As we reached the last problem and her eyes strayed from our book for the umpteenth time I took pity on her.

"Take it," I nodded at the phone. Man, that girl could be fast when she wanted to be.

"Oh gumdrops thank you. I thought I might spontaneously combust." Lena's fingers were flying before I could even get my pencil back on my paper.

. . . . . . . .

I closed my notebook in defeat. It had been a long, painful hour of suffering through Spanish, during which time Lena had looked up from her phone exactly twice.

Seriously, that girl had it bad.

And it seemed that it wasn't exactly one-sided either, if Lena's giggles and blushing were any indication. It looked like we might be here for a while, and I deserved a break.

"Hey Lena, I'm going to go grab a book. I'll be back in a sec." I pushed away from the table, and Lena just gave me a nod of recognition.

We were studying in Lena's favorite place—the city library. I had to admit, it wasn't too shabby as far as libraries went. Shelves and shelves of books stretched for forever, and there were a few separate study areas by bright painted-glass windows. I was definitely a fan.

Although we'd come to the library before to read to the kids, we'd only been in the children's area, which happened to be an entirely separate wing of the library. I always loved exploring new places, and the library was no exception. Lena would be fine if I looked around for a while.

There were three floors in the main wing and three smaller wings branching from the main one. In each wing except the technology wing there were scattered reading nooks throughout each floor that I loved, but when I stumbled into the southwest corner on the second floor I knew I'd found the mother load.