Cats Eat Birds - Damian Wayne/OC

34 | LIKE HERDING CATS

GOTHAM CITY; GOTHAM ACADEMY FOR THE GIFTED | 2:58 PM | DAMIAN

SOMEONE WAS OUT  for blood. Out to get him, to destroy Damian, because there was no way he still had classes with Cristen Young after all this time.

Joker's attack on the academy had sullened the student body of their celebratory mood. Though Damian never went to any of the athletic events, Bullet informed him that the start of them was solemn, muddying the mood through to the ends of football games and track meets. Championships were more whisper than competition. The school board had used the debris from the destroyed ends of the building to expand the gymnasium, but all that had really done was push the annual Valentine's Day Dance back a week—which didn't help GA's sour attitude either.

Construction finished right around the time that their second trimester of the year started. Damian had already built himself up to the idea that he and Cristen wouldn't share any classes—maybe one, if he was lucky. But finding her in three of his classes... that was just suspicious. Someone on staff knew about his... predicament... and was making a joke out of him. Surely.

Cristen had a check-in with the school counselor at the start of their third class together. As promised, Damian saved her seat next to his and dreadfully watched the class fill up around him. If she were here, Damian would remark how close the desks were, and Cristen would laugh easily about anchovies in a tin.

"Is this seat taken?"

Pulled from his thoughts by the voice, Damian glanced up. It was—Melanie? Courtney? Something irrelevant with an E sound. One of the more sociable girls in his grade, and one infamous among the males of his grade for her looks. Around him, Damian realized that the pair of seats he'd chosen made up the caboose of their friend group's circle.

"Yes," said Damian, without apologizing.

Melani pointed apologetically at her friend, and smiled in a way meant to persuade him. "Are you sure? Cause this is the closest seat to my best friend, Allie..."

Damian dropped his bag in the spot beside him for good measure. "I'm certain."

"Pretty please?" Melani rocked one heel back and feathered her hair over her shoulder, not convinced.

Like Cristen's, it was stark black and well-curled. (Unlike Cristen's, it was long and without shine). Damian supposed that was what made her so attractive; he couldn't see what else.

"No," Damian snorted, "You're wasting your time. Go on."

Being shooed was not something Melani was apparently used to. She made a face and squeezed past him and down their row to find an available seat, giving her best friend a mournful glance and whispering, "I'll find somewhere else. Who's he saving that seat for, anyway? I didn't know Damian had friends."

Her friend, Allie, was clicking her nails against her phone. "Oh, his girlfriend, I think."

A cold blush washed down Damian's back and up his neck. "Cristen is not my girlfriend. "

When they realized they'd been overheard, the friend across from him raised her brows and stopped typing. A smooth smile passed over Allie's face. "You don't sound very sure about that."

The noise of the classroom was too loud to convince Damian to retort, so he boiled that suggestion in silence. Of course he was sure about it—Cristen isn't his girlfriend! She couldn't be! Not like she should be, either, with the trouble that would bring. Why would anyone think so in the first place?

Inevitably, the bell rang and his class stilled. A syllabus was put in front of him and Damian paid it no mind.

Cristen appeared halfway through the class, slipping in at the perfect moment of silence to get every eye on her. She made a show of blushing as she supplied her pass, freckles curved around her nervous smile, and fumbled her way around filled seats to take hers at his side.