New Boundaries

Chapter 1: Chalk

(Korra officially meets Asami for the first time, however, not unscathed. Stay tuned for adorable and embarrassing moments.)

I dragged my boots against the floor. This class always runs so incredibly slow. I sat in the back corner of class, the farthest spot from the front that I could possibly find. Strategically I always picked the chair closest to the wall plug-socket, which also happened to be on the back walls of the classroom. Luckily, I wasn't on my phone much so I didn't bother with charging it for the day. I chewed my bottom lip habitually and tried to force myself to pay attention. "Damn... just how long can this guy talk?" I adjusted myself in my seat, putting my feet as far away from the chair as I could manage comfortably.

I was trapped in my government class for two hours. Despite easily making it into a university from high-school, I still honestly hated every bit of school. If I had it my way, I would be traveling the world and focusing on fitness. It was my dream to open a gym, be on my own, and not have to answer to anyone- which is basically all I've been doing my entire life. Always someone trying to control what I did, what I ate, how I trained-

"Korra."

I blinked. "Uh-" I looked up from staring at my paper, encircled in my own thoughts. "What was I just talking about? Do you even know?" My professor was staring at me, obviously waiting to embarrass me because I definitely didn't care about his lecture. Our professor, Mr. Schroff, happened to be one of those professors that thought that the American government was 'beautiful' and deserved its own museum. He was middle aged, close to bald, rather large, and never wore pants to class - instead, choosing to wear black sweatpants. As he wrote on the chalkboard he constantly wiped his hands covered in chalk on his pants. Thus causing white streaks to appear more and more as class continued on. Even more ironically, this was one of the rare classrooms on campus that even still had chalkboards. He was a funny looking guy. It looked as if he tried to get himself presentable for teaching at a university, putting on a nice collar shirt and everything. However, he never wore anything other than sweatpants to which he simply tucked in the tails of his shirt into.

"Uhhhmm..." I stalled, trying to remember anything I may have heard from the past 15 minutes. He sighed and shook his head. "Exactly. Pay attention next time or I'll kick you out of my class." He finished shortly.

"Yes sir," I mumbled, waiting for him to start turning around to roll my eyes. He continued writing more vocabulary words. "Okay, continuing on... Within the senate operates..."

I drowned out his voice, and continued staring at my feet. I had already taken this class close to 4 times in my entire educational career, and every time I got an A. I stopped caring and paying attention about 2 classes ago. I could show up for only the midterms and final and easily set the curve for the course. However, this professor also along with being a rare chalkboard user, also took attendance. Which meant that I had to show up- or be dropped from the course. Lucky me.

I peeked at my phone in the pocket of my soccer pants. It read 11:23. I had around 30 more minutes left in this class. Everyone else in the course looked horrifically bored. Some were slouching in their chairs, others were searching up pictures on their phones. The small girl next to me had her laptop out. Studious student taking notes? Not even close. She was currently playing 'The Sims'. She even brought her own mouse to class. And I was the one to get called out for not paying attention. I chuckled and she looked at me. I shook my head and smiled back. She looked back to her screen and continued clicking away. "Why didn't I think of bringing my laptop to class and playing video games," I continued to laugh silently, grinning at my paper.

Time passed exactly as it had before, myself hiding as far back into my chair as I could, trying to avoid the gaze of the 'chalk man' up front. Some students started to walk out mid lecture, not even bothering to stick around till the end. I wish I had balls like them. As it closed on 11:50, I started throwing what little I carried into my backpack. Two binders, a pen, and a highlighter. I always traveled light because I was always walking someplace. Plus I didn't need much, this was one of the days of the week where I only had one class.

"Alright, that's it for today- homework is due tomorrow night at 6pm, don't forget," Mr. Schroff finished. The classroom was suddenly filled with the noises of chairs being pushed back, people standing up, and slacking on their bags. I stood up, stretched, and reached down to grab my bag following suit. I really wanted to get out of here and go to the gym. I lived for the gym. There's something about getting better, getting stronger, and seeing results if you stuck to it long enough. I smirked, "I wonder if Mako will-"

I felt someone slam into my side and I fell sideways, losing my balance. I didn't exactly know how I was falling or why I was falling, but my first reaction was to catch myself. However, my body decided to not catch itself correctly and I landed rather hard on my hand and wrist. I winced and sucked in my breath at the familiar sharp pain shooting up my arm. I coughed, temporarily out of breath. "Oh- crap, Im so sorry! I didn't even see you there!"

I looked up to see a familiar face reaching down towards me, her delicate hands reaching around my other arm which was holding my bag. I felt the familiar stripe of burning red cross my face. "Asami Sato. Just knocked me over," I eternally reasoned. My mind immediately began stressing over my messy hair that I chose to wear in a simple ponytail today, to the boring pair of soccer pants from my wardrobe.

"I- Uh, yeah," I stuttered. I couldn't formulate words today, crap, why couldn't I formulate words. "I'm so so so sorry!" she continued, pulling me off my side and back onto my feet. I clenched my teeth, feeling my arm start to throb. "Oh, are you hurt? Oh my god, let me take you to the campus health office! Crap, Im such a klutz-" she continued, chasing over her own words. I looked up towards the familiar green eyes I snuck peeks at during class for the last 2 months. "I uhm, I'm fine. I'll be okay." I smiled slightly, rubbing my arm.

I winced as I pressed along my forearm, trying to gently figure out if I broke anything. This is not good, I just barely had gotten my arm to stop shooting up with pain every time I tried to curl a weight. I had torn a ligament in my forearm years before and it had never truly healed.

Asami put a her hand to her mouth, and she looked like she was about to tear up. "I am so so sorry," she continued. I felt really bad for how bad she felt, even though I was the one ending up injured in this situation. I let out a small smile, "Don't worry, I'm pretty resilient. I'll survive." A lie, because I actually bruised so easily, I made bananas look tough. She picked up her purse from the floor and sighed, "I just didn't see you, I was super stressed about how I was supposed to study for this class, with the midterm being next week-" Midterm? I didn't even bother paying attention to those details.

"Uh. There's a midterm?" I answered back blankly, without even thinking. Asami raised a delicate eyebrow at me and smiled, "Uh. Yes, its actually the next time we meet here... didn't you know?" I looked around, everyone had left by now and it was just the two of us in the room. I stepped back, and ran my non-injured hand through my bangs, "Er, no, I mean, I don't really-"

"-Pay attention," She finished for me. I chuckled nervously, "Yeah. But I mean, I've never studied for them before, and I got an A on the last midterm we had." Asami's eyes widened at my words, and suddenly her hands grabbed mine. "Please help me study!" I winced and sucked in a breath as she grabbed my recently injured hand. "Sorry!" she dropped my hand again, and settled for biting her lip. She looked... hot when she did that and I couldn't even find shame in the thought. "Er, ah, yeah I can help you. I'm probably the one setting all the curves in this class anyway."

"Yes!" she smiled and stepped past me, heading towards the door of the classroom. "So I'll see you in the library tomorrow at 3:30?"

"Yep, you'll see me," I replied, feeling my stomach swirl at the thought of seeing her again.

"Perfect. I'll wait outside of the library for you."

And with that, Asami swirled around, her hair perfectly moving along with her, and walked outside, leaving me standing there with a lot more than a crippled arm.