He was there.
He was there! Relief shook her body as she took a thankful breath.
Music was blasting from his truck so loudly it could be heard from inside the building. Ironically, the song was one of her guilty pleasures; Mr. Brightside by The Killers, whose overplay on the radio surprisingly hadn't made her sick of it. And, just like he promised, his hands were waving wildly in an oddly agreeable rhythm to the song.
A few students had stopped to stare, others to laugh. Walking next to her, her best friend wrinkled her nose as she followed her gaze. "What is that kid doing?" She exclaimed, incredulous. "What a weirdo."
She barely spared her best friend a glance. "Keeping a promise," she murmured, already picking up her speed towards his truck. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Mr. Hall rolling his eyes from his classroom window.
Mr. Geoffrey—she felt weird calling him that, but he was less anonymous now that he had a last name, so she felt she had to cling to that sole piece of information—broke out into an infectious grin as he saw her approaching his truck.
He stopped his arm-flailing movements to reach out to pull her up to the truck with him. Her face flushed at the hand-to-hand contact. "Hi," he greeted as his warm hazel eyes scanned her face.
"Hi back," she breathed, biting her lip.
"Mr. Hall disapproves of my dancing," he whispered conspiratorially, grin growing. Together, they glanced over at the frowning teacher still glaring through the window and both broke out into laughter.
"Just wait until he sees the desk," she whispered back.
Abruptly, he looked down with a slight blush. Following his gaze, she realized they were still holding hands—and yet, neither moved.
"Ah, so I guess this is a 'yes' to my question?" He asked, grinning.
Resisting the urge to scream an obvious duh, she broke eye contact and looked up towards the sky with a shrug. "I don't know," she droned, relishing in how childish he made her feel. She was too used to being around uptight, rule-conscientious people; he had no idea what a breath of fresh air he was. "Maybe..."
He shook his boyish bang out of his eyes so she could see the quirked eyebrow. His tone was anything but doubtful. "Oh?"
She nodded, biting down on her laughter. "Well, on two conditions do I say yes and go to the dance with you."
Amused, he rolled his eyes good-naturedly. "Name them."
"Number one: what did you do to get on the principal's bad side? Not like it's very hard, but…" She trailed off, glancing at him skeptically.
He let out a bark of laughter and shook his hair out of his face again. She couldn't believe how adorable she found that. He let out a loud exhale and shook out his feet, as if loosening himself up for a big speech.
"Bear with me," he murmured quickly. "Okay, so seventh period I have Ms. Craig; who is quite possibly as boring as Mr. Hall. Only she bores even herself, so she doesn't bother with the bad jokes. Anyway, I sit a few rows behind Nathan Tourney—the kid who always wears that same weird sweatshirt—and I happened to notice that today, his hood was down.
"Excuse my lack of compassion towards the environment, please, but I had a lot of unused paper in my binder and too much pent up anxiety about trying to figure out a really kick-ass way to get my letter to you—so I started playing basketball."
He took a breath, preparing to continue, but she quickly cut him off. "Basketball?"
He grinned. "Like I said: bear with me. So, I'm rolling up pieces of paper and shooting them over some kids' heads, into Nathan's sweatshirt hood—see, playing basketball—when, lo-and-behold, in walks the principal. It was like a dozen light bulbs went off in my head."
She found that her expression had shifted into something half-shocked, half in awe. "So she caught you?"
"Better," he assured her. "I threw one at her head."
Her jaw dropped. "On purpose?" She exclaimed, unable to fathom purposefully getting oneself into trouble. Over her, no less.
He laughed. "Yes, on purpose. So the old bat whips around with the angriest look I've ever seen. Some kids even had to look away; but Nathan—ah, good ol' Nate—pulls up his hood to hide his grin…or so I assume, because it was very funny. Anyway, that's when he realized why all the kids had been snickering all period, because all of the paper balls come spilling out.
"Like a true gentleman, I turn myself in, hands behind my back."
She laughed at the image he painted, performing a walk of shame with invisible hand-cuffs. "Then what?" She asked, unsuccessfully hiding the eagerness in her tone.
"Once we were towards the science hall, I made my getaway. I've got quite a few years on her, obviously, which gave me a great advantage; at least a good few minutes. Enough time to make an excuse to get my quote-unquote forgotten binder," he finished, smirking.
She shook her head, almost unable to believe it. "You…but…getting into needless trouble for someone you'd never met? Really? What if I ended up being, well, totally gross-looking?"
"Well, for starts, you didn't," he said coolly, "and anyway, if I didn't, I could have lost the opportunity and would have to spend the rest of my life muttering what if's under my breath."
He had a point. "Now, what was condition number two?"
She noticed the parking lot was almost empty now (even her best friend had split) and they were still standing on his truck with The Killers album Hot Fuss blasting on the stereo. With a fleeting glance towards her seventh period window, she saw Mr. Hall was out of sight.
She took a steadying breath. "What is your first name?"
He laughed as he realized that he still hadn't told her—although to be fair, he didn't know hers either. "My name is—"
Just as his lips were pursed to say it, Mr. Hall stormed out of the front entrance, angrily pointing at the two. "I know it was you!" He yelled. It was the first time either of them heard his voice be anything but stoic. "I'll have you two suspended for this! I just got new desks, damnit!"
YOU WILL NEVER KNOW THEIR NAMES. EVER. /cackle
I just had to write this. I had to; and I had to make them very teenagery, too, so the dialogue isn't the most profound piece of writing. Some people wanted the dance scene as a follow up, but I think writing that would be way too cuddly-wuddly-aw for even me to write.
You guys have no idea how nervous I am about posting this. I tried very hard to make it live up to the hype, but I'm sorry if it disappointed you...but, well, I like it. :x
Now that I have a place to say this: I AM SO FLATTERED. Like unbelievably. You guys make my day every time I get a new review for this little oneshot...er, two shot? Um, I don't own the album Hot Fuss or The Killers. Who are awesome, and definitely a guilty pleasure.
Oh, for all readers of The Happiest Place on Earth who have yet to see the update on my user page, it's being rewritten. I'll post an official A/N about this soon.
I would really like to know what you guys think. Please review if you can!
xoxo times the never-ending-number-of-pi