Pencil, Paper and Passion.

Mr. Kalebrow and I arrived at my house ten minutes before Ben did. I stood in the open doorway and watched in amusement as Mr. Kalebrow headed straight for the kitchen. After he’d disappeared from view, I turned my gaze outside, keeping an eye out for Ben’s arrival. When he drove up, I walked outside and down the front steps to meet him at the bottom step. As soon as he was within arms reach, he grabbed me by the waist and pulled me in, planting his lips against mine.

I smiled into the kiss, and wrapped my arms around his neck, keeping it light. When it ended, he kept me close and rubbed his nose against mine. “What’s on the agenda for this evening?”

“Mm. I’ve got homework for almost every class and you have papers to grade. I thought we could do that before dinner, if you’re staying, and then watch a movie, if you want.” I pulled away and grabbed his hand to lead him up the steps and into the house.

“I want.” He tugged on my hand when we reached the door and I looked over my shoulder at him questioningly. He grinned. “Those papers I have to grade are in my car.”

“Oh. Well, go get them. I’ll be in the kitchen.” I smiled at him and let go of his hand to go inside. I grabbed up my book bag from the entryway floor and carried it to the kitchen. Mr. Kalebrow sat at the counter, watching Maya bake on the other side, as he shoveled something in his mouth. I shook my head at him as I walked over, put my bag on the counter, next to a plate of brownies, and sat. “Don’t you ever stop eating?”

He finished swallowing the food in his mouth before answering. “Not when it’s this good.”

“You’re going to get fat. Then you’ll be of no use to me as a bodyguard.”

“No, I won’t. I have a very high metabolism.” He shoved the last bite of food in his mouth, just as Ben came in with his leather case and sat down next to me.

Maya spoke up from across the counter, where she stirred something in a metallic bowl. “So does Miss Eliza. That’s why she can get away with eating so many sweets and not gain a pound.”

I paused in the act of lifting a brownie from the plate and grinned. “Nothing sticks.” I took a huge bite of the chocolate morsel and talked around it. “But I keep trying.”

Ben spoke up, leaning around me as he spoke to Mr. Kalebrow, “Have you learned anything new?”

Mr. Kalebrow shook his head. “No, there’s nothing new. I’m trying to get my hands on the police report from the day Eliza was attacked, but until then, there’s not a lot I can do.”

“Except?” Ben inquired, his brows drawing together.

“Investigate everyone I know.” I interjected, thinking back on that morning. I still didn’t know how I felt about it, knowing my friends’ private lives were being pried into, except that I knew how necessary it was.

Mr. Kalebrow narrowed his eyes at me, and I watched as the man I’d first met came out again. His posture was rigid, defensive. His eyes were cold and when he spoke, the light Italian accent was chilly. “It has to be done.”

Did he really think I didn’t know that? I wanted this to be over. If investigating everybody was what it took, then so be it. He could investigate the entire state, for all I cared, so long as he resolved this situation. I wasn’t a child, hiding beneath the blankets. I knew what had to be done. So, I returned his stare, just as cold, and inclined my head. “Yes, I’m aware of the necessity of your investigations.”

He blinked, taken aback by my tone. “This morning, you said-.”

“It hardly matters what I said. You’ll continue your investigations of the people close to me; I simply don’t want to hear the reports. Now, that’s enough on the matter.” I turned away from Mr. Kalebrow, to smile at Ben. “Will you help me with my Chem.?”

Out of the corner of my eye, I watched Mr. Kalebrow’s eyes widen in surprise. He hadn’t been expecting me to dismiss him. But I was well and truly done with the subject. I knew what had to be done and there was really no use in going over it again and again. So, I ignored the whispered argument going on between Maya and Mr. Kalebrow about whether or the not the matter should be dropped, and focused on my Chemistry teacher.

“Well?” I asked him, just as Maya and Mr. Kalebrow stormed out of the kitchen together.

Ben raised his brows at me. “No, I won’t help you.”

“Ben-!” Genuinely shocked, I stared wide eyed at him. He was my teacher! He had to help!

“It’s unfair to the other students. Besides, you don’t need help. You could probably teach my class, yourself.”

“But I-.”

“And I have my own homework, remember?” He reached into his leather case and pulled out a sheaf of papers and a pen. “These papers need to be in the grade book by tomorrow afternoon, which means I have to grade them tonight.”

I glared at Ben for a few seconds, before dropping my gaze. When it fell on the forgotten brownie in my hand, I huffed out a sigh. “Fine.” I shoved the rest of the brownie into my mouth. Chewing thoughtfully, I pulled my homework from my book bag. I had a five paragraph report due for senior English, which I’d need my laptop for; ten problems for Pre-Calculus; the preliminary questions for my Chem. Lab that I hadn’t finished in class; I had to edit three shots for photography (again, I’d need my laptop) and lastly, I had an entire chapter to read in my History textbook.

I picked up the Chem. Lab and flipped to the page that I needed, being deliberately noisy. I huffed out a large breath of air and rifled in my bag for a pencil, still making as much noise as possible. I put the pencil to use, but looked at Ben out of the corner of my eye. A smirk graced his lips and I watched as he shook his head, eyes never leaving the papers before him. I let out a genuinely annoyed sigh before giving up and concentrating on my homework.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Two weeks later, I was sitting in the same kitchen. This time though, the four of us (Maya, Mr. Kalebrow, Ben, and I) were sat around the kitchen table, battling it out in an intense game of Uno.

“It’s green! Christ, kid, are you colorblind?”

“It was yellow two fucking seconds ago, I swear. So keep the lip to yourself, Kalebrow.” I picked up the card I had mislaid on the pile and perused the other six in my hand. No green. Shit. Resigned, I lifted my hand to start drawing cards when I realized what number was currently face-up on the table. “Yes!” I plucked the matching seven out of my hand and slapped it down onto the pile with a triumphant cry, changing the color from green to red.

“Damn it!” Ben, sitting next to me, muttered. He had four cards in his hand and, judging by the sour look on his face, none of them were red. This was confirmed when he reached out and began drawing cards. After he’d pulled the eighth one off the deck he let out a quiet ‘are you fucking kidding me’ followed by a deathly glare in my direction as he pulled yet another card. This time however, he didn’t shove it roughly in with the other eleven cards in his hand. Instead, he laid a red two on the pile before returning to glaring at me. “This is your fault and I’m going to remember it in class tomorrow.”

“Oh, yeah, I’m shaking. Bring it on, Gallagher.” I smirked at him, idly fanning myself with the six remaining cards in my hand. “Your turn, Maya.”

“How come you call everybody but her by our last names when we play card games?” Mr. Kalebrow asked irritably, as we all watched Maya lay a yellow two over the red one, changing the color yet again.

“She frightens me.” I said, grinning when Mr. Kalebrow began drawing cards.

“I frighten you?” Maya pretended to look offended, dropping her seven remaining cards facedown on the table.

“You’re a scary lady. And you cook my food, so I take as many precautions to keep you happy as is possible.” I looked over as Mr. Kalebrow began cursing. Apparently, he’d had to draw ten cards before he could lay down a card, bringing his card count to thirteen.

“This deck is rigged. Who the hell shuffled this shit?” He began rearranging the cards in his hand.

“You did.” Ben replied cheerily, upon realizing that he wasn’t the one losing any longer.

“Can’t complain about your own shit, Noah.” I said in the sweetest tone I could muster, before laying a yellow plus two onto the pile, bringing my card count down to five and Ben’s up to thirteen. Oh, I am good!

“For the love of-! Elizabeth, really?” Ben began glaring at me again, as he drew his cards. “It’s like you’re asking me to fail you in Chemistry.”

“Sweetie, Maya would kick your ass and you know it.” I used the endearment shamelessly, having learned how much Ben hated being called by any pet names and exploiting it.

He shot a sidelong glance at Maya and visibly cringed when he realized that she was staring at him intensely as she laid down another yellow card, dropping her to six cards. “I’ll think of something else, then.”

I chuckled to myself, watching as Mr. Kalebrow began to draw cards from the deck again. “Jeez, don’t you have any matching numbers in that mess, Kalebrow?”

“Shove off.” He said it belligerently, but I noticed that his hand paused in the act of lifting up another card and that he regarded his hand a little more closely. When he suddenly cursed and slapped a blue six over the yellow one, I laughed out loud, earning myself a light kick under the table. “Keep it up, kiddo.”

“Oh, I will.” With a small flourish, I laid down my trump card. Wild plus four. I had four cards left in my hand and they were all the same color. “Yellow.”

“Fuck!” Ben threw his cards down in disgust before lifting his hand to begin pulling cards from the deck.

Ten minutes and a lot of shouted insults later, the game came to an end. I stood on the chair I’d been sitting in, hands lifted above my head. “Ha! I am the Uno queen! Bow to me, lowly peasants!”

Maya snorted before getting up from the table and heading out of the kitchen. “I think I’d rather go to bed, your majesty.”

“Same here.” Mr. Kalebrow stretched and yawned before following her from the kitchen.

I let my arms drop, staring sullenly after the pair. “They dare disobey their queen?! Off with their heads, Benjamin!”

“Christ, you’re punchy.” Ben stood from his chair and grinned up at me. “I think it’s time the queen herself went to bed.”

I let out a huge yawn. “Yeah, I guess. What time is it anyway?”

He pulled his phone from his pocket and checked the time. “About two in the morning.”

“Two in the…? Shit. Did we really play Uno that long?” I grimaced, thinking ahead. I’d be able to get about four hours of sleep, providing I passed out within the next few minutes.

“We really did. Come on, off to bed.” Reaching up, Ben grabbed me around the waist and unceremoniously tossed me face first over his shoulder.

I blinked at the floor, letting out a huff of air as his shoulder pressed into my stomach. “Well, this is certainly undignified.”

“This is part of your punishment for all the cards I had to draw.” He left the kitchen and began making his way to my room, carrying me effortlessly.

“Hm.” I looked down once again and suddenly grinned. “Well, there are some perks.” That said, I lifted a hand to give his ass a couple of friendly pats.

“I don’t think you’re supposed to fraternize with the peasants, your highness.”

“Oh. Well, I’m the queen, aren’t I? What I say goes.”

“What would your loyal subjects say?”

“That your ass is just as nice as I think it is.”

Ben choked and stumbled on one of the steps we’d been ascending. “Elizabeth, please.”

“Hey! Don’t drop the queen!”

“If I thought it’d knock a small amount of propriety into your head, I might.”

“Ben?” I watched the last stair disappear behind us as he began walking down the hall, towards my bedroom.

“Yeah?”

“I’m going to ignore the rudeness of that statement in favor of telling you that I’m beginning to feel lightheaded. Can I not be upside down anymore?”

“Shit.” Without bothering to stop walking, Ben shifted me around until he was cradling me against his chest, one arm behind my shoulders and the other in the crooks of my knees. “Sorry.”

I blinked owlishly at him, as the excess blood that had rushed to my head began draining back down into my body, making me dizzy. I suspected that the dizziness also had something to do with how tired I was. “Hey, Ben? Let’s not play Uno until two in the morning on Tuesday nights anymore, okay?”

Yawning, Ben stopped in front of my bedroom and nudged the slightly ajar door open with his foot. “I agree completely. I’m exhausted and I still have to drive home.”

“Mm.” Eyelids drooping, I cuddled closer to his chest as he made his way into my bedroom. “Just stay here.”

“I wish I could, but I don’t have any clothes with me.”

I determinedly kept my eyes open, on his face. I could see how tired he was, by the sleepy look in his eyes. “I don’t think you should be driving home, not in your condition.”

Ben sat me down on my bed as amusement crossed his features. “Elizabeth, I haven’t been drinking.”

“But you’re tired; you could fall asleep at the wheel.” I reached up and locked my arms around his neck, trying my best to pull him down onto the bed with me. My limbs, weighed down by exhaustion, refused to work however and the only thing I succeeded in doing was somehow smacking our foreheads together. “Oops.”

“Oops, indeed.” Chuckling, he loosened my arms from around his neck and intertwined our fingers together. He leaned down, pressing his lips softly to mine. “I’m going home now. Goodnight, sweetheart, I’ll see you tomorrow.”

I sighed in resignation, allowing him to release my hands and straighten. He would be fine, and there was nothing to be concerned about. He was a very capable driver and it seemed that the little knock on the head had woken him up some. I closed my eyes and yawned again. “Night, Ben.”

When I heard his footsteps retreat and my door click shut, I rolled over on my side. I fumbled around for a few minutes, squirming and cursing, before I was able to pull my blankets out from underneath myself and cover myself up. As soon as I accomplished the task, I curled into a ball, my favorite position to sleep in, and promptly passed out.

~~~~~~~~~~

The next morning, I awoke to a pounding at my door and Mr. Kalebrow’s raised voice. “Hey, your highness, up and at ‘em! You’ve got ten minutes to get downstairs or you’ll be late!”

Groaning, I rolled over in my bed before shouting back. “Go away, Noah! And be quiet about it!”

“Nine minutes, kiddo!” If anything, his voice had gotten louder and decidedly more cheery.

“Ugh.” I cracked open one eye, noting that sunlight streamed in from my window. “What time is it?”

“7:32! Let’s go!” Mr. Kalebrow rapped his fist against the door a few more times. “You’re down to eight minutes!”

“Yeah, yeah. Put a lid on it, Kalebrow!” I yelled, climbing clumsily from my bed. To my delight, I only stumbled twice on my way to the bathroom. I stared at my bleary eyed reflection before sticking my tongue out in a raspberry. I brushed my teeth and washed my face as quickly as possible before I pulled my hair into a ponytail. I gave makeup exactly .02 seconds of a thought before forgoing it in favor of leaving the bathroom and heading into my closet, so I could throw on a too big, black and white sweater and a pair of dark, semi-skinny jeans. I took the time to find a matching pair of socks and pulled them on before slipping my feet into a battered pair of bright orange Keds.

I snatched up my phone and book bag before heading downstairs. Mr. Kalebrow stood at the bottom, tapping his foot impatiently. I rolled my eyes at him. “Well, am I on time?”

“Barely.” He turned on his heel, heading for the front door. “Let’s go.”

Rolling my eyes once again, I trailed after him and we were seated in his car and on our way within minutes. I played with my seatbelt, feeling oddly restless. I tapped my foot to some nameless tune, before heaving out a sigh and leaning forward to switch on the radio. Going with my sudden mood, I fiddled with the dial until I found an alternative station, blasting out some remixed version of a Radiohead song. My foot continued its tapping, this time to the beat of the music.

“Really?” Mr. Kalebrow asked me, shooting me an exasperated glare. “Are you really going to make me listen to this shit?”

“Listen here, buddy. It doesn’t have to be Rachmaninoff and Mozart all the time, okay?” I returned his glare and crossed my arms over my chest, before I realized where we were. “Hey, eyes on the road, Kalebrow!”

“Nothing wrong with Rachmaninoff.” He muttered it defensively beneath his breath as he turned his eyes back to the road. Speaking up, he addressed me directly. “What the hell is your problem anyway, kiddo?”

I turned my gaze out the window, trying not to pout. “I don’t know.”

I could feel his eyes on me as he spoke. “You and the teacher have a fight?”

“No, we did not have a fight.”

“Are you pissy because you’re tired?”

“No.”

“Then what the hell is it? Because I’ll be damned before I put up with this shit all day.” He pulled into the school’s lot, parked and turned in his seat to face me.

“You don’t have to! You’ll just sit in this parking lot and sleep all day! That’s all you do! When are you actually going to get something done?!” The words tumbled out of my mouth, one after the other, all of their own accord. I couldn’t stem the flow, try as I might. “It’s nearly been a month and you have nothing to show for it! Why isn’t this over yet?!”

There it was. There was the source of my sudden restlessness. I was impatient. I was fed up. I was tired of waiting and under all that I was scared. I thought back on the last several weeks, looking at my behavior throughout the time. Overly cheerful. Clinging too tightly to the people around me. Faking too many smiles and ignoring too many emotions. I’d projected that overly cheerful attitude onto everyone around me and they’d adopted it in deference to me, so I had nobody but myself to blame for my sudden irritation at it. I closed my eyes tightly, ashamed of myself. “I’m sorry, Noah. I’m sorry.”

“No, it’s alright. I understand.” Mr. Kalebrow’s voice was gentle and I opened my eyes to see his concerned gaze on my face. “Look, why don’t you just ditch today? I’ll the teacher and-.”

I shook my head. “No, it’s Wednesday.”

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“My History teacher gives a quiz every Wednesday. I can’t miss another one.” I took a deep breath before unlatching my seatbelt and opening the passenger door. “I really am sorry for snapping at you like that, Noah. I know you’re doing your best.”

He shrugged. “You were right though, nothing really has gotten done. In my own defense, however, there’s really not a lot I can do but stockpile information on the people you interact with on a day to day basis. If I could get my hands on that police report…” His hands clenched into fist as he trailed off. “The cops have something otherwise they would be clutching it so tightly to their chests. I need that police report.”

“You’ll get it.” I leaned over to give him an impulsive kiss on the cheek before exiting the car and tossing a ‘thanks for the ride’ over my shoulder and slamming the door shut. I hurried into the school, into my hallway. That’s how I’d come to think of it nowadays, as it not only held all of my classes but my locker as well now, so that Ben could keep an eye on me as I switched out textbooks and binders. I never ventured from this certain stretch of classrooms. I ignored the large amount of students milling about and went straight to my locker.

I thought back on my conversation with Noah and wondered what I could do to help, as I twisted my combination into the lock. Would the police give a copy of the report to me? I’d been the one attacked after all. That mean they had to, right? I sighed to myself, making a mental note to have whoever ended up driving me home stop off at the police station after school. If I could get my hands on that report for Noah, this might all be over soon.

A small smile graced my lips at the thought and I swung open my locker. In the very next instant the smile was gone, replaced with my gaping mouth as I stared at the sight before me. It took me several minutes to comprehend what I was seeing and in the next instant after I had, I was screaming. I dropped my bag and scrambled backwards, falling on my ass in the process, as scream after scream tore its way out of my throat.

“Elizabeth!” Ben shouted my name at me, his hands clamping down on my shoulders as he dropped to his knees beside me. “What is it? Are you hurt? Where are you hurt, Elizabeth? Sweetheart? Tell me!”

I shook my head, one last shriek ripping from my esophagus. The end of it was cut off by a hysterical sob and I flailed my arms wildly, trying to explain. “M-m-m- Oh, god. Oh, god. P-please, get it out!”

“Get what-?” Ben was cut off by another students scream. We both looked up to see a girl staring wide-eyed and horrified at my locker. Ben followed her gaze and I heard him suck in a harsh breath. “Jesus…”

I squeezed my eyes shut, refusing to look at it again. More sobs tore themselves from my chest and my flailing hand finally found purchase on Ben’s shirt. I clutched wildly at him, begging, “Get it out. Get it out. Please, get it out…”