Screaming Color
three
xcole doesn’t think much about life after college. thinks about it very little, actually. pretty much not at all. but niall horan, her new best friend (she says sarcastically), thinks about it a lot.
it’s a thursday afternoon when it comes up, the future. they’re in niall’s dorm room and cole’s lying back on the bed with her feet propped up against the wall. she’d been reading her poetry book, but she’d pushed it aside a few minutes ago in a moment of intense frustration. poetry was going to get her nowhere, she’s convinced. absolutely nowhere.
niall, she’s sure, has finished the assignment already. niall somehow manages to finish the poetry assignments almost before they’re assigned. cole, however, has left it till last. she’s already finished all of the reading for her two history classes, as well as her french work. there’s just this poetry reading left, and she knows that if she doesn’t do it, it’ll haunt her, wake her up in the middle of the night like some bad dream.
so she picks it up again, but the words go blurry in front of her eyes.
“i hate this stupid class,” she mutters, shoving it away again.
“what?” niall asks. he’s seated on his rug, his back leaning against the bed, and he’d been so silent for the past hour that cole had nearly forgotten he was there.
cole stares at the ceiling. “i hate poetry class.”
“why?” niall pops into her frame of vision, his face just inches from her own for a second has he climbs up on the bed and mimics her position, kicking his feet up next to hers on the wall.
“cause it’s stupid,” she says. she’s being childish, she knows, but frustration does that to her.
“it’s not stupid,” niall says. “you’re just not very good at it.”
“heeeey!” cole reaches out blindly with her right arm to swat at niall, and ends up coming into contact with the warm skin of his upper arm.
niall shoves her back. his big warm hands tickling her sides for a second before he pulls away. “well, you’re not,” he says. “i can help you out, if you want.”
“you can help me out?” cole doesn’t mean to sound skeptical, but, well, she’s skeptical. niall horan, perpetually late, always needs to borrow a pen, that niall horan? he wants to help her out?
“sure,” niall says. “i’m gonna be a teacher, so i’d better start sometime.”
“you’re gonna be a teacher?” cole echoes.
“yeah,” niall says. “here, sit up.”
he twists himself around into a seated position and tugs at cole’s arms until she follows suit. then he picks up her book and begins to read.
niall horan, it turns out, is full of surprises. he has an impeccable reading voice, for example. he has the kind of reading voice that makes cole forget that she’s listening to him read her homework. the kind of voice that tricks her into thinking she could be half in love with him already.
(no, that part comes later. much later, on a rainy tuesday morning, when cole is lots of days older and several minutes late to class and wearing niall’s softest t-shirt like it’s her own. it will hit her like a shot of caffeine to the heart, and there will be no unthinking it. there are a lot of things, cole will learn, that she can’t unthink when it comes to niall horan.)
it’s a thursday afternoon when it comes up, the future. they’re in niall’s dorm room and cole’s lying back on the bed with her feet propped up against the wall. she’d been reading her poetry book, but she’d pushed it aside a few minutes ago in a moment of intense frustration. poetry was going to get her nowhere, she’s convinced. absolutely nowhere.
niall, she’s sure, has finished the assignment already. niall somehow manages to finish the poetry assignments almost before they’re assigned. cole, however, has left it till last. she’s already finished all of the reading for her two history classes, as well as her french work. there’s just this poetry reading left, and she knows that if she doesn’t do it, it’ll haunt her, wake her up in the middle of the night like some bad dream.
so she picks it up again, but the words go blurry in front of her eyes.
“i hate this stupid class,” she mutters, shoving it away again.
“what?” niall asks. he’s seated on his rug, his back leaning against the bed, and he’d been so silent for the past hour that cole had nearly forgotten he was there.
cole stares at the ceiling. “i hate poetry class.”
“why?” niall pops into her frame of vision, his face just inches from her own for a second has he climbs up on the bed and mimics her position, kicking his feet up next to hers on the wall.
“cause it’s stupid,” she says. she’s being childish, she knows, but frustration does that to her.
“it’s not stupid,” niall says. “you’re just not very good at it.”
“heeeey!” cole reaches out blindly with her right arm to swat at niall, and ends up coming into contact with the warm skin of his upper arm.
niall shoves her back. his big warm hands tickling her sides for a second before he pulls away. “well, you’re not,” he says. “i can help you out, if you want.”
“you can help me out?” cole doesn’t mean to sound skeptical, but, well, she’s skeptical. niall horan, perpetually late, always needs to borrow a pen, that niall horan? he wants to help her out?
“sure,” niall says. “i’m gonna be a teacher, so i’d better start sometime.”
“you’re gonna be a teacher?” cole echoes.
“yeah,” niall says. “here, sit up.”
he twists himself around into a seated position and tugs at cole’s arms until she follows suit. then he picks up her book and begins to read.
niall horan, it turns out, is full of surprises. he has an impeccable reading voice, for example. he has the kind of reading voice that makes cole forget that she’s listening to him read her homework. the kind of voice that tricks her into thinking she could be half in love with him already.
(no, that part comes later. much later, on a rainy tuesday morning, when cole is lots of days older and several minutes late to class and wearing niall’s softest t-shirt like it’s her own. it will hit her like a shot of caffeine to the heart, and there will be no unthinking it. there are a lot of things, cole will learn, that she can’t unthink when it comes to niall horan.)