LokixReader - All for an Ounce of Love - Part 6

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“Please have the logic puzzle done on Thursday, everyone.” The professor for this course, Jean Grey, calls to the babbling stream of students that are hurrying to be done with school for the day. And I am reminded that I have no idea what I should do now that I’ve seen all of my classes and what I’ll be dealing with for who knows how long.

Biology is the only class with that super cool interactive video game, and the other classes are mostly just lecture, from what I can tell. Perhaps we’ll get to take a field trip in Myth, but my hopes aren’t too high considering Asgard is off-limits to mortals.

Slipping my books for Critical Thinking into my steady, tired arms, I wander out of the mostly empty classroom with despondent ease settling in my throbbing veins. How have I already acclimated to this place? It seems like yesterday that I was still up in arms about everything that was rushing in on me at once.

It was yesterday.

Maybe it was because I spent all of yesterday night studying for tomorrow, reading up on things that I’ve never found myself caring about before I came to this universe. I mean, school is important to me and everything but I never really needed to put this much effort into anything before. And I don’t think I need to, but I feel like it’s the best thing to do right now.

Maybe it’s all just my mind’s way of getting Hans off the brain. He hasn’t made any contact with me since Sunday, but I think that’s probably because I never gave him my number.

But he knows where I live. So if he really wanted to see me, wouldn’t he have come here? Left a note? Done something romantic?

Suddenly finding myself at the dining commons, I throw my books down onto the nearest table and hunch over them like they’re the first sign of comfort I’ve seen in ages.

“Hey,” a somewhat familiar voice calls to me before the rattling of the table signals to me that whoever this is has suddenly invited themselves to my pity-party. “Remember me?”

My head flicks up to find none other than the girl who helped me in Biology yesterday. Her pony-tailed, brown hair flutters around her shoulders as she leans in, apparently taking a big-sisterly approach to my manifested defeat.

“I’m the girl from Bio? And your work?” Wait...

“That’s where I know you from. You looked so familiar...” And so plain...but whatever.

“I just wanted to say hey. I was worried that I gave you a bad impression back at the store. I didn’t know that Hans acted so friendly with people that he hardly knows, so it threw me off a little is all.” Wait...but didn’t Ed say that Hans was very much like that? Maybe he just acts differently in front of different people. But then wouldn’t he have just not let Ed find out? I bet it was all just an exaggeration. Maybe Ed is just jealous?

Now I feel bad for judging Hans...

“Oh, no worries.”

“Yeah, after Bio I figured I didn’t leave any impression at all, but I thought I’d be on the safe side just in case.”

“Again, no worries.” She sits up triumphantly, exposing to me a rather long elegant neck and the flicker of her yellow-green eyes. Interesting...I wonder if those are natural or mutated? Or contacts? No, I don’t see a line... “How do you like working for Ed?”

“Oh, it’s...uh...okay? I guess?” She wraps her arms around herself, apparently becoming uncomfortable. “I see it more as just being able to work with books. Ed’s kind of a freak.” She ends her pronunciation of that last ‘k’ with a laugh that explains the awkward look on her face.

“A freak?”

“Yeah, like...he probably just hired you because you’re pretty and you’re a mutant.” Rubbing her sides with flicks of her fingers, Elise’s neck twitches in what seems to be an involuntary spasm. She hides it with a twist of her now-free fingers around her deep brown, straightened locks. “I’m Elise, by the way. You’re r/n, right? That chick who’s got the same name as that colonist?”

“Colonist?”

“Yeah, it’s kind of just what she’s called around here. I mean, we didn’t really want you guys here.” Oh. Thanks. “It’s expensive for all of us and if all that stuff didn’t go down with that batshit crazy scientist, you never would have even had powers, so it wouldn’t be like you were really missing out on anything, right?”

“Um,” actually, I feel more at home here with people who don’t even want me here than I did living the life I had back home, “yeah. That’s true.”

“See? I keep telling the others that and they tell me not to say anything to the newbies but it’s clear that you can take it. I mean, it’s the truth and you seem logical enough. Your other friends though...I dunno.” She looks off toward a table of mutants that I haven’t even seen before, like we all know each other because we all come from the same universe. What in the hell is wrong with this girl?

“Well--”
“Anyway, so did you get to know Hans at all? I mean, I saw you guys in the coffee shop. You already looked like a couple. Was he just teasing you? He does like to tease. It gets sort of annoying actually. He’s annoying.” She pauses, scratching at the space on her neck that was spasming before. “I mean, I can’t think of a specific time that he bugged me, but I just know him as that sort of person, you know? You know people like that?” I think I’m becoming familiar with one of those as we speak...

“Nope.”

“Oh, right, you don’t really know anyone here, do you?” She laughs, apparently finding the loneliness that I hadn’t even had time to realize was existent absolutely hilarious. “Sorry, anyway, what did you guys talk about?”

“What?”

“You and Hans?”

“Oh, uh...the application?” Not that it’s any of your business...? “Nothing else really.”

“Really? He seemed really into you. Well, whatever. I’m sure he’ll come crawling back for more discussion on that application soon.” I don’t...understand...?

“Um.”

“Anyway, I should be going to work. I think Xavier said that you’ll be working tomorrow after classes are over. The shift is from four to eight. So you’ve got enough free time to do whatever. It’s easy enough to juggle.” She stands promptly, like someone’s just shouted her name. “See ya.” And there she goes, trotting off with the oddest gait that I’ve ever seen.

Brilliant. I’m surrounded by lunatics. And it seems like she has some sort of strange infection in her neck. Might want to stay away from her just in case it’s contagious. Also because she’s insane. But for public reasons, I’m worried for my health.

--

Alright, so, I need to read the next two chapters in Myth? I think that’s what Xavier said. Placing my pointer finger onto the blue scanner and my eye in just the right place, I step into my room with a careful thought: I have to work with Elise. She also never introduced herself. So maybe she isn’t even called Elise?

How close is she to Hans anyway? Does he act like that with her, too? I mean--
“What...?” The question slips from my tongue as the red catches my eager, blissful eyes. A rose. He’s sent me a rose. The flutter of the cascading breeze catches in the standard, pale curtains and sticks in my periphery just long enough for me to make out that he must have come in through the window to deliver the gift.

Was this the gift that Mia said she helped him pick out? He spent an entire night with her to pick out one rose for me? That doesn’t seem right.

But as I step closer to the object of my current affections and apprehensions, another red object comes to my attention. The envelope is embossed with an antiquated symbol, resembling something of another language entirely. Some Asian dialect, perhaps?

Instead of dwelling on it for too long, I decide to just open it, peeling open the crisp paper of the letter like it would fall apart if I touched it just a little too roughly. Feeling around for the de-thorned flower that still lay on my unkempt pillow, my eyes drink in the words on the page, absorbing anything that I can, except for the meaning apparently. Nothing that he’s written here has even made it into my apparently thick skull.

With the scent of this rose constantly wafting in on my tantalized senses, I take to finally reading what words he’s left me on the gilded stationary:
Dearest r/i/n,

I write to you as the sun meets the earth, the velvet headiness of this rose drenching my mind with sweet nothings that I might whisper in your waiting ear. But alas, you are not in my arms this twilight’s peak and I am not able.

If it makes you feel any better, my lovely Hans, I can practically feel you muttering the words that I’m reading against the cartilage of my ear in that silken bass of yours...

I realize now that I was wrong in my methods of gathering information, but I assure you that it was all done in the name of our love.

Love is a strong word to be sure and I do know that I use it with haste; however, there is no other word that I feel quite so fitting. I only ask that you give me a chance to redeem the indirect ways of my proclivities. This was as forthright a method of atonement as I could manage without bursting through your institute’s gates and proclaiming my undying devotion to you in gaudy song.

I think I would have preferred that, to be honest. But I can appreciate the quiet nature of this approach...

I will see you at work on the morrow. If you accept my apologies, please wear the bud of this rose in your h/c tresses, tucked just behind your right ear.

Affected,
Hans Kline

Affected? Who the hell signs their letters with ‘affected’? Even with the oddity, this letter is...well, it’s a lot warmer in here than when I first walked in...also, very glad that I closed the door. I’m fairly certain I was drooling during part of that.

Should I forgive him? I mean...what if I just wear the rose in another way? What if I wear it tucked behind my left ear? I don’t want him thinking that what he did was okay...because it certainly wasn’t. But I do want to see him again.

I mean, I will see him again, obviously, but I don’t want him thinking that I’ve lost interest. Then again, shouldn’t I be making this harder for him? Shouldn’t I try to be difficult? He probably deals with women falling for him right and left, especially with linguistic skills like he has.

I suppose...yes. That would be best. Flower in a bun for my lovely Hans.

--

I’m so glad that work doesn’t have a dress code. At least not in the sense that I have to wear a specific shirt and pants or something. Makes this dress both appropriate and enticing. He won’t be able to keep his eyes off of me.

“Hey, c’mon. We need to check in with Ed and get you a name badge and everything. Oh, and your apron.”

“Apron?”

“Yeah, to keep your taggers and scanner in. And your pens. Just in case.”

“Right.” And probably a phone, some extra bobby-pins...I get the feeling that this apron is going to be more of a liability than anything else.

Without drawing any attention at all in this mass of quiet people, we make our way to the back and find Ed’s office like it’s the most important mission in the world. At least Elise seems to be a no-nonsense kind of girl. Then again, nonsense can be fun...

“Ah, there you are. Have a seat while I get the tag set up. I didn’t want to make it without asking what you’d like to be called by the customers.”

“...Just r/n? I mean, I guess?” Then again, making it something like Aphrodite or Sigyn might be fun as hell. Especially the latter. No one would know how to pronounce it.

“Alright, let’s get the lettering on there...” He spends a minute struggling with the cream-coloured letter stickers and attempts to place them neatly on the deep brown background. Classy? I think? I don’t get a super shiny, permanent one like the one Elise is putting on her apron?

“We’ll get you a better one soon, once we contact home office and they get their shit together. Oh, and don’t cuss in front of customers. It’s bad for sales.” Handing the little piece of plastic over to me, he waves us out of the office; terse, aren’t you?

“I’ll be training you, it looks like. Ed’s not the best at telling us what to do,” she leans in as we make our way back out to the salesfloor and lowers her voice to a volume that I was beginning to suspect she was incapable of maintaining, “by that I mean he’s pretty much the worst at his job,” straightening back up, she smiles and reinstates her more obnoxious tone, “so we have to improvise a lot of the time.”

Letting my eyes tear away from the girl, I survey the grounds of the bookstore in an attempt at feeling just a little more comfortable in what is likely to be my second home--He’s here. He’s here today. I think my heart just tried to leap out of my chest and into his sculpted, probably perfectly warm arms.

“You totally like him, don’t you?”
“What--?”
“Oh come on, that wide-eyed stare can only mean one thing~” she sings, trotting along to join him at the front desk with me following at a distance...however quickly that distance might be dissipating. “Isn’t that right Hans?”

“What exactly would I be assenting to?” His eyes flicker over her, the green in them surveying the twitches of her attempts at trickery.

“Just say yes.”

“Ah, r/n.” His attention transfixes on my eyes for the slightest moment, leaving him to contemplate what must be the most uncomfortable dilation of my iris’, until he notices the flower in my hair. And with the slightest tilt of his head, he spreads those lip-balm-covered lips across his beautiful face into the most charming, embarrassing smile. “I’ll train r/n today, Elise. Ed told me that he wanted you up on register. A book has been released today to which men are apparently flocking.”

“Ew.”

“Well, you know how he is about the bottom line. Regardless. You know how to handle yourself with the men of this universe. It would be best to assume that this little love,” he gestures to me, stepping around the counter that he was manning so gracefully, “might need a little protection from the impending rush of perverted old geezers.”

“It’s porn?” Elise takes his place, scrunching up her face as she undoubtedly worries for the sanctity of her femininity.

“Oh, I’ve no clue. But by societal standards, all men are perverts.” With a flick of my eyebrow, I hold a stopping hand up to his attempt to latch so lovingly onto me again.

“That mean you too?”

“Ah,” the grace of his fingertips touches at my bare arm, warming what had turned to goosebumps at his breathy recognition, “but who ever said that I was a man?”