fandomhigh | Living On Your Own, Friday, 8/8, Period 1

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living on your own

Living On Your Own, Friday, 8/8, Period 1

The home ec classroom looked more like an art class today, with home decorating catalogs strewn about and a stash of shoeboxes on one table with felt, paper, fake flowers, wallpaper and carpet samples, scissors, paint, modeling clay and other ~~moddable~~ supplies in abundance.

"Morning," Tyler said, once the students were mostly assembled. He had a large travel mug of coffee in one hand. "Today is our class on decorating, or, how to make whatever dump you're holed up in feel a little less like a dump."

He hesitated before talking again. "You don't have to do any of this. You are not your Pottery Barn rug or your clever coffee table shaped like a yin-yang. Stuff gets oppressive ... you do not want a life defined by stuff."

"But," he added, a smile dancing somewhere around his eyes, "I've been told I'm an extremist on this. And on the theory some of you might someday want more than a futon and a coffee maker, you're going to spend class today constructing and decorating dioramas of rooms in your future home. It can be a bedroom, a living room, a kitchen if that's where your mind goes. Here are some handouts on low-cost decorating for you to get some ideas."

He gestured to the table of supplies. "There's building stuff and some catalogs for more ideas over there. Go to it. I'm around if you need help."

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There really wasn't any pushing to it at all. If anything, it was more like Cal fell on his own volition. He frowned at Amber, confused by her response.

"But I do like you," he reminded her. Wasn't that obvious?

"I don't mean like like that, Cal," she said.

Cal's heart faltered.

"Like what?"

Surely he wasn't that dense.

"I mean like... like more than like." So this wasn't easy to explain. Amber's heart sped up and her cheeks grew warm. So much for keeping things light.

His heart was practically jammed in his throat from the effort to leap out of his mouth, but Cal couldn't help what came out instead.

"You mean...like like?"

It was asked in his usual wry wit, which he thought left him vulnerable to Amber thinking he was just teasing her, but he found himself saying it with a surprising earnestness.

He was teasing her and she wasn't sure what to make of that. Was that his polite way of casting her off?

Still, she found herself answering, her lips curving just slightly. "Yah, that's what I mean." If he laughed at her, she would have to laugh to for fear of looking like an idiot. Amber prepared herself for the inevitable.

There. That. A slight upturn in the corner of her lips. That was a smile; that had to be good.

"How do you know," Cal asked quietly, "that isn't what I mean, too?"

Amber was terribly afraid to look at him.

"I figured I would just know. But I don't. I was afraid," she replied softly.

"Well," Cal said, settling his attention to the front of the room, away from her, slumping slightly into his position with his chin in his hands, "I did. Mean it like that."

So there.

No way. She looked over at him, stared at his profile, his chin hidden in his hands.

"Say it again. Look at me and say it again."

Say it again, as if it wasn't making his heart palpitate so erratically he thought that perhaps the Object's heartburn had actually been contagious. Still, even if she was just messing with him, which didn't seem like something Amber would do, anyway, he slid his eyes back toward her and did as she requested. Demanded, actually.

"I did mean it like that," he repeated, wondering why she would need such an obvious thing restated. He told her about his dysfunction. He kissed her. What more evidence did a person need?

Amber wanted to see his eyes looking back at her when he said it, that's why. Obvious or not, she wanted to be able to read it in his eyes. Eyes were everything. If he was kind, if he was truthful, it would be in his eyes. She needed to see it.

"Then why did you not let me really kiss you the other night?"

The urge to look away was strong, but Cal understood what this was. They were just going to be honest with each other, was that it? But he wasn't used to honesty; he wasn't sure he could really even do it. He looked at Amber for a long time after she asked, searching her eyes with his as if to find the right answer there.

He knew the truth was simple, that he was afraid, but the answer was still more complicated than that.

"I didn't want," he finally decided, "you to feel like you had to."

Her lips quirked upwards in the corner. "I thought you knew me better than that. I never do anything, say anything, that I don't mean or that I don't want to do. I think you know that. Besides I knew I was pushing you towards more. If it bothered you, you could have just said so."

Anything Cal could think to say to that, he didn't know how to say it. Besides, part of him wondered if not saying anything would gain him something. He was used to situations where it would, but things with Amber were so much different from anything else he'd ever dealt with, that he couldn't be sure. And uncertainty always left him silent, looking away thoughtfully.

If it bothered him, he could just say so. Well, he wasn't saying anything, so clearly it didn't bother him. He just didn't quite know yet what it did do to him.

Cat got his tongue did it? That or it didn't bother him which only made her smile, looking down at her too colorful diorama.

After a moment of silence, she gingerly reached over to try and give his hand a squeeze.

Cal looked away a little further as she touched his hand, mostly to better hide the blush that he was pretty sure was spreading all over his face, hide the fact that his throat tightened around his heart wedged in it as her fingers tightened around his.

But he squeezed back. How could he not? She was holding his hand and this...this was something he could do. Subtle and secretive, quiet squeezes that no one else would notice unless they were looking for them. This was what he was used to; this was something he could be comfortable with.

Amber wasn't trying to hide it. Her thumb brushed against his skin and she gave his hand another squeeze before she let go. It's not that she wouldn't mind holding his hand longer, but that they were in class. She didn't want to get called out for any public display of affection when they were supposed to be working.

Besides, he seemed too embarrassed by the gesture, looking away like he was, the blush that she had to lean slightly forward to notice... she didn't want to bother him. She liked him, after all.

"Anyway," Cal said, lamely, after a long moment, "I like your diorama."

"Yah, you do?" she asked, laughing lightly then peeked over at his. "I like yours too. Like those bean bags, eh?"

"Can't be beat," Cal said, giving her a faint smile. "Cheap, comfortable, and fills up space."

"Maybe I'll buy one at some point. My room seems crowded as it is."

"...your room that you share with absolutely no one is too crowded?"

"She might come back," she replied. "I would hate to take up her space too if she does suddenly show up."

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Living On Your Own, Friday, 8/8, Period 1

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