fandomhigh | Chemistry You Can Use, Friday, Period 1

After waiting for the last students to arrive, Tyler shut the classroom door and briskly handed out copies of the syllabus. "Good morning, glad to see you all came back," he said. "First, that's your syllabus for the semester and the class rules. Don't get too attached to the syllabus part -- I might get bored and change it. But you might wanna start thinking about your midterm. It's about six weeks off, and you're going to be designing and executing your own experiment for it. We'll talk more when that's closer."

He indicated the paper mache volcanoes set on a lab table. "Right, yesterday Ino and Rikku, your TAs, gave me a hand and built those model volcanoes. Today we're going to make them explode."

"What you're going to do is put a good palmful of baking soda into the water bottle inside the volcano, then slowly pour in about a cup of vinegar. You can tint the vinegar with food coloring if you want it to look more like real lava. This is a basic acid-base reaction -- the acid of the vinegar and the base of the baking soda react and release carbon dioxide. The result is ... well, you'll find out. But first, let me explain what an acid is and what a base is." He did so, presenting a brief ~~and handwavy~~ lecture.

"We only have six volcanoes, so you guys get to work in pairs. Let me know if you have questions."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"It's only you and Liir, maybe Dean. Nothing I can do about that, but I can stop it happening again."

"Yeah, see," Ino said furiously, "that's what I don't get. You were fine with letting people get close 'til Isabel left and now you're not."

"She wanted me to", he says flatly. "Now she's gone, maybe I'm rethinking things."

"Rethinking things," it was only because they were in class that her voice hadn't rose above a furious whisper, "so I'm just a thing now?"

"...what? You're not a thing, but this... whatever... you can't make your mind up about between us is."

"There is no us if one of us isn't around! How am I supposed to know anything in that case?"

"I was right here", he points out. "It's not like I left the island."

"You weren't here," she said. "Not in any way that counts."

"Like I said." He wasn't looking at her. "Didn't see you come looking for me."

"Didn't think you'd want to see me."

Kabuto hadn't, when he'd not come to see her.

"Well, you could have asked."

"How could I ask if I didn't see you?"

"One visit, Ino. Would've told you one way or the other then."

"You weren't around."

And now she felt like crying. Boys were so stupid.

"What are we, then?" Just a thing? Just someone he'd throw to the side? Ino hunched her shoulders and didn't look at him.

Edited 2008-09-13 17:21 (UTC)

"I was in my room. You've been there before, remember?" Beat, and his shoulders hunched in turn, as he stared down at the papier-mache without touching it. "I don't know, Ino. I was waiting for you to make your mind up for real, but I guess I'm done."

"Done?" And that was a waver in her voice, though she tried not to let it. "That's it? Done? I just wanted someone who'd... be there."

"Right. You chose Kabuto, and then he leaves and it's right back to Michael the sap because he'll be there. Maybe I wanted someone who was really with me, but that was a dumb idea anyway."

"I didn't chose you because Kabuto wasn't here," she said, staring at her hands. "I didn't. I'd never wanted to pick between the two of you in the first place. You weren't my second pick."

Kabuto had just been there first.

"You knew I was going to leave", he said quietly. "Maybe you should've picked someone else."

Someone stable.

"Maybe I didn't want anyone else."

So not looking at him right now.

"Then you gotta take me as I am." He made an effort to take the harshness out of that, for once. "Next time I disappear, come see me."

"Okay," she said quietly.

"Okay."

He wasn't really sure what had been agreed on here.

Chemistry You Can Use, Friday, Period 1

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