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CHAPTER 4: CRAY-CRAY PROSPERO AND ALEXANDER HAMILTON

LOGAN

If you have read The Tempest by Shakespeare, and have three functioning brain cells in you, you'd know that twelve years in an island with his daughter drove Prospero to the ground; that man was delusional, a lot cray-cray. There's absolutely no other way.

"Man, are you seriously revising this shit before class?" Nate asks, a pen balanced on the crook between his nose and upper lips.

"Believe it or not, I genuinely want good marks in the subject and not just pass it."

"Damn, smarty pants," He leans back in his seat, plucking the pen and placing his hands behind his head.

We are in our Classical Literature class and it's one of my favourite subjects, hence the revision before class starts but dear God, I did not sign up for a crazy book hoarder who talks to spirits. Margaret Atwood in Hagseed was right; I feel for Miranda, being stuck in an island for twelve years with a weirdo who wanted to rape her and a father who was mentally unstable and talked to the trees and air. No wonder she jumped on Ferdinand's back, she was probably begging to be rescued from there.

"Bro, Logan," Nate nudges me, "Isn't that Lex's roommate?"

I look up to see Ellie sashaying inside the room with a redheaded girl. She's wearing another one of those pleated skirts she wore that day, except it's not yellow but cherry pink, a cropped top thrown over, white platform heels beneath.

"Wow she looks..." Nate remarks, his eyebrows raised.

"Pristine? Girly? Preserved?" I suggest.

"I mean, she looks like she walked out of a Netflix movie."

And looks damn good doing it if I am willing to admit it to myself. Yesterday when I saw her beside Alexis, it was a pleasant surprise but surprise nonetheless, I didn't think the yellow skirt girl from that day would be so close to me; it's a small world indeed. To think that she got paired with a spitfire Alexis.

Yesterday was the first time I really noticed her, Ellie. She's definitely got layers, considering she quoted Virginia Woolf back at me. Fuck I was already sporting a semi back then and her stumbling and stuttering just warmed my heart. I never took well to people correcting me but Ellie narrowing her purple eyeliner tipped eyes at me with her, her pink cheeks going pinker with the settling realisation of what she said, had me zipping my mouth shut in amusement. She doesn't really seem like the Regina George reincarnation she dresses up as, not with her Virginia Plath information and golden-beige thighs that seemed to swallow the chair and had me mentally wrapping them around my head.

"Never seen her in any party before," I prompt, looking over at Nate so he can give me some more information.

"Eh, I think I have seen her at one but she keeps to herself."

"So, an introvert?"

"I don't think so, she does talk to people. Just not much."

She sits skipping a row, in front of me and I notice her shiny brown hair is held back with two sets of clips, decorated with silver stars. I don't even realise I am smiling looking at her until Nate points it out.

"Dude keep it in your pants," he chuckles, "Your hands are rough enough to make her bleed, and I can guarantee she won't be too pleased about the car grease in your hands after you work at Hardy's either."

Interestingly enough, I like the idea of dirtying her up a bit.

Thirty minutes pass and I am close to dosing off. Professor Lewis goes on and on about the similarities between The Tempest and The Hamlet, and as much as I like this class, I am getting a migraine right now. There's only so much I can understand about the symbolism of lightning in both the plays.

Ellie's clipped head is teasing me relentlessly, especially when she leans in to whisper something in the ears of the redhead and the clips almost fall off. Something about her clips are driving me to the ground, I need to have them and stop the itch in my palms or I will go absolutely bat shit crazy.

I stare at the greying head of Professor Lewis as she writes something on the board for five more minutes before a lightbulb goes inside my head. This might be the stupidest idea ever and I might come off as a creep but oh fuck it, you only live once.

 I wonder if I am spending too much time around Alexis.

Tearing off a page from my notebook, I fish out my Humans and complexities textbook which also functions as a journal for me, and turn to the last pages until I find what I am looking for.

'I am reduced to a thing that wants, Virginia. I composed a beautiful letter in the sleepless nightmare hours of the night and it has all gone. I just miss you; in a human desperate way. You with all your undumb letters, would never write so elementary a phase as that; perhaps you wouldn't even feel it.'

I scribble the note haphazardly and fold it up until it's the size of my thumb.

"Hey," I nudge the blond guy in front of me, "Pass it to the one in front of you. The one with the hair clip."

He takes the notes from me, bored out of his mouth and shoves it in the space between Ellie and the redhead. Startled, Ellie takes the note from him when he mentions it's for her. For the time she reads the thing and comprehends who it's from, I bite my nails down to their cuticle, Nate peacefully snores on his table, brown head covered by a book placed strategically in front of him.

For what feels like hours after, my nails are all jagged and my legs hurt from bumping it against the underside of the table restlessly, she sends a note back, a small smile on her face when she notices me noticing her.

The blond guy doesn't even look at me as he throws the note back on my table, the same one I sent to Ellie.

'Cold in my professions – warm in my friendships – I wish, my dear Laurens, it were in my power by action rather than words, to convince you that I love you. I shall only tell you that till you bade us Adieu.'

Alexander Hamilton to John Laurens in 1779 (If you don't know where it's from and mix up your authors again 😉 )

I lean back in my seat and release a breath. She's fun. 

                             ★-★

BESTIES HEYYYY!!
I've exams from tomorrow and it absolutely sucks B A L L S
Anyway, hope you like this chapter, please don't forget to vote, comment and share❤️