favorite liar | xavier thorpe

5. late night serenade... sort of

𖡼.𖤣𖥧𖡼.𖤣𖥧

After a fight between two girls and three guys - the girls winning, obviously, - an awkward interaction with the town sheriff who has already developed a vendetta against Iris and Wednesday, and getting busted by Weems for trying to escape, Iris finds herself in some kind of music room with a dusty, but playable piano later that night.

Yoko snores and is taking a nap before the fair right now, and Iris doesn't know how to get her to shut up, and Weems probably won't let her go into to town to buy some earbuds at any point in the near future, so now she's just killing time before Yoko finds her and drags her to the carnival with everyone else as she plays some Beethoven piece she always forgets the name of.

The room she's in is surprisingly scenic for being so abandoned. Then again, all the rooms here feel abandoned, so maybe she's just gotten used to it. It's small, only enough room for the piano, a person to sit in front of it, and six foot tall stacks of boxes on either side filled with various music sheets, none of which Iris recognizes anyway.

And there's one window straight ahead, staring out the side of the school with just rows and rows of trees, and slightly in the distance and to the right is a lake running on infinitely. It's very artsy, if Iris says so herself.

"Are you not freezing?" Iris is more shocked by the fact that she didn't hear anyone coming than she is by the voice that appears to her right. Xavier, of course.

She doesn't stop playing, but she loses her place a bit in her music - Wednesday gets Thing for tonight (they do every other day), so she doesn't have his usual helping hand turning her sheets for her when she needs - so she's decided to just memorize the tune to make her life easier.

"No," Iris can slip out, but the syllable makes her miss a note again, and now the whole symphony sounds silly, and she'll have to start all over, and-

"What are you playing?" Xavier takes a seat on the bench next to Iris and she has no choice but to scoot over so his side isn't pressing into hers.

"Beethoven," Iris answers more curtly than before so Xavier takes the hint. The whole reason she finds solace in playing piano is that she gets to be alone while doing it. After spending the whole day putting on a fake persona so that people will talk to her, Iris appreciates the time on her own.

"Ah, Für Elise," Xavier says with the accent and all.

"Definitely not," but Iris has already lost her spot, and it's far too late to start her piece all the way over again, so she just puts her hands in her lap and stares at the keys, knowing Xavier probably won't leave her alone until he's done with the conversation.

Iris doesn't really know how to feel about the guy. He's cute, sure, and him being an artist is hot, but he feels kind of. . . entitled sometimes.

She stalked him through Enid's gossip page and learned his dad is a super famous psychic, and maybe it's because of that that the two are so drawn to each other. Iris with her visions and Xavier with whatever he inherited from his dad. Two peas in a pod.

But it still seems like he expects something out of Iris. Like every time they're within 10 feet of each other, he wants her to drop everything to have a conversation with him.

But at the same time, he's oh so broody all the time. Like "oh, my life is so hard and no one understands me," so what does he really want from her?

"Teach me," he puts his hands on random keys, waiting for Iris's instruction. "To pay me back for the fencing lessons," he stares at her.

"Those were your idea," but Iris starts moving his fingers into the nearest chord position anyway because the mere thought of him pressing down on the keys to make a disconcert sound makes her head hurt.

"How long have you been playing for?" Xavier starts making small talk - one of Iris's least favorite things, but you have to do what you have to do - as he watches her press her hands over his to play the first note of Für Elise - his request, not her choice.

"9 years."

"Why'd you start?" Another note.

"Wednesday started playing the cello, and I wanted to be musically inclined too."

"I used to play the guitar in middle school." Two notes this time.

"Cool."

"Your hands are cold." One more.

"Sorry."

"Don't be." Three notes. "You normally stay up this late?"

"I try not to."

"My roommate was being annoying, so I left, then I heard music coming from over here, I wanted to check it out, kill time." Two notes again.

"Cool."

Iris picks up the pace in realigning his fingers in the right position and pressing down to make a tune, so there's less room for conversation. Nothing against him, just charging up for a whole evening of socializing at the fair.

"So, how are you finding it at Nevermore?" Xavier doesn't get the hint.

"Fine. . . Depressing."

"You just hang out with the wrong crowd," he assures. "Are you going to the fair tonight?"

"Probably."

"Great, I'll see you there," he lets his hands drop from the piano as he stands and walks out the door easily.

Iris's fingers are left feeling colder than before.

a/n:
bonding 🤞 anyway this was short I'll post the next chapter soon 😋