Check, Please (Book #2)

Twelve.

I waited another week before finally sucking up my pride and going back to Hines' office. I'd asked Parker to find out ahead of time when Melanie would be there, and then prayed that my professor wouldn't be. Although I doubted he'd mind if I told him I needed a tutor for his class, I could just as easily see him offering to help me out personally. Maybe it would've been better to have the remedial lessons coming straight from my teacher's mouth but I doubted that I would actually learn anything from him. Instead, I'd sit in his office sweating buckets and crossing my fingers that I didn't sound like a total idiot when I asked questions. No, that sounded like painful waste of time and, for some reason, I found it easier to accept the idea of Melanie walking me through each lesson rather than Hines doing the same thing.

Holding my breath as I lifted my fist to knock on Professor Hines' door, I felt an irrational urge to walk away and figure things out on my own. Maybe I'd be able to turn my grade around with some extra effort, though I knew that thought stemmed from an inflated ego rather than a place of reason. Shaking my head, I rapped my knuckles against the doorframe before the devil on my shoulder could talk me into shooting myself in the foot.

Although I'd been contemplating running away just a few moments before, I was relieved when I heard a girl's voice call, "Come in."

Pressing all of my weight against the doorknob, Melanie smiled when she saw me walk inside. My nervous reluctance began to fade. "Hey," she said, reaching up to tug at her ponytail. "One second, I just need to finish grading this."

Careful not to disturb the precariously balanced stacks of paper around my feet, I took off my backpack and cautiously made my way towards the chair that I'd sat in during my last visit. It was still in the same angle that I'd left it in, and I had a feeling that it probably wouldn't move after I left either.

"You know, you have terrible timing," Melanie said as she crossed out an answer on the exam in front of her. I watched her green pen fly back and forth across the page while she wrote out the steps to the correct equation.

"Why?"

"Hines literally left..." She glanced over her shoulder at the wall clock above her head. "Fifteen minutes ago."

"Oh." I swallowed. "That's okay, I, uh--actually, I wanted to talk to you."

The confused frown on Melanie's face was replaced by a flash of understanding. "That's right." She quickly tallied the correct points on the student's test and then wrote the score in the upper right hand corner. Reaching for a ledger book, she ran her finger along a list of names before adding the grade to a column titled, Exam #3. I liked watching the way her handwriting curved into neat, feminine lines. "Parker talked to me the other day--you want me to tutor you, right?"

"I mean, yeah, if you can."

"No problem." The way she said it made it sound like it really wouldn't be and she reached over to pull a nautically-themed planner from her bag. A golden anchor was emblazoned on the front and each time she turned a page, it looked like the tide was ebbing and flowing. "Which days work best for you?"

"Any, really," I replied, though I hoped she wouldn't suggest meeting during the times I usually had appointments with Dr. Fersan. "I've usually got, you know, frat stuff every other day during the week but I can miss them if I need to."

Melanie tapped her pen against the desk. "Do you want to?"

"What?"

"Miss them." When I blinked, she continued, "Your 'frat stuff.'"

"Oh, right." I shifted in my seat. "Not really."

Melanie smiled. "Then you don't need to." She scanned the monthly overview for September and I was inwardly satisfied to see that I'd been right when I guessed that she was the sort of person who'd keep track of all her friends' birthdays. Exclamation points and girly doodles drawn in bright ink covered the page. Towards the end of the month, Melanie had drawn a giant heart around the twenty-ninth and written, Sammy's engagement party! Pick up dress from seamstress - 20th.