The Art of Boy

--Three--

[dedicated to]: grrappleberry because omg ok she's back 

[A/N]: Okay, I suck at updating, it's official.  Oh man, please don’t judge me for this.

Chapter Three

Surprisingly, Noah stuck around.  Instead of being creeped out, he just looked amused.

"No broken bones," Noah's mouth quirked up.

"Well gee, that's nice to know."  

"Isn't it?"  A smooth, rich laugh escaped from his lips.  "Who's your roommate?"

"My roommate?"

"Yeah."

"Uh-" His name was on the tip of my tongue, but I couldn't seem to remember it.  My memory sucked like that.  Fumbling with my registration papers, I finally came across a name.  "Fritch?"

It didn't sound right.

"Fritch? That's the chemistry teacher."

"...Right."  After digging some more, I finally slapped my forehead at my stupidity.  "Oh!  Chase Arborhale.  I just met him; how could I forget?  D'you know him?"

I rubbed my head, deciding that slapping myself could never be a good punishment.  If I were to succeed at this school from a scholarship, I would need all my brain cells.

Noah took a step back.  "Chase?"

"Yeah."  I nodded.  "Tall, kinda scary, really nice eyes?"

I slapped myself again.

Mentally.

"Sure?" Noah looked confused again.  Then he snapped out of his daze, suddenly tensing.  "I hate that guy."

It was out of the blue, his fists curling into balls and his eyes narrowing.

"Uhm, okay?" I wasn't sure what to think, given that it was my first day in the wrong school and that all I wanted at the moment was to know that my to-be roommate wasn't getting hate mail.  But apparently that was too much to ask for.

Noah sighed, running a hand through his hair.  "He's just an ass.  Avoid him as much as possible."

But he's my roommate, I wanted to point out.  Avoiding isn't really an option.

"His dad owns the school," he continued.  "Basically, he can get away with anything.”

That much was obvious.

"No," he corrected himself, his mouth curling up into a smile. "He can get away with...almost everything." Then a smirk came over his face, shadows lining the creases so heavily they looked like scars.  He laughed, but it was dry and cold and sounded nothing like he did before.  

I stared at him, not knowing what to say.   His face looked a little creepy, but since I was just meeting this guy, I didn’t really want to tell him that.

"Heh," I choked out, "Cool."

Noah snapped out of his trance, shaking his head.  “Sorry, “ he laughed weakly, “Just bad blood.  You still need directions, right?  We keep forgetting.”

The change in subject caught me off guard.  “Uh, yeah!  Directions.  Right.”  I shifted through the stack of papers cradled in my arm, snatching up the map.  “I’m in…”

“Room 240,” he finished.  “I know where that is.”

“Wha-” My mouth dropped open at his retreating back, and I ran, stumbling with my suitcase to catch up.  “How d’you know?”