Enigma

Art Room

Nico caught Fab in the hallways right before lunch as she was walking to the cafeteria with Tracie.

"Fabrizio!" she called out, gathering his attention.

Fab jogged over with a smile. "What's up, Nico?"

"Did you talk to Julian?" she asked, resulting in a surprised reaction from Tracie.

"Who's Julian?" Tracie asked.

"The new kid." Fab told her. "Anyways, yeah I talked to him. He's cool! I was just going to meet him for lunch. You guys should come?"

"Oh, uhh..." Nico swallowed the lump in her throat she didn't realise she had. "No thanks."

"C'mon! He'll like you guys!"

"I...kinda already met him." Nico admitted sheepishly.

Tracie rolled her eyes.

"Let's go then!" said Fab.

"Well, you two have fun with the weirdo. I'm gonna eat lunch with Rob." said Tracie.

Rob. Nico shuddered at the mention of his name. Rob was Tracie's boyfriend, who Nico hated immensely. He was disgusting, very rude and always smelt like he hadn't washed in weeks. Bleh! No thanks! She just couldn't understand what Tracie saw in him.

"Alright...see 'ya." Nico waved her off. It looks like she didn't have any choice other than to go eat lunch with Julian and Fab. "Let's go, Fab." she mumbled grudgingly.

"I told him I eat lunch in the art room and he liked the idea of that." Fab explained.

"Yeah, he would." Nico laughed. "The cafeteria sucks!"

Fab jokingly elbowed her. "Why do you still sit in there then?"

"I don't know." she shrugged her shoulders. "I've sat in there everyday since freshman year. I haven't really thought about going anywhere else."

"You'll be in for a treat then! It's nice and quiet in there, and our teacher lets us put records on!"

"She does? Would it even be okay for Julian and I to eat lunch in there? We're not in art."

"Yeah!" he nodded, his curls bouncing. "She's so chill. She usually goes to eat lunch in the staffroom and lets us have the classroom all to ourselves."

When they approached the art room, Nico pursed her lips at the sight of Julian leaning against the wall by the door.

"Julian!" Fab waved to grab his attention.

"Hey!" Julian perked up at the sight of him, then noticing Nico was behind him. "Oh..."

"You've already met Nico, yeah?" asked Fab, pointing to the girl who had now stepped into view beside him.

"Yeah, hey." Julian didn't make eye contact with Nico at all as he spoke, which hurt her feelings a little.

"Hi, Julian." she mumbled, staring down at her boots.

Fab pushed open the door of the art room and stepped aside to let Julian and Nico in.

"Looks like no one else is in today." he said, noticing the obvious lack of people. "Sweet! Room to ourselves."

Nico immediately walked over to the record player at the front of the room and got down on her knees to look through the box of vinyl beside it.

Fab pulled out his sketchbook that he carried with him everywhere and put it on a table that he sat behind. He grabbed a box of colorful pastels from a table beside him and smiled to himself. "I've gotta work on a project, so you guys do whatever. Just don't break anything or I'll lose my lunchtime privileges in here." he laughed.

"Sure thing, man." said Julian, reaching into his pocket. "Can I smoke in here?"

"If you lock the door, turn the fan on and go over by the window, yeah." replied Fab. He didn't take his eyes off his paper as he roughly scribbled things down.

Nico's eyes lit up as she found one of her favorite records, 'Dark Side of the Moon' by Pink Floyd, and she picked it up, waving it in the air with a quizzical look to show Julian and Fab.

"Yes, a classic!" Fab nodded enthusiastically, whereas Julian just shrugged as he opened a window.

Julian thought that if he showed clear disinterest in anything Nico did, she was more likely to leave him alone.

Nico stood up, carefully took the record out of it's sleeve and put it on, instantly smiling when it started. Her smile made Julian want to smile too, but he kept a frown on his face as he puffed on a cigarette.

"You were right, Fab!" Nico giggled as she danced about the room, her skirt flowing gracefully with every movement. "I do like it in here!"

Fab chuckled to himself as he watched her dance about. She looked like a flower dancing around in the cool summer breeze.

"Hey, man," Julian spoke up, motioning to Fab with a box of cigarettes. "You smoke?"

"Yeah, thanks dude," Fab nodded. "...but I've gotta stay here and work on this for a bit."

"Oh, okay." Julian nodded, exhaling smoke through his nose. Nico blushed when she saw him. She thought he looked hot when he did that.

"Wanna chill after school, though?"

"Sure, man."

Fab turned to the girl dancing at the front of the room. "Nico?"

"Uh, okay!" she nodded.

No, no, no! Julian grunted. He didn't want to spend anymore time with her. She just looked so innocent and pretty. He didn't want to spoil that in any way...but little did he know, Nico wasn't so innocent after all.

Julian was shocked to see Nico pull a joint out of the pocket on her shirt and gracefully spark it up. He watched in awe as she effortlessly blew out perfect rings of smoke, then continuing to dance around the room. He thought she looked beautiful.

"Nico!" Fab cried. "Watch the smoke, dude!"

"Oh, fuck." Nico chuckled. "I forgot, sorry!"