Tutor and Tutee (Deleting)

Chapter Twenty-three

Time flew and before I knew it, I was standing in front of Dorm 86, feeling hesitant to knock. Nate was reluctant to let me go when I told him that I would be back at the same time as yesterday. He was hugging me tightly, whining about how boring it would be for Laura to tutor him. I was also quite reluctant to leave him as well.
When I had the courage to knock, the door opened and there stood Laura. When she looked up to see me, she smiled her usual hearty smile and greeted me before heading downstairs to our dorm, leaving me with Leo.
Leo looked at me with a smile and waved, telling me to come in as I waved back awkwardly, walking towards him after shutting the door. I sat down on the chair and looked at Leo who was still smiling at me. I raised a brow, wondering why he was so happy.
"Uh, before we start, I'm just curious, but why are you so happy?" I asked, placing my stationary box down on the table.
"Well, I'm in a good mood, I guess."
"And why is that?"
"Because a friend of mine came over here."
I almost snorted at his assumption. Who told him we were friends? Sure, we got along previously but that doesn't mean he was my friend. He was probably only saying that because he doesn't remember me. Not that I care about his opinion of me but my opinion of him was that we were just acquaintances.
    "But you have Laura, don't you? She's like a friend as well, right?" I said.
    "Yeah, but ya know, the girl's annoying sometimes," he said with a hint of annoyance in his voice. "She's always bugging me when I'm in a bad mood."
    Wow, I wouldn't say sibling rivalry because it was far from that, but how could he say that? Laura seemed like a pretty nice person, to be honest. Maybe she was just trying to cheer him up and he mistook it for disturbing him.
    "You sure Laura isn't trying to cheer you up?" I asked.
    Leo just sighed as he shifted his chair closer to mine. "Maybe."
    I couldn't really tell if their relationship was good or bad but it wasn't my business. I shouldn't feel concerned for my bullies.
    "All right then. Let's move on and start," I said with a small smile.
    "Yeah," Leo agreed, returning the smile.
    Before I actually started, I looked at Leo with a small frown. "Listen this time, okay?"
    Leo nodded, placing his elbow on the table with his cheek in his palm.

After teaching Leo about Euclidean geometry again, I noticed that he actually paid attention. His eyes were focused on the angles that were drawn and he answered a few of the questions that I had asked him to make sure he wasn't daydreaming. I handed him a practice worksheet and told him to finish up the circled questions.
    Leo wasn't as irritating as before anymore. He was quiet this time and he listened to me. I didn't know how to feel about that but I felt pretty happy. He was doing the questions with a blank expression as if they were easy.
    Once he was done, he handed me the paper and I marked it. I was pretty impressed with his work. He was a fast learner but Nate was a faster learner compared to him.
    "Congrats, Mr. Happy. You passed with a total of 65%," I said with a proud smile.
    But he let out a groan. "Ugh, I thought I was gonna get all of them right!"
    "Well, don't be so arrogant next time. But good job on the paper," I said with a genuine smile.
    He took the paper back and smiled at me, flipping through the pages to see where he went wrong. As I looked at him, I started thinking that he wasn't a bad person on the inside. Even though he introduced himself to be a playboy type, he was actually a really nice person.
    "Ya know, you could've gotten 70% if you didn't make a careless mistake," I said as I leaned back into the chair.
    "What? There was a careless mistake? Where?" Leo asked, flipping through the pages again.
    When he almost flipped past the page that has his careless mistake, I stretched my arm to grip the edge of the page. I leaned closer to him so that it wouldn't be so difficult to point out the mistake as I didn't need to stretch my arm any longer.
    "Here," I said as I placed my index finger on where his wrong workings were.
    When he wasn't saying anything for a minute or so, I wanted to look up to see if he was looking somewhere else. But when I looked up at him, he subconsciously placed his hand on my head as he started stroking my hair as he stared at me in awe.
    I smacked his hand away with a small frown. "Dude, I told you not to do that."
    Looks like I was able to get him back from space as he chuckled. "Sorry. Your hair's just . . . really soft."
    If it were Nate patting me, I would have smiled at him. But this wasn't Nate. It felt different from Nate's touch.
    I wasn't really mad at Leo this time, though. But I still didn't like it.
    I puffed out my cheeks as I looked away. "Well, I'm sorry that I have soft hair but just don't touch it, okay?" I folded my arms as I looked down at my feet.
    As soon as Leo opened his mouth to speak, my eyes wandered off to the clock and I stood up, taking my stationary box. "Times up. I'll see you tomorrow."
    "Sure," Leo smiled.
    I managed a shaky smile as I opened the door only to see a smiling Laura outside, greeting me.
    Honestly, Leo wasn't a bad person. Maybe it really was okay for me to befriend him. But I don't know how Nate would feel about me befriending my elementary school bully . . .