Ursa Minor (On hiatus)

A grain of sand pt. II

A/N: Dedicated to Alirawwrs for reading voting and leaving lovely comments! Hope you like this chapter!

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We ended up in one of the low buildings, a café/lunch restaurant. The season over since several months. There were only us and two older men sitting by a table each, barking at each other from time to time. The girl taking our orders more interested in checking her phone. The presence of the summer visitors could still be felt though. The place overall more functional than fancy. The flowers in the window plastic. The cutlery as well. The waxed cloth nailed to the tables with staplers. A kids menu with ice-cream included in the price. Allen lead the way to a table by the windows. We both giggled like preschoolers as I smuggled my vegan sandwiches onto a plate with fries. Fried with Godknowswhat. Allen looked at me half-amused half-skeptical as I arranged them to make it look like a meal offered on the menu.

"It's supposed to look like that." I said defensively.

"It's supposed to look like that." Allen repeated to an invisible observer to his left. Such a dork. I kicked his foot under the table. He didn't kick back of course. Too nice.

"You sure you don't want any of this?" He gestured to his own plate filled with fried fish and fries and mayonnaise made with Godknowswhat. Ugh.

I shook my head. "Fish have feelings," I declared solemnly, suppressing laughter. "They can feel pain."

Allen halted mid-movement, a fork loaded with fish and mayonnaise half-way to his mouth. "Even when they're fried?" I rolled my eyes, resisting the urge to kick his foot again. And Allen chuckled. "You got me worried for a second there."

I snorted, eyeing the fries on my own plate but resisted the temptation. Bit into one of my sandwiches instead. Suddenly so fucking hungry. There was some minutes of silence as we both dug in, focused on our food. An effect of the sea air maybe.

"It's a nice place, right?" Allen said in-between bites. I nodded. "Great to be back by the coast, my last school was also pretty close to the sea so in the spring-"

"What was it called?" I interrupted. "This last school of yours?"

"John Whitmore High School." I nodded, quickly adding it to the Allen-themed google list in my head.

"Did you like it there?"

"It's a great school," Allen answered evasively. "Great surroundings. We'd often..." He went on about outings or whatever, sounding like he was reading from an information leaflet handed out to parents of potential students. I couldn't listen to it. I stopped myself from snapping 'That's not what I asked!' Because there was an even more important question I needed the answer to. "Were you expelled?"

Allen halted his ramblings looking disoriented for a second before smiling. "Where did you get that from?" I immediately felt a bit stupid bringing it up.

"Uhm, there was this rumor, like when you started..."

"And you think it's true?"

"I wouldn't have." I shrugged. Finally deciding to go with my gut and abandoned my somewhat soggy sandwich for the fries. Delicious."But then why the rumor," I continued, chewing. "I mean, you're not exactly the kind of person that attracts those kind of rumors."

"Are you?"

I smiled. "No. More like that I un-accidentally almost burned down the science lab."

"Yeah I heard about that." Allen nodded, chewing on his own fries. "Was it..?"

"It was completely accidental. But it worked wonders for my reputation though, so don't tell anyone."

Allen grinned. "I won't."