❀ Auslly one shot ❁

Fire alarm

Dedicated to PrincessMuffin21

Ally sighed, throwing her pencil down onto her desk. She had been studying for the last four hours, and she was exhausted. Her exam was in less than twelve hours, and she still didn't feel prepared for it, even though she had been studying all week. Lucky for her, her roommate was gone for the night which meant she had all the time to study. However, not even that was comforting. This exam was thirty percent of her grade, and she needed to pass if she wanted an A in the class.

Leaning back in her chair, she looked up at the ceiling in her dorm room, counting each of the tiles in order to pass the time during her small break. She could always ask the cute boy across the hall to help her study since they were in the same class. But she didn't know his name; all she knew was that he sat all the way in the back of the classroom and kept to himself. He never bothered to raise his hand or speak out in class which was peculiar since it was an English class. She was sure he had to have something to say about the readings they were assigned on countless times.

It didn't matter. She barely knew the boy, he was a complete stranger, so she shouldn't be worrying about him. If he failed the class then that would be his own problem. However, she did need help with studying, and everyone always said having a study buddy helped...

Ally quickly made up her mind, and gathered her study material that was scattered along her desk into her backpack. There was no harm in asking the boy if he wanted to study with her, the worst he could say was no. Besides, she was positive he would gladly welcome her company since she was the top student in that class while he was not.

She was about to zip her backpack closed when the fire alarm started going off. Cursing, she dropped the bag on her desk chair, and left the dorm room. Out of all the times to have a fire drill, the resident assistants just had to choose to do it close to ten at night. Granted, most of the residents were in their dorm rooms at around that time — most of them studying or getting drunk on a school night — so it made sense, but it took away precious time from her. How was she ever going to work up the courage to ask the boy to study with her now?

So there Ally stood, outside, fifteen feet away from the building like she had been told to do so many times before, in the freezing cold. It was the middle of October, winter was already in Vermont, and she was wearing sleep shorts with a baggy t-shirt that wasn't hers. She cursed everything around her; the people who were chatting at the benches not far from her, the resident assistants scrambling inside to make sure everyone left their room, and the boy in his boxers bouncing from foot to foot next to her. They were all part of the problem somehow.

Wait.

She looked at the boy next to her, and to her surprise it was the same boy she was going to ask to study with her. His blond hair was a mess — looking similar to bedhead — and his skin was flushed because of the cold air around them. He wasn't wearing anything other than blue boxers with little trucks on them; she felt sorry for him. It must have been worse for him than it was for her; at least she had the decency to wear a shirt.

"What are you looking at?" he growled.

"Watching the idiot standing next to me who thought it was a great idea to come outside in only their boxers in the middle of October."

The boy rolled his eyes. "Oh sure, make fun of the guy who was fucking sleeping before the fire alarm went off. Wasn't planning on there to be a fire drill tonight of all nights."

"Join the club."

She felt uncomfortable as his eyes gazed down her body, taking in what she was wearing before darting back to her face. "At least you actually have a shirt on — wait a minute. That's my shirt!"