Seven Twenty-Eight

22.

"I'm so far from prepared," Mary complained, reaching out to pull a plastic fork out of the cup, "What if the whole time I've been learning everything wrong and I go to France and sound like an idiot?"

Elisa raised her eyebrows, reaching over to grab her own fork. "Tu es si dramatique," She sighed, shaking her head, "Vous êtes parfaitement alphabétisé."

"Would you stop?" Mary rolled her eyes, "I'm trying not to think about it-"

"How are you going to calm your nerves if you refuse to speak it?" Elisa scoffed, turning to look at her, "Practice makes perfect, you know?"

"C'est la pratique qui rend parfait," Mary repeated, brushing her hair off her shoulder.

Elisa nodded, holding her plate closer. "Exactly," She retorted, tilting her head.

Mary hummed in response, turning away against as she began walking toward the table. "I speak plenty of French," She spoke over her shoulder, "Nearly perfect, if you will— It's just that no one else I know understands it."

"Teach them," Elisa joked, trailing behind her.

"Teach the Reynolds brothers French? That's funny— They can hardly speak English," Mary snickered, shaking her head as she squinted at the boys in question, "Some of the things they say is very questionable and-" She trailed off, spinning around on her heel to look at Elisa, whose footsteps faded off.

"What are you doing?" She asked, moving closer.

Elisa bit her bottom lip, tearing her eyes away to look at her. "I um-"

Mary followed her previous stare, turning around to see. "I'm glad he adjusted nicely," She mumbled, seeing Jackson settled into a seat with a familiar group— Aiden, Mellie, Roni, and a handful of other people she didn't know. "God knows he needed to get the hell away from us."

Elisa let out a soft breath, nodding her head as she kept her head turned away. "Je vais à la bibliothèque," She murmured, causing Mary to whip her head around.

"What? You aren't going to sit with us?" She frowned, moving to stand in front of her.

"Non," Elisa replied simply, her faux French accent still laid on thick.

Mary opened her mouth in surprise, turning to watch in confusion as Elisa walked away. She huffed when Elisa left the building completely, looking around for a moment before turning back to the table.

"And then there were three," She announced as she plopped into her seat, slouching forward to lean her chin in her hand.

Oliver looked up from his plate, his eyebrows knitted together. "Weren't you just with Elisa?" He asked, turning to look over his shoulder.

"She left," Mary grumbled, picking open her sandwich, "I swear I could kill him-"

"Where did she go?"

She slowly turned her head to look at him, her eyebrows raised. "To the library," She told him, "You know how long it's been since she's eaten lunch in the library?"

He raised his eyebrows back at her, leaning forward to look at Sam. "Tell your girlfriend to heel— I didn't do anything-"

"Wh— Heel? I'm not a dog!"

"Sammy-"

Sam leaned forward casually, wrapping his arm over her shoulders. "Come on, Mar," He chuckled, "He's right."

"I'm just worried about her," Mary sighed, folding her arms over her chest, "It's been a long time since she's isolated herself from me like this."