seven

"Which project should we get started on first?" Emma asked, dropping her bag on the floor in the corner of her room.

Olivia held on to her own bag, not knowing whether or not to follow suit.

"How about Spanish?" the green-eyed girl mumbled nervously.

"Sure," Emma nodded and stared at how Olivia clutched onto her bag. Her knuckles were turning white.

"You uhh...wanna put your bag over there?" the Cuban-Mexican girl gestured over to her own bag.

Olivia let out a breath she hadn't realised she was holding in. Nodding in response, she put her bag down beside Emma's recently discarded one.

She unzipped her bag quietly and pulled out the notes they needed for their assignment.

Emma quickly followed suit, pulling out a notebook of her own. The two of them sat at her desk, flipping through the pages and reading the same poem from class once more.

After a few minutes of silence between the two girls, Emma finally slammed her notes down on the table and ran her fingers through her hair in frustration.

Olivia jumped at her partner's sudden movements.

"Sorry," Emma apologised quickly. "I was just thinking," she started slowly, afraid of how Olivia might react to the follow-up sentence.

The raven-haired girl urged for her to continue.

Emma sighed. "Do you want to get to know each other a little better first? We are going to be spending quite some time together after all,"

Olivia would've loved to say yes and leave it as that, but she couldn't. "Why are you suddenly so nice to me?" she snapped, causing Emma to flinch.

Olivia felt bad, but she needed answers. She wasn't going to let Emma's bipolar behaviour ruin her semester break.

"Just this morning, you told me not to speak or look at you. Is this only happening now, because we have to work together?" she asked, tears threatening to spill.

Olivia never liked to show her emotions because it made her vulnerable to her demons; but there was just something about Emma...

"No Lo, it's not..." Emma felt heat rising to her cheeks at the nickname she had just used.

She wasn't sure Olivia had heard it. Nevertheless, she pressed on.

"My dad bought our school a few years back without any intention of actually running it. That's when we met Ashley and Kate," the brunette shook her head solemnly.

"They've been my best friends ever since, whether I liked it or not. To be very honest, Olivia, I didn't enjoy any part of what I did to you this morning...and I'm very sorry about it."

Olivia softened at Emma's words. She felt bad for snapping at the smaller girl just moments before.

"I don't enjoy any part of what I do to the other students too, but Kate always threatens to tell my father things that aren't even true..." it was Emma's turn to feel the hot tears now.

Olivia placed her hand on Emma's shoulder. To her relief, the girl didn't pull away.

"Why don't you just tell your father about the lies?" she asked curiously.

Emma could only shrug. "I don't know. He always believes her because she sucks up to him," she sighed heavily before continuing. "I really do hope we can be friends. I'm going to do something about Kate, I promise,"

"What about Ashley?"

"Ashley, not so much. She's just like me, having to be submissive towards Kate because that bitch thinks she's better than the rest of us. If you could just give me a chance, I would really like to get to know you better,"

Olivia sighed. Should she really give this girl a chance? One moment she was beating her up, the next she claims she wants to be friends.

Could she really trust someone like that?

Then again, her mother had always told her to give people second chances. Another chance could change someone for the better, one would never know.

"Alright," she replied, finally giving in to the brunette's request.

"Thank you, thank you, thank you! I promise you won't regret it," Emma smiled, perfect rows of teeth showing.

"You're beautiful," Olivia blurted out, eyes widening when she realised what she had said. "I- I mean, your teeth...you have beautiful teeth,"

Emma blushed deeply at Olivia's comment. "Thanks," she mumbled shyly. "Um, you have beautiful teeth too?"

Olivia had the same reaction and thanked her quickly. God, she was a mess.

She decided to change the subject before it got awkward.

"One whole day together and I still haven't been able to catch your name, Ms. Jensen. Is this a song we're going to keep waltzing to or...?"

Emma gulped and tried to avoid the other girl's question.

While she desperately wanted to reveal her identity as the girl Olivia had heard crying in the toilet, she didn't know how well that piece of information would fare among everything else that was going on.

"Well, you've probably already heard my dad calling me Karla when he came down for a meeting today...that's my name," she said slowly.

"Right, that makes sense. How stupid of me to still ask you that question...I guess I'm still a little nervous," Olivia laughed and nervously rubbed the back of her neck.

"It's fine," Emma assured her.

"Not to be rude, but..." Olivia trailed off, debating whether or not she should ask the brunette a second question.

"Go on," Emma urged the older girl.

"You're not lying to me to protect your reputation, right?" she blurted out and continued to ramble. "It's just that— I've had a lot of people lie to me in the past and I don't want to relive those experiences. That and I've heard the other students calling you Emma in school, people like Ava and the others,"

"You've met friends?" Emma's eyes widened.

"Yeah, we have Math together," Olivia answered.

"Oh. Well," Emma started.

Should she tell Olivia her name was in fact Emma — the name she often went by, and that Karla was only just a name she'd let her family call her?

After a minute or so of debating on Emma's part and uncomfortable silence on Olivia's, younger brunette finally spoke up.

"My name's Karla. Emma's just a middle name. Don't worry about me lying to you. I've already promised I wouldn't do it, remember?" she reassured Olivia, whose tense shoulders finally slumped in relief.

"Thanks," the green-eyed girl smiled.

"Shall we get started on the project then?" Emma asked, referring to the half-annotated Spanish poem before them.

Olivia simply nodded.

The two girls worked quietly, letting a pleasant and comfortable silence fall upon them.

Somehow, they were able to finish their project without needing to communicate too much.

"Is it weird that I find it amazing how fast we get things done without even needing to talk to each other?" Emma asked out of nowhere.

"No, not at all," Olivia grinned. "I feel the same,"

"Good," Emma grabbed hold of her partner's hand and led them towards her bed. "Let's get started on our music project,"

Olivia nodded and gulped nervously when Emma left the room, returning shortly after with a guitar in hand.

"I'm gonna play a tune for you, okay?" Emma asked slowly, sensing Olivia's anxiety.

Olivia nodded again, not being able to form words.

Emma started strumming a beautiful melody, her fingers delicately pressing on the frets along the neck of the instrument.

"What do you think?" the brunette asked after she strummed the last chord.

"I t-think it's great," Olivia stuttered.

"Wanna write the first part of the song?" Emma questioned.

Olivia was taken aback by the younger girl's question. No one had ever trusted her with something like this. "Me?"

Emma could only laugh at the girl's reaction. "Yes you, silly. I trust you,"