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The second floor of the library, a group study area that is your usual haunt, is almost deserted-- which is rare for a Monday night regardless of the lateness of the hour-- and you had been completely focused on one of the readings for your Shakespeare class. Until you had finished it mere moments ago and discovered that you can’t find the next of your assignments.
“Bodhi, did you take that article on Hamlet that I was supposed to be reading?” you finally ask your friend, looking up from your search of the stacks of books and stray papers sprawled across your part of the table.
“Oh, I kind of.. drew all over it?” he looks at you almost apologetically, his eyebrows drawn together and his shoulders raised, and everything about his posture screams of nervousness.
It’s decidedly odd. After all, this is nothing new. Ever since you had started spending nights studying with Bodhi at the library, he has developed a penchant for ‘borrowing’ any of your papers that he can get his hands on.
You learned fairly early in your friendship that he can’t go to long without at least doodling something and since he usually only studies theory when he’s in the library with you, he never seems to have his sketchbook with him.
You’ve never minded because the random little drawings in the margins make you smile even when you’re plodding through a particularly dull essay.
Of course, there’s also the fact that you think he’s incredibly cute-- and you’d be lying if you said you didn’t have a huge crush on him-- and you won’t deny that you love watching him draw. There’s something wonderful about the way he throws himself into even the most casual of sketches. And after the first few times that he began to apologize, you had managed to convince him that you have no issues with this habit of his.
So yeah, this reaction from him, now, is definitely strange.
“Yeah, that’s fine, I’m used to it, remember? And besides, you always give them back,” you tell him, growing increasingly suspicious by the moment.
He’s refusing to look at you now and just as you’re about to ask him what’s wrong he speaks up.
“I’ll go to the GSO and print you a new copy,” his eyes are darting about now as he looks anywhere but at you, and is that a blush colouring his cheeks?
You can’t dwell too long on this though, because he starts to get up and you reach out immediately, snagging his arm before he’s even completely out of his chair.
“Oh no you don’t! Now you’ve made me curious,” you exclaim, leaning forward, eyes fixed on his in the hope that this will pressurize him into actually meeting your gaze, “Come on, Bodhi, you know I like having your doodles all over my stuff.”
You know even as you say the words that they could be misconstrued as something completely inappropriate but even as you begin to kick yourself over them, you realize that he hasn’t even noticed.
And for a minute you think that he’s going to shake you off and bolt but then, finally, he lets out a long sigh and sits back down. So you let go of his arm and wait, attempting to be patient as he pulls out the article you had been looking for from under his pile of textbooks and then simply looks at it instead of handing it over.
You lean in a little more, craning your neck and trying to get a glimpse of this mysterious drawing that he is so loath to show you.
“Okay, here,” he huffs just as you’re about to give up and snatch it from him, “I just...I’m sorry.”
At first you’re a little confused, he hasn’t apologized for this in a long while, not since that week all those months ago when he first developed this habit. And then he’s handed the paper over and all you can do is gasp, and then proceed to stare open-mouthed, speechless.
Because he’s drawn you- or to be precise, he’s drawn the pair of you in a lawn somewhere- you lying on your back with your head in his lap, lips curved into a lazy smile and a book propped open against your legs.
And him with his hands in your hair, leaning over you, pressing a kiss between your brows.
Your heart is suddenly beating faster and there are butterflies in your stomach and you can feel your cheeks heating up with a blush to match the one you find on Bodhi’s face when your eyes flick between him and the scene he has drawn.
What can you say? That he’s brilliant? That he’s drawn you too perfectly because you’re nowhere near that radiant? That you’re in love with the way he’s drawn himself? That now you’re dying to actually feel his fingers in your hair, his lips on your forehead?
“Is that...” is what you begin to say instead, and trail off, because try as you might you can’t stop the wide grin suddenly spreading across your face, “is that us?”
He clears his throat, shuffles his feet, blushes a little harder, and damn it, he’s even cuter like this, “Yeah, it is. I’m sorry, ___. I don’t know what I was thinking.”
“Well, I may be way off base here so stop me if I’m wrong but maybe you were thinking that you like me, and you want there to be an ‘us’,” you manage to get out all the words without stuttering or freezing up even as an inner monologue of ‘please let him say yes, please let this end well’ starts running through your head on repeat.
His eyes flash back up to yours instantly and you can see the surprise flit across his face clear as day before he lick his lips and settles for a hesitant smile.
“And if I was thinking that?”
You almost laugh out loud with joy, you are so damn relieved (you can’t quite believe this is happening, but there’s no way you’re backing out now).
“Then I’d tell you that I like you too,” you say, your heartbeat slowing, your smile mellowing, though you still feel like you’re on cloud nine, “and I’d ask you to get coffee with me Friday evening, or dinner, or anything really.”
“Yes, of course, to any of those, I’d love to go out with you, it’s a date,” his words tumble over the end of your sentence and he offers you a slightly sheepish smile, “sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt.”
You simply shrug, waving off his apology, entirely unnecessary as it is. And gods, just the way he’s looking at you-- his eyes display nothing but love and his smile is ever so affectionate and it would seem that he wants you just as much as you want him-- it gives you such a rush!
“That’s okay,” is all you can say in reply, and it feels painfully inadequate but Bodhi doesn’t seem the least bit perturbed.
And for several long minutes, you simply stare at each other until you find that your gaze keeps darting to his lips now and you shake yourself out of it with a sigh.
“Oh, and this sketch- it’s beautiful,” you tell him, and the shy smile on his face gives you the confidence to continue, “we should do that sometime, have a picnic, and I wouldn’t mind if you kissed me properly.”
You clap a hand over your mouth as soon as the words are past your lips and you would be dying of embarrassment right now if not for the fact that Bodhi doesn’t seem the least bit bothered—you haven’t even actually gone on a date and you’re already talking about kissing him-- oh no, not at all, he’s actually giggling and his eyes are sparkling with mirth and it’s just so damn adorable.
But then, just as suddenly, he’s smirking, and your breath hitches, and “___,” he begins, “I don’t know if you’ve noticed but there’s no one else around so I could just kiss you properly now.”
And so he does (once you’ve recovered from your outburst of laughter) and it’s everything you’d hoped for. And more. Obviously.