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“Will you stop it with the pen tapping?” Lydia yelled, reaching over to cover Cora’s hand in hers. “I can’t focus with that kind of background noise,” Lydia said just a little more calmly when she caught Cora’s icy glare.
“You’re going to ace this test no matter what, Dia, and you know it,” Cora argued with a roll of her eyes. She attempted to pull her hand away, but Lydia held it tighter and leveled her girlfriend with a raised eyebrow.
“You say that like you think you won’t?” Lydia guessed, rubbing gentle circles on the back of Cora’s hand to try and calm her. While Cora wasn’t always one for affection, Lydia had grown to understand exactly when it was needed.
“I took this class because you wanted us to have at least one course together this year and I have barely understood a single word of it,” Cora complained, finally mustering the strength to tug her hand away so she could lay back on the bed with a groan. The twin mattress was barely large enough for both of them, but Lydia made due by rolling in between Cora’s spread out legs, scoffing when she tried to kick Lydia off the mattress.
“It’s the history of women and gender, babe. We’re women so it’s important for us to know--” Lydia trailed off as Cora lifted her head off of the bed just to glare even harder at Lydia. She sighed and suggested, “We’ve got two more weeks before summer and a few months before signing up for next year’s courses. What if you choose the class we take together next year?” The minute she said it, Cora’s eyes brightened. Lydia would have been happy about that if a sly, mischievous smirk hadn’t spread across her lips.
“You know, I have really wanted to learn more about sonnets. How does Shakespeare 101 sound?” Cora asked. Lydia groaned and pressed her forehead into the mattress even as she nodded. If there was anything she hated most in the world, it was courses like that. She had chosen her double mathematics and biology major for a reason and one of those was so she could avoid reading old English - that made less sense than the Riemann Hypothesis to Lydia - in her free time.
“You have to pass this course with flying colors and maybe I’ll consider taking Shakespeare,” Lydia bargained, practically spitting the name at her girlfriend. Cora smiled and pressed a soft kiss to Lydia’s head before glancing back down at her book.
Cora passed the course with an A- and the following year, Lydia learned more about Shakespeare than she had ever wanted, but at least she had Cora by her side.