Chapter Text
How did he let himself get roped into these kinds of situations?
Ajax set his bag down by the closest empty table and sighed as he took a seat. Of course whoever he was tutoring wasn’t there yet. Would it have hurt them to try and show up on time?
If any other teacher had asked him, he wouldn’t have even considered agreeing to it.
But Ms. Tsaritsa had asked. He had been so pleased when he learned she was his homeroom teacher for his last year at Teyvat High, even as the other seniors who wound up in her class grumbled at it. Sure, she was known to be rather cold and harsh, but Ajax appreciated her direct approach. Especially when he had class with her later that day; her class followed Language and Composition, a class that infuriated him to no end because Mr. Barbatos (who was always trying to get them to call him Venti, as if he was a student and not a teacher) never seemed to take things seriously.
That was beside the point though. Ms. Tsaritsa was a teacher that he admired for a host of reasons that may or may not have included her being hot, so of course he said yes when she asked him specifically to tutor a student.
It was a little surprising, considering she wasn’t the kind of teacher to go out of her way to help a student. Ajax assumed they must have gotten into her good graces, an impressive feat considering they apparently weren’t good at math. He was already preparing himself to be patient with whoever he was working with, winning smile ready to go the moment whoever he was meant to work with walked through the door.
Even if he was getting more and more pissed off the longer he was made to wait.
This was something the Tsaritsa herself had specifically asked him to do, so he would do it to the best of his ability if it meant there was even a chance she’d praise him.
The library doors opened, and Ajax turned, hoping his tutee was finally making an appearance. Instead, all he saw was Lumine Voltaire. He sighed and rolled his eyes, turning back to the table as he pulled out his History notebook to keep working on the essay Mr. Morax assigned for the next day.
It wasn’t that there was anything particularly wrong with Lumine, at least externally. Ajax could begrudgingly admit to himself that she was pleasant on the eyes, although admitting that to anyone else would be an entirely different story.
Because despite being more attractive than most of their classmates, Lumine Voltaire was a troublemaker. And not the kind that got into harmless, fun trouble like Itto and his self-proclaimed ‘Arataki Gang’ (and Kuki, who had always been inexplicably close to Itto and his gang despite her maturity and intelligence, was there to reign them in if things ever got out of hand). No, Lumine was an actual delinquent. She would talk back to teachers when she wasn’t skipping class and gallivanting off to who-knows-where to do who-knows-what, detention was her assigned lunch space, and she never seemed to turn in any of her assignments, except supposedly her group work. Some of the rumors he’d heard about her were even worse, though he tried not to put stock in any that hadn’t been confirmed (despite the fact that Lumine never did anything to deny the allegations against her).
At the rate she was going, he fully expected her to be gone before midterms rolled around. In fact, he was surprised she lasted this long. That’d be a relief for him, since she seemed to enjoy annoying him in particular.
With a sigh, he drummed his pencil against the table, but before he could begin writing, someone plopped down in the chair across from him.
He looked up, frowning when he saw Lumine sitting across from him, elbows propped against the table. “You can’t sit there.”
“Why not?”
He scowled. “Because I’m here to tutor someone, and they’ll need to sit there.”
She tilted her head a little. “Sounds like I’m exactly where I’m meant to be, then.”
Ajax’s jaw dropped. “No. No, you’re joking.”
“Nope,” Lumine popped the ‘p’ as she leaned back in her chair. “Sorry I’m late for our tutoring session, Childe.”