Chapter Text
There isn’t a single reason Theo Raeken should be sitting in the school library on a Tuesday evening. Not when he has better things to do, like drum fingers on his steering wheel in the 7-11 parking lot waiting for his phone to buzz with a want or a need or even a can you check this out? He’s not picky these days. Beacon Hills has been quiet for a little while, and he refuses to feel guilty over the selfish desire to have something to do. Anything besides pulling his seat back under the shade of elms in the preserve until it’s dark enough for the deputies to moonlight as Stanford Prison Experiment participants. Except, his truck started making a clanking noise six days ago and after three days of gritting teeth every time he turned his key, glaring at the dashboard like he could will the machine into compliance, his one lifeline in this town finally gave out.
There are many talents he’s picked up, polished and perfected over his seventeen years, but skilled mechanic is not one. And so this is day three of what he’s grudgingly starting to acknowledge as the week from hell.
No one’s commented on the fact that he’s been here more than any other student this week, nor has anyone seemed to pick up on the fact that he stays there after everyone’s left. He spends the time groaning, mostly, sleeping, occasionally. The highlight of this exercise in loss of agency has been easy access to the locker room. Running water, fresh towels, soap. He’s made the pleasant discovery that a hot shower can cure much more than dull aches. Boredom, for one. His face has never been drier but there’s something about leisurely scrubbing at patches of skin that makes the wait for sunrise a little more bearable.
He reads, too. What Beacon Hills High lacks in competent teachers, adequate security, a healthy school population… it more than makes up for in the wide selection of genuinely engrossing reading material. It helps that he sleeps between the stacks. At night he grabs a couple books and with his phone pointed over the edge of a shelf above his head, pores over them until his eyes burn. He never closes them when sleep tugs, only passes out after every ounce of defiant wakefulness is sucked out of him. If he goes willingly it’s never pleasant. He’ll wake up soaked in sweat and with limbs too heavy to carry him across the school to wash any of it off. To scrub any of the fear and loneliness away.
He hasn’t made it to the second floor. On the first night, he’d slept under the table, the length of his body just inches short of going end to end beneath the wood, and he’d woken up with a start— with a hand clutching at his chest— eyes bleary and desperate to blink away the looming shadows above him. Friend-shaped. Pack-shaped. Dead. One for each step leading to the next floor. The following night he settled between the stacks instead.
Tonight he’s restless. He’s scoured every shelf on this level. Mostly physics, biology, some chemistry. He’d even gone through a couple geography books.
He doesn’t think he can make it to the second floor, but the level just above the first, over the steps he’s loathe to trudge up, seems like a decent destination. It’s something to do.
He idles his way from the table, dragging himself to the steps, and his heart hiccups— as it always does— memories he refuses to bury clouding his vision. He sucks in a breath and leaps over all five of them, doesn’t trust his feet any more than that. Can’t trust that they wouldn’t give out if he remembers how crimson-slick his claws were the last time. He stumbles as his feet thud on the landing, but corrects his stance enough not to fall and takes quick steps to the stacks on the left. There’s enough natural light from the half-full moon to aid his search for something interesting. Something to do.
His fingers brush along dusty spines and books that have been dog-eared to hell.
He picks one, curious at its position between the hard covers of a set of encyclopaedias, tucked between the M and N entries. It’s out of place. Chemistry books are stored on the first level. He flips it open and on the very first page, above the list of names of recent borrowers there’s a yellow sticky note. The handwriting is atrocious, scribbled either in haste or out of desperation considering what it reads:
If you’re seeing this pls don’t take this book out I only returned it so I can borrow it again for another two weeks
He flips to another page and there’s another note:
pls pls pls I need this to pass
A few pages later there’s yet another note, this one with a line through the middle separating two messages:
If you have a heart you would think twice about taking this book out before I can finish all the assignments I have to make up
————
Also don’t move it from here I need to find it tomorrow
Theo flips through the whole book and there are at least three more notes which he doesn’t bother to read. It’s infinitely more interesting than whatever’s on the pages of the book, but he’s too restless to care about whatever academic crisis this person is going through. He flips to the end and a folded sheet of paper falls out. He picks it up and in the same scratchy handwriting— clearly this person just does not have good penmanship— it’s their attempt at doing a chemistry worksheet. A very poor attempt. As in, every single equation is wrong, and if this person has been enrolled in school for even half of this semester, that is an incredible feat.
He’s not sure what possesses him, but he’s at a table five minutes later with a pen correcting all the wrong answers. Every single answer. His lines are harsh over the pencil marks on the page, annoyance at the level of ineptitude rising with each question. Halfway through he decides to make a note:
Seriously? Do you even go to school?
Three questions to the end this person just stops caring and copies the same answer for the last question to this one. Theo is incensed.
Did you even try?
He finishes the next problems and scoffs. He flips the page and scribbles out another message:
Next time you take the book out for two whole weeks try READING IT instead of threatening other people who would actually get some use out of it.
Theo sticks the sheet into the book and tucks it back in place on the shelf. He spends the rest of the night reading about the history of the British in Argentina.
The next afternoon Theo’s at another table on the first level, waiting out the crowd of students eager to get something to stick in these final weeks of the semester.
When the lights on the field go out with that distinct click that signals he’s alone for the fourth night this week, he leaps over the five steps again. His landing is more wobbly than before, and he has to stick a hand out to grab at the railing so he doesn’t fall ass backwards and crack his skull.
He picks up the same history book from the shelf above the encyclopedias and continues his read. He’s restless again, and after fifteen minutes he shuts it and sighs. His eyes flit over to the lower shelf and he stares at the chemistry book. It looks the same, tucked between M and N, just as he left it. He pulls it out anyway.
Three sheets of paper fall out and Theo huffs an amused breath.
The first two problem sets are easy. And Theo’s not sure how much time he spends doing them but when he rolls his neck and checks his phone for— something, anything, it’s been an hour.
The third sheet isn’t a problem set at all. It’s blank with two yellow sticky notes tacked on:
Thank you so much whoever you are!!!! I left that in by accident and it saved me this morning. Not to mention I got ALL of them right.
And thanks for not taking the book out, but I guess you didn’t really need it since you’re so smart.
I’d be super grateful if you’d do these ones too. Pls pls pls!!!!
————
P.S. you’re kind of rude
The empty library comes to life with Theo’s chuckle. He lifts his head and stares absently down at the table on the first level with a tiny smile on his face. He grabs the pen and scribbles on the empty page:
You’re welcome. Also you’re lucky I was bored.
p.s. I think me being rude is the least of your problems. Pay attention in class.
The next night Theo listens keenly for the click of the lights being turned off all the way across the school. He leaps to the second level and this time lands on his ass. It hurts like shit but he groans his way up, rubbing at his tailbone and goes straight to the shelf. He has to hand it to this person, they could fool someone as sharp-eyed as Theo, because the book doesn’t look like it’s been touched.
This time four sheets are tucked between the pages. The first one is a problem set.
Theo skips to the last sheet, a buzzing sense of urgency flowing through him. He doesn’t dwell on it, just presses his lips together and holds his breath. Three yellow sticky notes this time:
Here’s to you being super bored today!! I know this is a big ask but I’m really desperate and I don’t have the time.
Theo guesses it’s the three sheets of chemistry problem sets in his hand. A lot of work for one person to get done in one night, but if this person assumes he’s a student here, it’s a lot for one student to get done in the couple hours of downtime they have throughout the day.
Number two reads:
P.S. You’re right. I have so much going on you being rude shouldn’t bother me. But I pay attention in class!! Chemistry’s just hard.
Number three is written much more clearly:
P.P.S Can you tell me how you got the answer for number 14 on the second sheet you did? I still don’t get it
Theo settles at the table and starts the first sheet. It’s a little more advanced than the previous ones but nothing he can’t close his eyes and do. He’s really good at chemistry.
When he’s done he checks his phone— for the time. One hour. Not bad considering he hasn’t written this much in a while. He sets it aside and stares at the second sheet. Not a problem set. Not even chemistry. This person has some nerve.
Theo’s staring down at an English Lit paper. A blank one. With only the question typed at the top. No identifying information or even an indication of the word limit.
Correction: this person has some fucking nerve.
Theo grabs the sheet with the sticky notes and he can’t help but scoff as meaning suddenly dawns on him. ‘Big ask’ is a gross understatement.
This person doesn’t even know if he can write a paper, much less if he knows what the heck he would be talking about.
He gets to work anyway, scribbling out points to answer the question— along with quotes that come back to him more easily than anticipated— because he refuses to write this person’s paper but he’s always found literature fun and it beats doing more chemistry sets.
When he’s done outlining what is soon to be a stranger’s winning essay on the significance of houses in works of literature and how they contribute to the interpretation of the works on a whole, Theo feels relief. The kind that comes from doing good, from doing well. From serving a purpose.
He sets it aside and narrows his eyes at the third sheet, which is another undone English Lit paper.
He shakes his head and leans back in his chair. He could just not do it. He was nice enough, kind enough to have done this delinquent’s homework for two nights, only for them to have the gall to pass off half a semester’s worth of Lit work in one single day.
Theo starts it anyway, and this time he decides not to outline the essay, but to write the whole thing.
When he opens his eyes the sun is up, and he panics. Shoots up with wild eyes, knocking his chair over behind him. It clatters noisily and it’s only when he realises he’s alone, that the library is still closed and empty that he gets his breathing under control. He stares down at the table and sees the essay he was working on, not done but almost there. He’s cutting it close as it is so he decides to make a note on the blank fourth sheet in lieu of finishing it:
Instead of depending on bored people to do your work, maybe just put a little effort in.
p.s. You say you pay attention in class but there’s no way you’d have this much work to finish when finals are coming up if you’d actually been doing that this whole time.
p.p.s. If you take out the book and apply yourself, you could figure it out.
He sticks the sheets between the pages and heads to the shelf. Just before replacing it, he leans down and scribbles just below the last line of his message:
Sorry I didn’t finish the second essay.