Where Are You Going? - Part One

[churbooseanon]

Summary: Nic “North” Draktos is a nice college guy with hopes of becoming a teacher and maybe a published mystery writer. Perhaps that means he jumps at strange goings-on that probably aren’t really mysteries. Yet there’s this one guy he keeps seeing around campus, and he doesn’t know what to make of the guy. And the ‘mysterious’ Miles ‘York’ Cunningham? Well, he’s just an overworked, probably slightly overpaid guy working his hardest to support him and his younger brother after their world fell apart a while ago. But together they might be able to solve the question of where life goes from here.

Well this sure turned out to be more than expected. I promised myself I wouldn’t start something new. And yet here we are, something new. I have no clue how long it will be. I just know I’m exploring this.

Where Are You Going? - Part One

    Oddly enough it’s not the motion that really makes him stand out. Apparently people really aren’t good with the early morning classes, because there is almost always one or two coming through the door just before the start of class. In the front of the room Professor Halliday watches sharply for anyone to be tardy, a pen hovering over a piece of paper to take down the names of those to earn his ire and a classwide mocking. Well, the former happened, but despite Halliday’s threats the latter hadn’t come to pass. No one wanted to be the one giving that shame, in case it might be for them. So it isn’t the motion that draws Nic’s attention, no. It’s the fact that Professor Halliday doesn’t speak up. There’s a brief glance from the mustached man, and then… nothing. No note taken, no comment, just Professor Halliday starting into the morning lecture.

    Notes are important, Nic reminds himself of that, tries his hardest to focus only on the lecture. It’s a dry class at best, the material far from Nic’s wheelhouse, but in a liberal arts school you took what classes you could get to deal with mandatory course load before throwing yourself at your major. Which was why Nic was here, at eight in the morning, trying to learn statistics from a man who couldn’t keep his voice above a low drone. Notes are important, Nic reminds himself as he sips at his overly caffeinated coffee, it’s only that he doesn’t know that he can keep paying attention. In addition to Halliday being Halliday… well, the guy that walked in.

    The guy sits in the back corner. Very back corner. Like no way he isn’t getting out of the room first, and Halliday doesn’t let anyone sit there. Nic tried it out a week back just before the first class, and he knows it’s more than just something the Professor hates, it’s unstable. The seats in here are the old sort of metal with poorly padded backs and bottoms covered with a fabric that feels like sandpaper on the skin. Worse, the bottoms of the seats fold down when used, and flip back up to vertical when not so people can get through the aisles. And that particular one, unless someone managed to change it out in the last week, was almost off its hinges, the thing was almost falling off. That the guy would hover there was mind-boggling. That Halliday allowed it was something else.

    Lord help him, he has to know more. Which is what gets Nic quietly getting to his feet. It’s not like Halliday isn’t just going over examples of a concept he’s already gone over a few times in the last ten minutes. Not his fault, really, the class is basically created for freshmen and non-majors, so he takes it relatively slow. Faster than high school would have, but still slow enough. And Nic? Nic has to get a look at the man, which means quietly slipping up the aisle, trying to keep from disturbing people as he executes his escape all for the point of catching sight of one person.

    He’s handsome, that’s what Nic gets from the quick glance at him as he moves quickly and quietly up the aisle. His brown hair is almost artfully tousled, his soft gray eyes focused intently on Professor Halliday’s lecture. The mustard yellow shirt he’s wearing has the school logo on it, like the ones in the campus bookstore, and a small stain on the collar that might be grease. Without looking the man is writing quick and highly detailed in a notebook at his side, but he doesn’t have the textbook with him like other students, he doesn’t have the handout from the previous night’s homework that will be turned in at the end of class. It’s a strange sort of mix of things that leaves Nic wondering more about this man rather than less. His face is young, probably not much older than Nic, so… senior year? On the other hand there’s a bag at his feet that isn’t really a bookbag, more like a heavy satchel like those the faculty use, almost matching identically to the one Professor Halliday has up on his desk.

    After he gets out of the classroom Nic strolls to the fountain. Needs to take up a believable amount of time, and to be honest his mouth is a bit dry from the coffee. Gives himself a bit of a breather, wonders just why it is this guy is caught in his mind. It’s the mystery, he decides, and Nic has always loved a mystery. Nicole always teased him growing up, saying how he couldn’t get his nose out of those books. Encyclopedia Brown when he was learning to read, Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew soon after, and before fifth grade he was devouring Agatha Christie and Conan Doyle, Sue Grafton and James Patterson, everything their father owned and anything the library could get. While Nicky was kissing boys (and almost immediately after switching to kissing girls and never looking back), Nic was trying his hand at writing his own mysteries, running them by the writing circle at his school, talking to the librarian to ask what she thought, comparing notes with his dad. And this guy was definitely a mystery. Which meant Nic needed another look.

    He heads back, resolved to get a better look. If he wasn’t certain that Halliday would find some way to punish him for it, Nic would fake tripping up, trip over the guy. It would give him a great reason when class was over to run up after the stranger to get more information.

    Nic almost stumbles over the first stair when he starts down. Somehow, he’s gone. The man had disappeared as suddenly as he had arrived, and all while Nic was at the fountain. There’s still time left in class. Where could he have gone and why? He does pause when he sees something. A pen, emblazoned with the college’s logo, lays on the floor by the seat. Not his imagination then. Nic leans down to scoop the pen up before continuing down to his seat.

    Damn, now he’s got another thing to wonder about.

    Who takes math notes in pen?

    Nic smiles to himself as he returns to his seat. This is going to be interesting.