E
VERYONE IN THE INTRO TO PSYCHOLOGY CLASS SAT UP, PREPARING THEMSELVES FOR THEIR GRADES. Slowly, Melanie walked around, passing exams back to each student. Noah’s fingers drummed across the table as he waited for her to make it to him. He had worked hard and studied for the past few weeks, even outside of his study sessions with Melanie, to make sure he passed this exam. He needed to because if not, he would fail. Noah anxiously waited with a knot in the pit of his stomach.
When Melanie finally made it to his row, she passed Julie her exam first, and of course, there was an A scribbled on the front. Melanie glanced at him before she grabbed his paper, and that made him even more nervous. Why did she look at him like that? Did he fail? Was she feeling sympathy for him because he failed? That couldn’t have been a you passed look.
When the blue pamphlet made it in his hand, Noah was hesitant to look at it as he stared at Melanie instead. She quirked a brow at him, probably wondering why he was looking at her instead of his grade, but for the first time in his life, he was scared to. Though he and Melanie were much closer than they had been before, he knew that she wouldn’t just give him the grade he wanted because of that. He would have to earn his grade.
She gestured for him to look at his paper before she went to the next row. Noah stared at the spot where she last stood before he swallowed his fear and looked at his paper. On it was a B. He got a fucking B. Relief washed over him as he breathed deeply.
“You got a B, Noah. That’s really good,” Julie said. He flashed her a smile as he opened his exam, and to his surprise, there was a message in it.
How could you forget this when it was the last thing I taught you? :(
There was a frown face next to it, and Noah couldn’t help it, he laughed.
“What’s so funny?” Julie asked curiously. Noah didn’t bother to answer her question as he looked behind his row to see Melanie, who winked at him. Noah grinned brightly. He fucking passed. All of the tutoring he had done paid off. When Coach Benson found out about this, he would celebrate. There would be no sitting on the bench for him, and he would own this year.
“How were you able to get such a high grade?” Julie asked curiously. And Noah wasn’t surprised that Julie was curious. Just a few weeks ago, he was getting D’s and F’s on everything. And now there was a B on his exam. Even Noah was surprised with himself.
“Melanie tutors me,” Noah said off-handedly as he continued to flip through the exam to see what he had gotten wrong. It was only when he felt Julie staring that he realized he had said something wrong.
“Melanie?” Julie asked with a pinched look. “Who’s that?”
Oh. “I meant Professor Bryant.”
Julie’s eyebrows furrowed. “You call Professor BryantMelanie?”
Before Noah could respond, Melanie made it back to the front of class and began to go over the ways people could improve their grades if they failed the exam. And Noah was grateful. He didn’t really feel like explaining himself about the situation.
It wasn’t long before class was over, and once it was, instead of heading to the door, Noah strolled down the steps on his way to speak to Melanie, who had a few students talking to her. As Noah straggled down the steps with hopes that by the time he made it down there, those students would be gone, Julie followed after him.
“Do you want to go to lunch?” she asked, hopefully.
“Oh. Sorry, I can’t. Mel— Professor Bryant owes me lunch.”
Melanie, who just finished talking to her last student, glanced at him with an arched brow, before realization settled in.
“Yeah, you got to pay up,” he said, thinking back on the deal they had made last time. If he passed this exam with higher than a B, she had to make him dinner again. And Noah was happy about that. Melanie’s food was good, and he could eat it all day.
Melanie groaned. “Maybe you should have failed the exam.”
Noah’s eyes widened before he laughed, following her out of the classroom. “How can you say that to your favorite student?”
“You’re not my favorite student,” she whined out as they walked out into the hall.
Noah flashed her a smile. “That’s not what your friend said.”
She gave him a look that told him she thought he was insufferable. That was okay with Noah because as long as she looked at him like that, it would make him happy.
“Let’s go knock out this next class,” he told her, wanting to make good on his own promise. She glanced at him and gave him a small smile, and he relished in it. Noah found that he lived for her smiles.
CHAPTER
17
MELANIE
A
