He doesn’t want me.
“Statistics,” I say, but my voice croaks, and he turns his head to stare at me.
I take a breath, try to regain my composure and force a smile. “Thanks for helping me with my assignment.”
“That’s a little premature,” Luca says. “I haven’t helped you yet.”
He silently reaches for the homework assignment and reads it over to see what we’re working on.
And just like last year, he’s right there, explaining everything to me, walking me through what the professor is looking for and how to come to the right conclusion.
He’s brilliant, smart, and sexy as hell.
I want to hate him, but I can’t.
We spend an hour together, actually studying, which consists of Luca tutoring me in statistics and helping me catch up on today’s class where I felt like I didn’t learn a damn thing.
He stretches and reaches for my notebook. My stomach grumbles as he turns through the pages and shakes his head. “You wrote all this down in class, but it’s wrong.”
“It’s what the teacher said,” I counter.
“Yeah, well, it’s wrong.”
“Okay, Einstein, do you want to correct it?” I hand him my pencil.
“Not particularly.” Luca stands and heads out of the study lounge.
I expel a sigh and rest my head on the table.
I guess he’s done with me.
A minute later, the sound of crinkling draws my attention, and I lift my head, glancing up.
Luca returns with a bag of potato chips, shoving the salty snack at me. “Your stomach is making sounds, and I can’t concentrate when you make noises.”
“Thanks,” I say, reluctantly taking the bag from his grasp. I pop a few chips into my mouth and crunch away.
The sound of my annoying crunching doesn’t seem to bother him. He’s diligently fixing my notebook, cleaning up my scribbles and comments so that they’re accurate. He’s flipping through my textbook along with my notebook, making sense of the chaos in front of him.
Is Luca actually being nice to me?
I opt not to ask, keeping the question to myself.
I offer him a potato chip, and he opens his mouth, letting me pop one inside while his hands continue erasing and then rewriting, before turning the page in my textbook and then in my notebook, doing it all over again.
“I think that once you have notes that are accurate, you might actually better understand what you’re learning,” Luca says.
“I’m not a bad note taker,” I counter.
“No, but I think you didn’t quite grasp the concept and then you’ve built on the framework, which has just made everything a mess.”
“Story of my life,” I say.
Luca turns his head, tilting it as he glances at me. “Don’t do that.”
“Do what?” I ask, not sure what I’ve done to offend him.
“Turn this into everything being your fault. Because it’s not.” He turns to face my notebook, flips the textbook page, and then erases my notes before reworking what I messed up.
