[OTA] Cramming

[itsybitsyrigby]

She had an English test tomorrow, and she was worried. At sixteen, what else was there to be worried about, really? She didn't have a girlfriend to be concerned with. Most of her friends were already in bed, or dealing with their respective significant others. But Karisa? Pff. Karisa was sitting at the bar inside MacKinnon's, feet swinging while she pored over textbooks and manuals and notes. She had goals, and that meant keeping her grades up. Even one bad test could be disastrous for her GPA.

But her Sprite was nearing empty and she'd need another round of fried batter crispies soon. And probably a break, but she might have to be forced to take one of those, even though she already had her head in her hands and a frown rather than her usual sunny grin.

Save her brain before it starts leaking out her ears please.

Comments

[standlikestone]

"Dude, are you studying?" At a pub? Unheard of. Riley will just be taking the seat across from her, beer in hand. "No way. Girl, please."

[itsybitsyrigby]

She shrugged, blinking a few times in an attempt to clear her eyes; cross-eyed was not a good way to read notes. "I have a test in the morning and I'm not ready for it. Yes, I'm studying. I have to." She attempts a smile, but it's not quite what it's supposed to be.

[standlikestone]

"You don't have to. You just want to. Crazy, man. Totally not what girls your age should be doing in pubs at night."

[itsybitsyrigby]

"You're right. I could choose to not study, and fail instead. Good change?" No. Not a good change. Not even close. But she shrugged again and finished the last of her fried batter bits with a yawn. "What should I be doing, then?"

[standlikestone]

"Definitely a good change. You haven't lived until you fail a test." She takes a long drink of beer with a smile. "What should you be doing? Picking up the dudes or the chicks. Let's be real."

[itsybitsyrigby]

"My GPA can't afford a failed test. I can't and I won't do it." But she will, however, sip from her Sprite and rub her eyes again. "I don't have a girlfriend. I wouldn't know how to pick a girl up if I wanted to." Which she doesn't. Because she has a test.

[standlikestone]

"Oh, really. You'll drop for a 4.0 to a 3.9? How sad." She mock-pouts, then leans forward. "That's what I'm here for, stupid. Come on. Let's go have some fun."

[itsybitsyrigby]

With a huff, she shakes her head. "You don't understand, Riley. My grades are my only ticket out and up." She has her skills, but they're all intellectual, at the moment. She hasn't trained anything else.

"Maybe just...a few minutes. Half an hour at most." She gives Ben a look and closes her books up; she trusts him to hide them away for her.

[standlikestone]

"See, that's the thing. Why would you want to leave?" She winks, then gets to her feet. "Okay, so who do you want to hit on? Besides me; I know everyone wants to do me but I'm hopefully trying out this monogamy thing for a bit."

[itsybitsyrigby]

Shaking her head, Karisa snorts. "I have to go to college to be a librarian, you know. That means I need the grades to go to college." But she shrugs. "Do your monogamy thing. I'm pretty sure no one here is looking at a sixteen-year-old."

[standlikestone]

"I'm pretty sure college will take you with a 3.9. Just saying. Unless you want a library degree from, like, Harvard." She snorts. "C'mon. Don't tell me you're too scared to flirt a little."

[itsybitsyrigby]

"Harvard wouldn't be a bad choice," she huffed.

"I'm not scared, I just...don't see the point if it's going to be a straight up no, you know?" Basically, yes, she's a little scared.

[standlikestone]

"For becoming a librarian? Honey, I don't think you should be slaving away to get into that school when you could learn the same stuff at a cheaper place. So you'll become a successful librarian after 22 years of having your nose to the grindstone, but what sort of life will that leave you with?"

She laughs a little, reaching out to tug on her hair. "Assuming people are going to say no is basically the definition of being scared. Come on. You're a cutie. And even if the chicks are blind, are you going to let rejection get you down? You're a strong independent woman who don't need no woman. Let's be real."

[intotherough]

Margery had blinked at him when he'd poked his head in the kitchen with the order of "Fried batter, basically. Karisa's studying," but the reason he'd hired her - besides her ability to fry everything that could be fried - was because she took everything in stride.

And he was sliding a plate next to Karisa's books and pouring her a Sprite Zero.

"I never studied so much when I was in school," he remarked. "Back in the Dark Ages, you know."

[itsybitsyrigby]

"Back when dinosaurs roamed the earth and men walked on all fours?" she teased, rubbing her eyes before straightening. Her back pops, all the way down, and the noise that comes out of her is both surprised and deeply, deeply satisfied; it'd been aching for a while. A crack of her neck, and her fingers, and Karisa instantly felt a lot better.

"I have a test tomorrow morning, is all, and I'm worried about it. Mr. DeWitt's tests aren't easy." And she'd only gotten a 92% on her last paper. It was an A-. She couldn't be satisfied with less than perfection. This was her life!

Feel free to make something up.

[intotherough]

"And we painted our faces with blueberries largely to freak out Romans," Ben agreed soberly. Though that was neither explicitly true nor that far back in time.

"You wouldn't necessarily expect theHearts to produce the hardass teachers," he added. "What are you reading now?"

[itsybitsyrigby]

She snickered, popping some of the fried batter into her mouth and chewing on it. It shouldn't be as good as it is, but she can't help it. It's all about the batter, and it tastes best here. Ben is also far more willing to roll with her weird tastes than is Diana at the Four Suits, so there's that, too. One more crack, one more moan, and then she relaxes fully.

"Dante's Inferno, plus the reader's guide and Cliffsnotes to go with it. And my notes. Have you ever actually had to read this?" It was amazing, sure, but she didn't want to be tested on it. This was hard stuff, and it sort of made her head hurt, just a little bit. That might be because of the late-night cram session, though.

[intotherough]

"In uni," Ben said. "For Catholic themes in literature, if I'm recalling back properly. " it'd been twenty years next autumn, after all, since he'd gone to the University of Aberdeen. Hard to believe he was getting quite so old.

"I'd think high school would be a tad young for it. My lit teacher liked to assign victor Hugo. Oh, and one harrowing semester with James Joyce."

[itsybitsyrigby]

"It's a study of language, imagery, and Mr. DeWitt being difficult. It's good reading, but it's hard. And his tests are hard anyway," she complained. There was a pout on her lips, even.

"Les Mis was last semester. If I didn't love reading so much, I'd be convinced that he's trying to kill all of us." Papers and tests and quizzes galore. So much to do. But it would all be over soon, she kept telling herself, and then they could move on to other things.

[intotherough]

"Teachers are always trying to kill us," more so when they passionately loved their subject as Alasdair DeWitt seemed to. "It's a ploy to make us stronger through torturously long pieces of literature and calculus."

Calculus was worse, in Ben's opinion. He had a deep-seated hatred of math that had made his da's dreams of med school an unlikely sort of thing.

[itsybitsyrigby]

"Working in the library doesn't actually alleviate the difficulty. It's shocking, I know, but no. Working in the library makes it seem even more ridiculous, actually, because there are so many other, better things that I could be doing with my time, but...I get Inferno instead." Karisa huffed. "I guess I'll survive, but really."

Her nose wrinkled at the idea of calculus. She didn't like math, although her grades were fairly strong in it anyway. But still, calculus just wasn't something she was remotely interested in being forced to include in her curriculum. It was probably akin to academic suicide.

"I need to find somewhere that I can get out and do something other than stare at my books for seventeen hours a day. Do you have any ideas?"

[intotherough]

It's one of those things you should only take if you have to - and Karisa doesn't strike him as a future economist or biochemist or some such thing. "Well, it'd depend on what you like to do. I'm thinking you get enough of the pub, working here." For which he's extremely grateful, by the way. "But there's always theatre and music and such going on. Chamber orchestra's starting their season soon, if you're into that sort of thing."

[itsybitsyrigby]

"Everyone would be confused if I started just hanging out here, anyway. Might start ordering drinks from me while I'm trying to enjoy a conversation with someone." Or no one, as the case may be. Ben was always the notable exception to what seemed to be rules in her life, but she didn't mind much. He was fun to talk to and nice to work for, so it wasn't exactly a stretch.

"I've always wanted to do something like that, but I'm pretty sure birds in their death throes actually sound better than me on any instrument, and wax figures act better than I do. It's embarrassing, really," she laughed. "I might take up something random, like ribbon twirling or shot-put."

[intotherough]

"Aye, and then you'd have to smack 'em. That's no way to guarantee yourself future tips." He nods, though his mother had put him on piano lessons in hopes that it'd cool down his mischievous side. Hadn't worked so well, truthfully.

"You could always do the backstage bit," he says, though. "Or just pick up baton-twirling. The flames make it awesome."

[itsybitsyrigby]

"My thoughts exactly. I don't see things ending too well if I have to smack around the clientele. That would be a different sort of establishment entirely." Her smile was mischievous and just a little more unangelic than perhaps it should have been. Karisa had her moments, after all.

"I could try that. I haven't ever tried baton-twirling. Are you any good at it?" Mostly because the idea of him twirling a baton is kind of hilarious, to put it lightly. Ah, life -- glorious thing.