DRESS || ( charlie dalton )

i. of cigarettes and study groups

˚*•̩̩͙✩•̩̩͙*˚＊·̩̩̥͙

DRESS
(( — DEAD POETS SOCIETY — ))

—chapter i: of cigarettes and study groups

MY ROOM. ASAP.
-NEIL

LORAINE NOLAN walked down the hallway, taking in the different boys around her, swirling through and moving their stuff into the dorms.

"hey, loraine" a voice next to her made her perk up. it was harry, one of the students in her year. he was pretty nice, but tended to talk a bit too much, expecting she was interested in everything he was saying. maybe loraine was just too nice to tell him she wasn't, or maybe he was just a bit too good at chemistry. "how was your summer?"

"oh, hello harry. i spend a lot of it learning and reading books, my mother has left me a ton of them. how did your summer go?" she asked politely, discreetly looking around the boy to try and look if the rest of her friends had already gathered in neil's room. the door was wide open, so she presumed not and relaxed a bit.

"we spend half of it in italy, my father has a good friend there and we were allowed to live in their second house. the ocean was amazing, you should really travel there sometime, i'm sure you would love it there. maybe i could take you with me, next year?" loraine perked up at the sudden offer and while she would definitely love going to italy, she would never go there with harry bredston of all people. not that she had to tell him that though.

"oh, i'd love to" she smiled uncomfortably "but you know how my father can be.." she left the sentence unfinished, just hanging in the air, assuming harry was smart enough to conclude the obvious rejection from that statement, but that was far from it.

harry's smile didn't even falter "oh that won't be a problem" he laughed and loraine felt like she was being made fun of "i'm sure your father would appreciate the offer, actually he and my father are very good friends, as you probably know, i'm sure we will be able to get his allowance"

now loraine got seriously nervous. "ehh" she muttered, unsure what to do. and if praying without your hands folded and eyes closed really worked, then her silent prayer had just manifested into three really familiar people. from behind harry, loraine could make out meeks, knox, and charlie walking out of the latter's room and if he had sensed her discomfort, charlie looked up and found her eyes.

"heya, bredston, are you bothering our favorite daughter—of—the—dean?" charlie had swung his arm around loraine's shoulder and her body immediately came to ease at his presence

"obviously not" harry rolled his eyes "and i don't appreciate you inviting yourself to the conversation, dalton"

"oh, you don't?" charlie repeated sarcastically. sadly, the sarcasm got lost at harry's end and the boy shook his head.

"of course, i don't, i wanted to ask loraine something in private and we were having a pleasant conversation until you guys came along" he raised both hands and used his fingers to point both at— and behind charlie. in the meantime, knox and meeks had followed their friend and were now standing next to them.

loraine outstretched her hand to the right and came in contact with the hem of knox' blazer, being more at ease, knowing she didn't have to tackle harry alone anymore.

at the lack of any more input from either side, harry shook his head disapprovingly "this isn't over" he exclaimed bitterly, looking directly at charlie, before his eyes swung to loraine, returning to his overly happy self from moments before "let's just talk at another time" and with that he took off in the opposite direction, leaving loraine's last words of plead stuck in her throat.