Your pencil taps a soft, irregular rhythm against your desk, a sound completely drowned out by the droning lecture spilling from the front of the room. To anyone else, the equations on the board might as well be ancient hieroglyphics. To you, they might actually be worse. Your eyes flicker to the side.

Wanderer sits beside you, effortlessly jotting down answers like he’s been through this lesson a hundred times before. Which, knowing him, he probably has—in some secret, annoying, overachiever kind of way.

You lean in just a little. “Hey… hey, Wanderer.”

He doesn’t look at you. “No.”

You blink. “I didn’t even say anything yet.”

“You were going to ask for the answers. I could hear the desperation leaking off your voice.” He finally glances at you, expression flat but eyes sharp. “You should’ve paid attention.”

“I am paying attention. I’m just not… comprehending.”

He snorts under his breath, flipping to the next page of his notes. You watch in silent agony as your own page remains depressingly blank.

“C’mon, please?” you whisper, nudging his elbow with yours. “Just a little help. I’ll owe you.”

“You already owe me. From last week.” He quirks a brow, then adds coolly, “And the week before that.”

You groan, letting your forehead thud softly against the desk. “I’m going to fail, and it’ll be your fault. Imagine living with that guilt.”

“I imagine it often,” he replies dryly. But then—without warning—he tears a small slip from his notebook and scribbles something down. “Soda,” he mutters, sliding it across the desk. “You bring me a soda after school, I pretend you didn’t beg for this.”