My Hockey Alpha novel Chapter 36

Nina

I had an anatomy exam the next day and after my shift with Tiffany I needed to get some studying done. It was nice and sunny out, which was a welcome relief after the weather being gloomy and rainy for the past couple of days, so I decided to find a spot to sit under a tree where there were few people.

A few minutes after I sat down in a spot a little ways out from campus in a quiet park, Luke showed up. He walked over to me and stood right in the way of the light.

“You’re blocking the sunlight,” I said, not looking up from my notebook.

“Oh. Sorry,” he said, stepping out of the way. He continued to stand there, just staring at me. I tried my best to ignore it in the hopes that he would just go away since I was not in a good mood at all after seeing Enzo’s hickey, but he didn’t budge. Finally, I slammed down my pencil and glared up at him.

“If you’re gonna hang around, at least sit down or something,” I growled.

“Okay.” He immediately plopped down on the ground.

I couldn’t help but smirk a bit, amused by his doglike obedience.

“What’s so funny?” he asked, cocking his head. As he did so, I could hear the faint rattle of his vertebrae clacking together.

“Nothing,” I replied, returning to my work. “You’re just… Do you have any thoughts of your own?”

Luke was silent for several moments before speaking. “Of course I do,” he said finally.

“Why don’t you share them, then?”

He was silent again for much longer this time. After about ten minutes, when I had become reabsorbed in my studying and thought for sure that he had gone dormant or something, he suddenly spoke again.

“I think you made a mistake in your notes.”

I looked up suddenly and furrowed my brows. “Huh?”

Luke pointed a gloved finger at my notebook where I had a diagram of a skull with notes scribbled on it. “Right there. You got your terms mixed up. It’s occipital bone, not parietal bone. The parietal bone is over here.” He pointed to another spot on the skull.

I stared at my notes for a moment, then realized that he was right and erased my notes so I could fix them.

“Thanks,” I muttered.

“No problem.”

He was silent again for several more minutes. I became absorbed in my studying again, only to notice eventually that he was inching closer and closer so he could see my notes.

“Hmm,” he muttered, rubbing his head.

I sighed and looked up from my work again. “What is it now?”

“Well, the glabella is used for facial expression, not supporting the lacrimal apparatus. That would be the lacrimal bone.”

Once again, I realized that Luke was right. I fixed my work.