Autumn Autopsy
an excerpt

It was Wednesday night, 2:24 AM according to the clock on the right hand side of the menu bar of my PC, and I was toast. Tumble Dry’s class was at 11:30 AM, in just about nine hours, and my essay was not blossoming the way I had hoped it would under pressure. A vague panicky feeling was beginning in my stomach, spreading out to my limbs, and weirdly, my eyes. It was hard to focus on things. My eyes kept on straying anywhere else but at the screen in the Word Program. My feet and knees kept tapping and jiggling incessantly in random tempos. Looking at my notes or my textbooks was no good either. Pushing the keyboard away slightly, I leaned over, the heels of my hands pressed against my eyes. The darkness was comforting, for a minute I forgot I was in the computer lab in the middle of the night stuck on this bugger of an essay. Which was really taking a good stab at buggering me, to be honest. It always happened this way; whenever there was an essay due all of these brilliant ideas would fly into my head for weeks before but when the time came to shove them all down on paper, or in this case word processor, those precious ideas would refuse to come out. Sometimes I wished there was a way to reach inside my brain and scoop out all of the information in there, for purposes like essays and tests.

So far, I only had an essay title, a topic sentence, opening paragraph and a conclusion. In the middle were a few vague outlined notes in lieu of actual paragraphs. Every time I would start to write a paragraph I would wind up deleting the whole thing and spend more time pouring over my notes and textbooks. Then there would be the obligatory staring-at-the-screen-like-a-vegetable phase before my synapses would connect the dots and remember what I had wanted to write. This was so frustrating! For a second or two, I contemplated just going to sleep right here. My eyes were already closed and it wouldn’t be hard to just lay my head down on my arms like I did sometimes in class. Big, warm hands had come up to massage at my shoulders. I looked up, squinting at the bright light hitting my eyes again.

“Thanks Julian.” Wow, my voice sounded tired. “Mmm…” I leaned into his hands, purring lightly. He kneaded at my shoulders and neck for a few more minutes, and ended up rubbing his hands up and down my back. It made me shiver again.

“Cold, Pepper?” He had started to take one hand out of the sleeve of a large maroon sweatshirt he was wearing.

“What are you doing Jules, stripping?” He smirked at me, his liquid brown eyes full of mirth.
“For you, I would. Here you go.”
“No, it’s alright…I….” I hoped I wasn’t blushing. He knelt down to offer me the sweatshirt, face to face. He leaned in to pass it over. I took it in my hands, feeling the bulky weight of it and the warmth it radiated from being wrapped around his body all evening. If I wasn’t blushing before, the thoughts I was having about how to substitute myself for the sweater, had probably turned my face an embarrassing shade of tomato.
“Thanks.” I whispered softly. There was no need to speak any louder with Julian so close.
“You’re welcome.”

It was one of those opportune moments. There was no moon in June, but there was something about being alone in the computer lab in the extremely early hours of the morning, that fed into the scheme of what could be catalogued as a very romantic moment. Julian leaned in closer. I leaned in closer. I watched his lips parting as he closed the distance, and then closed my eyes. The touch of his lips on mine was soft and gentle. They were merely content at the contact, not pressing for more. This time his cheek was smooth, and before I could get my arms around him to draw him into an embrace there was the sound of the computer lab door opening.

“Motherfuck.”

Of all the computer labs in all of the castle, she had to come into mine. It was Drew, holding a beer and looking at once shocked, hurt and angry. She looked about ready to lob that beer right at my face. Malice made her lip curl, contorting her face with its pretty features into an ugly expression. Clank. The beer hit one of the desktops with such vehemence, I thought it would have shattered.

“You stay away from my boyfriend!” She yanked the sweatshirt out of my hands.
“I’m not your boyfriend anymore!”

Julian stood up to his full height, towering over Drew. He looked just as angry as she was, both looking like they were about to come to blows. Instead, he tried to rip the sweatshirt out of her hands. Her grip was too strong, and they were suddenly in a tug-of-war. I should just have gone to bed instead of working on my essay so late. I should never have let Julian talk me into going to the pub earlier, with promises of working together on the essay all night.

“What’s going on, guys?” It was Zain; I guessed he had been patrolling the hallways on his night shift. I watched his eyes fall on the scene before him: Drew desperately holding onto the sweatshirt, with Julian clamped onto the lower half, both wearing more than surly expressions.
“Whose sweatshirt is that?”
“Mine.” Julian answered gruffly, not relinquishing any hold on it.
“Drew, give him his sweatshirt,” Zain said in his best kindergarten-teacher voice. If the situation hadn’t felt so serious I may have laughed. Funnily enough, she responded well to Zain’s soothing tone of voice. Dropping the sweatshirt, she just stood there shooting dirty looks back and forth, first at me and then at Julian. I saw Zain eye the two sets of books, pens and notes for our essays.

“Time to go, Drew.” She didn’t budge. Her mouth opened and shut, gasping silently like a fish, as if she was about to say something. Zain didn’t give her the opportunity to form a sentence. He took hold of her shoulders and steered her forcibly towards the door of the computer lab.

With all of the excitement past, the fact it was now 3:02 AM according to the computer clock caught up with me, and fast. I slumped back down into my chair, curling my arms and body around its flimsy back, with my head drooping perilously over the side. Familiar, big, warm hands lifted me out of the chair. My knees were feeling a bit jellied, but they held up fine with Julian supporting me.

“Time for you to go as well. I’ll come back and put all of our stuff in Keigo’s and my room.” I nodded, feeling slightly dizzy with fatigue.

“We can wake up early for breakfast and then power through the rest of the essay before Tumble’s class.” Julian spoke reassuringly as he deposited me at my door. He was still holding his sweatshirt, and with a surprisingly shy expression, he passed it over to me once again.

“Sleep well, don’t get too cold now, Pepper.” He kissed my cheek and moved away from me. The sudden change in temperature from his body warmth to the cool hallway was making me shiver.

I hugged the sweatshirt close and almost floated across the threshold into my room. I don’t remember getting into pyjamas, but slipping into bed, I pulled on the oversize, fluffy maroon sweatshirt. It smelled sharp and musky, of Julian. I closed my eyes to find images of more sweet kisses between Julian and I, to come.