Survival Of The Fittest

((Ron Kiser continued from Go About Your Business))

Ron tapped his fingers on the desk in a steady rhythm. It was first period on a Day 2, which meant honors calc. He tried to be awake and ready early on these days, since this class required too much brainpower for him to afford to be half-awake. Well, it was a good idea to be alert in the morning regardless of how difficult his first class was. Being sleepy left him inattenive, irritable... it was just a recipe for social disaster.

Especially since, in this class, he sat next to Aditi. Aditi was a good friend, he really did like her, but she could be a bit... biting... at times. She definitely wasn't someone he want to risk accidentally offending. She was also super smart, too, so it was nice to have her there. He could ask her questions about the work they were doing. So it was a good situation. As long as he never said anything stupid.

As if on queue, Aditi stepped through the doorway. Ron sat straight up and folded his hands. He smiled at her.

"Good morning. How are you today?"

It was uncouth, perhaps, but there was only one way to describe how she felt: fucking awful.

ADITI SHARMA - PREGAME START

For it to be simply put, nothing had gone her way that morning, and although perhaps prospects would rise in the coming hours, at that instant, her temperament was much more akin to a hailstorm than a sunny resort beach. First a meager and unfulfilling breakfast, only tepid, mildly undercooked eggs on display, followed by a commute that could only be christened as one word-hectic.

Suffice to say, she was nowhere near pleased as she stepped through the doorway, flats clacking as if to announce her current displeasure with the world. Her face betrayed but a bit of the anger inside her, the urge to tear and destroy or really, just scream, but all that appeared was a slightly displeased frown.

The fact that honors calculus was nowhere near her favorite class did not help matters much, either. Perhaps not her least favorite, but a merely middling placement in terms of preference indicated that it could be no salve.

She was still clutching her textbook to her chest as the insufferable voice of the most blatant suck-up known to man called at her, looking at her with his beady eyes and hawk-like eyebrows. Perhaps Ron wasn't exactly awful, but he was a prime example of a sycophant, so desperate for approval he almost radiated an aura of pleading. Now, it wasn't as if Aditi herself was any kind of rebel, but she only ever sought the approval of teachers. Ron, on the other hand, seemed to define himself as defined by other people, which certainly wasn't any way to grow a backbone.

Sad for him, she supposed, but it also meant that he would willingly listen to her rant, and so she smiled a bitter smile, as she slipped into the desk beside him and began to take out her neatly-organized materials.

"Really, Ron," she sighed, tilting her head defeatedly as if to incur sympathy, "Not very well, I'm afraid."

"Don't you ever wake up, feeling like the world is against you?"

He was listening, yes? He better.

Ron's smile fell. Aditi wasn't doing well this morning. This wasn't the ideal situation, he'd hoped for a morning without any trouble. But it looked like she had some problems and it'd fallen to him to listen to them. And he'd do that, of course. Gladly.

"I'm sorry to hear that." he offered her. He paused and considered how to respond to her question. "Yeah, I do feel like that, sometimes."

Ron's eyes drifted to the supplies Aditi was putting on her desk and He scratched the back of his head. That was a half-truth. Actually, he felt like the world was against him nearly every morning. But he wasn't going to say that, that would just make him look strange. It was fine for him to say that he had those feelings in moderation, though. Everyone did, right?

"What- so what's wrong?" Ron said, returning his gaze to Aditi. "If you don't mind me asking."

Ah, already with the platitudes, Ron so ready to serve her needs, knees metaphoricall already on the floor,r eady to cater to her every need. Pathetic, absolutely pathetic, honestly, the way he constantly allowed this to happen to him, but considering it could be used for great things on her end, she supposed she was alright with it. Still, his condolences sounded too much like a funeral for her liking, but she supposed he didn’t mean it. Probably.

“It’s nothing serious.” She said with the kind of countenance that suggested everything about it was indeed serious, the weight of her tone bringing gravity to each word. She blinked once, as if to test his resolve. “Just woke up feeling out-of-sorts.”

It wasn’t as if she could explain to him how much she felt the red-hot-anger burning within, wishing to burst from every pore like a volcano. Aditi wasn’t all that close to him, or really anyone at that school, really, and besides, she was quite unsure of whether he would have understood the situation. Probably, not, really, because for all his hard work she was still unsure whether there was genuine natural intellect in the brain behind those dull eyes of his, but if she was never going to ask him the question.

He wouldn’t have been one of the ones that burned no, the eruption but a certainty somewhere along the timeline of her life, but she could delay that release, if only for now.

“Would you have any advice to deal with that?”

She expected him not to, really. Perhaps, though, his response would help her to glean if there was anything underneath that surface of longing which she at times, did indeed loathe.

"Oh..."

She said it wasn't serious, and as much as Ron would've liked to leave it at that, her tone suggested it was actually very serious. Did she just want to hide her real feelings from him, or was it some sort of weird test to see if he noticed that she was lying? Girls liked to do that sort of thing, and it was frustrating. Talking with people was hard enough without adding this guessing game shit into the mix.

Then Aditi threw him a curveball. Maybe he should've expected she'd ask something like that, but he really didn't. She wanted advice? From him?

Ron felt a cold sweat on his neck. How was he supposed to give her advice about how to feel better? He didn't fucking know how to feel better! She hadn't told him what was wrong! What was he supposed to work with here?!

"I... uh..."

What did people usually do to deal with their problems? Drink? Yeah, but it was 8 AM on a school day and Aditi actually cared about school and he didn't have anything to give her anyway. Meditate? She'd probably just laugh at him if he suggested that... or call him racist, maybe? Was it racist to assume Indian people liked to meditate? Fuck, he didn't know!

He stared at Aditi, wide-eyed, trying to get words to form.

Would it be that bad to admit he didn't know, or would it just make him look like a useless retard? No, he had to say something. Just something simple, don't overthink it. Don't overthink it.

"Well, uh, just focusing on the positive things- on the future, works for me. Think about what you're, ah, excited about today instead of... what you didn't like... before."

Fuck, that was lame.

“Mmhmm?”

Ah, yes, stuttering. Flailing. General incompetence, to be sure, and Aditi would have liked to say she was disappointed, but was disappointment only a valid emotion if the person who felt disappointed actually expected better? If it wasn’t, she surmised that she was simply unimpressed. Not that Ron had been one to particularly impress her, but the question in question sending him into some sort of fit was simply sad to see. He was weak, that was for certain. She never would be like that.

All she communicated to him, though, was her blinking at him, one, two, three, as if it was a signal to get him to stop gibbering only a few minutes before class started. Expecting better was always going to be a risky proposition, and asking someone like him for help was never going to be a smart idea, but his reaction still fell below her lowered expectations. Her head tilted as brown eyes continued to look at him, not judging, at least presumably not visibly, but just watching. Waiting. Witnessing.

Perhaps it was a bit rude to send him into such a fuss, but technically, she hadn’t done anything, had she? Just shared her concerns, asked him what he thought she should do about it, and he ended up like that. Not her fault, all his. Asked a question, he was found sorely wanted. Simple as that.

His stuttered response only proved to add more fuel to the fire supporting the idea that he was not…well, alright in any sense of the term. Even a parried affirmation, a simple declaration that he did not know what to do, would have worked, and instead, what did he tell her? Think about what she wanted to day?

In that case, she wanted a softball bat in her hands, the aluminum in her hands, the sun shining above as she prepared to hit. The adrenaline that flowed through as the ball was tossed at her, the tensing of the muscles in preparation for the swing, and the final payoff as she contacted the ball and sent it flying, straight into the stratosphere.

Not that she was really any good at bat, but fantasizing seemed better than continuing to be entrenched in this conversation.

“Thank you for the advice,” she stated, looking back at Ron with that perfectly constructed mask, smile not wavering from it’s slight upturn.

It was almost time for class now. She was fine.

She stared at him, brown eyes burning a hole in his skull. Ron's face went red and he averted his eyes. Shit, he had messed up. What the hell was that, Ron!?

Then she smiled and thanked him for his advice.

Oh, okay.

Yeah, it was good. It was fine. Maybe what he'd said had actually been fine.

...Or maybe she just wanted to end the conversation after his sorry display and she was thinking that he was a complete idiot. He glanced back at her quickly, trying to see if he could detect anything beneath that smile. No luck. God, he hoped she wasn't thinking he was a complete idiot.

"Well, uh... hope that helps, a little. Hope you feel better."

It was probably fine. He was probably fine. Don't overthink it. Yeah.

Absentmindedly, he started tapping his fingers on the desk again. Was this class gonna start soon, or what?

"Class, please turn your textbooks to page 32."

Finally. With a deep breath, Aditi opened her notes and tried to ignore the disappointment residing right next to her.

((Aditi Sharma continued elsewhere))