wiped her forehead clean again.
"Sorry. Didn't mean to go primordial on you, but really, Shta! Mathematics!"
"What about it?"
"It's--It's logical!"
"Very."
"Shta!"
"I'm just saying, that math makes more sense to me than magic ever did."
"I don't want to hear another word from your venomous tongue!" Literally. His tongue was venomous. He was male after all (though he had heard urban legends about females with venomous tongues). "You are dismissed to work on your essay!"
"Fine by me."
"Good 'morrow, Shta!"
Hesitating for a moment, she turned to the holeway when he didn't return the greeting, muttering about heretics and mathematics.
"And good riddance," he replied, under his breath and out of her hearing.
Elly was in a good mood. She'd finished her paper ahead of time, adding the last resounding paragraph with a clatter of keys and a flourish. At the moment, she had it tucked under her arm, safely contained in a manilla folder with her name on it.
The taste of the words lingered on her tongue; she'd read it over and over again for errors, and because she would read it aloud as a speech today. All in al, the piece pleased her. Perhaps it was not the greatest work that humanity had yet to produce, but it was pretty good. Even her older brother, a scumbag alcoholic who wouldn't know a comma from a period (or his little sister from his best friend, when he was under the influence), had admitted to its clarity and strength. She'd left him counting imaginary stars while he waited to come down off his high so that he could come back inside. Their mother had a no tolerance policy, so their father had built a shed out back where he could smoke. Now that mom's crusade against smoking had prevailed, the shed belonged to Ry.
"Sorry. Didn't mean to go primordial on you, but really, Shta! Mathematics!"
"What about it?"
"It's--It's logical!"
"Very."
"Shta!"
"I'm just saying, that math makes more sense to me than magic ever did."
"I don't want to hear another word from your venomous tongue!" Literally. His tongue was venomous. He was male after all (though he had heard urban legends about females with venomous tongues). "You are dismissed to work on your essay!"
"Fine by me."
"Good 'morrow, Shta!"
Hesitating for a moment, she turned to the holeway when he didn't return the greeting, muttering about heretics and mathematics.
"And good riddance," he replied, under his breath and out of her hearing.
Elly was in a good mood. She'd finished her paper ahead of time, adding the last resounding paragraph with a clatter of keys and a flourish. At the moment, she had it tucked under her arm, safely contained in a manilla folder with her name on it.
The taste of the words lingered on her tongue; she'd read it over and over again for errors, and because she would read it aloud as a speech today. All in al, the piece pleased her. Perhaps it was not the greatest work that humanity had yet to produce, but it was pretty good. Even her older brother, a scumbag alcoholic who wouldn't know a comma from a period (or his little sister from his best friend, when he was under the influence), had admitted to its clarity and strength. She'd left him counting imaginary stars while he waited to come down off his high so that he could come back inside. Their mother had a no tolerance policy, so their father had built a shed out back where he could smoke. Now that mom's crusade against smoking had prevailed, the shed belonged to Ry.
