A/N: yep (swings legs and remains firmly unrepentant)

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How optimism led me astray,
Two hundred things I took the wrong way
But I saw her love gauge running low,
I tried to fill but it overflowed

Tame Impala's Mind Mischief

The pocket of her navy-blue jacket is heavy with a metal box where she keeps her cigarettes; her lighter, electric green and small, is kept in another pocket, so it doesn't clatter loudly like the bell does now. Green lifts his eyes to the watch ticking away, hung above the blackboard like a sentence.

She turns her head to check the time, hair sliding down her shoulder – she should tie it up, he thinks, reproachful – and Green can almost hear the heart rate of every boy in the room speeding up. The sun filtering through the half-shut blinds finds her brown color and infiltrates it, blemishing it with tiny dots of yellow, and someone sighs.

"I suppose we'll have to analyze Mr. Fitzgerald's work next week," Blue – Ms. Blue – finally says, smiling at the class like a teacher should never, all warmth and gloss. "Don't forget to turn in your essay by Friday," she adds, turned away from them, already picking up her jacket and her purse.

The end of her skirt glides across and up her knee when she exits, leaving the door open behind her, and Green can see the boys from the class over straightening in their seats, straining to catch a glance.

"I don't know how you manage to like literature," Red huffs, still pink and sweaty from basketball practice. Green looks up from his book, mentally marking down the number of the page. His socked feet skid on his bed when he cocks his head, curious. Red takes off his shirt, throwing it in the pile he has been adding to since Monday, and then huffs again. "Well, I mean, I guess of get it," he adds, searching his half of the closet for clean underwear. "You have Ms. Blue—I'm stuck with Mr. Lance. He takes it way too seriously, he does."

"Ms. Blue's not all that," he retorts, feeling annoyed. "Everyone just fancies her."

"Well," says Red, his shoulder blades twisting when he bends, digging through piles of washed and dutifully unfolded clothes, a contrast to Green's impeccable side of the closet, "she's cute. I can see why."

His sports' shorts hang under the elastic of his dark-gray boxers. Green returns to reading, tacking on absent affirmations to the end of Red's continuous chatter, and only closes the book when he hears the door of their room click shut. Outside, the day is ending.

Ms. Blue's office is on the third floor of the building, between the girls' lavatories and the service stairs. They roll down to the kitchens, where Red steals still-warm bread in the morning despite the matron's heated warnings that she'll get Mr. Oak to expel him one day, where Green has to sneak through to get to the third floor without being seen by anyone else.

His breath is loud by the time he glides across the third story, the essay on hope and green light and fancy parties secure in his hand. He hears giggling from the bathroom and his eyes flicker to the door, alert and perhaps just a bit too paranoid, and he walks faster, only stopping when he's smack in the front of Ms. Blue's door.

It has a tiny steel plate with her name engraved, and a tiny, detailed rose inscribed on the lower right. Tacky, Green thinks, feeling his lip crinkle in distaste before he lifts his hand and dryly knocks twice. There's a beat; he's almost hopeful that she's out and he'll have to give her the essay in class, but then the tidy clicking of her heeled black shoes makes its way across the hallways of his mind, and Ms. Blue opens the door with a satisfied smile.

"Mr. Oak," she greets, blue eyes checking his pristine collar, his tied shoes, the color of his eyes. "I was starting to think you had forgotten about this," and she plucks the paper sheets out of his grasp, leaning down to have a better grip, that mane of wavy brown hair slipping down her shoulder. She smells of perfume, not old lady cologne, something that makes him think of the Eiffel Tower.

"I was busy," he says dully.

"Oh?" She doesn't even skim his essay, just crosses her arms, leaning against the door frame. "With what, if I may ask?"

"Personal reasons."

Ms. Blue smirks, then, her lipstick catching all of his attention as it inches to the side, a flash of white blinking at him when she laughs, eyes closing. Two strands of hair stick onto the corner of her mouth, luminous and defiant, but Ms. Blue brushes them off with a swipe of her pale-pink polished fingernails – and how could a teacher even dream of painting her nails, really, it's all just disgraceful with her.

"Do you have time?" she manages, after laughing herself into a fluttery, breathy voice. "I'd like to discuss your views on Mr. Fitzgerald's metaphors."

Green makes a point to check his wristwatch first, nitpicky, and only then nods, walking past her, listening to the soft click of her lock.

"Hey, man," Red greets, from his bed. He's flipping through Green's history appointments, legs crossed, a bag of chips lying idly by his side. Green narrows his eyes at him and the black-haired boy stiffens: "I promise I won't get them greasy!"

"Whatever," he replies, loosening the knot of his tie with two fingers. He lets his bag drop at his feet, and then lays down on his bed, staring at the ceiling.

"You were late today! Homework starting to pile?" asks Red, returning to Rome's social hierarchies and architectural wonders. But only briefly; Green knows theory only sticks if the other boy finds it interesting enough, and Rome doesn't seem to cut it for Red. "You look tired, too. Something the matter?"

"Sometimes I get disappointed over the state of our educational system," Green drones, watching the outside lights flicker into life. They reflect on the paved flooring, the dark curves disappearing in the lacrosse field's direction. The streetlights accompany it, a hundred tiny yellow orbs sown across the blackened fields of green.

"Uhh," is all Red has to say on the matter, offering a confused, consoling smile in return.

Sunday is the staff's day off. Some, like his grandfather, or Mrs. Agatha, remain in campus, if only to make sure the school doesn't burn down in a manifestation of teenager-fueled energy. Ms. Blue, though, gets in her cozy car early in the morning, the right pocket of her jacket always heavy with her cigarette box, and drives off with a wave, laughter light in the dawn breeze.

And the boys who watch her pass in the hallway hang out the windows, waving back ecstatically despite still being in their pajamas. Green walks by with a grimace, his bag on his back.

"Oy, you going to Pallet today, Oak?" asks a black-haired underclassman, still in his wife-beater and boxer shorts (Green doesn't even find the energy to properly scold him). "Can you buy us a pack of Chester?"

"Smoking kills," Green retorts, still taking wide steps away from the crowd of sleepy boys.

"But it looks damn cool, doesn't it?" the boy replies, leaning against the wall with a superior crossing of his arms, a smirk drawn on his impish mouth. Green thinks of Ms. Blue's metal box, full of concave spirals and flowers, smelling of damp tobacco and perfume. Thinks of her fingers, brought up to his mouth, a cigarette lying between them.

Instead, he offers a grumpy syllable and walks downstairs, glancing at his wristwatch every ten minutes.

"We're going to play against St. Evergreen's next Sunday," Red tells him, after Green returns from the showers, hair still damp and soapy. He's lying down, throwing his basketball up, until it skims the ceiling.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

There must be more to it than just that, so Green waits, drying off his hair better. But it's only after he hangs the towel on the door to dry and sits down in his bed that the other boy begins. Eyes still on the moving basketball, "I think I might fancy someone."

Green's thumb runs across the length of his pinky.

"She's from Viridian Academy, but it's pretty close to St. Evergreen's, so I was thinking about going to see her after my game." Red throws the ball again. He's got his game face on, and Green wonders if he notices he's doing it. Probably not. There's a short, slightly awkward silence, and eventually Red cradles the ball in his arms, turning on his side to look at Green. "What do you think?"

Green's never paid much mind to this type of thing, and not just because this is an all-boy school, but because he's never been interested. And romance is so banal, so easy to describe but so impossible to live. He picks up his book, fingers smoothing down the side of it like a lover's spine.

"It's kind of weird hearing you talk about this," he finally replies, because it's the truth and because Red has never lied, so why should Green? "It's not like I'm some kind of love guru, so it's not like I know how to answer."

Red laughs, his left hand reaching out to the nape of his neck. "You're right. I just thought—I dunno. I thought you were seeing someone, too. Aren't you? You're always busy nowadays."

Green feels guilty, despite the fact that Red's voice is devoid of suspicion. Just simple small talk, like two friends are bound to do. He opens The Great Gatsby, searching for the spot he had been previously on.

"I'm not dating anyone," he finally says, because an absence of truth is not equivalent to a lie.

"Top marks," Ms. Blue says, winking at him, oblivious to the sound of heartbreak surrounding her, "good job, Mr. Oak."

He receives it without a word, just a nod, and if his eyes pause on the red ink of her cursive writing, it's because he has difficulties reading it. Ms. Blue loops her g and her s, and even has the cheek to draw a smiling face after her exclamation point. He feels like a kid in first class, or maybe he feels exactly like himself.

He slides his essay into his binder and closes it.

"Mr. Fields, better luck next time, hmm?"

The fields outside are sharp-green, brought out by the sun; the groundskeeper is working the grass mower today. Green can hear its loud hum even through the closed window, can hear the whistling tune the groundskeeper blows, something wavy that reminds him of Ms. Blue's hair.

"Sorry, Mr. Clavin, you'll have to get remedial lessons, it seems. Meet Mr. Lance at five o'clock!"

The condensation gathers at the line between wood and glass and he doesn't mindlessly reach out to blur it with his fingers because he knows better than to act out in class, never mind Ms. Blue's class in specific, but he still wants to. It's early enough that those damp patches will stay there until the end of this lesson, but Green wants to smudge them now, right now.

"Mr. Oak, something the matter?" Ms. Blue calls, on the way back to her desk. She throws her hair over her shoulder when she cocks her head, waiting for his reply.

"No," he spares, looking away.

He meets Red in the cafeteria. If the other boy notices his mood, he doesn't show it, instead choosing to chat about the fall one of his classmates took today in biology, or about this underclassman who was busted trying to sneak out of the school (presumably, to visit a girl), or about whatever works.

Green picks his potatoes from between the vegetables.

"Oh, and I think Yellow's going to see our match," Red adds nonchalantly, reaching for his glass of water. His Adam's apple bobs when he swallows, and Green could kill him when he wipes his mouth on his sleeve, forgetting himself and his manners. "So I thought you should come, too! It's not like you'll be busy – or are you?"

"You want me to spend my day off watching you play basketball."

"It's not just basketball! You can meet a girl, Green!" Red leaned over the table, one hand cupped around his mouth. Green stared at it. "They tell me Viridian Academy girls are really nice."

"Really? They tell me they are vapid and rowdy."

Red rolls his eyes, leaning back on his chair, arms crossed. He still looks amused, though.

"Fine, be that way. I, on the contrary, wouldn't like to spend my high school years without a girlfriend."

Green smirks at him, "you should have considered that before joining an all-boys boarding school."

He skips biology, not in the mood to deal with Mr. Koga's abrasive nature. The kitchens are empty and the service stairway emptier still.

"Mr. Oak," she greets, looking surprised even though she has probably already been expecting him. "Did you have difficulties with the lesson this morning?"

The back of his neck burns as he looks around the deserted corridor.

"It's fine," Ms. Blue replies, her voice lowering to a nearly-silent wisp. She takes a step back, her hand on the knob, allowing him enough space to enter her office. He can see her bed, today – she's left the door to her room open. On purpose? She's a bit of a slob, he knows, enough to forget about decency. Or just ignore it. "You can say it," she adds, eyes half-lidded, a lazy smirk on her mouth like a warm cat on a windowsill.

"Can I come in," he grits out, fists closed and warm by his side.

"Can you?" she purrs back, fingers curling around a lock of hair.

"May I?" he corrects, bringing his defiant eyes to hers. Ms. Blue smiles, bringing her disarming mouth to his.

"Oh, um, it's very nice to meet you!" greets Red's dream girl, a tiny blond thing with a soft voice. Green thinks he has seen her somewhere before, but can't quite place it until he sees the butterfly sown on her blouse. "Red has told me a lot about you!"

"Has he," Green says dully, side-glancing towards Red.

"All good things, I assure you," she squeaks, turning pink.

Green wonders, as he watches Yellow show them around her school, as he watches her schoolmates giggle and whisper every time the two of them walk by, as he watches Red's fidgeting hands, cowardly desisting every time they get near hers. Viridian Academy is pretty, but it lacks the green hectares, the brick wall's complicated relationship with ivy, the baby-blue car parked in the shade.

"Green," says Red, very seriously. He sits up on his bed, spine uncomfortably straight, like the line their eyes make when they meet. Green arches an eyebrow in reply, allowing himself a break from biology homework, and waits. "I did laundry yesterday."

"Okay," says Green, blandly, because he doesn't know what he's got to do with that.

Red's skin begins to ink, as colorful as his name. Green watches him attentively, slipping a fingertip between the pages, feeling the book's mouth close around his hand. Red's blush runs from forehead to neck and maybe even shoulders and Green shakes his head, feeling angry at himself and the world and at Carraway, too, because he makes Gatsby seem like his one true love and Green is so confused.

"There was," and then Red halts, bringing his eyes to the ceiling as if searching for the rest of his sentence, like it's gotten lost in the labyrinth of awkwardness; then, a sigh, resigned and embarrassed and everything Red usually isn't, "lipstick on the collar."

"What do you mean, lipstick," Green replies, the tone of his voice as dull as it is confused.

"Y'know, lipstick, what else is called lipstick, the thing girls put in their mouths but the only girls around us are—"

And Green doesn't notice doing it but he stands up and takes wide steps in Red's direction, his hand outstretched as it collides with the black-haired boy's half-open mouth. Red hurries to close it, big wide eyes looking up at him for an answer, but Green still feels his spit drying coolly on his thumb.

"Don't say it," he whispers, glaring at Red's sheets, under his other palm. "Don't say it, okay?"

Red never breaches the subject again.

"You know what," says the cheeky underclassman from last time, yellow eyes droopy with sleep. They remind Green of the midday sun. "I want to be able to go to Pallet every weekend, too. Can't you pull some strings?"

This time, there's another boy – a quiet, menacing-looking redhead. He is pale, freckled, and delicate, almost like a girl, but he looks at Green like he's gum on his shoe. Green stands a little taller, straightening his tie with two expert fingers.

"I'm a senior, Gold," he shoots back dryly, aching for a cup of black coffee and a quiet classroom. "You'll have your perks in two years."

"I just thought – " continues Gold, smirking, his free hand creeping around Green's shoulder like a girl-eating snake. The older boy removes it with a grimace, wondering whose deity he's offended today, and finds Silver's pale mouth quirking to the side, his chin hiked.

"I told you he wouldn't be able to do it," says Silver, and Green decides he doesn't like him at all.

"I'm not talking to Gramps to get two brats out of the school just because you think I'm lame," he replies, adjusting the strap of his bag – heavy with lit books and appointments, he's having a double period after break, "but nice try, you almost had me."

Gold just sighs, muttering something about crystals, and how Christmas holidays are just around the corner, anyway; Silver, though, stays behind, making sure Gold's distant enough for him to drop his smirk and glare almost painfully into Green's eyes. He flicks his hair out of his face, chin hiked as high as Green's irritation meter, and gives him a look running from the top of his head to the end of his polished shoes.

"She can do better," he hisses. "You know it."

Green rolls his eyes, resisting the urge to pinch the spot between his eyebrows, and says, "yes, but so can I. And she knows it, as should you."

He skips literature in the end, taking shelter by the vending machines behind the gym, blowing into his hands and watching his breath fluff into translucent clouds of gray.

"I realize you've met my little brother," says Ms. Blue, with a radiating smile. Green thinks about energy sources and feels the back of his neck heat. "He's so protective, but he means well. Just ignore him," she adds, with a careless wave of her manicured hand. Today, she is wearing heels, the ones that make Green want to study the theory of gravity, and when she crosses his legs, mid-laugh, he can't help but follow the line of her ankle, calf, knee.

He leers at the teacup she has served him – it's boiling hot. So is Green.

"This is so wrong," he finally groans, letting his face drop between his hands. Blue shrugs, enthusiastically stirring her tea.

"I've done worse things," she admits, setting down the teaspoon – but not before running her tongue across its concavity, looking like a cat who got the cream. "Are you breaking up with me," she adds, then, though it's less of a question and more of a dramatic pose, her wrist touching at her forehead, her beautiful face twisted into a face. Green cannot believe this woman is older than he is. "Just joking! I know you would never!"

"I'm graduating this year," Green tries, and Ms. Blue just hands him the tray where she's piled all the sugar cubes. "I'll be eighteen next year, too—"

"Sugar?"

"What? No. I—" He sighs, feeling increasingly frustrated.

Ms. Blue sets the sugar cubes down, bringing up the plate with the still-warm scones with a speed Green didn't think possible on this reality.

"Scones? I got Silver to cook some for me – he's really good, did you know?"

"No, I—"

"You should definitely feed. How are you finding your tea?"

"Blue," Green says, and wants to slam his hand on her stupid glass coffee table, but doesn't. It's the first time he's called her Blue, just Blue, no miss or teacher or mistress – just Blue. Not even when she lured him into her couch and kissed his breath away, not even when he started thinking over their – their relationship? Their lack of it? – seriously and feeling like a little kid, not even when she told him her parents were dead and gone and that the only person she trusted was herself. Her casual smile doesn't change. "We're going to have to talk about this. About—" and he glares at his useless hands, curling and uncurling in his lap. "—well, us."

"I don't see why not," she replies, sipping her peach tea – one of the store-bought packages; Green almost gags – like someone who is sitting in the sun, like it's summer and like they're not years apart. "We don't have to talk about it. Whatever comes, and all, you know?"

Green looks out her window.

"You know, you should really try a scone," she adds.

Green barges on Red kissing Yellow. Kind of. Maybe? He thinks he interrupted before they could.

Red continuously drags him into Viridian Academy when he can, despite the fact that Green is in honor classes and Red isn't – and he's got a stupid sports scholarship that Green could've had if he didn't think it wouldn't prove enough of his worth – and one sunny afternoon Green buys drinks (lemon tea for Yellow, hot chocolate for Red, black coffee for him), takes his time returning because Viridian Academy is not much, but it's beautifully built, and walks in on Red's shaky hands framing Yellow's crimson face.

"Oh," he says, monotone.

Yellow squeaks, her face dipping into purple, and stands up tremblingly, her knees almost knocking together.

"I'm sorry," she manages, and as she runs away, she almost knocks two boys to the floor.

"Okay, then," Green says, still dully, handing Red his hot chocolate without even grimacing.

Red just groans, burying his face in his free hand, and Green tries to tell himself it's not weird to see him chase after a girl, that it's not weird to know they would've kissed if Green had taken longer (have they kissed before?), that it's not weird that Green remembers the color of Red's cheeks and the soft path of his fingers tracing down Yellow's cheek perfectly.

Really.

For the first time in years, he doesn't go home for holidays. Red, who has delivered the authorization slip already, only finds out when it's morning and Green's trunk is still open and unpacked.

"You should've told me," he says, good-natured and smiling, and Green hadn't expected anything else. He slips his hands into his pockets as he watches Red fight with his scarf – red and white wool and a pretty outlining of those weird monsters the red-haired boy liked to catch when they were kids with Gameboys. Red's mother doesn't knit and Green keeps quiet, smirking mutely into his collar. "I don't know what's gotten into you, but I'm here for you – you know that, right?"

He hums his assent, nodding simply when Red smiles, dragging his trunk behind him, all the way to the train station.

"I'm thinking of visiting Yellow during the holidays. She lives in Viridian, did you know? That's really close to Pallet – like, what, half an hour by train? I've already talked to my mom about it, and she says it's fine, but I don't want to bother her, and it's not like she's invited me, but—"

Green filters out when he spots Ms. Blue's cocked hip, her hand on her waist, her eyes on her trunk as two students help put it in the carriage.

"Oh, boys," she purrs, delighted, "you mustn't try so hard. You might pull a muscle—oh," and then she sees him, and her smile widens (should he be concerned or flattered?) as she turns her back on the two pink-faced morons who are attempting to cart off her trunk. "Mr. Oak, what a delight! Oh, and who might this be?"

Red, perhaps the only boy oblivious to her charms (just as of recently, though), only smiles and greets her cheerfully: "I'm Red – I'm Green's roommate!"

But his cheeks dye pink when Ms. Blue runs a hand through her hair, his red eyes catching onto the color of her lipstick nervously. Green ignores him when he glances at his collar, making sure it's not kissed.

"I see you're going home for the holidays," she says, and Green isn't quite sure of the following minutes of the conversation, just that it's small talk and thus uninteresting.

But then Red's waving goodbye on the train and Ms. Blue is still by his side and he asks: "I thought you were going home, too."

"No such luck, kiddo," she says, and ruffles his hair without checking if someone's staring at them.

"Your trunk," he explains, eyes faraway.

"Silver's," Ms. Blue replies, fingers padding around the shell of his ear, sensitive, making the hairs on his neck rise. "I'm staying for holidays."

Wondering what to make of that information, Green just nods pacifically, watching the train zig-zag into new destinations (the tiny villages sprayed across the green hills).

She gives him a ring full of keys (polished, new, made especially for someone other than the owner) after a staff dinner.

Her cheeks are rosy, rosier than he's ever seen them before, and Green bristles without really knowing why. She still doesn't show difficulty in navigating the hallways with those shoes, but Green does the right thing and walks her to her office. He hears his grandfather exclaiming jovially, hears Mrs. Agatha murmur things that make him feel spicy, and fears for his sanity after hearing Mr. Koga sing several Christmas carols. Ms. Blue doesn't take his arm when he offers it and he sulks, just a little.

"You know, Mr. Oak," she says, fiddling with her keys, leaning against her nameplate, "you really are one of a kind. You'll make someone really happy, one day."

Green, who was forced to take up on Gold's invitation for underage drinking, only offers: "I don't know, you're pretty hard to please."

And Ms. Blue just smiles secretively, her tongue darting out to smooth down her lower lip. He doesn't expect a goodnight kiss and he doesn't get it, but Ms. Blue still lets her mouth brush against his jaw when she slips the keyring into his pocket, taking far too long to remove it without it being Inappropriate. He lets her.

"Merry Christmas," she says, disappearing behind her swinging door, behind the smell of expensive perfume and nicotine. "Tell me when you get a license."

"Mm," he replies blandly, closing his fist around the metal, counting down the days to graduation. Wondering what it's like, driving a baby-blue car into the sunset.

He tells his grandfather he wants driving lessons the very next day (wondering if her transmission is automatic or manual).