Arya was at her locker when Hot Pie appeared at her side, out of breath. In his hands he clutched a worn grey notebook, with a Gendry written in faded black marker ink in the upper corner.
“Arya,” he panted, “You have next period with Gendry right?” Arya nodded at that, and he continued, holding out the notebook in offering, “Give this to him? He forgot it in math class.”
“Yeah, sure,” Arya said, accepting the notebook, “No problem.” Hot Pie mumbled out a thanks before hurrying on his way.
Arya finished up at her locker and headed to English, where she sat next to Gendry, notebook held loosely in hand. When she entered the room it was to find him already in his seat, hunting through his bag.
She plopped down beside him, and held up the notebook, “Looking for this?” His eyes snapped up staring at the book in her hands, and she had half of the next sentence out before she noticed how wide his eyes had gotten. “Hot Pie gave it… You ok?”
When his hand snapped out to grab the book she pulled it back on reflex, curious to his behavior. “Give it back!” He growled.
She laughed, “Why? What about math got you all worked up?” He scowled at her, and went for the notebook again. She leapt up from her chair, nearly running into a fellow student who was on his way to his desk.
She flipped open the notebook, to the first page and froze, staring down at the cardboard cover. She looked up and Gendry’s hand was still reached out at her, eyes round and cheeks red.
Arya felt her cheeks flame herself as she looked back down at the book. Doodles filled the page, mostly versions of her name, sometimes with a Waters instead of Stark, little swords and shields with G.W.+A.S. filled up the spaced between.
She was startled out of her silence as the book was pulled from her hands. She turned to see Gendry stuffing it back in his back, refusing to look at her.
Instead of speaking she just sat back down, and pulled out her own blue notebook, and opened it to a very similar looking front page. She set it down on Gendry’s desk so she knew he would see it.
She saw him reach out and trace her doodles with his index finger and when he looked up at her it was in awe, and they both had matching goofy grins spread across their faces.