The Catacombs
Lila hates the catacombs. The dank basement of the library always smells like old books and dust and she doesn’t understand how anyone can like that smell.
If she hadn’t already exhausted all the other study spots on campus, she would never even step foot down here. But it seemed coffee shops were no longer going to work with her, and there was no way she’d ever be able to focus in her house while her roommates cried over The Bachelor.
Thus the circumstances that bring her down to the cramped little study rooms in the catacombs.
The midterm break is three days away, making it essay and exam season. The one time in the semester that study rooms are all taken up. She’s going to have to work some magic.
The room at the far end of the hall is the biggest one—which isn’t saying much. That’ll be her target.
Inside is some guy she’s never seen before. That’s not uncommon on such a big campus, but he looks just a bit too old to be a student. She might even think he’s a really really young professor with the stuffy jacket and dorky grandpa glasses he’s wearing.
With dark red hair pinned back out of the way of deep blue eyes, she thinks he could be cute if he had any sense of style. But as it is, he wears that stuffy professor jacket over a t-shirt of all things, along with some weird bug necklace and a tacky orange scarf to top it all off, like what even. On the table in front of him is a laptop, a to-go coffee cup, and some musty old books scattered about.
Everything about him screams geek. Should be a piece of cake.
She cracks the door open with her best innocent, saccharine smile. Adopting the sweetest, most gentle of voices, she asks if she can have the study room. “It’s just…I always use this room and I can’t focus anywhere else and I have a huge essay due tomorrow.”
He stares at her a moment, expression absolutely unreadable. Then suddenly,
“Are you a theatre major?”
…
“What?”
“I asked if you’re a theatre major.”
Lila blinks. Perhaps the most surprising thing here is the complete innocence in his question. His tone isn’t snarky or malicious in any way; he’s genuinely just asking.
“Um…No, why?”
“Oh.” He shrugs and turns back to his work. “You’re just really good at acting.”
She bristles. “Excuse me? Acting?”
He doesn’t look up. “Yeah I almost believed you despite the fact that I use this study room almost every day.” The way he says it is almost like he’s complimenting her. No aim to humiliate; he’s just stating the truth as he knows it. “And when I’m not using it, I’m down here in the catacombs.” He glances up for just a couple seconds to get a confirming look of her. “And I’ve never seen you before.”
Okay, time to switch tactics.
“Okay, so I don’t always use this study room. But I really can’t focus anywhere else and I desperately need to get this paper done.”
“And I do always use this room, know from experience that I can’t focus anywhere else, and also need to get work done.” He keeps typing as he speaks, completely nonchalant.
“Do you even go here? You look too old to be a student.”
“I’m 26 and I’m a grad student.” He finally looks up then with a tired expression. “Look I’m sorry but you’re distracting me. Can you please go away?”
“I’m sorry,” she rebukes, “but you’re keeping me from work. Can you please go away?”
He sighs. He seems about as done with this conversation as she is.
“If you promise to be quiet, you can sit at the other end of the table. There’s an outlet over there and everything.”
She rolls her eyes but acquiesces, guessing this is probably the best she’s going to get.
He really is quiet the entire time. He doesn’t listen to music or anything and he’s probably the most focused person she’s ever seen. It’s surprisingly easy to get work done around him; with how quiet he is aside from the very steady clicking of his keyboard, she can almost forget he’s even there. She makes surprising headway on her essay.
When she leaves, she doesn’t say anything and neither does he—still just typing away. She wonders if he even notices. She also wonders if he’s going to work through the night. The library closes at some point, right?
The next day he’s there again. He’s wearing a different t-shirt though and his scarf is a slightly different shade of orange, so he must have left eventually.
“I thought your paper was due today.”
“Different paper.” It’s not.
They agree to work in silence again. Her paper really is due tomorrow this time and she manages to finish it before some ridiculous hour of the night. This is some of the most productive work she’s ever done. There’s something very therapeutic about his keyboard clicking. And every time she starts burning out, she just looks up and watches him in his intense focus for a couple minutes. It works really well to keep her going somehow.
His coffee cup goes untouched. She’s pretty sure it’s empty. He really ought to drink some water or something.
“Another paper?” he asks when she shows up the next day. He’s on to her.
“This time I’m studying for an exam.” It’s actually the truth for once. She doesn’t even bother asking if she can share the room this time; she just walks in and drops her textbook on the table. “Not that it’s inconceivable to have three papers. I once had six all due on the same day.” It was five and they were spread across two days.
He looks at her with mild confusion for a second before he shrugs and looks back at his laptop. “Fair enough.” Then it’s silence and therapeutic clicking again.
The next day she thinks there’s no way he’s there. It’s officially break. Most of the school is gone. She’s just one of the few who prefers to stay on campus.
She thinks maybe she’s right when she shows up early in the morning and he isn’t there.
Then he arrives a few minutes later. His hair is wet from a shower and he’s actually drinking from the coffee cup in his hand. He looks confused.
“You’re still here?”
“I could say the same about you.”
“I actually live in the area, what’s your excuse?”
“I don’t like going home.”
The grunt he makes sounds slightly sympathetic. “I can understand that.” He sits down and stays getting his stuff out. “If you’re done with midterms though, why are you here?”
“I have a big paper due right after break.”
“What subject?”
This is the most talkative he’s ever been. She doesn’t mind it exactly; it’s just different.
“Politics.” He just sort of nods and doesn’t really respond. “What about you? What are you working on?”
“My thesis.”
“For what?”
“Archaeology.”
Wow that makes sense. His outfit screams fossils.
Again they work in silence. She notices that he only eats a granola bar around lunch time while she brought herself a sandwich. And as she suspected, it’s just the one cup of coffee and nothing else all day.
The next day she gets there before him again. And again it’s just a cup of coffee and a granola bar.
The day after that, she thinks she might have caught a hint of a smile on his lips when he walks in, though she can’t be sure.
“You beat me again.”
“What, like it’s some sort of race?” He just gives her a quizzical look. It totally is.
They don’t say much else, just get to work. She eats a salad for lunch that day. He has a cup of coffee and a granola bar.
And the same the next day.
The day after that, when she’s getting out her lunch,
“Hey, catch.”
He looks up just in time to catch the orange she tosses him. “What…?”
“You’ve just been eating a granola bar every day. Eat something real for once.”
“I eat real food when I’m at home.”
“And how often are you at home?”
…
He doesn’t say anything else, just accepts the orange. Then she rolls a bottle of water across the table. He opens his mouth as if to object, but fizzles the second she meets his gaze.
The next day he shows up with two cups of coffee in his hands.
“I took a guess and got you a caramel macchiato.” He looks extremely nervous and awkward as he holds it out to her with a rigid arm.
She takes it. “Thanks. That’s my favorite.” The look on his face says that he knows she’s lying. She wonders what her tell is that he’s picking up on.
“Um…” He scratches the back of his head. He’s still standing there awkwardly. “What’s your name?”
Oh. Oh. They never exchanged names. She realizes she doesn’t know his either.
“Lila. You?”
“Jalil.” He looks really relieved when they shake hands. “Nice to meet you, Lila.”
There’s only a week left of break but pretty much every day goes like that. Jalil brings her coffee in the morning and she gives him some actual food for lunch. And they share comfortable silence and get work done.
Lila finishes her essay with two days to spare. As she’s packing up her stuff that day,
“So do you just live in the library?”
“Basically,” he shrugs. “When working on a doctoral thesis, it’s much more convenient to—,”
“Wait, a doctoral thesis!?”
He pauses, nervous. “Yeah…?”
“Didn’t you say you’re 26?”
“Yeah, I am.”
“How are you already getting a doctorate!?”
“I just take a lot of classes,” he responds, shoulders hunched.
Wow. She didn’t know someone could be so much of a nerd that it actually impressed her.
“So are you going to be done after this semester?”
“Not by a long shot. I’m aiming to finish in the spring.” Same for her, except with her bachelor’s.
She smiles, and tries to ignore the relief she feels knowing that he’s going to be around another semester. “Cool.”
The next few weeks go by far too fast. When classes start up again, she finds a rhythm of heading to the library after dinner every night and staying until around 11. Jalil is there without fail every single time. And every time she enters the room, he greets her with a small smile.
Even if she isn’t there for lunch, she still brings him fruit to eat. She’s about 80% sure he isn’t eating healthy—or at all—throughout the day.
As finals approach, she starts staying later.
“Hey, you’re not going to take advantage of the library being open 24 hours for finals are you?” she asks one day.
Jalil looks up from his laptop with pursed lips.
“…No.”
“I’m way better at lying than you are.”
The first night of finals week though, she ends up staying there with him through the night. This research paper has been an absolute thorn in her side and she’s determined to finish it that day so she can actually spend time studying for her other finals.
Jalil gets up around midnight and says he’ll be right back. She figures he’s going to the restroom or something. When he returns though, he has two cups of coffee and a bag of pastries from the library café.
She smiles when he hands her the drink. “Thanks.” By now he knows that her favorite is raspberry mocha.
When Lila finally finishes her paper it’s about 5 am.
“Okay,” she says as she shuts her laptop. Jalil looks up at her. How can he look as awake as he always does when she feels like death? Does he just never sleep?
“Did you do it?” She nods. He smiles. “Nice.”
She pauses to smile back. She’s so tired and worn down and something about his smile just feels like the warm blanket that she needs right about now.
She slips her bag over her shoulder and points at him accusingly. “Go home soon, okay?”
His smile widens and it’s…gosh, it’s warm. “I will.”
“Goodnight, Jalil.”
“Good morning, Lila.”
Her internal clock is all fucked up the next day. When she wakes up the sun is setting. Her breakfast is dinner and she feels like her day is just beginning when she goes down to the catacombs.
“Question,” she says as she walks in. She drops a stack of heavy text books on the table. “How the hell do you get up for an 8 am final when you spend all night in the library and mess up your sleep schedule?”
He chuckles. “I force myself to stay awake the whole day and then go to bed around 6 pm.”
She stares blankly at him. “That sounds awful.”
“It is.”
He says it with a smile though and it’s far too charming for her to dread the long night ahead.
She moves to sit adjacent to him halfway through the night when she gets out some apple slices and peanut butter to share.
“Thanks,” he mumbles. He seems even more consumed in his work than usual. He’s been glaring at the screen with a slight frown for a while.
“Something wrong?”
“I can’t find this source in any of the languages I read.”
“What language is it in?” she asks, leaning over to look at his screen.
“Italian.”
“Oh, I can help you.”
He pauses and turns to her with a skeptical eyebrow raised. “You read Italian?”
She nods. “It’s my first language.”
He narrows his gaze, scrutinizing her features. “Are you lying to me again?”
She rolls her eyes. “No.” Then she scoots her chair closer and focuses on his laptop. “Show me.”
The article isn’t too long, but it takes them hours to get through it because she keeps stopping to ask him questions. He doesn’t seem bothered though. She learns that his thesis is focused on comparing ancient mythologies across the world, noting patterns and drawing connections. It’s far from the most interesting thing in the world for her, but it’s oddly engaging when he talks about it. He’s so intimately familiar with the material that when he describes it, he speaks more like a narrative storyteller than some dry archaeologist.
It’s…really cute.
She knows her sleep schedule is really fucked when 6 am rolls around and she isn’t even tired. She’s done studying for the night though. She’s gone over her notes enough times she can practically recite them. She’s completed all her study guides and double checked every answer. She even did all the review questions in her text books. She’ll take some time to go over everything again before each exam, but she’s pretty much set for the rest of finals.
“How much longer do you plan on staying here?” she asks. Jalil checks his watch. “I dunno. I’m not really tired, but I should probably eat soon.”
She thinks for a moment, just watching him go over the notes he took from her translation.
“Want to go get breakfast with me?”
She watches as his eyes still on the page. He blinks a few times before turning to look at her. “What?”
“Breakfast. You know, one of those actual meals that people who don’t live in libraries eat? There’s a place down the street that makes some of the best crepes I’ve ever tasted.” And that is most certainly not a lie.
He keeps blinking at her, evidently surprised by her words, and a bit of pink rises to his cheeks. “I…um…okay.”
It’s not until they’re walking down the street that she realizes he’s taller than her. The guy is all leg, so sitting in the chair across the table, she couldn’t really tell. Even if she’d seen him standing a few times, she’d never actually stood next to him. It’s weird.
Conversation carries between them naturally as she asks more questions about his research. He’s awkward at first—admittedly, it does feel really weird to interact with him outside of the library—but he’s quickly put at ease talking about his work. She can hear his passion in his voice and see it in the way he waves his arms animatedly while speaking. She never knew someone could get so hyped up over archaeology but she supposes he would have to love it to pursue a doctorate in it.
“So why archaeology?” She asks when they receive their food.
“My father’s an archaeologist, so I got interested in it at a young age.”
Perhaps if she were paying more attention she might have noticed the way his smile faded then. But as it is, she’s mostly focused on her food and goes on, oblivious.
“Oh that’s cool. You two must have a lot to talk about then.”
“Um…no.”
She looks up when she hears the tenseness in his voice. Though he picks up his fork to start eating as normal, she doesn’t miss the hard look in his eyes or the way his jaw is set.
“Touchy subject?”
He presses his lips together and looks up with a shrug. “Yeah, a little bit.”
She nods and goes back to her food. “I get that. There’s a reason I don’t go home for breaks. So what other languages do you know?” She doesn’t miss the way his expression eases after that.
It takes five cups of coffee strategically spaced throughout the day and her friends keeping her constantly engaged in conversation, but Lila manages to stay awake until 6. When she finally lays down that night, it’s the deepest sleep she’s had in years.
She wakes up at the crack of dawn feeling mildly refreshed but also strangely out of it. Her shower helps, but she’s glad she doesn’t have her first exam until tomorrow so she can have a day to adjust.
When she makes her way down to the catacombs, she finds herself smiling as she breathes in the scent of old books. When did she start liking that smell?
In the study room she finds Jalil…asleep. Completely passed out with his head in a dusty book and his computer dormant in front of him. Worried and amused—mostly amused—she approaches and gently shakes his shoulder.
He sighs out a delicate hum—the sound of it sweet and oddly soothing. She takes a seat on the table in front of him.
“Jalil, wake up. You’ve been in a coma for three years.”
He opens his eyes and glares at her, brow furrowed in confusion. Then he sits up and puts on his glasses. “You’re lying,” he says in a relieved sigh as he realizes who she is.
“Yeah, that one I’ll admit to,” she smiles playfully. As he stands up and stretches sore muscles, she notices his hair is even messier than usual. The part on top that he keeps pinned back is all loose and frizzy.
“What?” he asks when he notices her eyeing him.
“Come here,” she says, reaching out toward his head. The table is just the right height that he only has to dip his head the slightest bit for her to reach. He looks confused, but he doesn’t question it as she pulls the bobby pins out. His hair is so course that it mostly stays back, but it springs up from his head making him look like a mad scientist. She giggles lightly at the sights and sticks the pins between her teeth. Then she combs her fingers through his hair and pins it back in place.
It isn’t until she sits back again that she notices the way he’s looking at her.
“Thanks,” he mumbles.
That look has her heart skipping.
“It…um…it would have bothered me.” She glances around, forcing herself to pull her gaze from those eyes. “So why were you passed out in here? Did you not go home and sleep yesterday?”
When she looks at him again, his lips are pursed in that way he does when he doesn’t want to admit something. “I…went home and showered. And then came back.”
“Jalil.”
He looks away and scratches the back of his head with a nervous smile. “I knew you were probably going to come back in the morning and I didn’t want to leave you here alone.”
Warmth prickles through her chest, but she tries not to let it show.
“It’s okay to leave me here alone.”
Those perceptive eyes zero in on her, but she stays strong. “Really?”
“Yeah,” she shrugs. “It’s not like it matters if you’re here or not.” A knowing smile comes to his lips. “What?”
“You’re lying.”
“What? No I’m not.”
“Yeah you are.”
She rolls her eyes. “Okay so I like your presence, that doesn’t mean anything.” His smile widens more as his gaze darts back and forth between her eyes. “What?”
He doesn’t answer her. He just smiles and the next thing she knows, a warm hand cups her jaw, fingers threading through the hair at the base of her neck. He leans in slowly, giving her time to react.
Her only reaction is to tilt her head to meet his.
His kiss is gentle, sweet, and combined with the fuzziness from her lack of sleep, it renders her absolutely breathless.
When he parts from her, he’s still wearing that grin, only it’s even wider now.
“Liar.”
