((Set right after this rp))

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“I’m sorry,” Abby bit her lip and scooted back to her side of the table. “I can’t let what we were doing affect what needs to be done… no matter how much I liked it.” She smiled sadly at him, probably not quite as disappointed as he was but she too cursed her inability to let something remain unfinished. Damn her sense of dedication and work ethic. She might not be a straight A student but those ethics had helped her get a damn good GPA and she didn’t want to see his affected because of her.

“I’ll help if I can…” She volunteered, a sort of peace offering. “And I’m guessing that concentrating on the homework isn’t the only thing relatively hard right now.” It was a stab at a bad joke, trying to help lighten the mood. What was true for him was true for her, she just didn’t have anything quite so visible to display her body’s desire. “You know if it's just the math due tomorrow I’m sure we can get through everything pretty fast right? It's, what, ten questions per chapter? It shouldn’t be too hard should it? The papers can wait till tomorrow, the notes even longer since those are due at the end of the week… You should study for the quiz though.” She sighed and muttered very unhelpful, and unkind, words about teachers and their unholy obsession with homework. Back before she knew better Abby used to believe each professor thought their class was the only class you had and assigned homework accordingly.

Being an adult sucked! Being a responsible adult sucked even more so.


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He waved a hand to dismiss the apology; he knew her well enough to know that leaving things undone was just something she never did. Now that his head was on a little more straight he realized that he shouldn't be surprised that, in this particular instance, things turned out the way that they did. Besides, he probably should have been grateful that there was a more responsible one between them. It meant neither of their GPAs would suffer, which was definitely a good thing. His scholarship depended on it.

Cliff still chuckled lightly at her joke despite it being something he was more suffering rather than enjoying at the moment. "Halfway there," he said with a little groan as he shifted in his seat. "If you waited any longer to stop us I'd probably have to go to the bathroom, but right now it's manageable."

With another sigh he glanced down at his math book, nodding along as she proposed a course of action for the rest of the night as far as their homework went. It sounded like a good plan; he was just trying to be the overachiever to push his GPA to a place where he was a little happier with it. Had he known they were gonna get so close to doing that he might have been a little less ambitious. "Yeah, I think I can manage the math. It's fifteen questions a chapter, so I'm about halfway done with the thirty questions. The papers are each maybe a quarter done so I can manage those tomorrow…"

Her mutterings got a smirk out of him and he reached over the table with his palms upturned, making grabby hands and hoping she would take a cue and reach over as well. "You're nearly done, right?"


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“Oh dear,” Abby winced slightly, now kind of wishing they had stopped a little bit earlier before things had become a bit heavier than either of them meant. “I’m sure doing equations will do wonders with your libido.” Nosy, the young woman leaned over just enough to get a look at his book and saw he had gotten to the eighth question. “Halfway done? Cliff you're more like a quarter way through. I think you're going to have to wait on the papers, no ifs, ands, or butts.” Abby at least had the grace to cover the snicker that burst from her at her comment, her mind now squarely in the gutter. “Totally didn’t mean it that way.”

After taking a few breaths to calm down, and to get her mind focused back on homework, she reached over and took Cliff’s outstretched hand. “Yes, I’m just taking notes for my papers now, but it's nothing that can’t be put off. One isn’t due until Friday, the other two have outlines due on Wednesday with a rough draft due on Friday so I’ve got time. It's you who is swamped.” After a moment she scooted a little closer, the better to look over his shoulder and at least attempt to help him with the math but not too close to tempt her into throwing away any hope of getting his evil homework done. “Evil, evil maths… Now where do we start?” She eyed the pages and glanced at Cliff then back at the pages. “Can we just burn it? Would that work?”


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"I meant halfway with the first chapter," he said in his own defense, though the smile he wore as he said it showed that he was mostly joking. "And yeah, just the thought of math is making it loads easier on me, actually." Which was true; he needed maybe another minute or two before he was totally calm again, so in the meantime he just laughed alongside her at yet another joke she (accidentally) made and waited things out.

Eventually it'd gone down completely and he started flipping through his textbook with his free hand. With his other hand he was holding hers, his thumb faintly tracing circles on her skin. "Lucky you; if it wasn't for my math and english professors, my schedule and homework would be a breeze." He sighed and simultaneously gave her hand a squeeze to sort of comfort himself; the contact had a rather soothing effect on him. When she scooted closer he shifted a bit in his seat as well to give her a little more room to see, which meant incidentally moving slightly away from her. A good thing, considering if she got any closer the temptation to ignore all the math homework would be overwhelming.

"Yep, it is evil. A necessary one if I wanna graduate," he said with a nod, then chuckled. "And no, we can't burn it. If we could, I would have insisted we burn it later and keep doing what we were doing earlier." An innocent smile spread across his face as he glanced at her. "Anyway, I can get on top of it and be done in maybe an hour, two hours tops. It's challenging but not impossible. After that, probably study for the quiz first, then maybe notes for my papers if there's time."

He paused, then glanced around and only then noticed that he didn't actually have a wall clock. "Speaking of, what time is it?"


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Abby couldn’t help but shake her head at him sadly, he would learn about over loading himself with work. As well as researching the professors before signing up for their classes. It actually seemed like he was already learning it on his own, she just hoped he would be able to get a handle on all the work sooner rather than later so he wasn’t always so damn swamped.

She snickered at his comment and his innocent smile, “Oh please I think the friction we were starting to create would have started the fire for us. No matches needed.” Abby left her one hand in his, enjoying the simple contact of skin on skin, but tapped his book with her other, free, hand. “One thing at a time Cliff. Finish the math then think of moving on, the sooner we get started the sooner we can be done.” And maybe get back to the kissing. That last part was only in her head but she had a feeling that roughly the same thoughts were lurking in the back of his brain too.

“Time? I have no clue.” Abby never wore a watch, actually relied on her phone for telling the time. Apparently Cliff was the same since he didn’t seem to have a wall clock anywhere around, not that she would have noticed without it being pointed out to her first. “Hold on.” She scootched back towards her bag, their linked hands stretching out behind her, so she could fish out her phone. “It is just shy of eight now… and I have a missed call from dad. Crap.” She shot him an apologetic look before letting him go and getting up, walking a little bit away so she could give Cliff at least a little privacy while she called her father back.

“Hello daddy, sorry I missed your call.” .... ”I’m studying at Cliff’s place.” .... “No. No movies tonight. Just homework.” …. “I’m sure he will be too busy with classes and practice but I’ll ask.” …. “Yes dad.” …. “No dad.” …. “I know dad.” …. “I will dad. Love you too.” …. “Good bye dad.” …. “Bye dad” …. “dad I have papers to finish” …. “DADDY! I promise I would tell you if I was dating Cliff.” Abby had the grace to shoot a sheepish look at Cliff, apologizing for the lie. The lie was so much worse because of what they were doing just a little bit ago. “Really now Dad, I’ve got to go. Good night.” After a moment she ended the call and lightly banged her head against the closest wall. They were in a bit of a jam now since they had told her father about them seeing each other but apparently he had at least caught wind of it. They would have to address this sooner rather than later now if she didn’t want her father to come after Cliff.


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"Damn, it's eight already?" he mumbled as he started working through the math. At the mention of her father, however, he visibly winced. The man had always been good to him growing up, but he'd seen how he was with the boys that ever went out with Abby and he knew how...harsh and intimidating he could be. Or at least first-hand from Abby's exes. He watched her walk off a small distance for a bit of privacy, and he took the chance to finish off another problem and start on the next one. He was maybe half-listening and he caught a few things here and there until she raised her voice, which caught his attention.

The drop in his expression was probably a little more obvious than he would have liked; three weeks and they still hadn't told him, and now she lied to him about it.

"Rock, meet hard place," he said with yet another weak smile as he leaned back, glad for the break between his math problems. Though, he took a break from math problems only to be faced with a different kind of problem, so it wasn't entirely a break from "problems" in general. "We have to tell him sometime, to at least confirm anything if he's heard rumors floating around." Somehow he got the feeling regardless of how he found out, though, Cliff could expect to have a very pointed conversation with him. Which was scary enough on its own.

"So I'm guessing...no movie tonight, huh?"


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“I know, I know. I just didn't…” Abby trailed off with one final head thunk against the wall. She had delayed telling her dad at first because it was still so new and it felt like anything could throw off the balance. And then it just never really came up, or rather she avoided it in the hopes it would never come up. Except now their grace period was over and she had to tell him.

With a sigh she stood upright, although it was tempting to continue to just rap her head against the drywall, and head back towards Cliff. “I'll talk to him tomorrow between classes. Hopefully he will be too busy to really go off.” As she passed behind him she gently ran her fingers through his hair. Once back at her original set she sat back down and promptly planted her face in her text book. “He really isn't that bad you know.” Her words were muffled by the pages. “He can just be a little over protective sometimes.”

When Cliff asked about the movie Abby laughed and tilted her head so she was now just laying the side of her face against the book, rather than the front. She arched her brow and asked, “did you get the other 22 problems done while I talked to dad?” She sat up and leaned over to look at his progress. “You're closer. The sooner you finish the sooner we can watch a movie.” Absently her gaze dropped from his eyes to his mouth, movies the last thing on her mind as she worried her bottom lip between her teeth.

With a mental shake of her head, and a vocal sigh, Abby turned back to her own notes. Her offer to help him still stood but she needed the few moments for her to actually see the words on the page to get her mind off of their previous actions, and just how much she wanted to continue them. “By the way dad wanted me to ask you over for dinner on Sunday. You can say no if you want, you don't have to come.” The offer was said to the book but was meant for Cliff. Part of her wanted him to say yes, another part no… She wanted them all to have a meal together but she was also aware that it would give her father ample opportunity to grill Cliff over an open flame.


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The feel of her fingers in his hair had him hum briefly, a soft and pleasant note to reflect how much he actually enjoyed the contact. Cliff's eyes rested on her defeated-looking form, head down in her textbook in classic frustrated student fashion, and he had the strongest urge to go over and give her a hug, but he knew that in the state he was in a hug would lead to one thing, then another, then another, and then perhaps his murder if her father found out. So instead he buried his nose into his math problems again, and when she leaned over to glance at how far he'd gotten a small smile of pride spread across his face.

"Nearly halfway now," he said, scribbling the solution for yet another problem before moving on to the next one. "And if there's no time for a movie I'll settle for an episode of something and some quality time on the couch before I walk you home?"

He left the question in the air as a silence fell; a quick look up at her and he saw that she was once more focused on her own notes, which was good for him. Another problem done, moving on! Just as he was about to start another one, though, she mentioned dinner and his pen stopped short of hitting the page. "Dinner?" he asked, looking up at her again. The fact that she wasn't looking him in the eye made him nervous; maybe he wasn't "all that bad" like she said earlier, but he knew any conversation involving his daughter and the guy she was dating would be no walk in the park. Dinner...was a bit of a scary thought. The brunette studied her expression for a moment before making his decision.

"Dinner sounds good," he replied, then got back to his equations. "Just tell me what time he wants me to be there, and I'll be there." Cliff wanted this to work, and he knew that in order for that to happen he needed to have this talk with her dad.


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“Sounds like a good idea. But math first, Netflix later.” Abby tossed him a smile and went back to her own work, he seemed to be getting into the rhythm of things because he had more done by the time she looked up at his response to the offer of dinner.

“Ok. I'll talk to him tomorrow and get the details. Is there anything in particular you want to eat?” Abby liked to cook and normally made the weekend meals when she went home. Sadly her dorm kitchen didn't really handle doing much more than microwave food very well.


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"Cool. And surprise me, hon," he said with a smile, though he narrowed his eyes a bit at the nickname that just naturally rolled off his tongue. Hopefully she didn't mind; if anything he could just go back to calling her Abby or Abs if she didn't like it, otherwise it felt...right. "I've always been a fan of your cooking. I'm sure it'll be great."

With that he got to his homework like a boss, finishing it within the next hour or so with a weak groan. The break he took afterward was ever brief, however--just water and a small snack--as he studied up for the quiz as well, but intended to finish what he set out to finish that night.


”itspao_”