Teaching Noah | √

034

"Listen, that woman's songwriting skills are out of this world. She's a genius. Harry too— have you heard Watermelon Sugar on this shit?"

"No, Noah," I chuckled. "I've never even come close to a vinyl record player before."

"Okay, then. Prepare to be entertained," he fixed the disk on the player, and I watched him in amusement as he burst into a rendition of Watermelon Sugar alongside Harry Styles. Though his voice was something else, he didn't seem to care, and his moves were flawless— the whole display in front of me threw me into deep fits of laughter. When he was done, I clapped my hands, still laughing, "I've never seen you like that before."

"Was that entertaining?" he chuckled.

My laughter had reduced to chuckles. "You have no idea. Who knew you could dance?"

"Believe me when I say, Jason Derulo has nothing on me," he grabbed a towel and slung it over his shoulders, "Now, I'm going to take a shower," he walked towards the door to his bathroom before calling out, "Don't finish the donuts!"

"You might be unlucky!" I called back.

I was still amazed at what my eyes had beheld today, but I couldn't help but be curious about a few things. Just a few things that made me wonder what Noah was about. Clearly, he was not one to talk about his parents' wealth, and he wasn't much of a spender. Well, except it was something he really needed, or donuts for every time I pestered him about them. Also, the time we were at the amusement park, he was the one who covered everything— but declined cards and him not doing anything about his messed up car were a mystery to me.

Noah came out of the bathroom shortly in fresh clothes and a little water dripping from his hair. He reached for one donut in the box and took a bite before sitting opposite me. He smelt of soap— a scent that was musky and cool.

"It's surprising there are still donuts in here," he teased.

"You were just lucky," I picked a donut from the box as well and took a bite.

"After these donuts, what then?"

I shrugged, "I have no idea," I hadn't given any thought to it, because I noticed that I didn't need to plan for anything with Noah. Things just happened spontaneously.

"Everything okay?" I heard him ask, and I nodded, "Just one pressing question."

He had a small smile on his face like he knew what I was about to ask, "Shoot."

"I'm just wondering—"

"The car?"

"Mhm," I nodded.

"I've told you before, I don't have the money to fix a car problem at the moment."

"Why not, though? What of the money you make from tutoring? Where does it go?"

"To my savings. . . I'm trying to get a house, remember?" he paused. "I'm not going to lie, sometimes, I'm tempted to not get a house. I convince myself that maybe it's not so bad living here, because sometimes, it really isn't bad living here, but I also know that I'm not going to live here forever, I'm going to leave one day. . . eventually. So, I just save up because the car problem can wait right now for me."

I nodded, "I understand."

"There are one too many cars in the garage at the moment. If I need a change of car, I could have one in seconds, but I don't want to. It's easy to take advantage of my parents because they barely notice anything, but I don't want to either. . . I'll rather work hard to get my own stuff and fix my own problems."

I listened to him, and I felt a small smile on my face. Who was he, really? "I like the way you think, Noah."

"Thank you," he smiled shyly.