Page 2 of Beauty and the Nerd

Ben moved down the hallway towards Emma’s room, grateful to not see anyone from school there.

He’d wanted to come last night after hearing about the accident through a group chat for the tutor center who’d seen it posted online, but knew if he had, things wouldn’t have gone well.

Part of him was still amazed, even after three months that she actually wanted him still.

He wanted her just as much…well, he wanted the real Emma, not the persona she showed to the rest of the school to keep the others from turning on her.

The door for her room was open, and he moved into it, stopping short when he found several others standing around the space. He cursed under his breath before Emma’s gaze slid over to him, and he saw relief flash in her beautiful blue-green eyes.

“Ben!” she said with a light smile at him.

“Wait…you remember him?” Carter stated, his gaze narrowing as he glared at her, and Ben’s wonder increased higher as to what happened.

Their vice principal told him that she’d woken unable to recall anything but her mom but was otherwise stable when she stopped him in the hallway for a favor.

As he’d been working with her through the tutor center, he was asked to drop off her work.

He’d thought it was far too soon for anyone to push her on it, but he didn’t begin to argue since he’d wanted to come check on her in person, especially since he hadn’t heard from her directly all day.

His thoughts may have shown on his face though, since the woman added to let Emma know there was no rush, they just wanted to get it into her hands, so she had plenty of time to complete it while she recovered. Now, he simply had far more questions since it seemed she remembered him.

“I…I do, I guess,” Emma said as her mom came up behind Ben.

“Ben, it’s good to see you again,” Nicole said ushering him further into the room with a frown at the rest of the group in the space.

“Hey Emma,” he said, forcing himself to control his desire to move over to her, slide his hand onto her cheek and kiss her. He was thanking god that she was alive, and the only thing that he could see to even say she was injured was a bruise on her forehead and a cast on her arm.

“Hold up, how do you know him and what the hell are you doing here?” Carter demanded, and Emma pulled herself further into the bed away from Carter as her face paled.

“Ben’s been helping me out with some classes through the tutor center,” Emma said, and he saw surprise and a bit of relief in her mom’s eyes at the statement.

Ben ignored the others as he moved around the bed to sit the information down on the table not near the rest of the group there.

“Your teachers wanted to make sure you had this for whenever you felt up to it, Emma. Ms. Bentley said there’s no rush, but your teachers were sure you’d want it since you’ve been so diligent this year on your grades. ”

“Thanks,” she said taking the book off the top to look at it, a light question slipping onto her brow as she did.

“If you need any help with it just let me know. I’ll head out to let you get some rest right now, but I’ll be available whenever you might need.

” No way was he about to remain in the room with the others there.

He didn’t know how long he’d be able to control his need to reassure himself that she was actually safe.

He wanted—needed—to reach out and touch her, make sure she was really there, truly okay after being in a car accident with Carter.

Especially one that’d left her with memory loss.

“Can you stay for a couple minutes? I think some of this looks familiar, but maybe if I go through it, something else will come back,” she suggested turning her face so only he would see the look she gave him. He read the huge ‘please’ in it and he wasn’t about to say no to her.

“Sure,” he agreed settling his bag on the floor next to the table to grab a chair from it.

“You want to do homework?” Carter questioned raising his voice slightly, anger tinting it entirely, and Ben felt Emma withdraw from the guy more than noticing her physical withdrawal from him.

Physically she just barely leaned away, her mouth tensing a bit, but her eyes flashed with something he’d never seen before, never wanted to see in them again, and her breathing grew a bit slower making him really need to know what was going on, what happened.

“Why don’t the rest of you head home?” Nicole suggested to the group seeing Emma shifting away from them even though they were all at the foot of the bed.

“Visiting hours will be over at seven and I think Emma will need a nap after dinner. Ben, you can stay until then, but the doctors said not to let Emma push herself.”

“Nice and easy, no complex math, got it.” Ben gave her mom a nod, and he listened to Carter’s friends hackling him as they left without even a goodbye amongst them beyond from her friend Megan.

“Damn man, it’s pretty sad when the girl you’re nailing doesn’t even remember you but knows her freaking tutor,” Steve stated, and they heard Nicole hush them as she shut the door behind her.

“Em,” Ben said as she reached over and grabbed the curtain, pushing it down towards the foot of the bed so no one would see her from the door.

“Come here, please.”

She sat up further, and he wasn’t about to deny himself the chance to hold her.

He felt her shake slightly as his arms came around her and he held her as tightly as he dared, unsure of all the injuries she sustained.

The cast on her wrist and the bruise on her forehead were too much already and if there was anything internal, he didn’t want to begin to make it worse.

“What’s going on, baby?” His question put a light smile on her lips as he gently laid her back against her pillows once she’d calmed down.

“I heard from Ms. Bentley that you couldn’t remember anyone but your mom, didn’t remember anything, were having trouble recalling names and faces, but you clearly recall me—us. ”

“I just didn’t want to deal with the cops when I woke up.

” She turned onto her side to get a little more comfortable, then reached over and held his hand seeing the way his brow lifted.

“I don’t want it getting out right now. I don’t care what they think about me remembering you and not them.

All I’ve wanted today was you here with me. ”

“Em.” He sighed softly reaching over to kiss her forehead where the bruise stood out starkly. “I wanted to come last night when I heard but I knew what people would think.”

“I’m not mad, Ben. I get it and completely understand. I just can’t do this anymore. I can’t keep pretending that I barely know you. I can’t keep pretending to date Carter,” she added unable to hide the shudder that ran through her or the break of her voice at the end.

Ben felt the coolness of her arm and pulled the blanket up around her further, before taking her hand back into his.

“What happened, baby? Carter said some car came around the curve on the wrong side of the road but that doesn’t explain how he didn’t have time to avoid it or how you got the brunt of the accident when it hit his side on the front of the truck.

He doesn’t have a scratch on him but your head, your arm… ”

“Carter was mad that I wanted to leave the party early. I was so tired of the crap there and didn’t want to deal with them anymore.

I wanted to come home, see if you were free, and spend the rest of the evening with you.

So, I told Carter that I had to go. On the drive, he reached over, grabbed me, and pulled me towards him.

I didn’t know what the hell was going on until he pushed my face down toward his groin. ”

“What?!” Ben nearly shouted, and Emma squeezed his hand tighter, not about to let him go after the creep.

“I pushed at him, fought to make him let me go and that’s when the car came around the curve. Carter had pushed the top of the seatbelt from my body so when it hit, I didn’t have anything to stop me from hitting the dash.”

Ben slid his free hand back beneath her head, lowering his towards her. “You don’t want to tell the cops that, why? He assaulted you.”

“I just don’t want to deal with the backlash that might come from school from it.

There’s no way to know how everyone there would react if I pressed charges on him.

What he’d do. What his father would do or attempt to get me to back down.

Right now, with Carter thinking that I don’t recall what happened, it means that he’s not as likely to try it again.

He’ll know that if I do remember that I can tell the police and he’ll be in trouble.

He won’t want that coming out since he has two offers to play college football still on the table.

They’ll likely withdraw them if they hear that he’s been accused of sexual assault. ”

“I don’t want you near him. What’s to say he won’t try it again simply because he thinks you don’t remember or because you can’t fight back as well with a broken arm?” Ben questioned wanting to go find him and beat him into the ground, even if he wasn’t as physically built as the asshole.

“Just give me a week or two, then I’ll break up with him, threaten that if he doesn’t leave me alone, I’ll tell the cops what I do remember about the accident,” she said, but he knew either way was dangerous.

“I just really want to be with you right now, without everyone asking questions about the accident.”

“I really want to be with you too, Em. You have no idea, how relieved I am to know you’re okay, baby.” He slipped onto the edge of the bed with her, wanting to keep her entirely safe.

He didn’t care what anyone said now. The semester was nearly finished. He wasn’t going to volunteer for the tutor center for the next one. They could come out with their relationship after the new semester started. Hopefully then he could show everyone that Emma was his and he was hers.