Silence, thick and heavy, weighed down on her with nothing but the sound of charcoal scratching at the thin paper’s surface to break it as he continued to work. Eyes remaining on him, their blue hues worried, angry, waiting for something, they didn’t waver; Not once did they deviate from his haggard form as he drew whatever image he had in his mind, her own drawing ceasing to be a priority. The class could wait in the wake of everything that had happened, and, with him next to her...she was going to get the answers she required so she could plan accordingly.<br/><br/>Plan<span style="font-style: italic">what</span>, she wasn’t entirely certain just yet, but being in the dark was far worse than knowing in her book.<br/><br/>Longer still, the silence lasted. Now, the scratching of his pen accompanied that of the rest of the room. Louder and louder the drag of point across paper became, droning out the sound of her breathing and overwhelming her until even thoughts couldn’t penetrate the forefront of her mind.<span style="font-style: italic">Too much…</span>Talyah had to fight the urge to plug her ears, to show yet another chink in her armor the longer he took to dignify her question with an answer. There was no glancing at the piece he was working on, no attempt to interrupt him, the urge to swipe the paper from the cool surface strong, followed shortly by the urge to grasp his collar and demand he speak that instant.<br/><br/>Each was an urge she ignored. Each was held in check, but only just.<br/><br/>As his lips parted to speak, she nearly leaned completely out of her chair in anticipation, not wanting to miss a word. And, just what was she given for her trouble? What did he offer her as an answer for everything she’d asked?<span style="font-style: italic">“You don’t remember me? How could you forget me, Talyah?”</span>Where the pencil scratching had dominated her very being only moments before, this one utterance now took precedent, repeating over and over until it became an unintelligible mantra in her mind. He insulted her intelligence, no matter how jesting the question had been in, the telltale smirk on his features enough to allude to that fact.<br/><br/>His voice again jolted her from her current thoughts, the feel of an edge brushing against the skin of her arm causing goosebumps to form, eyes not venturing south. Not yet.<span style="font-style: italic">Why should I take the time to look at what he’s created?</span>she asked, inner monologue full of petulance and annoyance.<span style="font-style: italic">Why should I give him an artistic critique when he refuses to answer what I’ve rightly asked?</span>But, like he had been before, his face turned away from her own and he spoke again, spoke of what made no sense at all, of what she didn’t think was prudent to comment about so plainly when her sanity and the thin fabric of her sensibilities was on the line, hanging in the balance of the tension about her; tension he so blatantly ignored with a willpower she couldn’t seem to muster.<br/><br/>An exasperated sigh tumbled free of her lips, eyes rolling before eventually moving down to the picture he’d created. It was dark, painful, her mind feeling the sadness that came with every feather that fell to the cold grown beneath this dark specter's form...a visage that could only have been the very same of the man who now sat next to her. A frown crossed her features, her delicate brow creased and wrinkled with confusion.<br/><br/>Angels, in the young woman’s mind, were little more than fairytale myth. They were nothing but creatures found in works of fiction that came in and saved the heroine from her problems, that died for their charges, that fought the demons of a pointy-tailed Satan. They had brilliant wings, vibrant eyes, halos that caught the light around them as they hovered above their heads, and were nearly always bathed in some heavenly light while clothed in something of a pure-semblance, namely white robes. They were always handsome or beautiful, the opposite in every way of their nefarious counterparts. Part of her thought it conceited to draw himself in such a light, but she made no move to comment on such as he continued, finally addressing her chief concerns.<br/><br/>Concerns he somehow seemed convinced she was at fault for.<br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic">Because I wasn’t paying attention to my surroundings, I’ve been attacked? Or was it even an attack at all? Was it merely someone attempting to get my attention and he intervened because he’s some sort of a stalker?</span>Tal wondered, looking up at him with a dubious gaze, her brow quirked in her confusion with the stress he was putting on these beings, these angels. On souls and the very makeup of one’s mortality.<span style="font-style: italic">Odd…</span><br/><br/>Odder still, he admitted to being in her classes intentionally, which added to her stalker theory, her eyes continuing to watch him as he took the picture back and picked up where he’d left off, mind trying to figure out just what she believed of this all. His word that he’d rather spend time with me, that she’d be safer that way, had her baulking. Why should she, if she were in some sort of danger, trust her life to a complete stranger? A stranger who spoke more like he lived in some fantastical world where he was the only thing standing between her and the monsters under her bed? And, where he admitted to placing himself in each of her classes, what more could she expect? Would he be in her dorms? In each place she frequented? Was anywhere sacred on this campus that she’d not see him popping up, in his quest to “spend time”?<br/><br/>“I ask you about...what all of that was,” Talyah started, voice low as a hand picked up her own pen and resumed the drawing she, herself, had started; Strokes of the pen were jerky, agitated, not as practiced as his. “And you, instead, talk about souls and angels, of danger, without offering even the slightest bit of something real for me to believe…” More silence ensued as she shaded the dark eyes she’d drawn, coloring them in over and over, so no hint of light shown through the black of her page. “Do you know how crazy you sound? How all of this sounds?”<br/><br/>Another pause as even her pen slowed its movements. “...Who is<span style="font-style: italic">they</span>?” Her eyes slowly crawled back over to him, brows pulling tightly together. “Who is the<span style="font-style: italic">they</span>you’re so against?”