She had recently developed a few bad habits; one of these habits was a particularly intense form of gum-chewing. She did not chew – she gnawed, chomping with the sort of reckless abandon that regularly endangered the insides of her cheeks, leaving painful welts as evidence of her persistent nervousness.

 

He liked number two pencils. He did not like anything but number two pencils. He refused to write in pen because it smeared – presumably he had had a bad experience with ink and some important document or favorite shirt – and no one knew the reasoning behind his stark hatred of mechanical pencils. What was more, he only liked sharp number two pencils. There was a plastic pencil case in his room devoted entirely to the storage of an array of  the brightly-colored pencil sharpeners that he employed tokeep his pencils dangerously sharp. There was even a mounted pencil sharpener on his desk, though it went vastly unused due to its immobility.

 

Erin read almost everywhere she went, and this trait wasn’t limited to sitting or standing still. She particularly appreciated the way people tended to jump out of her path when she walked around with her eyes on a book, although every so often some joker would try to rip the book out of her hands. But that was high school for you; or, specifically, that was Bedford High School.

 

“Stand still.”

“I am standing still.”

“You’re bouncing up and down. That’s the opposite of standing still.”

“The opposite of standing still is probably running – ” she began, but Jake cut her off.

“The point is, you’re not standing still. And stop biting your cheek, too. I didn’t realize you were so nervous about the audition.”

“I’m not!” she insisted.

There was a few minutes’ pause while they watched other scholarship hopefuls file past, instrument cases in tow. Jake glanced over at Megan. “Stop biting your cheek already!”

“Fine!” She stopped.

He barely resisted the urge to roll his eyes. “I can tell you’re just biting the other side.”

“There’s no way you can tell that.”

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