The asymptotes of a cotangent function are... are...
A singsong voice cut sharply into his train of thought as long blonde hair swept down across his cheek and onto his math homework. "Whatcha doing, Louie?"
"Don't call me Louie," he replied, swiping the hair off of his work. "And I'm trying to work. I don't bug you when you're doing your homework."
"You bug me when I'm doing more important things," she replied. "Sin is a phase shift of cos," she read from his paper. "Wow... never heard of that."
"It's sine and cosine, not sin and cos," he replied in amused annoyance. "It's usually high school work, but I'm a little advanced."
"You're in eight grade and you're doing..." she read the label in the corner of the paper. "Precalculus? You've got to be kidding. You can do precalculus and you can sing and dance? You're cooler than I thought you were, Louis."
Louis blushed slightly. No one ever thought he was cool because of his talents. "Really?"
"Of course. Anyway, I was just coming to tell you that my mom bought some candy corn at the store and gave it to me to hand out, so I wanted to know if you wanted some."
"Sure." Her small, manicured hand held out a pile of the orange and yellow and white candies. He took them from her, sliding one into his mouth. It was sweet... almost too sweet. Like Cici's sweet smile as she took her hand back. He found himself grabbing it, intertwining her fingers with his. "Thank you, Cici."
Her smile sweetened as her sky blue eyes met his. "You're welcome, Louis. You can have more if you want."
He smiled back at her, squeezing her hand tighter in his. "Cici?"
"Yes?" She was still smiling and gazing, one hand in his, one hand on her bag of candy.
"You can call me Louie if you want." He raised her hand to his lips. "Anytime you want."
"I will." She released his hand and reached down past him, pointing at the writing on his worksheet. His heart was pounding against his throat, hoping that she wouldn't see what he didn't want her to. Her finger landed on a line of print. "The asymptotes of a cotangent function are zero, pi, and pi times two." Her finger slowly traveled to his own scrawl in the corner, the scrawl that spelled out her name. "And Copette Calliope is indeed the hottest girl on earth. Thank you." She stood up, withdrawing her hand. Another smile had blossomed onto her face. "I'll see you at practice in a few hours, Louie."
A sigh burned its way into his chest. "Yes. I'll see you, Cici."