“Who’s fault is that? You’re the one who won’t let me in.”
“Maybe that’s because I don’t know if I want to let you in.”
I push out the chair across from me. "Sit. Let me see if I can change your mind."
“Aren’t you getting work done?”
“I’ve been working ahead. It’s fine. Thanks for caring about my intellectual mind.”
“What about mine?” he asks, lifting the stack of books in his hands.
“We can talk some, and then I’ll get out of your hair. That work for you?”
“I wouldn’t mind, but I don’t actually get any studying done here.”
“No? Why not?”
“It’s too distracting.”
I lift my eyebrows. “How so?”
“Well, maybe I’ve been on a kick lately.”
“What kind of a kick?”
“Where I prefer girls like Belle.”
“Belle?”
“You know. Belle. Beauty and the Beast.”
“Did you have a crush on the cartoon Belle?”
“Maybe I did.”
I giggle. “I don’t look like her at all.”
“Actually, if you had a book in your hand… You have that faraway look in your eyes sometimes when you seem like you’re dreaming of a happier place.”
“Like when Belle sings about wanting to explore the world.”
“Exactly. I have to say that I was always bothered about the ending of the movie, though. She dreams of going out and exploring, but then she falls in love and decides she just needs to explore a castle—”
“And that huge library!”
“—and not go out and explore the rest of the world after all.”
“Who says she and the Beast didn’t go out at least for their honeymoon?”
“I don’t know. That’s not really enough, and I mean, they were in France, right? When was it set? Shortly before all of the French nobility lost their heads, right?”
"You've spent way too much time thinking about a movie meant to be a fairy tale."
“I know. I used to babysit the girl next door, and that was the only movie she would ever watch. I must have seen it a million times.”
“Shouldn’t you hate it then?”
“It was hate it or love it, and… Belle’s hot.”