“Hey…”, Shane called out, gently.

The figure lifted her head and Shane recognized the horn-rimmed specs. She smiled.

“Carmen, right?”, she murmured, walking over slowly.

The figure nodded in the dim light.

“Yeah. Hi”, she said under her voice.

Shane stood right before her, shifting her weight from one foot to the other, and shoved her hands in the hip pockets of her jeans.

“What are you doing here, all alone?”, she asked softly.

Carmen looked down at her book and Shane frowned, realizing that she looked slightly embarrassed.

“Uh, just reading. I’m studying”.

Shane chuckled heartily.

“How can you read? It’s too dark in here”, she uttered.

Carmen shrugged, closing the book and resting it on the ground beside her.

“Actually I was trying to repeat a poetry by heart, so, uh, I don’t really need to read anything”.

“I see…”.

Shane tilted her head to a side, meditatively, and sat down beside Carmen. Instinctively, Carmen jolted. She was shaking and Shane’s brows furrowed.

“I don’t understand why you’re studying here. It’s a cold night and you have your apartment, so…”, she trailed off.

“You and your girlfriend were too noisy, I couldn’t focus”, Carmen replied, honestly, pushing her glasses up the bridge of her nose in an usual gesture.

Shane’s eyes widened.

“Oh, fuck!”.

“Yeah. I figured out as much”, Carmen chuckled.

“No, no, I mean, I’m so sorry. I’m sorry, really. Carmen, why didn’t you tell me?”, she asked.

Carmen gave her a lopsided look.

“I tried. You didn’t hear me”, she muttered.

Shane pursed her lips and looked down.

“I’m sorry. It won’t happen again”, she mumbled, sincerely embarrassed.

Carmen crossed her arms over her chest to protect herself from the cold and stared at the dark sky above.

“It’s okay. Just tell your girlfriend not to scream too much…”, she smiled.

Shane shrugged.

“She isn’t my girlfriend. She’s just someone I barely know”, she felt the need to reply.

Carmen hid a smile.

“Aaww. It’s even worse than I thought, then. You must be a heartbreaker, which means that every night it’ll be the same old story with someone different”.

“I’ll tell them to be quiet”, Shane smirked, and Carmen giggled.

“Deal, then”.

“Yeah, deal”.

They stayed silent for a while and Shane felt herself relaxing beside that strange, nerdy girl. A girl with soulful eyes hidden behind thick glasses, and long hair tied in a ponytail, and lousy old-fashioned clothes, and books – many, many books. Shane was used to girls that looked gaudy and loud, that showed their beauty like a weapon, that were always conspicuously flirty.