Chapter Text
This is starting to get exhausting.
You sit next to Stacey, your battered physics textbook splayed open like a riddle in front of you. The upcoming quiz casts a long shadow over your best friend, and you can feel the weight of it in the furrow of her brows and the restless tap of her pencil.
Stacey, despite all her strengths, has always found herself adrift in the sea of theories and equations that you navigate so easily.
“Always remember na 'yung computed value for electrostatic force can be positive or negative, denoting attractive or repulsive force, respectively. Kaya pa ba, Staku?” You ask, worried that you might be pushing too hard. Each time you dive into Newton's laws or the intricacies of electromagnetism, you watch her eyes grow distant, her understanding slipping through her fingers like grains of sand. It's not for the lack of trying; God knows how your best friend's determination is as fierce as a mad scientist's, but the language of physics remains elusive, a dialect her mind struggles to translate.
She waves off your concern, her pencil moving rapidly across the paper as she solves the problem set you gave her for practice. You hear her mumble the numbers under her breath and the consequent squeak of confusion she lets out every now and then.
It's incredibly endearing. For a moment you do nothing but watch her, a soft smile unconsciously gracing your lips.
She's beautiful, you thought.
The late afternoon sun filtered through your room's window, casting golden patterns on the worn pages of your textbook, and you found yourself increasingly distracted by the way her hair caught the light, creating a halo around her head.
Ethereal. Breathtaking. All the words you can get out of the thesaurus. But you are a scientist, not a poet.
So, you allow yourself to explain the tug in your heart in a way that you understand:
Newton's law of attraction, in its essence, speaks of a cosmic dance, a silent, invisible force that pulls objects towards each other across the vastness of space. It's an unseen thread, delicate yet unbreakable, binding the stars to their orbits and the planets to their suns. This force, though imperceptible to the naked eye, weaves the universe together in a grand, harmonious ballet.
Just as the moon tugs at the ocean, causing the tides to rise and fall, you also feel a pull towards those who enter your life, sometimes subtle, sometimes overwhelming. (In Stacey's case, it was a gradual shift; building slowly, eventually accelerating, and gaining momentum that you had no choice but to let the force of your emotions bring you to where you are now. Right beside her.) It's the force that causes your heart to beat faster when your eyes meet across a crowded room, or the way thoughts of her linger in your mind, unbidden and constant.
The law of attraction, once a mere concept in your studies, started to weave itself into the fabric of your reality.
The friendship you share with her is more than a simple connection; every look, every laugh, every touch, every shared secret begins to exert a force on you, as real and undeniable as any physical phenomenon.
And so, amidst the diagrams and formulas, you found yourself falling for Stacey, drawn to her with a force as natural and powerful as the laws of the universe you so eagerly explained.
“Jho…” You are brought back to reality as you hear her sigh in exasperation. You hum questioningly. You see the way her back is tense, her neck is strained. You could almost see the blood vessels pulsating through her temples. She wordlessly takes both your hands and guides you towards your bed.
“Timeout muna?” You tease before letting yourself be pulled. Her hands travel up your shoulders and you try your best to ignore the static electricity it causes.
(You can't, not when you feel it from the edges of your fingertips down to your toes. You just can't.)
(Not when it's Stacey.)
She pushes you to lie on your bed before she follows, putting an arm over your waist and tucking her head into the crook of your neck. You feel more than hear her sigh contentedly, nuzzling into your side even more.
Here's another fascinating phenomenon: no matter how close two objects get, there will always be molecules of air, even in a vacuum, separating them. It's the ever-present forces that govern our universe keeping even the closest entities slightly apart. But as Stacey pulls you closer, her lips almost touching the side of your neck, it feels like she's defying the very laws of physics.
You feel her warmth seep into you, her breath gentle and rhythmic against your neck. It's almost as if she's trying to crawl into your heart, ignoring the fact that, scientifically, there should always be some distance, some small separation of air molecules. Stacey's determination to be close to you transcends these invisible barriers, and you realize that some forces are stronger than those defined by science.
In this moment, the concepts of physics fade away, and all that remains is Stacey, her very existence, and the loud beating of your heart screaming for her name. Her presence is a comforting weight against your side, a tangible proof that sometimes, human emotions and desires can surpass even the most steadfast rules of the universe.
With Stacey, you feel invincible.
In her arms, the impossible becomes possible.
And as she snuggles closer, you can't help but think that maybe, just maybe, love is the most powerful force of all.
“Pahinga muna.”
You chuckle, and you know she feels the rumble of your chest from the smile she presses against your shoulder. You start caressing her hair because it helps her relax, and you feel the way her body sinks even further into the bed.
You still have to cover half of the units for tomorrow's exam, your mind working overtime on how you can make her study the coverage and still have enough rest for the day.
“Jho.” She tugs your shirt. You can't escape her. She knows you and the complexities of your mind as much as you know hers.
Right. Enough physics in the meantime.
“Okay,” you give in.
You place a tender kiss on her forehead before returning,
“Pahinga muna.”