We all knew this was coming. This will probably be the last of what I call, the 'Check' series, because all three of them have the world 'check' in their titles. This time you are Lyra.

Your name is Lyra Kotone and you visited the local library often. You were a busy college student with too many essays to write and not enough time to write them all. Luckily, the library had some pretty late hours and by late hours you mean that if you paid for a premium card, you got in at any time, because there was always a librarian or someone that could help you there.

Of course, going at 12am didn't give you all the perks as going, say, around 1pm, but, it didn't matter. The café wasn't open, only a few computers weren't turned off, and sometimes the workers were scary.

You walked down an aisle, trying to find a book for an essay you were having to write about the ocean, however, you weren't having much luck finding it. It was 5am and surprisingly, the library was sort of busy. The nice, older librarian you always asked when you couldn't find a book was busy with another college student who was running off of coffee and there was only one person behind the help desk.

He had light green hair that stuck out and tired green eyes that bore into your skull. He was sipping coffee and glaring at anyone who got to close. He didn't give off a particularly 'friendly' vibe. He gave off more of an 'it's too early for this bullshit, so don't even look in my direction unless you want a black eye' vibe.

Still, you needed the book. You bravely walked towards him and you almost turned away when his eyes locked on you, but you stood strong. "Good morning."

"Good morning, though I am only saying that because I am required to." He said dryly, sipping his coffee.

"That's chill." You said, shrugging. He had a nice voice. "Can you tell me where this book is?" You asked, slipping him a piece of paper with the information about the book on it.

"The mating habits of seahorses?" He questioned, looking at you like you had 4 heads.

"I'm a biology major and I'm focusing in on the ocean." You explained quickly. You swear you saw a very tiny, tiny, smile on his lips, but it disappeared as he stood up and walked out from behind the desk to show you where the book was. It was a silent walk and a fast one, since his strides were so long.

"Here." He handed you the book once he located it.

"Thank you very much!" You smiled brightly at him and he just shrugged it off and stalked off back to his post to continue glaring at people.

The next few times you came into the library, it was late night sessions, but every time, the green haired male was there. You two would sometimes be the only two people down in the downstairs section, which was the young adult, adult, and research area, along where all the computers were. Upstairs was the check out area, kids area, and where all the dvds and videos were.

You two didn't speak unless you needed help with something, or you were leaving for the night. You did want to make friends with him, since he seemed to be your age and he was really good looking. "I'm Lyra, by the way." You called out from the computer you were sitting out. He looked up from his book and towards you.

"You can't sit in silence, can you? You move a lot and get up and walk around a lot." He said. "You take more breaks than you work. How do you get anything done?"

"By coming here at midnight to work." You replied quickly. "How have you not been fired yet? You glare at everyone and never help anyone unless they're brave enough to speak to you."

"I volunteer." He told you, which surprised you.

"You volunteer? Why?"

"Because." He shrugged it off and looked down to his book and you sighed with defeat. You still didn't know his name, but, at least he spoke to you, even though he was sort of a giant asshole when he did.

"My name is Proton, by the way." He said, glancing at you.

Your face broke out into a smile and you swore you say that tiny, tiny smile on his face again.

"Mrs. Hazel?" You asked librarian replied, smiling at you. "Do you need help with something?"

"Sort of….can you tell me about Proton?" You questioned nervously. "He's always here when I come and he told me he volunteers here, but he seems like he hates it, so I don't see why he does it."

"I would, sweetie, but, I don't think he'd be happy with me if I told you. It's a personal reason, but I'm sure he'll tell you in time." She replied. "He might seem cold, but he is a sweet boy. I think he's taken a shine to you."

"Morning." Proton said, setting a thing of coffee down on the old woman's desk. "Hazelnut espresso, three shots of milk, just like you like." He said and then sat a small bag on her desk. "Morning, Lyra." He greeted you and went straight to the help desk to go on with his normal routine of drinking coffee and scaring child and adults with his glares.

"See?" Mrs. Hazel smiled, sipping her coffee and pulling a muffin out of the bag. "He's a good boy. He's just gone through a few things. He'll tell you one day. He knows your name and greets you, that's a good start."

"Alright, thank you." You nodded your head and headed towards the stairs to go upstairs so you could leave for class. "Bye Proton." You smiled at him as you passed the desk.

"Leaving already?" He questioned, which surprised you.

"I've got class. I'll be back later, though, I know how much you miss me." You smirked and he rolled his eyes and went back to his book.

It was late one night, around 2am when he came in, relieving the other person of their position. You had been there for 3 hours, hunched over a computer trying to work on the essay. You heard Proton talk to the other male for a little bit before he left and Proton sat down.

You knew after twenty minutes, he was expecting you to get up and move, or turn and speak to him, basically just do ANYTHING other than sigh, mumble under your breath, and type. You jumped when you felt a hand on your shoulder.

"C'mon." He said, pulling you out of the chair. You whined, groaned, and whined more as he led you up the stairs and to the café. "Sit." He ordered and you complied.

"Proton, this essay is due in," you looked at your watch "6 hours and it needs to be 10 pages. I've only done 3."

"Tabitha told me you had been sitting there for 3 hours and that you didn't even get up once to walk around. You need a break." He dug around behind the counters, obviously having access to it. Another worker, a girl with curly orange hair, came over and grabbed a can of soda. She nodded to you and headed off to straighten up the kids section. "Here." He set a little plastic cup of ice cream in front of you, putting a plastic spoon in it to finish it off.

"No sprinkles?" You asked and he rolled his eyes, but took the ice cream back and added sprinkles to it.

"There." He said and sat down in front of you with his own ice cream while you dug into yours. "Better?"

"Yeah, thanks." You sighed, feeling a little better. "I was trying to get it all done, but I guess I should have taken a few breaks. I don't know why I even am majoring in biology. All I want to do is help fight the pollution of our oceans."

"That's a pretty good reason to do it." Proton said, eating his ice cream.

"It's what I cling onto when I want to give up. I'm just glad this place is always opened. Though, it's friendly when Mrs. Hazel is here. You still scare me." You admitted, making him chuckle. "Mrs. Hazel really likes you. She told me you could be cold, but you were a really good boy."

"Of course." Proton rolled his eyes. "Is that all she said about me?"

"Yeah, I wanted her to tell me everything she knew about you, but of course, she said that when you were ready you would tell me and it's personal and blah blah blah." You rolled your eyed and continued to eat your ice cream. You both sat in silence.

"I volunteer here because it's the easiest way to work off my volunteer hours." He said, after a while. "That's what a lot of the other guys, and girls, that volunteer here do."

"Volunteer hours?" You questioned, confused.

"Yeah." He muttered, spinning his spoon around his small plastic cup. "I got in trouble with gang related stuff, but the judge decided to go 'easy' on me and gave me like, 200 hours of community service I have to do. I'm up to 124 hours now." You really didn't know what to say to this. He was in a gang before?

"That doesn't really surprise me much." You admitted, shrugging slowly. "I mean, you have that vibe about you. Not saying you're a bad person or anything like that, because, you obviously are learning your lessons and stuff." You said quickly, not wanting him upset at you. "I don't think you're a bad person because you're nice to me. Sort of. To other though, you are terrifying, so you getting into trouble with the law doesn't surprise me."

"I'm terrifying?" Proton questioned, eyebrows raised.

You looked at him with a serious expression. "Proton." You said, staring him in the eyes. "Did you not see how you looked at that little girl yesterday? She ran off crying."

"Did she?" Proton asked, surprised. "She shouldn't have talked to me in the morning."

"Proton!"

You crawled on the floor in front of the 'Help' desk, where Proton was currently stationed. It was a beautiful morning outside and the sun was shining through all the windows, so of course Proton was in a bad mood. You grabbed the paper you had and tapped it to the desk.

It read, in bright red letters, 'I'M NOT A MORNING PERSON'. You believed it was your duty to at least give a fair warning to everyone who came to the library, that Proton was not a morning person and it was best not to talk to him. You crawled off, and ran into someone's legs.

"Messing with Proton again?" Petrel asked, his purple hair slicked back. He held his hand out to you and you accepted it, standing up and brushing yourself off.

"Like my sign?" You laughed and pointed to it. He looked over, seeing Proton barely awake, trying to read a book, while glaring at everyone who came near him.

"It's perfect." He chuckled, and put his hands on his hips. "I enjoy having you around, Lyra. Have you ever thought of volunteering here?"

"I have thought about it, but I'm so busy with school, I doubt I'd have time." You mumbled. "But, now that it's December, classes are over. I just have exams all next week and I'll be free."

"That's good. A lot of people take time off and go on vacation this month, so we could use all the help we can get." He said as Proton glared at someone who chuckled in his direction. "So, are you up for it?"

"Yes!"

"What the hell are you doing here?" Proton asked you as he walked down the stairs to his regular post, the help desk. You were organizing a cart of books that needed to be returned to their correct spot. It had been almost two weeks since you two had seen each other and that was mostly due to you being busy with exams. "Where have you been?"

"I had exams last week. I'm organizing books, what does it look like I'm doing?" You asked, rolling your eyes. "Petrel asked me if I wanted to volunteer here, and since school is out now, I figured I'd do it."

"Of course he did." Proton mumbled under his breath before he began to help her organize the books. "When do you get off?"

"Same time as you." You said, flipping through a book before placing it on the rack. "C'mon! Let's go put these books back!" You said cheerfully and pushed the cart towards a line of shelves. He sighed, but followed after you.

"How did your exams go?" He asked after a few minutes of you two putting up books silently. He had found his own rack of books to put up, and you two were actually getting a lot done.

"Fine, I hope." You mumbled. "I'm sure I got B's on them, hopefully A's, but, I'm just paranoid."

"I bet you did fine, you're smart." He said, sliding a book back into place.

"You really think so?" You asked, looking up at him. He looked at you and then looked away, his face a bit flushed.

"Of course. You spend almost every single day in here, reading and doing school work. You're smart."

"Thank you, but I just have to work my ass up to keep up with my classes." You grumbled. "I have a hard time sitting still, you know this of course, so sometimes I just can't stand sitting in those hour long classes, sometimes two hour long classes, so I skip and just end up here, trying to figure out the homework myself."

"That's not bad. At least you're trying." Proton said and it made you feel better. "You could just give up and drop out, but you keep trying."

"Thank you Proton." You smiled at him and he looked at you.

"Just being honest, you should know that." He said, before he turned back to the task at hand. You stared at him, a goofy smile on your face. "What?" He asked, trying not to look at you. His cheeks were getting red and he turned to you with a glare, trying to scare you off.

It didn't work.

"I knew you were good." You simply said before turning back to the shelf. This time he stared at you. "I know you like people to think you're all tough and badass, and you are to a certain degree, but I knew that you were sweet and a really nice guy underneath it all." You continued to feel his eyes on you after you put a few more books away, so you turned towards him, only to find him closer to you than you remember. "Don't try to scare me off now." You said, getting up in his face. "I know you want me to think you're a badass gang member, but I find it very difficult too."

"Tch." He seemed a little irritated, you weren't sure of what though. "I don't want you to see me as a badass gang member." He admitted. "But I'm not some pansy push over boy who is super sweet, you know."

"Of course not." You agreed, nodding your head. "You just come off that way, you know? All mean and cold. Are you one of those people who becomes friendlier after you get to know them better? What are they called in anime shows? Tsunderes?"

"Go out with me and maybe you'll find out." He stated and you stared at him, mouth opened.

"Wait what?" You asked, needing him to repeat it for you.

"Go. Out. With. Me. And. Maybe. You'll. Find. Out." He said each word slowly.

"You want to go out with me?"

"Didn't I just say that?"

"Yes!" You said, nodding your head. "I'll go out with you if you change that sassy attitude of yours."

"I'll stop with my attitude once you stop putting signs on my desk."

"Maybe you should stop tearing them down. They're placed there for the safety all people who come to this library."

It's impossible for me to write a nice cute romantic ending. I just have to load it down with jokes. I can't even write a sex scene without making jokes in it gosh someone help this is why I can't get a boyfriend.