Joey checked his phone and texted his friends. “6:54…” 

“We eat at 7, so should we be going already?” I replied, laying my skates aside for later. 

Joey got up and muttered: “I’m not going anywhere with you, but yeah…” He exited the room silently and I sighed, waiting a little longer before going to the dining room myself.

Surprisingly enough the place was already packed and I claimed a chair at an almost empty table. Almost empty, except for Georgy; a chubby redhead with an acne problem so severe, it looked like someone had used a cheese grater on his face, and Maximilian, or Max for short; an intimidating, long, slim guy with white hair that covered about half of his face. In all my time of knowing him, I had never seen Max smile, not even once. 

“Hey, Simon!” Georgy sniggered. “Heard ya got stuck with Joey. I didn’t know us losers were even allowed to be in a 10-foot radius of those popular guys. With the glares they sometimes give us, I was sure it had to be illegal or something.’

“Yeah,” I muttered, not in the mood for a conversation. I had not lied to Joey. Georgy and Max were not my friends, although they certainly seemed to think so. In my view people who I would be forced to sit with during lunch breaks if I could not find an empty spot to sit alone could hardly be described as anything more than acquaintances. However, in Georgy’s imagination, we were like the three musketeers, underdogs fighting against the oppression of jocks and basic bitches. (Those are not my words, but his.)

Suddenly I felt a hand on my shoulder and jumped a little. “O sorry to startle you, Simon,” a familiar voice said next to me. 

“Jesus Christ, Derek, why do you keep scaring me like that?” I sighed as Derek sat down next to me. Derek was not the tallest of guys, to put it lightly, but he more than made up for that with his personality. If the words ‘outgoing’, ‘flamboyant’ and ‘loud’ would be mixed to create a person à la power puff style, I am pretty sure the result would turn out to look remarkably similar to Derek. He was not anything like me, Georgy and Max; he had plenty of friends, good grades… I always wondered why he would still hang out with us.

I chatted a bit with the guys while we were given bread and salad, but my gaze drifted from table to table in search of Joey when the main course was served. I found him sitting several tables across from us and he seemed to be having a good time. I heard one of his friends say: “Dude, stop stealing all of the bread! How much do you even eat?” I recognised him as Joey’s team captain Jacob. 

“Payback for leaving him with Simon I bet,” a blue-haired boy answered jokingly while cutting up the steak he had been served. Joey did not respond as he was currently stuffing his mouth with baked potatoes. I could not help but smile weakly at the sight. 

Jacob rubbed over his sharp jawline with his thumb and looked disapprovingly at Joey. “You really have no table manners…”

A hand started waving up and down in front of my face and snapped me out of my snooping. “Hello, earth to Simon?” Derek frowned with a sweet, lopsided smile that left crinkles on his face. “You seem a bit down today… Are you still bummed over having to share a room with Joey? I mean… He’s not that bad you know.” 

He tapped on the table with his long, perfect, polished nails and rattled on: “Sure, he’s a typical, dumb, masculine jock, with all that comes with that stereotype, but he’s a sweet guy once you manage to separate him from ‘the pack’ so to speak.” He leaned back in his chair, balancing it on the two hind legs and looked at me in concern. 

I sighed. “Ugh, that’s not it… Well, not all of it anyway,” I muttered. “I guess I’m just not feeling great today…”

“That’s alright, you can’t be happy all the time. I’m sure you’ll feel better tomorrow even though we are going to that dumb Viking museum full of old crap,” he beamed. “If not, we’ll make sure it’ll be more fun than today, right guys?” He looked at Georgy and Max. 

“Sure,” Max answered with his low, calm voice. 

Georgy jumped up and looked confused, of course, that idiot had not been paying attention. “Wait, what are we talking about again?”

I sniggered, which made Derek smile even brighter. “See? Already better. What about we go ice skating on the lake after dessert?” He proposed. 

Maybe I was not so alone as I had feared on this trip. I could try being friends with Max, Georgy and Derek for a change. “Sure, I would like that,” I answered optimistically.