Miguel’s heart raced as they walked towards their next, he was rather pissed that it did, had he known Eric for like 40 whole minutes, and his heart already identified Eric as something worth racing towards.

“What did you do over the summer?” Miguel asked due to the ‘get to know your seat partner’ activity.

“I didn’t do much just worked a bit.” As did Elm, Miguel thought, then scolded himself. He should get to know Eric, whether he was Elmor not, as a human, not his possible pen pal.

“I worked most of the summer as well.” Miguel said, “Favorite subject?”

“MATH!!!” Many people glanced over as Eric turned the brightest shade of pink Miguel had ever seen. “I mean, um, math I guess…”

Miguel’s smile grew, not just because of the adorable blush, but also, math happened to be another person’s #1 subject too. ‘Calm down Miguel, lots of people like math,’ but that thought couldn’t stop his grin.

** (slight time skip)

With only languages left Miguel was bothered by the thought of leaving Eric and was overjoyed when Eric nervously stuttered out “So I guess, well would it be okay… if you know, I like, or really we, you know exchange cellular telephone numbers?”

Miguel laughed, pulled out his phone and opened a new contact page. “I think it would be better than okay,” he said with a wink that had Eric’s blush back full force.

Eric quickly typed his info in, and Miguel did the same on Eric’s phone. They left their separate ways for language class. Once Miguel was settled in, he checked Eric’s contact page and saw he had put “🙊😳Eric😳🙊” as his name and in the notes section “the little blushing boy😳.” Miguel let out a laugh and yes he looked crazy laughing to himself in the back of the classroom, but he didn’t care, ‘the little blushing boy’ was still making his day, even from the other side of the school.

Miguel got home and immediately started pouring over old letters from Elm to find some clue to Elm's identity. Once he started reading the letters, he was 100% absorbed.

As he finished the first two years’ worth of letters he felt pain in his stomach and looked at his space grey phone’s clock to see if it was already time for dinner. He was surprised to find it was 10:43 PM, he had just spent 7 hours reading. Worth it!

He sighed as he realized that he should make some dinner and get to bed if he wanted to get a decent night’s sleep. He made two burritos, both with tons of ‘Butt Burner Hot Sauce’ and wolfed one down, with little notice of the spice. He left the other for his dad in the usual warm container, in the usual spot.

He made his way to bed, stretched out and thought of what he remembered from his day’s reading. From what he got Elmwas;

-Brown-eyed and below average in height

-Kind

-Smart

-Funny (on purpose and accident)

-Low on friends

-Had weird loopy handwriting (which Miguel thought was the cutest thing)

-Loved Guayakí, Yerba Mate drinks

-He loved to draw short 4-9 panel comics, about anything really, a dead-end love story that ended randomly, or an animal being adopted, or their life when their owners were out.

Miguel chuckled and thought, and eventually dreamed about everything he would share with Elmonce Elm was comfortable sharing his name.

Miguel went through his morning routine and headed off to school. He got situated in his seat and pretended to read off his phone as he glanced up at the door whenever he heard someone enter, hoping to see his new friend.

About 2 minutes before their class was to start he looked up to the door once again as it creaked open. A grin spread across his face as Eric walked in and made a beeline for his desk next to Miguel’s. A grin broke onto the smaller boy’s face as he fumbled into his seat.

“Hi, how was French?” Eric inquired.

“It was pretty good, how was Spanish?”

“Great! Oh, until the kid next to me let out air through his anus, for the effect of a potent blast of scent in my general direction, which would not have been so bad if he hadn’t kept doing it all period.” Eric said with a sarcastic grin that showed the pain caused by his classmate’s frequent farts.

From there they made small talk until class began.