Utterly drained from my previous energy, at least mentally, I went back to the changing rooms and took a quick shower. Here, I could not take my clothes with me, because the shower room didn’t have any hooks to place them on, so I had to return to the changing room with only my towel around my waist. I noticed that most people here did not use the showers, and waited the time out to shower in their room instead. So I did feel a bit uncomfortable as I stepped into the changing room.

Angel was living up to his reputation and again was everywhere, so I stumbled right at him. He reflexively shielded himself from damage by stretching his arms out in front of him, but that made them directly touch my chest. He blinked a few times, before taking the situation in and then swiftly jumping back, stuttering some apologies. He quickly turned around and basically ran away.

It was funny how little I was bothered by his actions, they instead amused me. I got dressed and almost left, until I heard some classmates talking among themselves:

“Have you seen this? Do you think, he’s into that delinquent?” A blonde guy said.

“I don’t know, but he’s not doing himself a favour.” A black-haired one answered.

“Pfft, as long as he’s not into me, he can be gay for whatever criminal he wants to. But I honestly don’t want to see scenes like this.” The blonde again.

“Hey, that’s a little harsh, don’t you th-“

“How would you be able to gossip about things that don’t concern you then?” I interrupted, one eyebrow raised, my mouth in a sarcastic smirk. Their disgusting grins quickly faltered. I took another step forward. “Huh, too scared to answer?” Another step. I grabbed the front of the blonde’s shirt and closed the gap between us. 

His face portrayed pure fear when mine got closer and closer, our faces and lips only a few centimetres apart. Then I paused. “What? Are you afraid I’d kiss you?” I laughed at him. “Don’t worry, even if I was gay, I’d never kiss such a lowlife. Don’t fucking bad-mouth others, now that you almost shit your pants.” I smirked at their expressions and let go, quickly got dressed and left.

A few meters ahead, I saw Angel eagerly talking with the guy that was on Ben’s side for the most time of PE. I was still wondering, why I was defending him back in there. I didn’t really have a reason. Well, they did call me a criminal and especially the blonde was being a little shit, so someone had to teach him some manners. How ironic. I almost felt like a warrior for Justice. Almost.

I took large strides towards Angel and Ben’s-probable-friend. I left my schedule at my room, so Angel was stuck being my guide for the day. I just hoped that he didn’t misinterpret it as me wanting to associate with him. As soon as I came near, their voices quieted down, and the unknown boy just stared at me questioningly. 

Can’t blame him. I was quite the ass towards Ben today, so he must assume I never talk to anyone here. While that was the plan originally, I was now stuck with my roommate for the rest of the year, so I might as well make the best out of it.

I ignored him and turned my attention to Angel, “Let’s go, I dunno where the next classroom is,” and went ahead. It took him only a few seconds to say goodbye to the other, and until I could hear his steps getting closer. I didn’t turn around and instead waited for him to be by my side.

“Next, we have history,” he stated, still smiling. He must be friends with the other one, they seemed quite close for him to smile like that. (Or he is just especially fond of history lol.) Or does he have a crush on him? I shook my head at that thought. Is he really into guys, though? I didn’t like people assuming something about me when it was just stuff they heard from others. Since I didn’t care about his personal space, I decided to invade it to get my answer, “So, you’re gay?”

This caught him off guard. He just stared at me before cautiously taking a few steps back, away from me. “W-what, how d-do you…,” he asked, eyes wide like the metaphorical deer in the headlights.

This made me stop to look at him. I raised my brows. “I heard some guys in the changing room talking about it,” I answered indifferently. I was sure he was out in the school for those guys to know about it, so I didn’t get why he was so shaken by my question. I wanted to keep going, now that I had my confirmation, but Angel just stood there and didn’t make any attempt to follow me.

He instead stared into nowhere, looking as uneasy as the first day we met, maybe even more. When I tried to step towards him, he just took a step back. Now, I was creasing my brows in annoyance, “What’s wrong with you suddenly? Wanna be late to history or what?”

That brought him back to reality and made him finally go ahead of me towards our next class. He still kept a greater distance, though and he didn’t say another word for the way.

I decided that it would be strange for me to sit beside him right now, so I made my way to one of the seats on the back, until suddenly another student plopped down beside me. I didn’t know if I should be impressed or annoyed by his stubbornness, as I looked into a pair of friendly and hopeful hazel-brown eyes. I was more annoyed, though and just ignored Ben’s presence beside me.

The lesson went by like every other before: The teacher was holding his lecture, students were taking notes, and I was sitting there, not getting a thing. I groaned out which made Ben chuckle beside me. Yeah, great that my suffering amuses you. I didn’t even spare him a glance, when suddenly his voice was directly beside my ear. “You’ve never liked history,” his breath tickled my ear and made me jump a bit.

“What the… Stop that shit,” I couldn’t even look annoyed, I was so not used to all that surprising contact today. Also, how did he still remember if I liked history? Even I couldn’t remember something so useless, especially since we only had history lessons for the last year of primary school.

He chuckled again but then finally turned his attention towards the front.

As soon as the bell rang, I was out of the room. I only grabbed something to eat and my gym clothes and made my way to paradise. PE lessons today weren’t physically intense, so I had to get my daily doses of relieve now.

The moment I entered the gym, however, I almost ran into Ben, who was also going in the same second. Oh, for fuck’s sake, why? I immediately turned around on my heel to go outside again, but his hand grabbed my arm. I absolutely wasn’t in the mood for him now, so I roughly pulled his hand off, “Let go, don’t fucking talk to me anymore.” I saw hurt covering his previous happy features but didn’t care and went outside. Running it is then. Maybe that was better anyway, considering, I should give my upper body muscles a little bit of rest.

After my jog, I returned to the shared room. I remembered that I have to spend two long hours with Angel today and already dreaded the idea, since the boy was acting strange. I took a shower, but the other one still wasn’t there.

After one hour of waiting, he eventually decided to enter the room and avoided looking at me. I was growing more and more irritated, the running session did not do much to relieve my stress. “I think, you’ve forgotten something,” I stated calmly.