Last night, Daniel had come up with a list of things Charlie could do for him.

He wanted him to convince Daniel's mom to buy him new shoes. The old ones were ugly and stupid, why did he ever buy green running shoes? He wanted the ones with gel soles and red sides. His feet always hurt.

Charlie should buy him at least five Force of Tyranny card packs, maybe six?

The two have to play Limbo: World of Undead together, he doesn't care that Charlie doesn't like platformers.

Charlie has to tell him what his secret is. Daniel didn't have to come with him or anything, he just wanted to know why Charlie would make a whole fake schedule for his mom to come home an hour late. Even if he was just getting food somewhere, Daniel has to know now!

He didn't get any farther than that, even though he wanted to. He felt cheated that his best friend would just have a secret double life like that without telling him.

What if he has a girlfriend??

He stopped, shocked by the thought. Could Charlie really be hiding a Girlfriend from him? The idea really pissed him off for some reason. It wasn't because he didn't have a girlfriend, no definitely. He would be happy for Charlie of course. The only reason was because he was bitter that his BEST FRIEND would hide that from him. He wouldn't tell Mrs. Collins, EVER. He wasn't a snitch.

Whatever...

Daniel forced himself to ignore the thought. No matter how annoying it is, he will just have to confront Charlie in school.

Even his mom noticed that he was being extra grumpy today.

"What's up your ass? Got dumped or something?" What? Daniel looked over to Mattia, they weren't even friends why did he care? "I didn't get dumped..." He rolled his eyes. It seemed like everyone was out for him today. Throwing his backpack on the ground, he fell onto the chair grumbling under his breath. This could be a long day.

Pffft-

The same side as the comment before. Daniel huffed and turned towards his classmate. "Am I not allowed to have a bad day now?" All he got was a grin and a headshake in return. He wouldn't be annoyed at Mattia if Charlie was already in school. But he wasn't. He was running late.

But the first lesson went by and still no Charlie. So he was at home. Was he actually just sick and Daniel was making a big deal out of nothing? No, he still didn't know why Charlie takes an extra hour on Wednesdays before going home and why he felt like he had to lie about it. But it did seem like his answers had to wait.

He groaned at the realization. Of course, Charlie was sick, it was the fall. He just had to spend the whole day wondering about the big mystery.

The first break came and even though he had already resigned himself to the fate of eating alone, Mattia showed up and planted himself in the seat next to him. It was usually Charlie's but it's not like he could say anything against it now. "Yo, are you okay by the way?" The guy, who Daniel had always thought was too tall, scooched his chair closer and leaned on the desk. "Mm..." Daniel pushed the guy off of him. "Just annoyed really..." he trailed off. The day just felt slow and he still wasn't over the idea that Charlie had some secret he wasn't privy to.

"Ha!" Mattia's voice was shrill, "I mean what else is new right?" There was now an elbow being shoved into Daniel's ribs and he had enough of it. "Dude fuck off." There wasn't any malice in his words, but he had to shove Mattia away from him again. "You ever heard about personal space?" He just smirked. "Yeah yeah, Could answer my question though right?" The question was pretty stupid, and Daniel already answered the first one. He had always thought that his too-tall classmate didn't really make that much sense. When first meeting him, Daniel had even thought that he had been held back a year.

"You notice Charlie missing right? Your brain works that much still yeah?" He didn't really mean to be mean, it just sort of slipped out. "Dang dude, yeah I noticed. You notice how you have no other friends though right?" They both chuckled. Mattia was the sort of guy that Daniel was. He always felt bad making jokes like that to Charlie.

"He's definitely sick, but like I'm just mad at him for somethin' from yesterday. Feels like he's running from the consequences y'know."

He didn't expect it, but Mattia was easy to talk to. Of course, Daniel didn't spill any beans on Charlie's secret fake schedule, but they talked and they actually had a bunch in common. Mattia didn't have many Force of Tyranny cards but he loved the game, he even knew some secret knowledge that there was a video game based on it in the works. He just said to keep it under wraps "I'm not supposed to know that, so neither are you."

When Daniel mentioned The Bar Full of Nothing, Mattia admitted that he had never actually seen it. He had seen all the spoilers online but he didn't have a Cyro account to watch it.

By the time breakfast was over, Daniel still had a less-than-half-eaten sandwich and plans for Mattia to stay over at his place to watch BFoN together.

He had basically forgotten to be annoyed at Charlie in the process.