Fourth period rolled around much slower than I wished it would. I even looked forward to it, this time around.

I would say I wasn’t sure why, but I knew exactly why.

I wanted to see Sebastian.

Ugh.

And here came another one of my complicated feelings I didn’t understand.

I had other friends. I kept in contact with all my friends back at home in California. We texted nearly every night, and maybe once a week I’d manage to wrangle the whole gang together for a video call where we could play some games together or even just sit in silence together.

I had other friends. I had better friends. 

Sorry, I mean, I had friends, not other friends, because he isn’t my friend.

He is my tutor, classmate…and unwilling acquaintance at best!

But regardless of our not-friends status, why was there still such a big, nagging, ANNOYING part of me that did want us to be friends?

He was kind to me, but he was kind to everyone. He always had been. It was just his nature. Well, sometimes.

He talked to me a lot, but I couldn’t tell if it was just because he was being nice or if he actually liked being around me.

I wasn’t sure why he would feel that way if he did. I was just some guy, not sure what he saw in that.

Either way, I couldn’t be friends with him.

I couldn’t miss him, I couldn’t want to see him, I couldn’t smile when he smiled or notice all the things he used to do that carried over even now, four years later.

It would just make everything worse.

I was only here for a year and then I’d leave.

So….what good could this friendship possibly do for me?

What, we’re friends and I get attached to him again and then I leave and I’m broken a second time?

Or…he finds out the truth and freaks out. Or someone else finds out the truth and tells everyone, and then I have to live through a year of hell instead of a year of silent torture. Or….he finds out the truth and….wants to be friends again. And things are good and then I have to leave and we spend the next few years talking every so often until we drift away again, forgotten by one another.

Or worse. He finds out the truth and wants to be friends again…until one day he wisens up to who I am and…he leaves me again. 

He leaves me broken and alone just like he did then, just like my parents did then, just like my family did then…

Even if we did become friends again, it was only a matter of time until he got sick of me.

It was as inevitable as my leaving at the end of this year was.

We were friends once. Once upon a time he was my everything, really.

But that was then. This is now.

And now….he's just a classmate. My tutor. Someone I know in passing. An acquaintance.

And nothing more.

But every time he looked at me with those beautiful brown eyes of his and smiled the same way he always did…I felt my resolve crack just a little bit more.

I…really hoped it was strong enough to last.

Class was overwhelming, as usual. Every so often I’d glance over at Sebastian and watch what he was doing simply to alleviate my boredom. At least it kept me awake.

When the bell rang for lunch I gathered my stuff and began to walk out, but he dashed up behind me and stopped me before I could manage to escape down the hall and evade him.

“Hey Jet.” He beamed as he skidded to a stop behind me.

“Hey, Sebastian. What’s up?” I turned to him, and he glanced away.

“Nothing, really. I just wanted to say hi.” He shrugged. 

Oh. Well isn’t that nice.

“Oh. Um…hi?” I stammered, trying to find anything in this hallway that I could look at that wasn’t him.

He just wanted to say hi?

So he wanted to talk to me.

He wanted to talk to me.

For no reason?

Resisting the urge to slap myself in the face so I could pull myself together, I quickly steeled myself and turned back to him. 

“You’re feeling better now, right?” He smiled at me.

“Yeah, I’m okay now. Sorry I missed so many days. I’ll probably have a lot to ask you the next time we have one of those tutoring sessions, eh?” I laughed, but he didn’t laugh along with me. 

“Hm.” He hummed. “Probably. I’m free after school today if you are.”

I opened my mouth to say no, to tell him I had to get home right after school. Say that I had plans, I had homework, I had to water my cat and walk my plants (both of which I totally actually had), uh…insert other excuse here that I totally had to do immediately instead of meeting up with him.

“Yeah, alright.” I said instead, internally cursing myself. (God damn it!)

But it really was all worth it, because he smiled so brightly I nearly had to squint, squeezing the straps of his backpack as he did so.

“Great! See you then!” He beamed, walking off in the direction of the cafeteria.

He had quite a skip in his step as he hurried down the hall.

Was it…was it possible he considered me a friend?

…..nah. No way. 

However, I was curious. I’d seen him speaking with a few other students a couple times in passing but I’d never actually seen him actually hang out with anyone.

I wondered who his friends were. He had to have some, so why wasn’t he talking to them instead of me?

So I decided to…follow him. Obviously. Naturally. Who communicates these days anyway? Asking people things face to face is so…ugh whatever I’m totally being ridiculous but I’m doing this anyway. 

Casually I strolled after him into the cafeteria, wandering over towards the vending machines in the corner and busying myself with pretending that I was deeply invested in the prices of these old sports drinks. 

I never came in here. I liked to eat my lunch somewhere quiet, somewhere calm, somewhere where I wasn’t surrounded by dozens of people I’d known my whole life who didn’t recognize me at all. Made things less awkward and annoying that way.

When I turned and glanced around, I spotted him in line getting food.

When I turned around again a minute later….still in line. Long line I guess.

Some sophomore wandered up behind me as I was turning a third time and began to look impatient, so I dug around in my pocket and inserted a few bucks to actually get one of the sports drinks.

They were probably really old, but I did actually enjoy Gatorade. Sometimes drinking them made me less dizzy, which was always a nice thing to be.

I grabbed the bottle and stepped behind the vending machine, casually leaning against the wall to crack it open and gaze around the cafeteria.

And there he was. 

He was sitting at a table with a group of people who were all talking and laughing. I didn’t really recognize any of them, but they looked familiar enough I figured I’d probably known them in passing when we were younger.

Hm. So he does have friends. What a relief.

But then I squinted. 

And I realized he wasn’t actually sitting with these people, just at their table.

The others were all sitting next to each other, nudging each other and laughing at the other’s jokes while he was distanced. He wasn’t even a part of their conversation, it looked like. He just glanced over at them every so often, listening to everything they said but saying nothing. 

And nobody sitting there bothered to turn to him to include him in their conversation either.

Did he…not eat lunch with anyone?

My stomach turned sour at the thought- either that or this drink was expired.

I remembered when we were kids. It was always just us at lunch. Neither of us really had any other friends. When I left…

Did he just…never become friends with anyone else?

No way. 

No, really no way. 

His friends were probably just on their way. Or maybe busy today?

But the longer I waited the more torn up inside I felt.

If he had no friends here, and he did see me as a friend, was I his only friend?

Was I his only friend a second-time?

I couldn’t be sure.

But as I watched him, I noticed him glance at the others at his same table again. 

He looked a bit like a kicked puppy as he turned away from the group, them all laughing at a joke he clearly wasn’t meant to get.

Then he finished his food, stood up to throw away the scraps, and just…walked out.

This must be it then. 

Now he’s meeting his friends.

So I continued to tail him.

But when he just sat down against the wall in the middle of some random hallway I couldn’t help but feel more confused. Then he put in some headphones, opened his backpack up, pulled out a book, and just began to read.

Oh my god. He had no friends.

I was his only-

No, let’s not jump to conclusions! He’s nice to me, but that doesn’t mean he sees me as a friend, right? Right?

But then I thought back to a few days ago when he asked me to eat lunch with him.

…And I wondered.