One More Year 20 ~ Nifty

One More Year

by Bradley Scott

**Note:

This is a rewrite of an older story of mine on here called Another Day, which I never finished, and no longer really like, but I'm hoping to redeem it.

This is written in British/South African English, although almost all similar media I consume is American, so that will probably have its influence, but not on spelling. For the purposes of keeping this note short, I'll include specific non-common words I use in a list at the bottom.

**

**Disclaimer:

No underage sex happens between any of my characters. I tend to make that quite clear in the narrative, but just in case it isn't, I state it here. (This is also more Romance than Erotica, so the sex doesn't happen right away, but when it does, everyone is 18.)**

Chapter 20

Mrs. A took a deep, steadying breath. It wasn't often you saw her nervous, but the teachers had more to lose from their moderation sessions than the students did. Our marks could go down - or up - depending on how we did, but Mrs. A had ambitions to be put on the board that directed the syllabus, so every year it remained a big deal for her. But she'd always done well, or she would have less at stake.

"You two-" She indicated Jerry and Sid "Are here to make sure I'm not being too strict, so just have fun. You two-" she said to Lea and Marc, "are here to make sure my curve is the right shape, so for God's sake, please just try to be consistent. YOU THREE, however-" She turned to Louis, Angela and me.

"You're here to make sure that I'm not being too lenient, so please, I really need you to shine. Jay, Angela - you did this three years ago, and you were fantastic, so just do it again. Louis, I know I've never taught you, but you did amazingly in my prelim, and I'm going to need you to live up to that, okay?"

"Right." Louis gave her an awkward thumbs up.

"Okay, good." She nodded sharply. "I have to leave now, because I'm not allowed to interfere. But please just have fun, relax, and do well." She looked at the three different groups, in turn, to make it clear that those were three separate commands. After that, she turned and stiffly made her way to the door.

It was a bit strange to see Marc and Louis standing right next to each other. I never got around to telling Louis about my crush, but it seemed almost pointless now. Academic. Historical. I vaguely remembered not wanting to get too close to Louis, back when I first met him, because I thought he'd looked too much like Marc, and I hadn't wanted to revisit that.

But seeing them together made me wonder what I'd been thinking. Marc looked so different - scruffier, shorter, blunter features. Louis looked like a much more refined version, if he even looked like him at all. I'd thought they could have been brothers, but that seemed like a bit of a stretch now. Maybe cousins, at most. All they really had in common was the hair colour.

Louis' features were sculpted in a way that Marc's weren't. His face was all ridges and angles that could almost make him look mean, if he wasn't almost permanently wearing a slight smile that went all the way up to his eyes. And Louis worked out - just a bit, but it was a lot more than Marc - so he was lithe and lean, and you could see actual muscles shifting when he turned his neck.

"Jay." Angela's voice caused me to snap to attention.

"Uh, yeah?"

"I was saying that she'd probably be a lot calmer if she knew we'd been practising." Her tone was slightly clipped - mildly exasperated at my wandering mind, probably. Fair enough. It wasn't really a good time to get distracted.

"Right." I grinned. "But we're technically not allowed, and it would have freaked everyone out." I nodded back to the other four.

"Yes, I said that." She frowned. "You are ready for this, aren't you?"

"Yeah, sorry." I shook my head. "My mind's wandering a bit. Too much prep. I'm probably daydreaming about my favourite books."

"Well, that would be good." Louis smiled softly. "I think we're pretty well-prepared though. And there's nothing on Jay's list that he hasn't talked to me about for fun."

Honestly, I still didn't quite get why we had prepared so much, but the group sessions had been okay. It was probably good to get into the habit of working hard, for when we started studying for finals - which we'd be doing as soon as this week was over.

Besides, when we'd split up for the day, Louis had hung around at my house, or I'd given him lifts home, and that had been kind of fun. I really enjoyed hanging out with him, and unlike a lot of other people, I never got tired of him being around.

"She's here." Angela looked pointedly towards the door towards the door.

A friendly looking woman with short, grey hair was talking to Mrs. A just outside, and patted her on the shoulder. She had a fluffy, bright-pink jersey on, and wore a large pair of spectacles. The general impression she gave off was that of someone's grandmother - she didn't look anything like the formal, stuffy moderators we'd had for other subjects so far.

"Good morning students. If you take your seats, we can get started." She settled down at the head of a circle of desks Mrs. A had arranged, and we all nervously took our places. Mrs. A had of course told us all where to sit, so that we were in the order the moderator would have on her list.

"Now, before we do anything, I'd like to go through my list and just nod if I read your name, so I can know who I'm talking to. I'm Mrs. Morris, but you can just call me Rita. We're here to talk about the books you've read, and discussed in a similar way earlier this year. Let's begin by making sure I know who's who."

"Angela Saccente." Angela nodded, and Rita took a note. "Jason Newell. Louis Calvet. Marc Mitchell. Lea Goodman. Sid Vee. Jerry Fielding." The nods proceeded around the table, as Mrs. A had intended, and Rita gave the group a warm smile. "Oh my, we are very organised today, aren't we? Alright, let's get right into it. Angela, from your list here, I can see you read Great Expectations, by Charles Dickens. How was it?"

"It was okay." Angela grinned. "I thought it would be better."

The shock of Angela making a joke almost made me miss it, but when Rita broke into a hearty chuckle I laughed too, and after frowning for a second Louis joined in. Lea laughed nervously, but no one else did, and Sid looked very confused.

"Very well." Rita smiled. "Was that answer just for the joke, or were there parts of it which you found... objectionable?"

"Oh, no." Angela blushed. "There were definitely parts I didn't like. Ms. Havisham, for example."

"What about her was it, exactly?"

"Her entire treatment." Angela then began to give an impassioned summary of why she thought Dickens had been so problematic in his construction of a female character whose sole purpose revolved around betrayal by - and revenge on - men. I zoned out a bit, not because I didn't agree, just because we'd talked a lot about it already, in our prep. I looked over to Louis, and he gave me a grin.

He'd probably heard it more often - all the books on my list were ones I'd loved, so they'd worked on memorising theirs much harder than I had. They'd quizzed me over mine once or twice, but once it became clear that I had an obsessive grasp of detail over something I'd actually enjoyed, they'd paired off and I could work on other things. I was up for moderation for more subjects than the two of them, anyway, so Sue and I had worked on preparing for Accounting while they'd gone over their book lists.

Angela finished her review, and Rita smiled. "That's an excellent analysis. Thank you, Angela. Has anyone else read great expectations?"

The rest of us shook our heads. I actually had, but it had bored me to tears, and I was worried that saying that - which would be the main thing I could contribute to the discussion - wouldn't put me in that good a light. You were supposed to like classic, foundational literature. Not fall asleep when trying to struggle through it.

I was next on Rita's list, and she asked about The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. I still had my analysis prepared and memorised from the last time I'd done it, and I more or less made my way through it smoothly. When she quizzed me about the details, I think I did pretty well, and she looked fairly pleased. "All right. That's quite good, Jason. And which of the characters would you say you identify with?"

Louis chuckled. "Careful, Jay's going to say he thinks he's Hyde."

I laughed, and Rita smiled. "So would you identify with Jekyll then, and his transformations into Hyde - which symbolise him giving into his baser, darker urges?"

I cleared my throat. "Uh, yeah. I guess. We all have parts of our personality we don't quite like, that we occasionally let out."

"I see. Who else has read Jekyll and Hyde?" Rita asked. Angela and Louis raised their hands. Unsurprisingly, no one else did. Marc had been a bit better with reading when we'd been close, but this might have been a bit too old to appeal to him. Rita nodded at Angela and Louis. "And do you two know Jason fairly well?" They both nodded. "Excellent. And which character would you think he is?"

"Gabriel, definitely," Angela said firmly. "He's got his flaws, and he makes misjudgements sometimes, but he's still essentially a good person, and it's not as if he's on a downward spiral."

Rita chuckled, looking at my expression. "It would seem he doesn't agree. What do you think, Louis?"

Louis smiled. "I think Jay's too hard on himself sometimes. He's not a monster, he's just way too introspective. Definitely Gabriel Utterson."

I laughed at that, even if it made me blush slightly. Rita smiled warmly. "Are the three of you good friends?" We all nodded, and it made me feel really happy how none of us had hesitated or shown the slightest bit of self-consciousness about that.

"Well, then I'd stick to this line of questioning, but move on to one of Louis' books. Let's see if we can find one all three of you have read. Raise your hands if you have. Let's see - The Alchemist? No. The Picture of Dorian Grey? No. Pride and Prejudice? Ah, excellent."

My eyes had shot across to Louis when she'd said the last one as I'd put my hand up. I hadn't put Pride and Prejudice on my list. I'd had too many other candidates, and I'd kind of wanted my selection to seem cool to Mrs. A back when we'd done it. Louis and Angela had gone through theirs together, mostly without me, but I couldn't believe I completely missed that it had been on his. One of my favourite books. I really should have paid more attention.

"All right then. Louis, who in the book would you say you identify with?"

Louis grimaced. "So, I don't want to immediately go for one of the main characters, but... Mr. Darcy does a lot of things that he thinks are good for the people around him, and he doesn't do it to make people think well of him, he just does it because he thinks it's the right thing to do."

"And you identify with that?" Rita asked.

"Well, it's not as if I'm running around breaking up engagements or forcing people to get married." He blushed slightly. "But I try to help my friends where I can. To be there, and offer advice, and maybe just listen if I can't do anything else. I also don't always get it right - sometimes I misjudge someone, or am wrong about what someone else is thinking, and then the result backfires. I guess I identify with that."

"Jason, do you think Louis is right in that summation?"

I smiled at him quickly. "Yeah, absolutely. Louis is always fixing up my messes, and I haven't even known him for a whole year yet. But he's a lot more charismatic than Darcy - he's not going around putting people off his personality. Everyone likes Louis."

Louis blushed, and Rita turned to Angela. "So Angela, do you agree with Louis' assessment, and Jason's?"

"I think Louis is right that he tries to help all his friends, and sometimes that might not always go well for him. And I think Jay is right that Louis is much more likeable than Darcy ever manages to be." She smiled warmly at him. "But I think they're both missing the fact that Louis, out of a sense of principled behaviour, hides what he wants so much that sometimes it makes him misstep occasionally. He's also quite like Darcy in that way."

I frowned at Angela, wondering what she meant by that. Between the fact that they'd been going to the same university visits together, and sharing rides home from most of our study sessions, they'd grown pretty close. I didn't realise they'd gotten that close, though. Closer than he and I were, it seemed. I felt vaguely jealous at the idea that Louis was telling her more than he ever told me. I wondered if he'd come out to her yet - he hadn't told me about it, if he had.

"Well, isn't that interesting!" Rita said. "I'd love to explore that further, but I unfortunately only have you all for a limited time, so I'll move on to other questions about the book. Now, let's see."

She asked Louis a few more, and I tried not to interrupt - even if I liked it more, she was trying to make sure he was the one who had actually read it, since it was his selection. Then she continued down the line, asking everyone about the books on their list.

Marc had some fun takes, and only made a minor misstep when he started getting The Hobbit mixed up with events from its movie adaptations. Lea didn't have any great insights, but she could solidly prove that she'd read everything she'd said she had. Sid and Jeremy were lost, but that was expected. It looked like Mrs. A would be happy with the way this one turned out.

After the session, I dashed off to the bathroom, which I'd needed for a while. We'd be waiting for Sue, Ellie and Sara to finish their Economics tutorial, before we drove home for the day's study session. Although we'd probably do something social first, since we probably all needed a small break, and Ellie would probably enforce that.

Jamie lay sprawled across the bench in the bathroom, looking casual and relaxed, as always. I almost would have laughed. It had been a while since I'd seen him in there, but something about it felt oddly normal and comforting.

He grinned up at me. "Heyyy, it's Jayyy."

"Hi, Jamie." I dashed right past him, into one of the stalls. I had more urgent needs than chatting.

He was still there when I got out, but he'd twisted around on the bench so that he was sitting. I walked past him to the basins and began washing my hands. Through the mirror, I saw him stand.

"So, what are you doing here today?" He stepped up next to me. It almost sounded like an accusation. I knew he was here for the Economics tutorial - although he was clearly avoiding it, if he was hiding out here in the bathroom.

"English moderation." I nearly sighed. I was pretty tired and bored after the session, and I didn't really have the energy for him right now.

He nodded. "Ah, cool. How'd it go?"

"Fine, I think." I shrugged.

"Cool, cool. I'm only up for AP maths tomorrow. You in on that one?"

"Yep. I've been up for five subjects. Awful, right?"

He laughed, rubbing the back of his neck. "Yeah. Rough, man."

"Tomorrow will be my last one, though. So that's a relief." I dried off my hands, and turned. "Anyway, see you tomorrow then."

"Wait." His hand shot out, and grabbed my arm. "Sounds pretty stressful, with all those moderation sessions. Want to... blow off some steam?"

I looked down at where he was holding me, and back up at his face. He stepped in close and pressed himself up against me, his breath washing over my skin. Fuck, Jamie was hot. It had been stupid of me to ever pretend my crush on him had ever been anything I could control. It seemed like he was over whatever it was that had been making him keep his distance from me.

But I didn't really want him touching me any more. Well, not entirely. I could feel his warm hand on my arm, and I could still remember what his skin tasted like. There'd always been a voice in my head that convinced me that what I wanted to do was always the right thing to do. But I was so tired of listening to that part of myself and, this time, I was determined not to.

I slowly moved my head forward, until there was only a finger's width between our lips. I had no intention of actually kissing him, but I wanted to see what he would do. To his credit - I guess - he paused for a moment, before turning his head to the side. "I uh... still don't want to kiss."

I pulled my head back slightly, and nodded, satisfied. I reached up my hand to his cheek, and turned him back to face me. "That's fine, Jamie. You don't have to do anything you don't want to do." I patted his cheek, and reached down to my arm, prising myself out of his grip. "But neither do I."

He didn't have a response, and just stared down at his hand - the one that had been gripping me - as if he couldn't believe I'd managed to pull away. If I'd stopped to think about it, I might have been a bit surprised too. He looked back up at me with a strange, curious smile on his face.

"I'm going to be very busy." I took a step back, and headed for the door. As I reached it, I turned back with a huge grin on my face and winked. "See you around."

I felt like I'd finally done something right. Maybe it was just how I'd been feeling since things had fallen apart with Eric and Nick, or maybe it was Louis' good example - along with the knowledge that he didn't always get it right when it came to love, either. But I was feeling really good about myself.

I was practically beaming as I saw Louis moving towards me down the hall. He stopped me with a gentle hand on my arm. "You okay? You look weirdly happy."

"I kind of am." I was almost bouncing. "I've finally made at least one good decision."

"Well, congratulations. You can tell me about it later. I need the bathroom too." He let his hand drop. "Uh, listen, I don't know if this makes things awkward for you, but I kind of... Just told Angela I was gay."

"Oh, wow. Big step."

"Yeah." He grimaced. "I'd normally have told her by now, because I really trust her, but I didn't want to make things awkward for you. But I kind of realised that she'd already guessed, so it felt weird not to tell her. Sorry."

"Oh, it's fine. Angela's... trustworthy." I shrugged. "So, she knew? Is that what that Darcy thing was about?"

"No. That was something else." He put his hands in his pockets and looked away.

"You can tell me if you want. But obviously you don't have to."

"Good." He looked back at me and grinned. "Because I'm not going to."

"All right then, Gandalf." I laughed. "Keep your secrets."

"I will."

We broke apart, heading in our separate directions. I got to the wall Angela was sitting against, and slid down on the floor next to her. "Hey."

"Hi." Her pale grey eyes lifted to my face, and she smiled slightly.

We sat there quietly for a while, but then a strange sense of resolve, or recklessness, came over me. I'd known Angela forever now. She never gossiped, or said anything derogatory about anyone. I'd even heard her passionately defend gay rights once. She was definitely trustworthy, and the fact that Louis also thought so made me feel really safe, somehow.

I cleared my throat. "Louis says you know things."

"I do." She smiled mysteriously. "I know many things."

My entire social life had changed - Ellie, Louis, Melissa, even John and Sara were my friends now. Angela and Sue had always been around, and that relationship had always been sort of professional, but now we kept seeing each other socially too. It was kind of great, even though I knew that everything would change once finals were over.

Maybe I felt kind of jealous that things were already out in the open between her and Louis. It seemed crazy to me that I'd been hanging out with this cool, stable, loving person for three years, and we'd only just developed some sort of personal relationship. It made me feel kind of like taking a chance - especially since Louis had already taken it.

"Did you know that... I'm gay?" I asked softly.

"I did."

"And do you have any thoughts on that?" My heart was racing.

"Not particularly." She shrugged. "Unless you want to be more specific."

I took a deep breath. "I do not."

"Then I have no thoughts."

"You know many things, and have no thoughts," I mused.

"It's almost Buddhist, isn't it?" She laughed.

I just grinned back. I felt giddy. It wasn't quite a proper coming out - she'd already known, and even the way I'd asked her had acknowledged that. But it was a start. I hadn't really had to outright tell someone since Jamie, and that was hardly a good blueprint, given what had happened afterwards.

Everyone else who knew had mostly just either figured it out based on what was going on with Eric, or been told by Eric directly. Not me. Angela felt like a good first step for me finally learning how to take control. That felt amazing.

Even Caitlyn - who wandered past shortly after we'd gone quiet - couldn't quite dull my mood. But she wasn't glaring at me, like she usually was. She was just staring vaguely in our direction, and when I glanced up her eyes quickly darted away. I wondered what that was about. Another person I didn't quite have energy to deal with.

"Anyway." Angela snapped closed her book and shoved it in her bag. "I need to go get more coffee. Just wait here for Louis. We'll go see if the tutorial is done when I get back."

"Sure." I watched her wander off in the same direction Caitlyn had gone. I chuckled to myself, wondering if I should shout a warning, but the two of them had never really clashed - much to Sue's annoyance. She'd always been quite insistent about loyalty, but Angela would never treat anyone badly. Not even Caitlyn.

Louis got back from the bathroom, and settled down next to me. "Where's Angela?"

"She went off to get a coffee. She'll be back in a sec."

"Good. I think the economics thing will be done in a few minutes."

"Cool." I didn't have a follow-up, because I was still kind of reeling about the Angela thing.

"You okay? Your vibe keeps changing today. You seem a bit nervous."

I laughed, and rubbed the back of my neck. "I just came out to Angela."

"Oh my god. Unprompted?"

"Yeah. It just kind of felt... like, she knew about you, so..."

He nodded, and beamed. "That's so great."

"Yeah." I shrugged.

"I'm proud of you."

"Thanks." I grinned. "You too."

"Thank you. Big day for Angela, though." He laughed. "Her two closest guy friends let her know they're both gay."

"Should we tell Sue?" I asked. "Now she's the only one in our study group who doesn't know."

"Ah, maybe." He shrugged. "How do you think she'll take it?"

"I really have no idea. She'll probably say something horrific and offensive."

He laughed. "Well, we might go out to lunch with her later. We could do it then."

"Yeah, sounds good." I shook my head. "I've been so worried about everyone at school finding out, and maybe the administration doing something homophobic."

"That seems fair. And like a good thing to worry about."

"I know. But at the same time, Nick's threatened to out me. So if that happens, I think it'll be good if none of my friends are surprised."

"If Nick does that, you might get to see me not being nice," Louis said darkly.

"That could almost be worth it." I laughed. "But yeah, he still hasn't, and it's been a couple of weeks now. So who knows? But anyway, my point is that Sue's the only person I still haven't told. So maybe I should tell her. But you don't have to tell her about you."

"I might anyway." He shrugged. "I usually don't keep it a big secret or anything. I just kind of didn't advertise it here, because you're all a bunch of bible-bashers."

"Please." I scoffed. "It's like every other day here that someone else turns out to be not quite straight."

"Yeah, that's a bit of an exaggeration. What, like three of you, so far?"

"That we know of."

"Speaking of which, Jamie was lurking in the bathroom."

"Yeah, he does that."

He cleared his throat, and gave me a weird look. "Did you um... say something to him?"

"Uh, yeah. Why?"

"He looked a little... I don't know. Contemplative."

"Right." I nodded. "I told him I didn't want to do stuff with him anymore."

"Ah, okay." He frowned slightly. "And you're serious about that?"

"Yes. I've told you about this, though. I don't want to get into a messy situation in general, but I'm not even... feeling things for Jamie."

"Right." He grimaced. "Sorry, I guess I just keep not quite believing you when you say that there's not more there."

"I know." I chuckled. "Why not, though?"

"I don't know." Louis shrugged, and looked away.

I couldn't pursue the topic further, because Angela got back at that point, and the three of us set off for the classroom where the economics tutorial was happening. Ellie and Sara were there too, and when the class finished, we all decided to head to the cafe, and Sara called John up. He and Melissa arrived outside the school a few minutes later.

Melissa ran up and wrapped her arms around me. "Jay, baby, I've missed you."

I hugged her back. "Who are you, again?"

"Don't break my heart. Or I'll break your legs." She laughed, and then ran off to hug Ellie and Sara, and to introduce herself to Sue and Angela.

We all started walking to the cafe, and Louis ended up next to me on the sidewalk. "Are we really going to tell Sue now?"

I blinked. "Yeah, I thought so. Why?"

"What if Sue says something homophobic, and Melissa shouts at her, or something?"

"Then it happens, and Sue will probably take the shouting-at in stride." I shrugged. "We don't have to do this if you don't want to."

"No, I do. It's weird, but we're around her so much now, and I don't like feeling like I have to hide it."

"Okay."

"Just... You go first, okay?"

"Sure."

We got to the cafe, got our drinks and all down. The conversation at the table tended to skirt around the issues of finals, which no one seemed to want to mention. I think we were all just enjoying our last few days of freedom, before we began to buckle down and really study. During a lull in the conversation, Louis kicked my foot under the table, gave me a pointed look, and nodded towards Sue.

A funny thought occurred to me. "Sue, Louis and I have something to tell you."

"Oh god, why would you say it like that?" Louis went bright red.

"What is it?" Sue looked up from her phone.

"We're both gay."

"What?" She blinked, and her head darted back and forth between the two of us. "Why are you telling me?"

I shrugged. "Everyone else here knows."

Sue looked around, and then nodded. "Thank you, then. I hate not knowing things." She tilted her head. "Are you two dating?"

At that point, John burst out laughing, and Melissa slapped him.

"No, we're not." Louis sighed.

"Then why did you say 'Louis and I have something to tell you'," she asked me.

"Jay thinks he's funny." Louis said wryly.

"Jay's hilarious." John chuckled, and got a dirty look from Louis. I laughed.

"Yes, Jay likes to make jokes. This isn't a joke, is it? That you two are gay?" Sue asked.

"No." I stopped myself from laughing. "No, sorry, very serious."

"Okay." She shrugged, and her eyes dropped back down to her phone.

Then the conversation had just... moved on. It was kind of great. Louis gently kicked my foot again, and rolled his eyes at me, but he looked relieved. After that, we pretty much all had a peaceful, pleasant afternoon. We walked back to the school, and I took Louis, Ellie and Sue back to my house so we could prepare for the AP maths moderation.

Without Angela's calming influence, Sue went slightly off the rails, obsessing about AP maths even after we'd covered everything. She took a twenty-minute break to play a fevered and fantastic song on my keyboard - one of her own compositions, I think - and then she decided that it was probably time for her to go home. Ellie walked her out, and then it was just me and Louis.

The AP maths moderation was happening at an awkward time the next day, so I'd invited him to stay over for the night. That way, he didn't have to get dropped off in the early hours of the morning by his mother and wait forever, just for something that would only take an hour. We'd also promised Sue we wouldn't do any more preparation without her, so he couldn't even pressure me into more work.

I'd handed him the controller for the Playstation, and told him to pick any game he wanted. He'd gone with a Final Fantasy game - a great choice, I thought - and was working his way through the introduction. I grabbed my phone and paced over to the couch. "Is pizza okay for dinner?"

"Sure." He bit his lip. It looked like he was trying not to laugh.

"What?"

"Oh." He blushed slightly. "Sorry. I just have a bag full of my clothes here, and if we're ordering pizza.... It's like staying at my dad's place. Just colder."

I could see his breath was fogging up in front of him. That happened in my room, unfortunately, especially if you were closer to the windows.

I grimaced. "Yeah, sorry about that. This room's too big to heat, and badly insulated. I don't think it was really built for people to be here in winter. I can get you a blanket, or you can borrow a jersey of mine if you want."

"No, it's fine. I'm warm enough." He shrugged.

"Okay. So... Pizza?"

"Sure."

I put through the order. He always went with the same thing, like me, so we didn't need to discuss. He liked mushrooms on his pizzas, but I tried not to judge. At least he was also anti-pineapple. I grabbed my book, and settled down across from him on the couch to wait.

"Is it weird that we're ordering take out for just us?" he asked. "What's your family having?"

"I have no idea. But it's fine. Special rules apply when I have friends over."

"Like your family just doesn't exist?"

"A little." I shifted uncomfortably.

"Sorry, I didn't mean it like that. It's just that it's always just been me and my mom. I always thought a big family might be kind of nice."

"It's not that great." I scrunched up my face. "Maybe it would be better if it were just my mom and just her actual kids, but... yeah. I kind of get ignored. A lot. So me pretending they don't exist is fair, I think. Getting this room was pretty cool, but it was also me being... shoved outside."

"Ah, shit, sorry. So not so great."

"It's okay." I shrugged. "The privacy is nice. I love the twins, but they're a handful. And I get along with my stepdad, but he doesn't feel like family. But my stepsisters are Satan's handmaidens."

He grinned. "Are they really that bad?"

"Yes." I chuckled. "I mean, they kind of are. They're very antagonistic towards my mom sometimes, and I get very defensive. Sometimes it feels like they don't even make an effort to be nice."

"Sorry. That sounds awful."

"I suppose it's okay." I shook my head. "My mom knows what she's doing, I guess. It's just annoying because Brian and Candy are gone now, but Dan doesn't seem to be going anywhere even though she's Candy's age."

He nodded, and gave me a sympathetic look. "So it's like they scared away your real siblings."

"Yeah. Is that stupid?"

"No, not at all." He shook his head. "So you still like the twins?"

"Yeah, of course." I smiled. "Love those crazy little monsters. They're usually in here all the time, but they're banned until the end of exams. If I let them in here at all this year, I'd never get them out."

"Right." He laughed.

I set my book down. "So can I ask you about your family, too?"

"Sure."

"So your parents are divorced?"

"Never got married, actually."

"Oh wow."

"Yeah, my dad's this aimless, drifting kind of guy. When my mom got pregnant she didn't really want to get married. Not to him. My grandparents just looked after both of us. Our house was actually originally theirs - we lived with them until my granddad retired, and they moved to their holiday home."

"Ah, okay." That explained some things - like why his house looked so old-fashioned, and why he and his mom shared a surname.

He nodded. "So, what about your dad?"

"I see we're back to me."

"I don't like talking about myself." He smiled. "And I actually don't know anything about your dad."

"Okay. Well, he was married to my mom until I was three, and then they split up. Apparently it was a mess - I don't think I was old enough to get it. Brian and Candy kind of understood what was going on and kept me from experiencing most of it."

"Oh, I'm sorry."

"It's cool. We don't see him much. He lives in France now and is always pretty busy jetting around the world. Occasionally he'll fly us somewhere with him. He's a business consultant, but I don't really know more than that. He's told me, but I never really listen."

"Do you get along with him?"

"He's okay." I shrugged. "It's a little hard to know him. Brian has some issues with him, because of the divorce, but he's only ever been an okay dad to me. Maybe everybody goes out of their way to keep it that way for me. He's definitely the fun parent, so I try not to get carried away by that, because it feels like selling my mom out for international trips and expensive presents."

"Do they get along?"

I laughed. "Not... really. When he's here it's really awkward. He came down for my birthday last year, bought me a car, and they fought about it until Christmas."

"Oh, I'm sorry."

I shook my head. "Don't be. It's such a ridiculous first-world problem."

"Not about the car. Just... do you always get caught in the middle like that?"

"It's getting rarer. At least I hope so."

"Yeah." He had a look of concern on his face.

I looked down as my phone buzzed. "Pizza's here."

We had a pretty great, relaxed evening eating pizza and playing video games. We didn't get back into heavy topics, but it was nice how comfortable I was telling Louis about my whole history. Ellie was the only other person outside my family who knew all that, and she'd had to drag it out of me, slowly, over many years.

Eventually it got late, and of course Louis was the responsible adult who suggested we go to bed. I got the bedding for the sleeper couch, and we made it up together. Then he changed in the bathroom while I stripped down to my boxers and t-shirt. He actually wore matching pyjamas, which I thought was kind of adorable. He turned off the lights and got into bed.

I lay there reading - in the dark, on my tablet - for around another hour. Louis was probably the one person in the world who I could probably have fallen asleep around fairly easily. He was always mature and calm, and I'd started to feel so comfortable around him. But my book had gotten good, so I kept at it slightly longer than I should have.

I was close to drifting off when I heard an odd, repetitive clicking noise. I couldn't quite figure out what it was, until I'd realised that I'd forgotten to give Louis an extra blanket, because mine was already on my bed, and the spare was in another part of my closet. That noise was probably him, nearly freezing to death.

"Louis?" I asked quietly.

"Yeah?" His trembling voice cut the darkness.

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. Why?"

"I can hear your teeth chattering."

"Oh, I didn't notice. Sorry."

"Don't apologise." I laughed. "I can get you an extra blanket, if you want."

"No, it's fine. I don't want to make you get out of bed into the cold."

"I'm pretty warm." I slid out of bed, and grabbed one of the extra blankets I was using. The middle one - it was pretty warm, and I thought he could use the head start. I'd just take one out of the closet on the way back. I quickly lay it out on top of him.

"Thanks." He shivered, and I saw his breath fog in front of him.

"Hang on," I ran to my bed to grab my pillow, which I threw down next to his head on my way back. "I have an idea." I lifted up the duvet on the sleeper couch, and climbed in next to him.

"What are you- Oh my god you're hot." He stiffened, and then relaxed, as I cuddled up to his side.

"So I hear, thanks." I snickered. "But see? I'm helping."

"You really are." He laughed, pressing his cold hand on the skin at my neck. "Are you sure you don't have a fever or something?"

"Yeah, I'm fine." I grabbed his hand and rubbed it. "I don't really get cold very easily. Plus, I had two extra blankets."

"Right. So like an Occupy Wall Street situation." He shifted, pressing more of himself against me, running his hand down my back.

"Exactly. I'm redistributing the warmth."

He just laughed, and his hand edged slowly downwards.

"Not there!" I yelped, as his fingers came around to my side and lightly grazed the exposed skin at the bottom of my shirt.

"Sorry." He said. "Cold?"

"Ticklish."

"Ah. Sorry."

"It's okay." I inhaled deeply. "You smell like grapefruit."

"Oh, that's my face-wash. Finest in the bargain bin."

"It's nice." I put my head on his shoulder.

"Yeah..."

I didn't have a follow-up. Drowsiness was washing over me, at that point. It started to seem like he was gradually warming up, and his shivering was replaced by deep, even breaths. I had meant to get up and go back to my bed once he was no longer in danger of freezing to death. But the comforting, emerging heat of his body pressing against mine and the steady rhythm of his breaths had me drifting into unconsciousness.

***

I woke up that morning as some of the light from under my curtains bounced off the tiles of the floor and directly into my eyes. I groaned, but couldn't turn over because Louis was spooning me from behind. As I gradually became more and more awake, I noticed a hard, fleshy object was jabbing into my left butt cheek. I blushed when I realised what it was, and slowly and quietly extracted myself from the sleeper couch.

Louis shifted when I got out, wrapping both his arms around the pillow I'd been on. His chest rose and fell slowly, and he had a faint smile on his face. I had to stifle a chuckle. I hadn't meant to fall asleep in there - I was just trying to let him leech some of my warmth. But it had been really nice, and I'd drifted off too quickly.

He looked so peaceful - his hair ruffled, a ray of sunlight gently falling on the smooth skin of his cheek. Something about the way he looked just made me smile. Until I realised I was standing over my sleeping friend, staring at him. With an erection. Fuck. I quickly went to the bathroom, and then put on the kettle.

"Morning." He'd clearly been woken up by the violently boiling water.

"Morning." I replied, getting out a tea cup for him as well. Louis was like the only other person I knew - outside of my family - who didn't drink much coffee, and preferred tea. Ellie would have tea with me, when I had it, but she said she only ever drank it because it was 'charming and old-fashioned'. Which didn't feel like the compliment she pretended it was.

"Did you sleep in here last night?" He looked down at my pillow, his voice a sleepy croak.

"Yeah, sorry." I busied myself with the teas, so he didn't see me blush. I was still trying to get the awareness of us both having had morning wood out of my mind. "I meant to go back, but then I fell asleep."

"S'okay," he mumbled. "It was nice."

"Yeah." I finished making the teas, and brought them to the table.

He rolled out of bed and shambled off to the bathroom. After a few minutes he emerged, and sat down to join me. "What time is it?"

"Around eight."

"Oh good." He yawned and stretched. "We can get started early."

I sighed. "You're just like Angela."

"Thank you." He laughed.

"Do you want to go out and grab breakfast before Ellie and Sue show up? We can take our notes."

He grinned, and shrugged. "Yeah, we have three hours, and we've already covered everything. I'm up for whatever."

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Terms: (Not necessarily appearing in this chapter)

• Matric - Final year of schooling in South Africa. (Senior year is the American equivalent, I think.)

• Moderation - Sort of an educational audit, where external moderators check up on the school's standards.

• Prelims - Mock finals, essentially mid-terms, but specifically geared to prepare you for finals.

• Maths - Self explanatory, of course, but I just want to make the point that the are MANY mathematics, so calling it Math is bizarre. Get your shit together, America.

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