Fragile Threads [boyxboy]

Chapter 23

"That purple looks good on you," Ethan's mom commented as she fixed his tie, frowning thoughtfully. All the Youtube videos on how to tie a tie still hadn't done them much good. "It's crooked."

"Let me try again," Ethan sighed, peeling his mom's hands away and trying to go along with the video as he re-tied it.

"Maybe Ari will know how? Will he be here soon?" June asked hopefully. "Your father at least knew how to tie his own ties."

Ethan just grunted and tried again. It was a little weird to hear his mom talking about him again, but it had only been a time coming. "Do you think he's better now?" Ethan asked unsurely.

June glanced up from her work on his tie. "I think we should always keep in mind what happened in the past, but not let it get in the way of the future," she said. "I do think he's changed, but even I won't forget what happened. There will always be that small bit of a wall up because of it. But it doesn't mean he's not worth the time now-he surely wasn't then."

Ethan nodded mutely. It was obvious she had done a lot of thinking on it too. They both startled when Ari knocked on the door, and June rushed to let him in. She explained the tie situation, and Ari swore under his breath. "My dad did my tie," he admitted. "I mean I kind of watched, but not really."

"Maybe one of your teachers at the dance," June declared, whipping the tie off Ethan's neck. "You can ask someone there, okay? But I'm giving up. Go have fun. Home by one, okay?"

"Okay," Ethan agreed before slinking out the door. He knew it didn't look quite right without the tie, so he was hoping someone would know how at the dance. He wasn't even sure what a full Windsor was anyways.

They got to the dance and Ari forced Ethan up to one of the chaperones. Ethan guiltily held out his tie, and the older guy helped him tie it, all while laughing to himself about it. They paid their small fee into the dance and Ari pointed towards the line for pictures.

"We got those done last time," Ethan groaned.

"Yeah, but my mom wants more, and so does yours I'm sure." Ari waved a check out of his pocket. "Let's get it over with."

A few underclassmen that Ethan had never seen before openly stared at them, but tried to give encouraging-yet-awkward smiles all the same. "Freshmen," Ari scoffed under his breath and shared a grin with Ethan.

We'll be freshmen next year," Ethan pointed out. Though it was fun to give the younger students a hard time.

"Yeah but college is different. I think. We won't obviously be freshmen unless we really act like it, like Jace warned us against. And if we know the right people, we'll get associated with them instead," Ari said, shifting on his feet as they waited for a photographer to open up.

The theme was unsurprisingly winter, but it at least seemed to have a magical twist on it. Ari checked off a background of a snowy setting-fitting how it had yet to actually snow-with threes and a mountain in the distance.

Ethan was very aware of one of the photographers giving them a nasty look here and there any time she turned or called the next person in line. He held his breath and tried to figure out which camera they would be sent to and hoped it wasn't hers. One on the left opened up for them, and he was all too glad to be greeted by a friendly smile.

It was slightly easier the second time around on top of the fact he and Ari had actually been getting more comfortable than before. Ari and the photographer were in charge of how they posed, and Ethan just went with it like a rag doll and a smile glued to his face.

They finished and left the gym out into the commons. It was much of the same dancing as the last time, just in better clothes. "Why are we here again?" Ethan asked.