𝐎𝐧𝐥𝐲 𝐅𝐨𝐨𝐥'𝐬 𝐆𝐨𝐥𝐝

Eric Is Not A Comforting Person||2.

"Eric!" Leith shouted, rushing through the courtyard towards the boy. The area was one of grandeur, adorned with lush greenery and a pond laden with waterlilies. The sun spilled down, over the world selflessly sparing all the light it could. College kids chattered amongst themselves, talking brightly to friends on this September morning.

The boy, tawny skinned and sporting a pair of beautiful hazel eyes, abruptly looked up. "Leith," he replied lightly, holding his hands to gesture at her lazily. "What's wrong? Another loan shark out to get you?" He joked, a smile dawning his thin lips.

"Worse," Leith complained, shuttering a sigh as she finally reached the boy's side. She put her hands on his forearms, squeezing them to stabilize herself. "A pretty girl talked to me at the book store and I practically forgot my name. I was stuttering, and fidgeting- I was basically like a drunk squirrel."

"Oh, yeah," Eric nodded, running a hand across the faint stubble growing in a five o'clock shadow. "She was telling me about how she saw you-"

"What?"

"You're talking about Valerie, right?" It was with those words that Eric spoke that Leith wished to curl up and die. Her lungs were being squeezed in a vice grip, and her eyes were widened in so much horror that she could have been an extra in a horror film. Eric stared down at her, and had the nerve to gently pat her head. "Your face is gonna freeze like that," he said. "And that's not a look you want if you're trying to get into Valerie's pants."

Leith softly swatted his hand away, expression returning to a regular horror struck look. "First of all, stop," she said, holding up her pointer finger and then her middle as well. "Second of all, she talked to you about it?" She questioned hastily. She shuffled her feet, and her face was set ablaze again as reminiscent embarrassment found her.

Eric hummed quietly with a sure nod. "She did." When he nodded it made a few strands of his bleached honey hair slip across his forehead. He had started dyeing it in high school, Leith was actually the one who bleached it. The first time, anyway. After some accidental over processing, a mild bald patch, and a two week bout of the silent treatment, their friendship eventually recovered. With the promise that Leith would never touch hair bleach again.

Leith pinched the bridge of her nose and let out a whining sigh. "Well what did she say exactly?" She wondered, staring doe eyed up at her best friend. "Does she thinks I'm a weird, or an idiot? Both?"

Eric, who towered over her, set his hand on her head. "She said you got really flustered, like you might have been sick or something," he said, in the most unsympathetic, sympathetic tone that Leith had ever heard. "However, being that I've known you your entire life, I was able to easily deduce that you weren't sick. Just bad at flirting."

Leith shot up a half hearted glare. Her tired eyes stuck to the ground as she replayed yesterday's events in her head. "It's not my fault," she complained, a little humor returning to her voice. "I just came out, how am I supposed to be good at flirting right out of the closet?" She reasoned, talking a step back and instinctually straightening the collar of Eric's shirt. "That's like asking a baby to be good at walking fresh from the womb."

"Well maybe I can give you a crash course," he joked, then glanced down at the Rolex on his wrist. "On the way to class though, because we're about to be late to Marketing," he said, walking forward after talking Leith's hand to drag her along.

"But that's where Valerie is," Leith lips twitched to a deep frown, that pulled her eyes down a bit and gave a natural puppy-dog effect.

Eric snorted, and dragged his fingers across the bridge of his nose. Which flushed them red, and made the hue of his dark freckles all the more prominent. If he weren't gay, he would have been quite the lady's man. Leith had seen more women flirt with him than their straight friends, and it was also funny watching Randy get miffed when the pretty ones were only focused on Eric. "Yeah, and she told me that until yesterday you'd never noticed her in class before."

"Your point?"

"My point is that the second Mr. Edison starts talking in his drab, saltine cracker-ish voice you'll be drooling on your desk in no time."

"I guess," Leith eventually started to talk towards class, shoulder to shoulder with Eric. She played with a strand of her auburn hair, that loosely fell in lustrous curls around her shoulders. Her boots quietly clicked beneath her feet, and every once in awhile a fall leaf was crunched under her shoe. "Or I could change my name, leave the country and start a new life on an island somewhere."

"That's true, there's a couple problems though," Eric quipped. "I wouldn't have anyone to throw paper at to keep me awake in Mr. Edison's class, you would probably pick a really dumb name, and knowing your luck, you'd end up on an island like the one in 'Lost'."

"I could fight a shadow monster."

"You and your spaghetti arms?"