𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐨𝐟 𝐬𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭, 𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐨𝐟 𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐝//𝐦. 𝐛𝐚𝐜𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐬𝐤𝐢

5//locked

That afternoon in AP Lang, I actually got a wonderful surprise. There was a new kid standing at the front of the classroom. He was by all definitions a very pretty boy. I could tell he was relatively tall, but it was hidden by the slight awkward slouch he held from being forced to stand before our entire class of half-asleep AP students. He had this honey brown hair that framed his face well, along with a pair of blue eyes peering through gold-rimmed glasses. Everything about his look seemed so casual, yet perfectly calculated.

"Hey, uh," He cleared his throat. "Sorry. Hi. I'm Theodore Reid, but, uh, a lot of people call me Theo. I prefer Theo. Or Teddy. I'm from New York City. I moved here last week."

There was an awkward pause where nobody said a word.

"Alright, Theo," Mrs. Berings smiled. "You can go into that empty desk right next to..." She scanned the room. "Y/n. Right over there," She pointed to me.

He sat down in the desk next to mine and waved. I barely waved back. I was too distracted by the way that he smelled really nice.

"You're Y/n, right?"

I nodded.

"Cool."

Cool. He said cool. To me.

"You're from New York City? In America?" I asked.

"Born and raised."

"Sorry if this sounds like a silly question, but—"

"No silly questions here," Theo smiled.

Oh, dear. What a pretty smile.

"Did you ever get to see broadway shows?"

And just like that, he lit up. "Yeah! I love musicals! My uncle works lights for one of the theaters, so I got to see some for free. Not trying to brag or anything, but I saw Anastasia's original Broadway cast."

My jaw dropped. "What? No fair!"

He shrugged. "I saw Derek Klena in the flesh. As Dmitry."

"He was so hot as Dmitry. And the tank top during In a Crowd of Thousands? Those costumers knew exactly what they were doing."

"Hot Russian men, am I right?" He held out his hand for a high five.

I returned it. "Oh, you'd love to meet Mischa."

"Who?"

"A real life hot Russian guy who goes to this very school," I paused, rethinking my words. "I don't know why I said that. He's not even hot. He's not even Russian, either. He's Ukrainian."

Theo shrugged. "Close enough. I'll need to judge for myself."

"Ah, damn it," I slumped against the desk.

"What? What's wrong?"

"I have to see that prick in Choir next period."

"Mischa?"

I nodded. "Yeah. He's kind of a dick. He's really annoying. Only I can't really seem to get away from him, so it's not quite an out-of-sight, out-of-mind type deal."

"Sounds delightful. Hey, could you show me to the choir room? I actually have it next class."

"Of course!"

...

I walked with Theo through the hallways.

"Oh! It's Anna, right?" He said, stopping some girl in the hallway.

She looked up, definitely blushing. Not like I blame her or anything.

"I'll see you in Math tomorrow. Looking forward to it."

He flashed his little pretty boy smile at her, and it made my blood boil.

I led him into the choir room, where Mischa immediately jumped from his seat. "Y/n! The chemistry test scores came out! I got 93%!"

I beamed. "Great job, Mischa!"

"Oh, thank you!" He caught me off-guard, wrapping me in a hug, partially lifting me in the air.

Just as quickly, he set me down, clearing his throat.

"You help me, I guess," Mischa mumbled before sitting back down as if he hadn't just done that.

"Oh, so that's the hot Russian you told me about!" Theo said, rather loudly.

Mischa's head whipped around. "The what?"

"Hot Ukrainian, actually. My bad." Theo corrected himself.

I elbowed him. "Not hot!"

Theo didn't answer, and instead raised a quizzical eyebrow in my direction.

"Sorry about my friend here. I don't know what he's talking about," I apologized to Mischa. "This is Theo, by the way. He's new."

"I figured," He said, crossing his arms.

It looked almost like he was sizing him up, assessing his character. "Which section?"

"Oh. I'm in the tenor section."

"You look like you would be in tenor section," Mischa said, arms still crossed.

Theo frowned. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"You look like a twink, that's what!" Caspian called from the tenor section. He was the section leader for the tenors.

"Oh. That's my brother, Caspian. He'll be your amazing, definitely-not-irritating section leader. He's actually not the most irritating section leader. That's Mischa," I jabbed a thumb towards him.

Mischa raised his arms in defense. "Not true. It is actually you."

"If I'm being asked, it's definitely Cas," Noel offered, lightly hitting Caspian's arm.

What a little flirt. Being friends with Noel, I knew all about who he liked. It was my manager, Jules for a few weeks and now it was my brother. Gross.

Caspian gasped dramatically. "To your own section leader? That's basically betrayal."

"There you are. The absolutely insufferable tenor section," I gestured. "Noel, don't be mean to Theo."

"I can try," He sighed. "No guarantees."

I nodded, satisfied as I sat down with my section.

...

Later after class ended, Father Marcus stopped us at the door.

"Ah! Y/n! Mischa! Could you by chance take these stacks of music back into the music closet for me?"

"Of course, Father Marcus! I'd love to!" I beamed as I took a stack back to the music closet, Mischa trailing behind. As soon as we got to the closet Mischa snickered.

"Of course, Father Marcus! I'd love to!" He mimicked me in a falsetto.

"Shut up. Just put the music back."

Mischa shrugged and looked for the right filing cabinet while I stood in the doorway, holding the door open.

"You going to help?" Mischa asked.

"Yeah. Yeah, I am. Right."

I went in to look for the filing cabinet, and the door shut behind me. I didn't think much of it, until I heard the faint little click. I went rigid, face full of worry.

"Shit," I muttered.

Mischa looked up immediately. "Huh? What? Are you okay?"

"The door shut," I looked back at him.

He made a face. "Big deal. Open it. Simple."

I shook my head. "It automatically locks from the outside."

"You cannot be serious right now."

He got up and pushed me out of the way, jiggling to doorknob to no avail. "It is locked!"

"Yeah! No shit, Sherlock! I told you so!"

After a few minutes of banging on the door, we came to the conclusion that Father Marcus had already left and we were stuck in the closet for as long as it would take someone to realize we were gone.