TAMPONS | PHAN

eleven; september

s e p t e m b e r;

The last person Dan would have ever expected to take the empty seat beside him in biology was Charlie Keynes. It was their first class of biology of the year – leaving lab partners and seats up for grabs. School had started a couple days ago, and between his paper route, hanging with Pj as well as loitering outside of Mitch's house the summer had passed by quickly.

"Hello Dan," said Charlie politely and Dan forced a smile.

"Hi Charlie," he replied, pulling his textbook and binder from his bag along with a handful of pens.

"How was your summer?" asked Charlie civilly and Dan sighed, he was going have to address the situation whether he liked it or not.

"Charlie..." he started, and the boy pushed his glasses up his nose, focusing on Dan with an attentive look. "You do know that – that if you sit here, we will be lab partners all year?" asked Dan and Charlie nodded looking down at the desk.

"Yes I know," he replied quietly. "And that's why I sat here," he added glancing up at Dan who raised his eyebrow, encouraging him to explain. "Here's the thing. I know what went on between you and Mitch in June. I also know that although Mitch hasn't directly said it... you mean the world to him and he'd do anything to be friends with you again."

"Me too," muttered Dan.

"I'll admit I did force my way between the two of you—" his voice dropped to a whisper "— I've been in love with Mitch since the first time we met." Dan's eyes widened. He had expected something was going on between Charlie and Mitch but had never been sure what.

"I had no idea..." lied Dan.

"He doesn't love me in that way, so I may as well forget about it. But listen, I don't care if you don't like me, hell you can fake it for the rest of the year if that's what you need to do to get Mitch to talk to you again," he said passionately and Dan stared at him in shock, it was the last thing he would expect Charlie to ask him.

"Why—Why would you do that for me?" asked Dan and Charlie smiled softly.

"I'm not doing it for you. I'm doing it for Mitch – he needs you Dan," he said and Dan shot him a worried glance. There was an urgency in Charlie's tone, that made him concerned for Mitch. Charlie opened his mouth to say more, but shut it abruptly as Mr. Burns walked into the room.

"Welcome class!" he said loudly. "Apologies for my tardiness. Today I'll be going over the syllabus for the year..."

Dan tuned out Mr. Burns as he droned on and on about volcanic plates, sexual reproduction and genes. Dan had already looked over the textbook, and knew what they were to be covering this year. He busied himself thinking of plausible situations to Charlie's urgency.

Mitch was suicidal or depressed. Mitch had cancer. Mitch was alcoholic. One of Mitch's parents died...

As each situation got increasingly dire, Dan shot an urgent glance towards Charlie who was listening attentively to the teacher, noting down the syllabus on a spare sheet of paper in colour-coded printing. I'll have to wait until the end of class, thought Dan dejectedly, placing his head on his arm as he pretended to listen – drifting off into his daydreams instead.

-

"Dan!" Charlie's voice hissed in his ear and Dan pushed himself up groggily.

"Is class over?" he asked, stretching out his arms. He had fallen asleep to the drone of Mr. Burns' voice. Charlie glanced towards the clock that was mounted over the door.