Tyler opened the door to reveal Josh. He frowned slightly at the sight of him, faintly orange as to why his friend was there.
"Hey, Tyler." Josh was panting, and his face was flushed, as if he'd run all the way there. He had a small cardboard box in his arms, about the size of a tissue box. He pushed the box into Tyler's fumbling arms.
Before Tyler could say anything, Josh ran down the walk and down the street leaving as soon as he had come. "Happy Birthday!" he shouted as he ran, and Tyler caught a flicker of his grin under the light of a streetlamp before the blue-haired boy disappeared beyond his line of sight.
Tyler was now vividly orange at the strange encounter. After a few moments, he closed the door and looked at the box Josh had given him. It was plain blue, with a hastily-tied blue bow around it.
"Tyler!" his mother's voice called from the kitchen. "Who was it?"
Suddenly feeling panicked, Tyler didn't know what to do. Quickly, he opened the door to the hall closet, hid the present behind a pile of towels, and closed the door again. "Just a friend from school!"
Tyler's mother smiled as he went back into the dining room. "I didn't know you had a friend."
Feeling a bit embarassed, Tyler sat down at the table. "Well, he's not really my friend. We just eat lunch together. And we sit near each other in a few classes. He has blue hair." Realizing he was starting to ramble, Tyler took a bite of his pizza to shut himself up.
Smiling at her son, Tyler's mother carried her plate to the sink. "Sounds like a friend to me."
After finishing his pizza, Tyler put his plate in the sink and carefully crept to the hall closet. He felt like a secret agent almost, hiding this gift from his family.
It was kind of ridiculous, really. Why would his family be mad at him for receiving a gift from a friend? But for some unknown reason, Tyler felt the need to hide it.
After retrieving the box from the closet, he took it up the stairs and to his room, closing the door tightly behind him. Sitting on the bed, Tyler held the gift in his lap.
Hesitating only a moment, Tyler carefully removed the bow from the box, unfolding the flaps and looking inside.
The box was filled to the brim with tubes of paint, more than Tyler had ever been able to afford at one time. His heart pounding in his ears, he carefully lifted one of the tubes from the box. The label read Midnight Blue.
YOU ARE READING
Colors // Joshler
FanfictionThere were a few colors that Tyler got the occasional feel of--yellow, blue, orange, and lavender. Any other color was rare. In fact, most days, Tyler felt somewhat gray. He wondered if that would ever change. ______________ Joshler High School AU a...
