God, it's fucking cold out. Fortunately, the football game should be over pretty soon and we ate shit like usual; the majority turnout for home Clark County Hawks football games is always a close call between the other team's support and our school's marching band, who are required to be there. And there's also us – me and the rest of the group –who're here to keep Hayley company while she waits to play the song of defeat on her clarinet with the rest of the band.
"Well, that was very depressing," Brendon shivers as the clock goes to zero and the buzzer signals the end of the game. 6-47 them.
"We've done worse," Jon shivers back.
"That's not really any less depressing," Hayley groans, standing up with her instrument. "You guys should probably get a head start to beat all of this traffic," she gestures to the nearly empty stadium and winks at us.
The movement of my knees feels briefly unnatural once I start to get up with the others. This was the last game of the season so Jon's parents are allowing him to have all of us over, under the guise that we are celebrating school spirit. The season could have stretched out a bit longer into December, but qualifying for a playoff would require us not losing all the time.
Spencer pats Hayley's epauletted shoulder, "We'll meet you out by the cars, alright?"
Hayley starts to shake her head, "No, no, no. Cas and Vicky said they were hungry, you guys go and I'll just meet you there," her hands position themselves on the clarinet, "Jon's place, right?"
"Y-yeah, but we don't want you leaving here by y-yourself," Cassie's teeth chatter towards the end and she nuzzles deeper into Jon's side.
"I'll stay behind and leave with her," I volunteer and they all agree on the arrangement. I just sorta feel like getting away from everyone, only for a second. There's a lot of things on my mind right now. Honestly, I'm getting paranoid that I look noticeably paranoid.
Once everyone leaves, I inform Hayley that I'll be waiting for her in the band room where I won't freeze my ass off. As I walk towards the school buildings the echoing of that same old song grows further and further away.
The door screeches open to the deserted band room, the metal chairs in disarray and sheet music piles on random surfaces, the harsh lighting revealing nothing. I forgot how unsettling being in an empty classroom feels; it has no purpose if not for the asshole kids who complain in it. At this moment, I almost pity the building, which I guess sounds weird, but it's a place that generations of students have flown through, despising its neutral colored walls, associating it with the idiots they were forced to interact with within its frame. People grow nauseous from the sight of this campus — I've overheard students hoping for it to be engulfed by flames a concerning amount of times — but it's just a pile of drywall and linoleum; when we leave it alone it's a harmless skeleton.
I move further into the room and find a spot against the back drum platform to sit at. I can't deny that a big source of my anxiety is from Brendon. I find myself thinking about him a lot more than usual and not really in the way that I'd prefer to.
It's only been about a month since we've picked things up and I will say, it is not at all like last time. We have our boundaries set and it involves simultaneously more and less sneaking around. Less in that, I'm not dancing around Spencer in close quarters, but more in that I'm lying to a lot more people, and while I was only moderately bothered by that before, I've recently been filling my time with fantasies of different scenarios where everything goes wrong and I get outed.
I only ever see things ending in humiliation. Okay, that's a lie. The endings I hate the most are the ones where I lose him.
My heart jumps a little when I hear the metallic screech of the door. I look behind me, expecting to see one of the marching band kids, but I'm instead met with Spencer. His cheeks are flushed from the cold and the instant he enters the heated room his body relaxes some. He catches me slumped over by the drums and huffs, "There you are."
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Oh Boy ★ Ryden
FanfictionRyan finds the perfect opportunity to explore a previously uncharted area of his sexuality in secret during a month long summer road-trip to California with his best friend. But now he's back in Las Vegas for his Senior year and he can continue to c...
