HIDING FROM THE TRUTH ✔️

CHAPTER 1: CLASSMATES

1.
Luke sat at his desk, copying down the notes the teacher was drawing on the whiteboard. He pushed his glasses up on the bridge of his nose for the tenth time. He got them over the summer and the black frames were too big for his face so he was always having to push them back into place.

The door opened but he didn't bother looking since he was furiously copying everything the teacher wrote down. He already knew how to do all of the work but followed along anyway. Just in case.

"Move."

Luke jumped at the abrupt demand, immediately grabbing his notebook to get up until he realized that the voice was directed at the student next to him. The chair was pulled out with a screech before the person sat down, making Luke nervously glance at them. He figured it was another kid who just wanted to copy off of his work. He was too awkward and shy to say no so it happened constantly.

But it wasn't. It was Gavin.

"Hey," he greeted casually, shrugging off his backpack.

"Uh, hi," Luke responded, confused why Gavin was in the same class as him. Wasn't he a senior? Luke was only a sophomore.

"I never passed this class so they're making me take it again," he answered Luke's silent question. "I doubt I'll do much better this time, but I'll just cheat instead," he whispered the last part so that the teacher wouldn't hear.

"Cheat?" Luke repeated with wide eyes. "Won't you get in trouble?"

Gavin grinned fondly at him, finding his innocent reaction endearing. What high schooler had never cheated before? Well, he was guessing someone as intelligent as Luke wouldn't have to. He'd always been naturally smart.

"Only if I get caught," Gavin said cheekily and unzipped his backpack, digging through it for a pencil.

Luke cringed seeing how messy it was inside. It was the first day of school, how did he manage to mess up already? There was barely anything in it but pieces of stray, crumbled up pieces of paper filled the otherwise empty space.

"Be careful. The integrity policy is really strict," Luke told him worriedly. Just the mere thought of Gavin getting in trouble for cheating made him anxious as he squirmed a little in his seat.

Gavin snorted. "The integrity policy? Everybody says that. They're required to but it doesn't actually mean anything."

Luke strongly disagreed with that but didn't say anything, watching Gavin flatten a balled up piece of paper on his desk and a pencil that only had half of the wood left.

"Here." Luke handed Gavin one of his expensive mechanical pencils. "You can keep it," he added.

"Thanks." Gavin bit his bottom lip to stop himself from grinning.

"Do you want paper too? Actually, I have some extra notebooks, you can take some of those. And I have way more pencils if you need any," he rambled as he searched through his perfectly organized backpack.

Gavin laughed. "It's chill. I probably wouldn't use them anyway."

Luke blushed, opening his mouth to respond but the teacher interrupted them.

"Is my class boring you?" she snapped. "Oh lord, Gavin, is that you?"

Her heart dropped into her stomach. Gavin and Owen brought her average percentage down a whole letter grade back when they were sophomores. She blinked at the sight of him, praying to god that she was only seeing things.

"Hey Mrs Riley! Did you miss me?" He smiled widely.

She squeezed her eyes shut, hoping it was just a nightmare. Gavin was a troublemaker that went down in history at their school. He was a class clown kind of guy that constantly distracted the class.