A New Me (Discontinued For Now)

School Prep(3)

Waking up being spooned by a guy much larger than myself was not how I expected to wake up this morning, or any morning for that matter but I guess life is just full of surprises.

I looked around the room in search for a clock. When I found one the time was, unfortunately, too small for me to read. As I tried to get closer to it without waking JP up, an alarm made me jump nearly out of my skin, instantly waking the guy who I didn't want up, up. I glared at the clock with such intensity that if looks could kill it would be smashed into a thousand different pieces.

"G'morning little one," JP's raspy morning voice said behind me. I silently gasped at the reaction it caused me to have.

I turned around bashfully. "Hi," I chirped.

His deep chuckle sent shivers down my spine causing me to roll away from him and jump up. What is happening to my body!? I'm not gay... Am I? Well, I wouldn't exactly know considering I lived alone my whole life. Or most of it.

"We got to get ready for school. Do you need clothes?" he asked.

I nodded in response. Today, was the day that Alexander and I were going to head towards an old magic shop to see what they had to offer. Now, I don't really believe in magic or miracles or whatever but I still want to check it out. It'll be fun.

"Alrighty then." JP grunted as he stood up in nothing but a pair of loose fitting sweatpants. I found my eyes wandering down his chiseled-but not too chiseled it's ugly-chest and abs. Soon enough my eyes were glued to his defined V-line poking out from his pants.

"Like what you see?"

My eyes widened as they snapped back up to meet his dark brown ones. "I-I... Oh crap! I'm sorry! I didn't even realise what I was doing! I'm sor-"

He chuckled. "Axis. It's okay. Stop apologizing."

I nervously rubbed the back of my neck. "Sorry," I whispered sheepishly with a nervous chuckle.

JP rolled his eyes. "I'll get you some clothes."

He then turned away from me and walked towards a door I didn't even know was there. It was a closet filled with clothes of different sizes for boys.

He pulled out a teal hoodie with a black dotted pattern. The black dots were more close together at the bottom and gradually became more spaced out towards the top. With that he pulled out a black pair of jeans and white shoes that had teal shoelaces. JP then threw them at me and set the shoes on top of his sleeping bag.

"Sorry, we don't exactly have underwear here so... you're going to have to go commando," he explained.

I chuckled with a nod. "I'm used to it. Oh Gods, I'm so used to it."

Before I took any of my clothes off, I glanced around the room to see if I was safe from prying eyes only to find that JP and I were the only two in the room.

"Where is everyone else?" I asked genuinely confused.

"Oh, they go to a school a little farther than ours as I'm assuming you go to Tabel High School too?"

"Yeah, I do. How come I didn't wake up when they did?" I asked as I started getting dressed.

The boy in front of me snorted. "They are super sneaky. I swear I can wake up to a mouse squeaking across the room but they never can wake me. I was honestly impressed for my first few weeks here but I got used to it after a while."

I hummed in acknowledgement but said nothing else. I was soon finished getting dressed so I sat down and waited for the other boy to get done too.

As I waited I thought back to the four years of Miss Neri being there for me. Does she actually care about me? Did she get tired of some homeless kid begging for any kind of food almost every two weeks? What did I do wrong?

"Alright little one, I'm done."

I looked up at JP to see he was practically wearing the exact same clothes as me except his hoodie was red with white dots and his shoes were red and white.

"Why do you call me little one? I know I'm small but I'm not that small. Right?"

He chuckled again but didn't answer me. Nope, instead he grabbed a blood red bookbag and walked out the room. I stumbled to get up and ran after him. He somehow was near the bottom of the stairs when I got to the door of the room.

How!?

JP's stupid long legs! That is so not fair!

When I caught up to him he was outside, already near the end of the driveway.

"You cheater!" I yelled at him playfully but also kind of serious at the same time.

The taller boy looked down at me with a smirk. "Oh? I didn't know we were... racing? What exactly did I cheat at?"

I looked at him out of breath. "You were supposed to wait on me so we could walk to the school together. That's what we were going to do right?" I asked with a tiny hint of fear in my voice. What if he doesn't want me around either? What if he wants me gone like Miss Neri wanted me gone?

JP obviously saw the look on my face and the way my steps faltered. "Aw, dude. There's nothing to worry about. If we didn't walk together then I would have stayed right by your side wherever you were. You don't have to worry."

I smiled up at him gratefully.

The rest of the walk was silent but comfortably so. Thankfully. Well... that is until we got to the town bakery.

"Axis! Oh thank God you're okay. I-I made you some donuts to apologise for calling those police officers and the CPS woman. I really hope you can forgive me," Miss Neri had stopped the both of us.

I furrowed my eyebrows and walked around her, completely ignoring her offer of donuts. I still can't find myself to forgive her for what she's done.

"Axis please. I'm sorry, I know you didn't want to go to a foster home but I wanted you to be properly taken care of. I hated seeing you look so much more sick and on the verge of death every other week you came to see me. It broke my heart. Y-you're like a son to me. I'm sorry."

By the end of her talking, I had froze on the spot. She did that to protect me? Keep me alive? No one else would have done something like that for a homeless kid, or more specifically, me.

I turned around and wrapped her smaller frame in my arms, hugging her tightly. She wrapped her arms back around me in a mutual embrace.

"Thank you and I'm sorry for everything."

"How about them donuts, huh?"

I smiled and nodded.