Anomalies ✔

Chapter Three

CHAPTER THREE: TWITCH

Those who restrain desire do so because theirs is weak enough to be restrained.
-William Blake

Our routine was interrupted.

And it was interrupted by a girl jumping onto Jasper, crushing him in a hug while laughing a bit too loudly.

She reminded me of my Uncle Kace the second I saw her. Hazel eyes, blacked hair in kinky curls, clearly snarky as almost the second she clung to him the two started arguing.

Jasper sounded mad, sure, but his eyes lit up in a way they didn't light up around me and I knew he was happy to see her.

They're friends, that much is clear.

"Get off, you ugly gremlin!" Jasper snarls, trying to shrug her off but she just grips him tighter.

"I'm a beautiful gremlin, Jazz and my name is Queen Vivianna, thank you very much."

Her name is Vivianna, she thinks she's a queen, my roommate thinks she's a gremlin and I just think she's a little...eccentric.

So basically, this girl is weird and loud.

Yet she looks fun and if my family is anything to go by, usually those three things- -gremlin or not- -tend to go hand in hand.

The musician apologizes before slapping her forehead, causing her to grumble and push herself away from him. "All this time I thought it was Queen Dumb Bitch."

"That's my middle name." She tells him back just as cockily, sporting a shit-eating grin.

See, we were having a really peaceful morning. I was calm and there were a few times a tic interrupted me but it was nothing like how I usually act when my public anxiety kicks in just by being looked at by someone I don't know.

My mornings with Jasper are...they're nice.

Usually we don't go to his building first, his friends have classes there and I doubt he actually wants me to meet them -I'm just his weird roommate after all.

Does he want me to leave...?

I know instantly they have been talking, it seems maybe about me, when I zone back in and manage to take in Jasper half-standing in front of me like a human shield to protect me from Vivianna's eyes.

Fiddling nervously, I twist my fingers together and feel my nose wrinkle as I look away from Jasper's magnificently built back.

Did he have to be made so handsome and tall and then actively decide to make himself that strong too?

First of all, that wasn't fair to anyone around because now we all look like a potato shaped like a human.

Secondly, I know I'm not a weak guy but I'm not even six foot and I'm a running back. I'm lean, deceptively strong and tall compared to a lot of people but this guy manages to make me look like a boy pretending to be a man.

"Fucking kill joy. I was just gonna ask him what's poppin'."

"You absolutely were not," My roommate snorts, crossing his arms. "I saw that look in your eyes."

"What if I was checking him out, huh, J?" The girl asks this and it makes me tic even more nervously, shoulders tensing as my head dips to the side.

People who are around gay people all the time pick up on my exhausted queer vibe but a lot of people can't.

I'm already a football player with Tourette's and the last time one of my football teams knew I was gay, I had to quit for the rest of the semester until the 'rumor' stopped.