School Activities

Senior Year

The days leading up to their Senior Year were the best Jack had had in months. Ennis had let him stay at his place. Jack had used his parents' divorce as an excuse. But, it was a good excuse since all they wanted to talk about was his dad moving and taking Jack with him. Jack hadn't mentioned that much to Ennis and probably never would. After all, it wasn't going to happen, so why worry about it? But, Jack helped move the rest of his dad's things from the house to the truck. That was all he was going to do about the move.

When Ennis wasn't at work, he spent a lot of time with his parents. They talked things over and things were patched up between them. They still weren't happy with him having sex with Alma since, in their opinion, they were way too young for that sort of thing. It was this that kept him from telling them about his relationship with Jack. He wouldn't even know if they would accept that sort of thing. "Homosexuality" had never come up. Of course not. Both of their sons had girlfriends and their daughter was happily married.

Once his dad was gone, Jack finally stayed at home. He missed sleeping beside Ennis every night but could hope that that would change in the near future. He wasn't going to let it go. One of these days, he was going to move in with Ennis. And neither of them would even think about the jokes around the school. Jack would prove that they didn't have to hide. They shouldn't care about the way other people thought of them. It was just teenage boys that were throwing around the jokes and harsh comments. It didn't matter to people outside the school.

In the privacy of people's homes, they might talk about it, but that didn't matter since they had the decency to keep it to themselves.

Jack wanted to be open about it. After the shitty summer, he wanted to look past those jokes. He wanted to get to the point where they no longer affected him. Could he get to that point? And would Ennis be standing there with him?

He could only hope.

The first day of the last year of high school arrived. Jack thought about the way last year had started. Him being the popular one, laughing at those that didn't look or act like him. Humiliating the shut-ins only to make a little bit of money. He had moved way past all of that and viewed himself as a better person because of what ADAM had forced him into. Yes, he hated to admit it, but to a certain extent, Adam got the credit for where Jack was right now. If only Adam had listened then...

Jack would still be the jerk he was last year.

The first day of school went by similar to the entire summer. As soon as he was assigned a locker he found the word "Fag" written across the front of it in what looked like pink lipstick. He wiped it off with the sleeve of his jacket and moved on. He ignored the whispers and the chuckles from the football team as he passed them in the hall. Other students just stared as he passed by as if they couldn't believe that JACK TWIST could become what he had made fun of so often just the year before.

He had no one to hang with that first day. Not even Ennis, who had to skip the rest of the school day at lunch to get to work. It was already evident that he would be needing some help. Jack would be with him to make sure he didn't drop out of school because of work. With a high school degree, Ennis could go on to do greater things than that stupid job he worked down at the grocery store.

Jack fell into a routine over the next few weeks. The jokes lessened but were still there. He was starting to get nods of approval and thumbs up from the nobodies he made fun of last year. He had earned their respect. The popular guys were slowly losing their power over those nobodies. Because of Jack, quite a few students had learned to stand up for themselves, causing the bullies to back down and give up. Jack didn't want to take credit for that, but it felt pretty good.

Mostly because Adam and the guys were getting what they deserved.

Jack walked into the cafeteria and got his lunch then spotted Ennis at one of the tables near the back. Jack walked over to him, only to find him asleep on a textbook, catching up on past work. Jack sat down across from him, setting his tray down a bit loudly. Ennis' head shot straight up, nearly jumping out of his seat.