How To Stay Afloat (BxB)

Chapter 1: Settling in

Author's note: Thanks so much for clicking on my story!

Please beware that this story contains triggering content. There's going to be cursing, queerphobia, self harm, suicide, drug abuse, eating disorders, mental illnesses, sexual content, sexual assault, rape and violence.

I'm gonna try to put trigger warnings at the beginning of each chapter with heavy topics.

And sorry for any mistakes. English is not my first language, but I wanna be better so feel free to point out my mistakes.

_____

"No! Sammy! Ew!" Kevin screams as he pushes me away after I made a joke about the mail woman hitting on him.

"She surely wants you to join that sect." Jared suggests.

"She's in a sect?" Kevin asks confused.

Kevin is my best friend. He's sitting next to me, his legs moving around in the air, as he speaks. His long dark hair is swinging around as he starts giggling in a high pitch when he watches me drop my phone on my face. He's got a pretty high voice.  Especially when he giggles.

"Dude, who do you think gave them your address and name?" Jared asks and glances at me as we both start laughing at Kevin's confusion.

Kevin now rolls his eyes. "Well, I'm sure she's just a nice lady and doesn't want me to have sex with her or join her sect."

"Or maybe both." Jared comments, snickering.

"Yeah, yeah. At least I have someone who's interested in me. Mister forever virgin." Kevin says to Jared as he passes me the joint that all three of us share.

Jared smiles and shakes his head.

Jared and I are seventeen and Kev is sixteen and our combined experience with girls is close to zero.

Some of us are more bitter about that lack of experience than others.

I had a girlfriend when I was fourteen, that hardly counts as experience since we only kissed like two times and honestly? It was fucking lame.

I take a drag from the joint and lean my head back against the back of Jared's sofa as I blow the smoke out.

Jared is also my best friend. I've only met him a year ago when he moved here. He's wearing his hair short on the bottom and a bit longer on top. I really like his hair. It's a cool brown colour. It's straight, but not shiny or thin at all. I wish I also had dark hair. My hair is a dirty blonde and it's really curly, but not the good kind of curls. It looks good on the first day after washing and then turns into a frizzy mess.

Jared's smile is really nice. I wish I had that kind of smile. But he doesn't really seem happy overall.

"Oh, you know. If we're all still in the same boat when we're eighteen we could always just date each other." Jared jokes with wiggling eyebrows and I almost choke on the smoke as I burst out laughing.

"Ew, I'm maybe desperate, but not desperate enough to turn gay. Especially not for any of you. No offence, but there's only one guy I wouldn't say no to." Kev says.

"Hemsworth." Jared and I say in unision.

I watch them as they talk about that actor until it bores me enough to unlock my phone. I look at the time and gasp. "Gotta get home. Need a ride?" I ask Kev as I sit up.

It's a school night and my parents won't be happy if I come home too late. Yes. I'm seventeen and still have a curfew.

"Finally." Jared says relieved.