Rehabilitation

11

Nathan didn't show up to community service for most of the next day and when he finally did he ignored us all and didn't say a word. It was so quiet without his cocky comments every so often. After I finished getting changed and was ready to leave I saw Nathan sitting on the sofas in the corridor. I wasn't going to say anything since he seemed pissed at us all but then I noticed he had a donut in his hands.

"Where did you get that?" I asked eagerly before I could stop myself.

"Easy. It's from the vending machine," He pointed to the vending machine in front of us, "It's utter crap."

"Don't care," I said, getting a coin out from my pocket and slotting it into the vending machine, "I love donuts"

I looked around to see him leaving, a faint smile on his face. I got my donut from the vending machine and started walking home. I looked ahead of me and saw Nathan walking the same way. If it was anyone else I probably would have walked a different way to avoid them but I found myself running to catch up with him.

"Hey," I said, slightly out of breath, and he nodded when he saw me, "Look I'm sorry about yesterday, we were just having a laugh."

"It's fine really, you can laugh all you want but she was beautiful...when we started," I laughed softly, then took a bite out of my donut. I felt him watch me as I did so and his stone cold expression softened a bit. We both fell into step with each other.

"Listen, Kelly told me-" I began.

"Oh no, has she blabbered some of my other personal thoughts."

"Look, she told me you're homeless." He didn't say anything, just kept on walking. "What happened," I asked, "With your mum?"

He didn't respond for a moment but reluctantly said, "She kicked me out, because I didn't get along with that cock Jeramy. She's supposed to look after me but she kicked me out, her own son," I was shocked to see this side of him. He'd never really shown any sign of emotions before but now he seemed genuinely hurt, "And she...she hit me." He sighed. That was what the red mark on his face was. His mum had hit him and kicked him out of the house, I couldn't imagine what he was going through.

"She's not the best mum but...she's never hit me before."

"Well from what I saw of Jeramy, which was actually quite a lot," He smiled slightly, "He seems like a twat, maybe even more of a twat than you," I grinned at him.

He smiled wider, after a second his smile dropped, "Well just to be clear I'm not homeless, I've been living with some of my mates."

Complete bullshit. Kelly said she had heard Nathan's thoughts the other day and he got kicked before then. That meant that he had been homeless the whole time.

"Where are you headed then?" If he wasn't going to tell me straight up then I would just have to trip him up and catch him in a lie.

"To my flat," He told me confidently.

"And where is that?" I inquired.

"Eh...you know just," He lifted his hand out of his pocket and waved it in the general direction of the buildings, "There."

I raised my eyes brows at him.

"Okay fine!" He finally gave in, "I'm homeless. I've been living in the community centre, happy?"

"Very," I said, grinning. Then a thought popped into my head. A stupid one. A really stupid one, but before I realized how stupid it was I was already opening my mouth and saying it. "You know, if you need a place to stay, my roommate is never home, so her room is free."

He looked at me, a surprised look on his face. I thought he might laugh or something but his surprised expression disappeared and he looked like he was actually considering it. My breath quickened as I waited for him to say something.

"Alright."

"Seriously?" I asked.

"Yeah, I know you're only doing this because you want to shag me but-"

"What," I burst out laughing, "I don't want to shag you."

"Sure, sure. I know you do, who doesn't want a piece of this," He said pointing to himself.

"Trust me, that's not the reason."

"Fine, if you say so," He said, raising his hands and looking defeated. We continued to walk and I realized that we were both going to my flat.

"But just so you know, now that we are living together, if you try any funny business then I'll have to move out. It'll be too messy otherwise, you'll end up getting hurt."

I laughed again as we neared my door, I took my keys out my pocket and unlocked it.
As we stepped into the house I said, "Trust me, if anyones going to get hurt it'll be you," Knowing full well it was a lie.