LOVELORN

4|New friends & tests

.　 . • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° . ☆

MONDAY CAME too quickly. My Saturday had been spent helping Zora re-organize her closet and bookshelf as well as doing school work. We hadn't brought up the party nor had I received a text from Mai the entire day. It wasn't like I'd attempted to message her either. I'd considered it, but never sent anything. As for Zora, I'd tried to talk about the party and Noah, but she'd dismissed the subject every time.

On Sunday we met up with Silas and Mara at the park. Mai had texted me and we'd been talking a bit back and forth. However, she carried most of our conversations.

In the nearly day we'd been talking, I'd come to know that she, like Zora, was a lot more outgoing than me. Which was good. If she was like me, our chats wouldn't have gone anywhere. At one point, she'd asked if they could sit with us at lunch. The 'they' in question referring to herself and Caio. I never thought I'd make more friends than my current ones in high school, but I found myself liking Mai a lot so far. Then again, we'd only really talked over text.

As usual, Avi drove us to school. I hadn't seen much of him since Friday, but I assumed he'd spent the weekend studying and hanging with his friends like he usually did. He dropped me off and we went to our respective classes.

Since I had English with Zora, that's where I was headed. Zora was already waiting outside the classroom, chatting away with Mara who was also in this class. I approached them and tapped Zora's shoulder. She whirled around, flashing me a smile when she saw it was me. I returned it, but didn't have time to say much as the teacher soon came.

The lesson passed slowly, and so did the others leading up to lunch. When it was finally lunchtime, I went to the cafeteria and got my food, before sitting down next to my friends. I texted Mai, telling her where we were sitting, and waited.

Three minutes later, Mai and Caio sat their trays down on the table. They greeted us and took their seats. I had only talked with Mai through a restroom door, text, and when she was drunk. I wasn't sure how it would go over when we were both sober and face-to-face.

"I'm Mai and that's Caio," she introduced herself, carrying the confidence I often saw Zora do in conversations. It seemed I had a knack for making friends with extroverted people.

"I think we share Math," Mara said.

"Oh, yeah, that's right. Mara, right?"

"That's me." She pointed to Silas. "And this is my boyfriend, Silas."

A conversation started up. It was mostly about classes and hobbies, that sort of stuff. I mostly talked when someone asked me something directly, otherwise I primarily listened. Which is what I always did in groups of people.

"How'd you two meet, then?" Silas asked mid-convo.

"I moved in next door in middle school and we just clicked immediately. The rest is history," Caio explained and Mai looked at him, grinning. She smiled a lot, that girl.

"Are you two together or just really close friends?" Mara asked the question we'd all been wondering about.

Caio and Mai shared a brief look before they both choked on a laugh, shaking their heads like the idea was outrageous. So, I would take that as a hard no. I didn't know why it seemed like such a ridiculous thing to them, though.

"Oh, no, no, no. Definitely not together," Mai told us, chuckling. "Never in a million years. But we do get asked that a lot."

"We're both gay," Caio clarified.

A silence engulfed the table. Despite not being straight myself, I sort of assumed everybody else was by default. But even if I was closeted, there was something about meeting other queer people that brought a kind of joy to my heart. I wouldn't say our school was that homophobic, but it wasn't exactly super accepting either. Regardless, it was rare to encounter openly LGBTQ+ people here.