NO Love Club (Boy × Boy) ✔

6) BICKERING WITHOUT MALICE.

X Bélizaire's POV

At first, when I saw Cole's name next to mine on that whiteboard, I groaned inwardly. But then I remembered dad's advice to always try to see things in a positive light, and thinking about our group work as an ordeal was a rather negative way of looking at it. No, it was not an ordeal, but an opportunity to get back at Cole.

I wasn't even sure why getting back at him mattered to me so much, but I knew it had something to do with the dreadful knitted sweater guy, Dee. If I was angry at someone, it was mostly to him. Cole was just asking for blood from his nose over the guy, for whatever reason.

Not to say Cole didn't know how to be a nuisance when Dee wasn't around. It was mostly his attitude, the way you could see from his face how all he thought, in endless circles, was: I hate you, I hate this class, I hate your friends, I hate your name, I hate this town, I hate, I hate, I hate.

Anyhow, the moment my eyes landed on Cole, I could tell something was bothering him. More than usually, that is. It took him minutes to realize I was standing in front of his desk, trying to get his attention. In that moment, just before he noticed me and the familiar scowl was back on his face, the look in his eyes was forlorn.

And, somehow, without even noticing it, I found myself bantering with him to take away that look from his eyes. I'm like that with my sister Maddie. I simply can't handle her sadness. No matter how much we like to tease each other from time to time, I could never forgive myself if I made her cry. I just couldn't wrap my head around why I wanted to make Cole smile.

I reassured myself the reason was obvious: I was being nice to him to show him how wrong he was about me. I mean, wasn't it a no-brainer? I wanted to make him take back his words, because, no, I was not a homophobe nor a bully. That guy was making me spiral into an existential crisis, so it was only natural I wanted to fix his wrong ideas.

Once I started bickering with him without malice, I realized how much more fun it was. Just by a simple touch and a few challenging words I was able to make him blush. He didn't even have a smart-ass comeback to mine and Ruby's words. Although, to be fair, it might have had something to do with his state of mind.

While Ruby and I were looking for Cole, we found out we had more in common than we had first thought. One of those was that she wasn't a fan of Dee, although she told me that they were friends, sort of.

"Sort of?" I lifted an eyebrow, while lazily glancing around to find out if there were any signs of Cole. He had made his disappearing act nearly twenty minutes ago, and I couldn't help wondering if he had gotten enough of us and left for good. I hoped not, because that would mean more work for me and Ruby when we would have to make the presentation.

"We hang out in the same group." Ruby shrugged, then turned her gaze up to me, as if to evaluate how much she could tell me. "We queer kids have to keep an united front, or at least that's what my ex used to say. For some reason she actually liked Dee, and though she's in uni now, we all agreed to keep an eye on Dee."

"That makes sense." I agreed, snapping one more picture, until I had everything I needed for my part of the presentation.

"And I know Dee can be a lot to take, but he isn't actually that bad." Ruby admitted, then narrowed her eyes at me and brought her hands on her hips. "If you tell him I said that, I'm going to kill you."

"Don't worry, we're not exactly on speaking terms." I laughed. Then I asked: "So, Cole is queer too?"

"I don't know." Ruby squinted her eyes and snapped a close-by picture from a weed growing through a crack in the asphalt. "I think he mostly just hangs out with us because of his brother."

I opened my mouth for more questions, when Ruby spotted Cole by the bleachers and said: "Speaking of the devil."

Something about him was different. I couldn't pinpoint what it was, until he was standing right in front of us. His eyebrows weren't furrowed and the corners of his lips weren't pulled downwards: he wasn't scowling. He seemed jovial, which was so unlike him I had to pinch my arm to make sure I wasn't dreaming.

"Have you taken your pics yet?" Cole urged, and when both Ruby and I nodded, he started slouching towards the school entrance.

Cole kept the door open for us, noticing my stare as I walked past him. A smile spread on his lips slowly and the dullness was gone from his eyes when he cocked up an eyebrow at me. He didn't have to say it out loud, I could read that expression just fine: game on.

Yet again I wondered what the heck we were doing. Why did I challenge him and why didn't he just turn it down? And why was it so important for me to make sure he had to take back his words? To make him admit I wasn't either of those things he accused me of?

The worst of all was that for whatever reason, I was actually enjoying our bickering, the challenge he was sending right back at me.

We headed to the computer lab, where most of our classmates were already working with their presentations. Ruby took her notebook, reminding us about the content of the assignment. There wasn't that much to do, actually. We just attached our pictures in the slideshow and explained each of them with a short sentence.

I have to admit Cole knew his way with photography, the images were sharp and the lighting just right. They truly seemed to hold some bigger meaning, especially the one he had taken from the bleachers. Obviously, I wasn't going to tell him any of that, when he seemed so smug already.

We had a decent time at the computer lab. I wasn't getting on Cole's nerves and he wasn't getting on mine. We shared a few sarcastic remarks, but mostly we just focused on the presentation. For once Cole didn't act like the nuisance he was; one could even have thought we were friends.

I wasn't the only one who noticed it.

I felt a pair of eyes grilling into me with the intensity of a laser beam and turned to face the gazer. Dee was glaring at me and Cole in turns, while clenching his jaw. Cole noticed it too, when Dee made a loud clicking noise with his tongue. Cole's eyes widened just enough for me to notice and if I hadn't known better, I would have said there was guilt in his eyes.

After that, Cole made an effort to return to his default setting, and we finished the presentation in silence. For some reason, seeing the scowl dulling his features irritated me. If he had had fun a while ago, that was gone now, all thanks to his friend. I could have sworn I saw jealousy in Dee's eyes, but that didn't make any sense at all.

****

Question of the day:
A random fact about you.

(Me: I love metal covers for pop songs, such as Blank Space by I Prevail and Oops!...I Did It Again by Children of Bodom.)