Friends with "that Niccals kid" | Gorillaz High school AU

Back on the usual road

"After careful consideration of the evidence and the arguments presented, I find the defendants, Tony Chopper and his partners, guilty of first-degree assault. The severity of the crime and the impact it has had on the victim cannot be ignored"

As the judge continues explaining his judgement, I zone out. I feel like screaming, hugging Murdoc, running multiple kilometers away and back again, just overall excited that, in the end, we came out on top. The case is closed as the six people on our other side all start crying or fussing.

"I guess we can go home..?" I ask

"Yeah, the rest is not our problem"

We end up walking home, sharing earbuds once again, this time allowing ourselves to smoke, eventually realising how uncomfortable formal shoes are when you've been wearing them for a long time, and taking them off, walking in socks.

After a long and surprisingly pleasant walk home we threw ourselves down onto my bed. I help Murdoc take his pants off, since it kept getting stuck in his cast. We change into home wear and try and decide what to do, settling on sims.

"So how long until your bones heal?" I ask Murdoc

"Eh, about two more weeks" he replies, making our sims have intercourse for the billionth time "Also, I've been thinkin', what's all this social media hype about?"

"What do you mean?"

"I only have my number to text and call with, that's more than enough, what else is there for people to fuss about?" He complains as I laugh a bit, he sounds like an old man

"If you stop making our sims make love, I can show you"

"Eh, okay, you win"

I explain to Murdoc what each social media app I use does, he calls me gay for having Pinterest and is visibly repulsed by whatever is on my Tiktok's "for you" page. He calls Insta boring and does not care for Tumblr. Oddly, when we get to Facebook, he seems somewhat intrigued.

"So you're telling me there's an app full of angry old people who argue all day and lame memes posted my forty year old mums? I want in"

It comes to me as a surprise, but I help him download it, the whole situation went like this:

"Okay, open the app store"

"What? Oh this thing... It's showing me a pizza slice or whatever the fuck that is"

"...You're not connected to Wifi"

"...Here" he stretches his arm out and gives me the phone.

I type the Wifi password in and download Facebook for him, he then tries to register.

"What is E-mail and am I supposed to already have it?"

"I'll make you one" I say, not knowing at this point if I find the situation funny or exasperating.

10 boring minutes go by.

"All logged in, I'll send you a friend request"

His screen shows a friend request from me.

"Ignore" he says as he taps the corresponding button and starts laughing hysterically upon seeing my reaction.

I send another one out of enervation and he finally accepts.

For the first hour he had sent friend requests to all my friends, his family, wrote "cant w8 2 c u wen u get home frm priso- i mean borabora" on Hannibal's timeline, and filled my timeline with either "farts" or "stuwey iz a homo" as I begged him to delete them before my grandparents see it.

He stops trolling and adjusts to the app as we go back and forth playing trivia planet.

SUNDAY

We spent all Sunday filling in notes, and there were so many we had to spend all day and even stay up until midnight.

MONDAY

We go to school after Murdoc is deemed well enough. Everyone looks at us, more than when we firs appeared together, all eyes are on us. At lunch we sit down with the usual crowd.

"Hey" we say.

"SPILL THE TEA, NOW" Noodle immediately yells.

"YEAH, LET'S HEAR IT, LUVS" Paula joins in.

"We fucking won the case!!" Murdoc exclaims.

"OHH did they cry?" Noodle asks

"Yeah, like half of them did" I say

"I KNEW IT!!" Paula exclaims

We tell the girls and Russel what happened in more detail as the hype slowly dies down. After Paula and Noodle are done, they go for a smoke, Noodle apparently tried it whilst we were gone. Russel keeps the conversation flowing.

"So, I've been thinking, the three of us could hang out after school it y'all're up to it"

"Sure, it's been long" I say

"Yeah, it has" he replies

The bell rings as Russel hands his plate back to the kitchen as we grab our lunch boxes. Russel goes back to his class but as we are about to go back, we are stopped by some 12th graders.

"Oi, Niccals, 'ow dare you get Chopper into jail? You'll focking pay fo' this, you twat"

"Yes, I did, and I'll 'focking' send you there too if you don't shut the fuck up" He yells back

"Yeah? Well you better watch your focking back, mate, we'll see you around"

They leave and we just walk into class as Murdoc tries to calm me down. After classes we meet up with Russel and get going. We shop for some snacks, and sit down in a park and start chatting.

Murdoc's POV

Stu leaves to find a bathroom and as he's far away enough I immediately lean close to Russel.

"So, you and Stu are close, right?"

"Chill bro, I ain't tryna steal yo man"

"Nah, nah, just, you know" I take a sip of my monster and sigh "Okay, let's not beat around the bush, I want to ask him to be my boyfriend"

"Go for it, man, he can't stop talking about you, he wants you for real" he simply says

"Yeah, yeah, that's not the problem, I'm sure he does" I lied, I'm unsure "It's just that I don't know how to confess, y'know, like, should I plan big; or should I casually just say it; or something somewhere in the middle?"

"I dunno, I'm sure it'd be nice if you planned something, but it doesn't have to be a whole parade, something he'd like"

"Yeah, and that is?"

"Uhh" Russel starts thinking "Well, it should be something sentimental, like a place you only go together, or during an activity that only usually involves you two"

"Yeah, I'll just blurt out 'Will you be my boyfriend btw?' while we have sex, that will definitely work" I scoff

"No, that's not what I-" he gets flustered a bit and pinches the bridge of his nose out of frustration, sighing "I mean like let's say you do a hobby of somethin' together, you could plan that"

"Yeah alright" I say as I start thinking.

My mind takes me down a road of memories, trying to think of places where our friendship/situationship's main events took place. I think of when we were kicked out and he snuck out, we met in this very park, but we come here a bit too often for it to be a big deal. The bar also came to mind, but I don't bet he likes that place very much. I decide to push the topic as Stu gets back from his wandering.

"Couldn't find the loo, mate?" I remark

"They hide it very well, you know" he laughs