While You're In The World

His Friends Called Him Neil

I met Neil Perry on my first day at Welton Academy. He introduced himself to me as Cornelius, but all his friends called him Neil. I wasn't sure if that meant that he wanted me to call him Neil, meaning that he already considered me a friend. Or if it was just a fun fact that he had friends and they called him Neil. Then again, I may have been thinking entirely too much about it.

"You're Jeffrey's brother?" Already, I was known. I wondered what else he knew.

"Yeah, that's me." His handshake was firm, something my father taught me to admire in a man. He said you could tell a lot about a man by how firm his handshake was. I couldn't tell anything about Cornelius though, because his eyes were so dark, so deep, I couldn't concentrate on anything else.

"So why did you leave Balincrest?" I looked away then, embarrassed to answer. I didn't feel like telling Cornelius that I was bullied, heavily at my old school. That the only reason I got in here was because my brother was such an exemplary student, and because the level of violence my classmates showed towards me at Balincrest had become increasingly concerning and Welton took pity on me. Maybe in time I'd tell him about everything, but for the moment, I didn't feel like being Todd, the bullied kid. I just felt like being Todd, the new kid who might not actually be a loser.

"Just wanted to change things up I guess. Jeffrey really liked it here, so my parents thought it would be good for me."

"Well, they don't call it Hell-ton for nothing," he chuckled. "But I don't mind showing you around, introducing you to some people, if you'd like?"

"Yeah, that'd be great, actually." And then before I could stop what I was saying, "I've never really been the best at making friends."

I felt my cheeks start to blush, not believing I had actually just said that. I was almost too embarrassed to look back at him, but when I finally brought my eyes back to his, I was surprised to see he was smiling.

"Me neither," he replied, his smile never fading. It was contagious, and I couldn't help but return it. "But I think you and I will be alright. I've got about 15 minutes until a meeting with the Dean, how about a little tour?"

I smiled and nodded my head, maybe too enthusiastically.

He wrapped his arm around my shoulder and dragged me along through the campus, giving me a very in depth tour. It was hard to focus on all the scenery though, when the muscular arm of a very mesmerizing boy was draped across my back, fingers curled around my shoulder. His body leaned into mine whenever he had to use his other arm to point something out, and it seemed silly, but I felt so safe under his arm. A feeling I wasn't accustomed to when wandering a school.

Our walk around the school lasted no more than 10 minutes, although I wished it had been longer. I wished we could have walked around the whole day like that, Cornelius and I side by side, his arm wrapped around me. But alas, he checked his watch, and said he should probably be on his way.

"Well um, thanks Cornelius."

"Neil's fine," he said with a smile, reaching out and patting me on the upper arm.

"Well, thanks then, Neil." I smiled back at him, and then turned, waving him off to his meeting before my cheeks could get too red. Was this what it felt like to have a friend? Was this what it was like to have a person like you, regardless of your past? Because it surely felt great.

I made my way back to our dorm, and began to unpack my things. I hadn't been there long when Neil came back, throwing the door open. Startled, I jumped, dropping the hanger I was holding. He looked up, almost as surprised as I was.

"I'm sorry Todd, I didn't think you'd be back so soon."

"I could say the same about you," I said, as I reached down to pick up the hanger, sticking my sweater back on it. "Is everything okay? How was your meeting with the Dean?"

"Well, it wasn't with the Dean, exactly." He sat down on his bed, huffing. I hooked my hanger in my closet, and followed him, sitting on my bed, mirroring his position on his. "It was my father, he wanted to, talk." He dropped his head slightly and focused his eyes on the ground.

"Oh, okay then." I picked a pill in my wool blanket, unsure of how to proceed. A talk with your father wasn't usually as heavy as a meeting with the dean, but Neil seemed particularly upset about it. "Um, a talk about what?"

He looked up then, a shocked look to his face, almost as though he forgot I was in the room while he got so lost in his thought.

"Nothing, really Todd, nothing to fuss over." He stood up with a jump, walking over to his desk to fiddle with some papers. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to be so dramatic."

"You weren't being dramatic, Neil. It's okay, I can understand how fathers can get sometimes."

There was a look to his eye, like he wanted to tell me more but was afraid to. So he just smiled.

"Yeah, you know how they can get." And with that, he seemed to be done with the conversation, so I didn't want to pry.

Although I wanted to pry. I wanted to find out what had happened between him and his father that had upset him so much. I definitely got into it with my father sometimes, but there was something different about the way Neil spoke about his own. Or rather, avoided talking about him. It was like he was afraid of him, or something else terrible that he didn't want me to know about.

I decided to leave it alone, for now. I figured that if he wanted to tell me, he would. It's not like I wasn't keeping secrets from him. Secrets about myself that I didn't want anybody to know. And besides, I had only just met him, maybe we'd never even be the kind of friends that told each other the deep stuff anyway. I didn't want to jump the gun and ruin what little bit of our friendship we'd had. So if it was as bad as I thought it was between him and his father, then I understood the hesitation. But I also wanted him to know, that whatever it was, he wasn't alone.

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My second Anderperry fic omg!! I hope you all enjoy this one as much as the first, and if you didn't already read the first please go read Forget-me-not Neil, I promise you'll love it <3 Please feel free to comment what you think, I LOVE reading your feedback/thoughts/prayers lol