Harmless Things (Jean Hobbs AU)

Part four

Dean P.O.V.

"Jack, do I need to move you?" The boy apparently called Jack muttered something I didn't catch. "In that case, come sit down here at the front next to Dean, thank you," the teacher continued. I felt myself tense as the empty chair next to me was pulled out. I looked at the stranger, who looked both tall and intimidating. With short blonde hair in style of a quiff, light skin colour and green eyes, the hidden homosexual inside of me found him attractive. Don't screw this up Dean. 

I looked back down at the table in case I was staring at him for long and felt myself blush. Dean, now is not the time to show him you're gay. I could feel his gaze on me which only made me feel more nervous, the rhythm of my pen-playing getting quicker. He must've got the hint as he looked away at the board uninterested, hardly playing attention. Deciding I was going to be the smarter one of the two who knew what was going on with the lesson, I scribbled down every diagram and note the teacher made on the new workbook I had been given. I stopped thinking of how anxious I was and focused, making me forget that Jack was even there. 

To my luck we were doing area of shapes which I had done before. It was repetitive, but I was glad to be something that was familiar to me even when the place and people around me weren't. 

"Dean, what's the area of this shape?" The teacher whose name I couldn't quite read off their name badge drew a square with a rectangle attached and gave me three measurements. 

"Uhh..." I felt everyone's gaze on me and the pressure building but I quickly worked through the calculations in my head to get myself out of the situation as quickly as I could. "94?" I said it as a question, but I was fairly confident it was right. 

"Correct! And how did you do that?" 

"Well, the square is 8x8 which makes it 64, the rectangle is 3x10 which is 30 and added together it makes 94." 

"Very good Dean, I'm glad to have you on my team," I smiled slightly at the comment then he went on to say we had a sheet of questions to do and that he expected us to finish as many as we could and ask for help if we needed it. It was one sheet between two so I put it in the middle of the table so Jack could see it too, but he hardly seemed like the type that did work and instead looked like he would waste his time talking to friends that were now across the room, but could I dare say he looked even a little relieved when he sat down next to me? 

Jack cleared his throat which startled me for a second then I met his eyes. 

"I'm Jack Howard," he's the one starting the conversation; I never would've seen this coming. 

"I'm Dean, Dean Dobbs, but you probably already knew that," he smiled approvingly that made me relax a bit. It wasn't something that told me he was cocky or thought he was better than me. 

"Where are you from?" 

"I'm from around here, I just moved schools." 

"Oh, why?" I shrugged and got back to work, not really wanting to tell him about my brother in case he saw him as an easy target and the whole problem started again; I could do without it, and so could Daniel. And I promised him that it would never happen again, so I would try my best to keep that promise. "Dean?" 

"Yeah?" I looked back up at him and felt my cheeks got hot and prayed he wouldn't notice, but it was too late as I saw confusion flash through his eyes. 

"Could you show me how to do this? I wasn't listening and you seem pretty good at it," I nodded and moved my arm that seemed to be the barrier between us from the table onto my lap momentarily and pushed my book to the middle of the table. I pointed to the first rectangle I had drawn and started explaining.