Failure (Troyler Au)

Chapter 4

A/N: Comments are greatly appreciated :)

Tyler

Slowly my eyes opened and I let out a tired yawn. Glancing at my alarm clock I realized that I had slept through all of my morning classes, which was very unlike me. Practically jumping out of bed I threw on a t-shirt with the sweats I had worn to bed and quickly threw my hair up with gel. It wasn't the perfect quiff I was known for, but it was better than nothing. I grabbed my bag, threw on a pair of toms, and grabbed my keys.

Speeding to school I arrived in one piece, right when the bell to 5th period rang. I locked my car and ran to the front office. With a beat red face I panted out "Hi. I would like t-to - check in. My name is. Tyler Oakley."

When I got my late pass I bolted out of the office. Halfway to psychology I realized that today we were being assigned our projects, and I would likely miss the beginning of her explaining the project. "Just perfect." I mumbled.

Walking into Ms. Helbig's classroom everyone turned to me and I could hear snickers coming from several students.

"Hello Mr. Oakley. How nice of you to grace us with your presence." Ignoring the sarcastic comment I put my late pass on her desk and looked for a seat. Glancing around I noticed one seat available in the back of the classroom. I let out a huff of breath when I realized it was next to Troye. Before today I hadn't even noticed he was in my class.

"Nice outfit," he commented with a smirk. I felt my face turn a light tinge of pink realizing I was basically wearing pajamas.

"Thanks. These are my favorite sweatpants. They really compliment my butt. Don't you think?" I replied cheekily. A rush of pride went through me when I saw the blush that appeared on his face.

I turned away from Troye and faced the front of the classroom. "As I was saying before Mr. Oakley interrupted, this semester's psychology project is about better understanding each other. I will pair up a success with a failure and you will follow your partner around researching how their life is different from your life."

Protests could be heard from everyone in the classroom. Despite going to the same school and attending the same classes, successes and failures didn't interact often, and no one was interested in learning about eachothers lives.

"Stop complaining. I know you don't want to do this. It wasn't my idea and if it were up to me we wouldn't be wasting the biggest project of the semester on this! This is now required in every school. The government seems to think this is a good way to make progress between the treatment of failures vs. successes," Ms. Helbig explained with a roll of her eyes.

"I've picked your partners already to save you the trouble. I know most of you hardly talk."

She began listing the partners and I was hoping for anyone but Troye. "Zoe with Kayla. Joe with Caspar. Phil with Dan. Marcus with Oli. Tyler with Troye." I looked up. Of course I got the one person I didn't want for a partner as my partner. Sure, I found Troye very compelling, but he didn't want to be around me and I didn't want to have to put up with that.

"Ok students. You have the last 10 minutes of class to discuss when you can shadow the other's life. This shouldn't be a one time thing. I want to see you and your partner hanging out together. Visit their favorite places, learn about their home life, if they have a job I want to see you talk about that, learn about what they are interested in, what school is like for them, etc. I want this report to be extremely in depth. Remember! This is 40% of your grade, so don't take this lightly!" Several more groans of complaint could be heard at this.

I turned my attention to Troye. "So, uh, what are you doing after school today?" I asked hesitantly. Troye didn't answer and continued glaring at me. "Listen. I don't want to be your partner either, because for whatever reason you dislike me, but you just have to look past that because I can't afford to get a bad grade on this project. It's too important. So I'm sorry you don't want to talk to me, but for the rest of this semester we have to hang out together, so just get over it."