Bandaged & Damaged {BoyxBoy & FIN & EDITING}

chapter thirteen

Junior blew bubbles in the cotton candy sky, blue and pink swirled around us. Then he placed the bubble bottle on the floor and jumped on top of a small wall that was near the school. I moved a bit and tilted to the left. He had a blank face that was usual for him. I stopped what I was doing and frowned.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

His brown eyes bore in mine. "I don't feel too good," he said softly. I looked at him closely. There was no sign of redness, he wasn't sweating like crazy, his eyes weren't puffy, and he wasn't sniffling like a sick person. Maybe he wasn't feeling good inside?

"Do you want to stop?" I said and grabbed the bubble bottle.

"When is this due?"

"Um, Monday afternoon."

He sighed and sat up straight. "Well, in already here and you did pick me to be your model, so I'm honored."

I tried to keep the frown on my face, but what he said made me smile a bit. Junior can be cocky when he wanted to.

"Can you smile at me?" I said and placed the camera hole on my eye. He stared at me for a couple of minutes before he smiled. I took a few pictures, but I didn't like them. It wasn't his genuine smile, the one where it showed his teeth, and how his eyes would crinkle a bit. The first time he met me.

"Junior..." I sighed.

"I'm just—!" He groaned and ran a hand through his hair. "I'm just camera shy, okay? I usually don't let people take pictures of me..."

"Why didn't you say that in the beginning. If I had known you were camera shy, I would have used a different model."

But the truth was I wanted Junior. He was the only person I knew that had a large smile on the campus and who actually liked to smile without a cringe face. It was one of his other qualities.

"I'm sorry. I'm just a wuss," he mumbled.

When my Ma got like this, I would try to comfort her by hugging her and telling her that everything will be okay and it's okay to be afraid of things. I found out I was scared of losing Miles. I removed the camera strap off my body and placed my camera next to sitting Junior. I sat next to him and wrapped my arms around him. He jumped up and gave me a weird look. "What are you doing?"

What was I doing? I shouldn't care if Junior was feeling upset or whatever. All I needed was a picture of him, and that's it, nothing more. I was supposed to feel nothing. I was supposed to care about three (now two) people in my life, Ma and Pa.

"I..." Talking about my feelings was hard. Why? Well, first, I didn't have feelings until I came to this fucking college, and, second, Ma was the only person I talked to whenever I felt bored or "upset." I was never upset because I didn't let things get to me. Junior was supposed to mean nothing to me, but whenever he wanted to hang out, he would come to me first. He would ask me how my day was, he would pay for me if I didn't have enough money, and he didn't treat me like I was a freak. I called Junior a friend because he was a friend to me, he...he was special to me more than the others.

Believe it or not, they fucked me over, and I still don't forgive them.

"You're upset. Why?" I questioned changing the subject.

Junior stared at me for a couple of minutes before he sighed and shrugged. "I was just thinking about my parents. They got mad me because my grades were low. It's my Senior Year, why should I be worried about grades when I should find myself a job when I leave college? They get on my nerves."

I pondered what he said. "If you get low grades, people won't hire you. You have to show improvement, at least," I said and slowly unwrapped myself from him.