Some Sugar and Honey (Boy X Boy)

Chapter 3 - Testing Time

      By the time the school day had ended I knew I wasn't going to see him again until those 15 days were up.  When I let that thought sink in I knew I had to prepare my mind for that, try my best to reduce the urge to have him around, have someone to talk to.

      Those two weeks were just as boring as days without company usually are, those of who have dealt with those would know (The one's who don't enjoy it I mean).    For those two weeks I had to deal with his left behind "friends", picking on everyone who was out of ear shot or not even in the room and, on occasions, the teacher when they were busy talking or distracted.  I caught moments where they would whisper my name but the rest would be too muffled to be understood.  There were times when they would just shout my name for the heck of it, cause me to look over and then giggle about it.  I always hated that, of course, I'm not the only victim of that game, they have two other people they like to do that to.  Of course, one of those people can handle them self just fine as she actually got up and hit one of them for it.

      

      By the time the final day had arrived, the last day of his vacation, I had nearly forgotten how long it had been since he had last spoken to me (Note that my memory is pure crap, please and thank you).  I had a calendar on the  inside cover of my notebook with which I would cross out the passing days, this allowed me to keep accurate track of how long it would have been till he returned.  The thought of seeing him again made my heart throb ever so slightly, my body heated a little at the realization.

      It was homeroom, the teacher had just finished taking attendance and the pledge was done, so a full three minutes left until we had to leave for first period.  I had finished the first two pages of my paper, my third nearly complete, and was working on a draft for my last page and sources, the easiest page.  We had three days left to work on the Graduation paper, despite this our teacher wouldn't change the deadline for any of us.  Being me I had asked if she would do anything for Maddox since he had been absent for so long, all she would do for him is give him time in class to work for our three days, then he would have to make time whenever he could to finish out of class.

      I sighed as I slid downward in my seat, not feeling the energy to sit up properly.  The class had lowered their volume considerably so the only audible noise was the cooling unit (Which was supposed to heat the room at this time but since it failed to do so it was renamed to a cooling unit).  I stared at the clock that sat above me, just barely within my view.  About a minute to go.

As everyone prepared to leave the room one voice rose up, breaking the silence into nothing.  "Dude, is he serious?"  Some whining followed after this along with more opinions.

"He's such a baby, I can't believe this."

"He's not making excuses about this, right?  He's just being a lazy fuck."  A couple kids not involved in the conversation turned to listen in, me included.  Maddox's group were all turned in, facing a student with a phone.  The boy was shaking his head as the others pulled the phone into their line of vision.  "Did you text him back?"  A girl questioned, handing the phone back to the boy.

"Of course!"  He replied sharply, tapping the phone screen as he spoke.  "I said, 'You better not be skipping just for the hell of it'."

"Did he reply yet?" The boy snorted as he replied back with a sharp 'No'.  Just as he answered he jumped in his seat.  "Never mind! He got back to me!"  Everyone leaned in to listen to the reply. "He says.... he can't come in 'cos some shit's come up..."  Everyone stayed quiet to see if there was more, but the boy was done.  The others scoffed at the vague answer.  At that moment the bell rang and everyone was up and out.

      As I was pushed out of the way, the thought rang through my head, Was he talking to Maddox?  Despite the fact that that was who he was obviously talking to I couldn't keep myself from questioning this.  When the way out the door finally cleared I slowly made my way through, keeping myself as close to the lockers as I could to evade the swarm of students heading opposite of me.  Something that always crossed my mind was, why don't they have road signs in hallways?  They're practically the same thing, hallways just seem a little more dangerous.

      Anyway, back to the story.  When we reached our first period room I noticed the boy from homeroom, I believe his name was Jason, Jay for short, was standing at the teacher's desk.  

"Maddox won't be coming tomorrow."  The teacher nodded and replied back with, "Is he sick?  Catch something on his way back?"  Jason scoffed, his eyes half closed, mouth blank.  "No, he's just being lazy, probably staying home so he can play on the internet or something instead of doing schoolwork."  The teacher shook his head as he wrote something down on a sticky note.  I wasn't sure if Jason was right or he was just jumping to conclusions.  I'm me though, so obviously I felt like he had a good reason for staying out a day longer.  Maybe he did catch something, or maybe he got hurt?  He could have been caught in traffic or something.  I tried thinking up as many legitimate excuses as I could, but I had a feeling, deep down that it might not have been so legitimate a reason after all.

      As I sat in my seat I couldn't keep myself from tuning everything around me out as I focused on Maddox's extra absence to be.  I felt like something was odd, but then it dawned on me.  I glanced back to Jason who sat a few seats behind my view.  He looked like he was ready to go to sleep like every other student.  I looked back to the front of the room to the teacher who had moved to his podium, binder filled with protruding colored sticky notes in hand.  I lowered my head a bit, tapping my pencil on my desk quietly.  They have so much freedom when it comes to interacting with him.  I pushed my pencil downward, forcibly snapping the lead.  I'm a bit jealous... 

------

   Just as the text said, he wasn't there the next day.  I felt a little relieved that I even successfully made it to that day as the next day he was to come back, of course, though, as my luck would have it, Jason was at it again.  

"Well, look at this."  He shook his head, a crooked smile on his face as he handed his phone over to the girl from before, the other kids in their group looked over her shoulder.  She practically hissed at the message that was sitting upon the screen.  "Is everyday senior skip day for him?"

My body flinched sharply when she said that.  I looked over to the group as they handed the phone around to each of the members.  "He's such a baby what's with him?"  one boy laughed.

"He's going to fail, oh my god."  A girl giggled as she handed the phone back to Jason.  

"Does he think he's being cool or something?"  The first girl hissed.  I felt a tingling sensation in my heart as they threw their opinions around.  Isn't this a sign though?  I voiced to myself.  Something might be seriously wrong... if he's going to miss tomorrow too.

"Look though, he just got back to me! He says, 'I'm still having some trouble so it may be a while.'"

"Some trouble?"  The second girl repeated.  "Trouble with what?" 

"That's just it, he won't say shit 'bout what it is."

I leaned over my desk as they continued talking.  Something WAS wrong, and I knew it.  Even if I felt like it was really nothing like they were saying deep down, on the surface I feared something terrible happened.