-rainbow cookie, tracob

5,

-

Jacob was pretty much over this whole day before it began. There was something about knowing that it was a Saturday, and knowing how he should still be asleep, that made turning off the alarm especially difficult. Almost as difficult as seeing Jed slumbering on across the room because apparently Soc majors don't have to do stupid community service projects on their weekend mornings.

It wasn't that Jacob particularly minded contributing to the community- if he could go and fold and sort clothing donations at a women's shelter and improve someone's life by doing that, he was game. He'd just be more game if it were after 2pm.

In an effort to pre-emptively make up for his likely lack of enthusiasm, Jacob even made it a point to look as neat and trustworthy as possible. Carefully placed facial piercings that matched one another, carefully constructed fringe. His jeans were the cleanest he had. There was no hope to cover up all of the tattoos- they sprawled too far up his neck and too far down either arm for that- but he did offset them with a cheerful baby blue shirt that somehow seemed to make him less menacing and more of an "I'm here to help you, not to steal your car" kind of guy.

He was only five minutes late, which was something to be proud of for him. Even still, he made his entrance to the shelter very quietly, in case there might be someone waiting inside to pounce on him for his tardiness.

There wasn't. There were maybe a dozen volunteers standing around awkwardly with hands in their pockets, while two women in matching t-shirts emblazoned with the organization logo apparently struggled to understand something on a clipboard. Jacob moved to take his place on the back wall, where he could avoid notice and notice everything, and just as he started to survey the room more carefully, his eyes fell upon-

-Troye, all smiles as he bounded over to where Jacob was. "Hey, kid, what are you doing here?" he asked the younger boy as he opened his arms and accepted him into a quick, tight hug.

"I'm supposed to be doing an observation on a non-profit for my Business 203 class," answered Troye delightedly. "So I'm volunteering here today!"

"Me too- well, the volunteering bit, not the business class thing. This is for my Human Services 341. We have to have like 15 hours of community service total, and apparently Saturday mornings are primetime for volunteer work? What a miserable stroke of luck," Jacob sighed.

"Well at least you aren't alone, right?"

"Yeah," replied Jacob fondly. "That does make it better."

Troye took a step closer and leaned down to mumble in Jacob's ear. "Thomas is here, too."

"The Thomas?"

"I- yeah. The one I always talk about. Do you want to meet him?"

He sounds so nervous and excited that Jacob just has to pull back and look at his face. Sure enough, his eyes are as bright as could be, even as he gnaws a hole in that bottom lip of his. "Of course, yeah," Jacob quickly assures him. "I've heard so much about him."

Which isn't technically a lie, even if it isn't all of the way truthful. He certainly has heard a lot about Thomas in the month now since he's known Troye. But that isn't what makes him so eager to meet the mystery man. It's more about the things that he hasn't heard- the things that he's seen, the things that he's read off of Troye's face when Troye didn't know he was telling a story. The things that he has spun from the details into webs of theories and conjecture and curiosity. Those are the things that have the sleepiness gone from his mind, replaced by sharp coolness and attention.

Either way, he'd been waiting for this far too long.

Troye started to lead the way, looking back over his shoulder every few steps to make sure Jacob was still following as they wove their way in and out of the people milling around. When he came to a stop, it was before a man that Jacob would have picked out of a lineup as Thomas based solely on the sneer on his face.