SOFT (egobang)

1: Sugar, We're Going Down

Danny POV

I sat against the wall in my first period class. A cup of coffee was on my desk- the Starbucks logo facing out so that my name was facing me.  The first bell was about to ring so I relished in the moments of silence before the room completely filled up with people wanting to talk to me.

I don't mean to sound cocky or anything, but I knew everybody in this school. Or at least I thought I did, until the last day of spirit week.

Spirit week was my favorite week of the year, where everyone got to dress up to follow a certain theme and it all lead up to our homecoming event! The rest of the week had gone by  fairly uneventfully. I'd taken pictures with my friends in all of the silly outfits we'd gotten to wear. This all lead up to Friday, where we all dressed in our school colors, in our case pink and gold. I was wearing a pink button down with tight gold leather pants- both of which I bought special for spirit week this year. I paired those with a pair of black doc martins and a pink bandana to keep my curly mane out of my face. I thought I looked pretty cool, if I do say so myself.

Anyway, as I sat there sipping coffee, waiting for the bell to ring, a second person entered the classroom. I never really noticed him before but the first thing that caught my eye about him were a pair of pastel pink cat ears sitting atop his head. He was wearing a spirit hood and it was kinda cute. Our mascot was a cat after all. The second thing I noticed was that he was using it to cover his face. He seemed completely embarrassed and I wanted to know why.

And so I got up, grabbed my backpack and coffee, walked right on over to where he sat and plopped down in the seat right in front of him.

"Hey there kitty my name's Dan what's yours?"

His head was down on the table and he refused to look up at me.

"Why do you care?" Was his only response.

I pouted. "Because you're the only person in this class I don't know, and that hat is mondo cute. So what's your name?"

He picked his head up and gave me a look "Really? Cos nobody else seems to like it." He pulled the hat off his head and stuck it under his arms. He sighed quietly. "I'm Arin."

I gently tugged at the hat under his arms and he let me take it. I gently placed it back on his head and pulled it down a little so it covered his eyes. "Don't be ridiculous. It's perfect, Arin."

He pulled the hat back up so he could see, and his eyes were met with me smiling like the dork I truly was inside. He smiled back sheepishly and then sighed, putting his head back down.

"Rough morning?" I rested my head on my hands which were positioned nicely atop the back of my own desk.

"People are fucking cruel."

"Want me to yell at 'em? It's spirit week, what could they possibly have a problem with?"

"They do this a lot." He picked his head back up and looked at me, eyes completely dull. He seemed a little broken.

"Who does?" I could feel myself getting upset about this and I wasn't sure why, but I wanted to protect Arin at all costs.

"It... it doesn't matter" He put his head back down, defeated. "You're friends with them anyway, you probably talk about me behind my back. You're probably just talking to me so you can make fun of me later."

"...First of all I'm friends with a lot of people you're gonna have to get more specific. Second of all if any friend of mine is being a bully I'm cutting them out of my life. That shits gross."

He scoffed a little at that. "It's whatever. Don't worry about it."

I sighed, but the bell rang, as if Arin was willing the universe to stop this interaction. People came filing into the classroom, and a couple came over to talk to me. That triggered Arin to get up and move as far away as possible. Damn. I was looking forward to passing him notes.