Vapour (Krii7y)

Us Against The World | Chapter 6

Jaren's POV

"John stop!" I whine, knocking his shoulder when he tried to steal my pencil.

"Dude, I need to write down the answer too." He complains, sitting up on my bed.

"Yeah well, me first." I reply, continuing to write answers down as I go.

"You got question five wrong, dummy." John says, pointing to my mistake. "It's spelt s-u-p-p-r-e-s-s-i-o-n, not s-u-p-r-e-s-s-i-o-n." John correct me, causing me to scoff.

"Ok Mr. Great at spelling." I retort, making him laugh.

"Maybe I should write down the answers and you should copy them." John says, pulling the pencil from my grip.

John came over after school because he wanted to talk and do homework.

He told me that he told Cameron and the guys to give it up with me, and he told them that he was gonna hang with me.

He pretty much told them to go fuck themselves.

Two days of school and I've already drifted through two friend groups.

Now it's just me and John against the world.

But surprisingly, I feel safe.

When I'm with John, I feel my worries melt away and I feel my fear dissipate.

I feel at peace with myself, and I feel like I'm near someone who is able to understand me.

He can literally read my mind, it's kind of cool.

I still have my doubts though, but me and John have been talking about the two groups I've sort of hung out with.

"It all started freshmen year. We were all the popular kids, all in one big group. Cameron and Jonathan got into an argument one day, Jonathan kicked him out of the group." John says, twirling the pencil around his fingers.

"And everyone let him do that?" I ask, doubting that the whole friend group would abandon him like that.

"Toby hung out with him a lot, but he was still apart of the main group." John explains, rubbing the back of his neck.

"And then what happened?" I ask, leaning forwards on my elbows.

"Jonathan and Luke started fighting with some of the others, kicking people out weekly. Eventually Matt, Eric, Ezra, Toby And Mason were cast out." John replies, looking down at me.

"What about you and Griz?" I question, watching as he lets out a nervous chuckle.

"Well, at the time, Griz wasn't at our school. He came in Junior year. As for me, I was best friends with Tyler and Craig. Luke, Jonathan and I were cool." John says, smiling slightly at the memory.

He looks somewhat guilty at the moment.

"But then one night I got drunk. Me and Craig got into an argument and I beat the shit out of him. Tyler attacked me after that, and then two days later, I was out." John mumbles, rubbing his arm.

"But you were drunk." I state, not really understanding why they'd kick him out for a drunken fight.

"Yeah, but none of them were. They started calling me a bad guy, an alcoholic, a druggie. So I started acting like one." He replies, looking out my window. "I started sleeping around, going to parties, coming to school drunk or high, sometimes both." He adds, looking over at me.

"Is that why all of you like stringing new kids on?" I ask, not sure if I'm fully understanding everything.

"That's probably a big part of it. I sleep around with people because it's fun, I drink so that I can forget my issues and have a moments peace, and I get high because I like the feeling." He explains, sounding so sure of himself.