hate is a strong word (bxb)

3

Benjamin would have been perfectly content with only interacting with the boy on that night. He could easily have gone the rest of his life without talking to him ever again or even thinking about him, but the world never seemed to be that kind to Benjamin Adams.

He should've known that he would have to see him the next day, but it had completely slipped his mind from the previous night. After all, the boy did appear to be around his age so it would make sense that they would have to go to school together. Benjamin just didn't want to think about when he would have to see him next.

"Hey, neighbor," the boy approached from behind Ben and Ben found himself stumbling over multiple swear words in his head at once.

Being far less amused than the other boy was, Benjamin replied, "hi," with a grimace upon his face.

Now that Benjamin could see the other boy in the light, rather than the darkness of his own backyard, he could see things that he hadn't noticed the previous night. In the lighting of his porch, he looked quite attractive and seeing him up close in broad daylight only confirmed these thoughts. Though, some "attractive points" were docked off by the fact that he already knew that the other boy was completely and utterly in love with himself.

Things go stale for a few seconds while he's quiet—and then he's not, "so, uh, I guess you're on my bus then... and you go to my school," Ben awkwardly searched for a conversational topic, despite not liking the other boy all too much, "uh, so you're... you're in what grade?"

"I'm a senior," Braxton answers.

"Me as well," Ben answers, cringing at his own words. Me as well? Who even talks like that? Jesus, why did it even matter? He shouldn't have cared what someone like that thought of him. He could say me as well if he wished to. "You didn't tell me your name yesterday," Ben states.

"I guess you were too busy being a pain in my ass," he suggests, "or maybe I did tell you and you were just too high to remember it."

"I'm a functional stoner. If you had told me, I would have remembered."

"A functional stoner?" the boy scoffs and makes it clear that the statement had left a sour taste in his mouth, "Is that what you call yourself, really?"

For a moment—just one moment—it looked like last night was just a bit of a fluke and that the two were going to get along with one another, but the more they talked and talked, it became apparent to Ben was not going to be able to tolerate him. Once a dickwad, always a dickwad, right? So, Ben chose not to waste even one more word on him and he looked in the opposite direction as if to pretend he simply wasn't there.

The issue with people like that is that they crave a reaction out of people. They're little attention whores, in the truest form, and it's the thing that they do best. They feed off of other people's responses. So, Ben thought that if he were to give him no reaction, he would have to shut up. Unfortunately, Ben was incredibly wrong.

"It's Braxton," he announces, seeing that Ben was saying no more.

"Stupid name," Ben couldn't help but say it.

Braxton let out a small amused laugh, "it's my parent's fault, not mine."

"What? Did they hate you or something?"

"You have nerve," Braxton laughed, "what's your name?"

"My friends call me Ben, but you can call me Benjamin."

"You don't really look like someone who would be named Benjamin," he says observantly, "when I think of someone with that name, I think of an older and buffer gentlemen. I don't know, it's not a tough name but it's like, I don't know, the name of a very mediocre man. A generic name like that fits the look of a generic man. You look like your name would be Benji, rather than Ben."