Homework (Lams AU)

Only To Discover It's Not Worth

Rewind to earlier that day..

John's POV

"John, so glad I caught you before my sisters did." Peggy says, grabbing my arm and dragging me away from the group I was talking with. We walk down the hallway together.

"What do you mean? What's wrong?" I ask.

"They're onto you and Alex." She says quietly, staring straight ahead.

I feel my face drop. This couldn't be good. "Wait..Really? They..They know?"

"Well, no. But they suspect something's going on. Like, more than before. They just interrogated Alex about it, and now they're trying to find you to ask you about it." She explains.

"Well, wha-what did Alex say?" I ask, a bit nervous. Okay, a bit was an understatement.

"Oh, he kept his cool. He told them there was nothing going on between you two." She says before frowning. "Which, by the way, shouldn't actually be the truth. Why the hell haven't you talked to him about this yet?"

"Peggy, I'm scared this is going to get back to my father. I don't want to secretly have something with him, because you can't keep a secret forever. The truth always comes out, and I don't want him to find out the truth."

She sighs. "I can't wait for you to move out of that house, John..You can't live your life afraid of your father."

I nod and before I could say anything else, her sisters join us and drag us to the side of the hallway, stopping us from walking. "Angelica, Eliza, hey!" I smile at them, trying to hide the fact that I was nervous as hell.

"John, sweetie, you would never lie to us, right?" Eliza asks, looking me in the eyes.

I raise an eyebrow. "Of course not, we're friends. Why?"

"Well, John, we've noticed a little something forming between you and Alex. A friendship? Maybe more?" Angelica asks. "We don't mean to be nosy, but like you said, we're friends. We wanna know what's going on between you two."

I shake my head. "Nothing is going on between Alex and I, I can assure you that." I state. They give me skeptical looks.

"John, why would you keep something like this from us? You know we'd never make fun of you." Eliza says sweetly.

I nod. "Yeah, I know that. I'm not keeping anything from you, there's no reason for me to." I shrug.

Angelica stares me down. "You know, we're going to find out, John. Whether you tell us or not."

I nod again. "I'm aware. Can't hide anything from you, Ange." I chuckle gently and the two look at each other. "Okay, well, I'll see you guys later, I have to go to class."

They wave and I head to my next class, panicking internally.

Timeskip brought to you by Revenge (It's gonna be mine) (If you know where this is from, I will love you forever)

"Good, John. Your art is improving I see."

I smile slightly at the teacher. She was the art teacher, but also my English teacher, so every Tuesday after school she let me paint in her room. She gave me tricks and tips, and we talked about life and stuff. I honestly have never liked any of my teachers, but I could see myself missing her when I leave.

"Yeah, it's okay I guess. I dunno, I don't feel like I've been putting out my best art lately." I shrug and stare at the picture in front of me. It was a picture of a lake. I hated painting landscapes, but it was important to do it every now and then.

She sighs. "John, don't be so hard on yourself." She says. "But, something has been bothering you, I can tell. You wanna talk about it?"

I hesitate. I know she'd never tell a soul anything if I asked her not to. But I was really afraid of it getting to my dad.

"I'm having...girl..troubles..." I hesitate to say. Why couldn't I tell her everything, minus the part of it being Alex?

"Oh, I see. What kind of girl troubles?" She asks, sitting down next to me. "Is it a girl I know?"

I shake my head. "Nah, you don't know her. It's just...I think I may really like her, but I can't be with her, you know?"

She nods slowly. "Okay, and why not?" She pauses and looks at my canvas. "Careful with those harsh lines there, John."

I nod and go to fix it as we continue talking. "Well, same reason I shouldn't be here. My little reputation would be ruined if were with them. And I really don't want my family finding out, either."

"But you really like this person?"

"I...I think I do. I really think I like them. And something happened between us a few weeks ago, but I haven't been able to talk to him about it." I freeze, hoping she didn't catch my little slip up.

"Ah, it's a him. Now that makes more sense." She smiles sweetly at me. "John, it's okay to like another guy."

I blush a bit and try to focus on just painting. "I, uh, I meant her. It's a girl." I state.

She raises an eyebrow but sighs. "Whatever you say, John."

I look at the time on my phone. "Oh, I'd better get going. Thank you so much, Ms. Smith."

She nods. "Of course, John. See you tomorrow."

I nod and gather all my stuff together before exiting the classroom. I walk quickly through the halls, trying to avoid talking to Alex. He sometimes gets out at the same time as me, and today was apparently one of those days.

He walks right up next to me and starts with the teasing right away. "Man, you must be failing that class pretty bad."

I simply nod, not looking up at him. I can't talk to him without hoping something will happen. I know nothing ever will, but every time he smiles at me, I go down a bunch of different rabbit holes of what could happen.

"John? You okay?" He asks.

"You know, you probably shouldn't be talking to me right now." I mumble, still staring down at the ground.

He stops walking, and I do the same, still looking down at our shoes. "No one even comes this way, they all exit towards the main parking lot." He assures me. But it wasn't enough.

I shake my head and look up at him, taking a deep breath. I just didn't want to get caught, because we almost did. "Look, I would rather we just not talk at school anymore. Like, at all. You know, like it used to be?"

He frowns quite a bit and I feel my heart drop, but he nods in agreement. "Yeah..Yeah okay. See you later, I guess."

I nod at him and go back to walking out the back door, him walking the other way. I sigh. Of course I had to go and screw things up between us, whatever that was.

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