Chapter Text
He can’t not remember a time when one parent or another has very clearly told him to look both left and right when crossing the road. Mindless drivers swerving haywire would be an accurate example of what they think the modern world had come to. But, right now, all he can think about is whether the word "right" or "left" sounds better because he has no other facts to base this supposed chase off of.
So, eyes flickering to either side of the hallway, Jake reminds himself that, hey, he has an insightful witness right in front of him that can give him the information he so desperately needs—it really does make him sound like the despondent love interest, whose depressing montage is seen as pathetic and naïve, to which it is not, he might add.
But as time ticks on, it only furthers that desperation.
"Look," is all he says, addressing her previous question, "I just need to know where he went, that’s all."
But to that end, she seems reluctant, crossing her arms over her chest as a show of her hesitance. Jake wonders about their previous conversation and what Drew chose to share concerning their interaction. Truth or not, Jake would rather live with the guilt of knowing than the guilt of leaving it as is—page thirty, a page that he flips back to more often than not.
But he’s brought out of his thoughts by a throat clearing, and he looks up—when did he look down?—to find that the teacher had been staring at him during his whole mind-to-heart conversation, an eyebrow raised in a curious manner.
"Give me one reason as to why I would so easily overlook his trust," she practically spits at him, eyes narrowing in dismay. "He specifically told me to tell you not to follow him."
To that, Jake couldn’t say he was, in terms of success, surprised. From what he’s learned over the years, Drew’s the type to fight his battles in a way only words could decipher, creating a sort of advantage by effectively using his speech as a defense mechanism. He’s smart and used to such an environment that it almost becomes an instinctive response.
Now, that’s a whole dose of complicated, but if Jake had anything to do with how simple describing someone’s habits is, the world as he knows it would crumble under the complexity that is "emotions".
"Emotions are complex in that they grasp at both beauty and misfortune, acting as equal dividers between what is visible and what is not."
"Depending on whether one chooses to see through the eye of the beholder, what is seen will change"—the "simple" dialogue of what is spoken by his own mother.
The real question he finds himself asking is, if he was truly living up to what those words meant, what they would translate to, why does he seem to blame the other boy for succumbing to them—emotions?
Either that, or he’s crumbling under his own weight. Drew was never an emotional person; he never cried during a movie or during anything else that had a specific trigger to release emotion. Jake thinks that maybe that’s why the concept of him bearing such a vulnerability comes across as bizarre and strange.
That’s what makes Jake curious. Not why, but what.
"I need to, please."
Her resolve seems to fall the slightest bit at his words, thankfully, and she sighs. The corner of his lips twitched upward at the implication that maybe she’ll have the minimal amount of mercy he needs in order to follow through with what he wants—to see, through his beholder's eye, how much emotions can affect someone.
She reaches out and places a hand on his shoulder, fingers curling around the edge of his denim jacket. The smile that adorns her face is gentle and understanding in the way it flicks upward at the edges, but with no teeth shown underneath the lips, it remains the most beautiful feature that only a mother can fathom.
She sighs once again before saying, "boy’s bathroom, second floor."
A matching smile breaks across his face. Jake nods, his head moving up and down twice in a quick motion, before he glances over his shoulder toward where the stairs that lead to the second floor start. Looking back at her, he thinks about giving her a hug—or, at least, some gesture of gratitude—but then reminds himself that only sons and daughters are alleged to be able to show that variation of thanks—it’s not really a student-teacher thing.
So, with as much enthusiasm as one can muster, he breathes out, "thank you," before running off to where she said to go. Taking a two-step distance between where his feet land on each step, Jake begins to think that maybe he’s reacting dramatically, reacting more than he should to this type of scenario.
But it’s too late now. At this point, mid-sprint, he can fully say, with confidence, that he’d rather get to the bottom of whatever controversy that has seemed to unfold right before his eyes than go back to the very beginning of his journal—to start all over again.
Getting to the top was simple; finding the bathroom wasn't difficult; it was getting in that was difficult. What would he find in there? He has no idea. But all he can think about is whether or not he’ll face a wall or a shell, and he won’t know which one he’ll prefer seeking out or slamming into with full force.
He hates this feeling of anticipation, an animosity that sits firmly inside the concept of fear of what he’ll see after two measly steps. He despises it, every fiber of his being repulsed by the prospect of witnessing this unavoidable outcome, this subtle crumble of falling rocks before the volcano erupts completely.
His hand stays hovering over the handle, which he’ll have to pull in order to enter this conspiracy. It almost becomes amusing with how much time has passed since he’s been standing there, faltering, staring at the switch to another loophole he doesn’t have the energy to fix.
But isn’t that what he needs—to fix his mistakes? That’s the whole point of the notebook plan, anyway; so, then, why is he hesitating? He should be grateful that this opportunity has been handed to him on a silver platter, with everything planned out.
Well, that opportunity was simply pushed away as quickly as it came. Shoved into the "I'll fix it later" pile, full of things shoved and thrown out to be done in the "near" future, but it was really only meant to be a safety net.
He’s pushed it aside, and now he’s pushed him away.
He opens the door.
It’s dark; the lights off during after-school hours. The tiles are bathed in the soft glow of a single light that’s been turned on. He knows who turned on that light switch; he knows he’s in one of these stalls; Jake knows which one he’s in.
Maybe it’s the fact that he can’t hear that person cry that scares him; maybe that’s why he can’t push open the door that’s been left unlocked. And here Jake is, wondering why the hell someone would shield their feelings from another—one could even hear that hint of sarcasm that lingers in his thoughts.
Repeating thoughts of "open it" run through his mind, unmerciful to the stubborn embodiment of his soul that lays vulnerable to them. He begins to wonder if this is really how hard it is to open a door in real life—it really shouldn’t be this hard.
"Don’t open it." He doesn’t. But the voice rings out through his ears, blood flowing from where it lies against the inside of his brain. Without thinking, he removes his hand from the handle, leaving it hanging between the tension in the air.
He still doesn’t think when he asks, "are you gonna come out?"
Knowing he won’t, Jake backs away from the door, his eyes darting between the tiles and the unmoving piece of metal. He has no idea what to do in a situation like this. He’s never had to know what to do until now; how’s he supposed to know what to do? If only there was a pre-made notebook on this stuff.
But, at this point, all he can think about is how stupid this is all becoming. Surely he can just leave—no need to fix this metaphorical loophole, right? And he will. He can assure you, he can and will leave if necessary. It’s just not necessary yet.
So he stands and waits, and waits, and stands.
He’s almost actually about to leave when the creaking sound of a metal door opening echoes throughout the mostly vacant restroom. Jake’s head snaps back to where it was, turning toward the entryway of the room, and sees what he was hoping not to.
The other boy stands there, present but not. His hair is ruffled to the point where the magenta-coloured strands have fallen over his eyes to cast a shadow over the features that lie tense beneath the surface; all Jake can see is a mop of hair and a pair of lips.
They stare at each other—well, Jake, at least, thinks Drew’s staring at him—while the door to the stall in which Drew was slams shut behind him. Is this what he had built up all the courage to see—a wall? At least if it was a shell, it could’ve been broken.
Jake can see both of Drew’s arms wrapped around himself, creating a barrier between them, as he glares, his eyes overseeing Jake’s expression as disappointment takes a toll on the latter’s features. His shoulders begin to sag, and his face falls to display this emotion to the other, who has some sort of control over his own.
Jake huffs out a laugh. "You know, I was really hoping to see that you could actually display an emotion to me. Knowing you, I should’ve known better."
What the hell was that? Why, of all the things he could've said, did he have to say that, pushing the other even further away from him? He's just blown his second chance to fix it and change the game.
But, to his surprise, Drew doesn’t back away; he doesn’t push away, even though Jake pushed first. He simply smiles. He smiles in a way that doesn’t seem to mirror what it was meant to represent. So, yes, he smiles, but it’s fake.
It’s fake in how it slightly resembles a human, a person that’s been broken down over a hundred times only to be betrayed again. It resembles a cliff—a cliff that was made to look down from. It has the appearance of finality—this gesture will never be seen again.
But then he bursts out laughing, loud and obnoxious. Jake physically winces at the sound, which echoes through the conditioned silence before coming to a halt when his fist collides with a wall. Jake's eyes widen as he watches the scene unfold, the wall being beaten down by someone who would never have considered a physical outburst.
"Exactly," he says, shaking his fist against the wall. "And I hate it."
Still opposed to breaking his shock-induced silence, Jake just stares while Drew brings his other hand up to brush at the hair that remains in front of his eyes. He swats the hair away and looks up to the ceiling, sighing deeply, before returning his gaze to the other, his eyes returning to darkness.
Jake snaps out of his trance for a second, breaking eye contact to look at the tiled floor below them, fascinated by the multitude of grays that lay back-to-back from each other. He fiddles with the hem of his jacket. "Sorry," he responds. "It was dumb of me to assume. If anything, I should know not to do that since that’s what they did to me."
It’s reasonable. It’s reasonable enough to not make himself look like a hypocritical jerk who doesn’t think before he speaks. He needs to open the door and let the other choose whether or not to make that decision to walk through—even if he doesn’t, at least he can say he tried.
But he’s scared—terrified, even. If he gets hurt again he will undoubtedly break, fall apart, in the hands of those of whom he decided to put his trust in again. But he still finds it hard to ignore the phrase ‘people can change’ because they can, in fact, change.
He chooses to disregard the "for better or worse" part because there is still a chance that the people he chooses to forgive—including himself—will not improve. And that still scares him.
Drew looks at him closely. He scans his face for any hint of a lie or a joke, but seems to find nothing and straightens his posture. Back in middle school, Jake had noticed that whenever Drew corrects himself in how he sits, stands, or does anything, he physically displays how nervous he is.
"What do you want me to say?" he asks, ignoring the piece of paint that came off the wall with his closed fist when redirecting his body’s weight. He then looks down, which Jake has just noticed, and then back up, locking eyes with the other. "Please tell me what I need to say."
Drew's fingers intertwine, flexing every few seconds while his eyes flicker to the floor once more, which Jake has now looked up to see. He can’t think of a page in his notebook on which it explains how to deal with this problem—this weird thing of noting all the different variations of how Drew gestures his emotions for Jake to see out in the open.
So he just stares, his eyes growing fond for a moment at the implication, before registering the question he was asked. Now, bear in mind that Jake is not the best actor when it comes to showing indifference. So, when he notices what is being asked of him, he gently smiles before approaching the other.
He places a steady hand on his shoulder, immediately making Drew look him in the eye. "Predictably, you would say how sorry you are. But all I need to know is, did you or did you not send the recording?"
Jake can physically see the anger rise in the other boy’s skin before it drops again. "No, I didn’t." Jake believes him. And he’s about to bring the shorter one into a hug before he gets stopped. "But I know who did."
The world stops. "What? Who?"
"Zoey." Zero hesitation. Jake's eyes widened once more as he gazed down at the other.If Jake really did just give him a chance beforehand, life would be so much easier right now. Yes, Drew did manipulate him into saying those things, and that they were "better", and many other things he’d rather not explain, but reasons are equally as valid as outcomes. Maybe not the execution of those reasons, but reasons nonetheless.
"Did you really mean what you said back there, that I was the first person you cared about?"
It takes a minute, but Drew nods. Jake smiles. "We really need to work on your protective attitude."
That gets a breathy laugh out of him, and Jake feels like a kid on Christmas.
Maybe having a notebook really didn’t matter in the end. In the end, all it took was for the book to be closed and another one to be opened.