Chapter Text
It was the second full day of school, and today 9-6 had English to start. Well, starting in 40 minutes of course.
Jackson came to school early, he couldn’t stop thinking about him, Josh. His beautiful, yet terrible bowl cut hair, and his Harry Potter-like glasses. Yet they all complimented his features wonderfully. Josh had been on his mind since he saw him yesterday in gym class, and for good reasons. The man was amazing..
Then suddenly Jackson ran into some girl, who gave him a glare that would’ve scared a lion. Not him right now, because his mind was on Josh. He muttered an apology, but kept wandering the halls aimlessly.
He kept day dreaming for the 40 minutes before class, then decided to find where his English teachers class was. Fortunately he was able to find it easily, it was by the learning commons. Mr. Ojo told the class to sit wherever they’d like, Jackson sat in one of the desks that faced the rest of the desks, which also happened to be where Omar was sitting.
“So, what’d you do last night?” Omar asked Jackson, Jackson blinked before answering.
“Uh, not much, mostly just played some games.” A lie, but who was he kidding? He wasn’t telling Omar he was thinking about Josh, those lips that seemed like they'd be so soft..
He shook his head a bit, trying to shake the thoughts out of his head. Then—he walked in. He heard Omar say something, but Jackson didn’t acknowledge whatever he said.
He was carrying his backpack only on one shoulder, and looked better then ever. He walked over to him, him of all people! Jackson knew he was staring, but he couldn’t help it. Josh walked over, brushing his non-existent bangs out of his face then spoke up.
“Hey Jackson, mind if I, uh, sit with you guys?” Josh made eye contact with him.
“Uhm, yeah, yeah of course. Come sit beside me.” He smiled softly, moving closer to his desk to let him go by him.
Jackson watches him as he walks by, then even as he sat down. He decided to look away, because staring for too long was definitely suspicious.
Mr. Ojo began the class by introducing himself, and how he was from Nigeria and only had “one wife” (which, who introduces themselves like that? Everyone in Canada only has one wife.) He talks about himself and whatnot, but Jackson still wasn’t listening. He was stealing glances at Josh like he was a teenage girl, he may as well be at this point. Similar to both of 9-6’s other teachers, he hands out a paper with the curriculum for the year. Novel study, (like every year before,) film study, (also like every year before,) podcast unit, (sounded boring,) and a few other things that of course made English class the least favorite class of most High-Schooler’s that Jackson knows. Finally after Mr. Ojo finishes talking, he hands out a paper.
“It’s for you guys to get to know your classmates better,” Mr. Ojo begins “it’s classmates bingo. You find a classmate who relates to one square, but try not to put them more then once. Whoever gets a blackout first wins a prize.”
Well, Jackson would love to get to know one of his classmates really, really well, but that was off topic.
Mr. Ojo handed out the sheets, Jackson glanced at it. Some of the questions were “Find a classmate who owns a dog” or “who lives in an apartment”. Jackson skimmed through it, attempting to find something he could sign on anyone’s who asks him. “Who likes to play basketball”, Jackson liked basketball, so he could do that.
As soon as Mr. Ojo even began telling them to start, Jackson turned to Josh. He put his own paper onto Josh’s desk.
“Why don’t we start first? You can write my name down under the basketball one.” Jackson smiled slightly, looking at Josh who just blinked a bit.
“Uh.. sure.” Josh began writing Jackson’s name on his own paper, then looked under their desks. “..You could put me under the same shoe colour. We both have black shoes.”
Jackson checked under the desk, they did both have black shoes. He nodded, writing Josh’s name under that one.
“Alright, thanks.” A brief interaction, but it was enough for Jackson’s liking, at least for now. He felt a tap on his shoulder, looking over. It was Omar, probably going to ask what he could put his name under.
“Put my name under the person who lives in a house, and I heard you say your doing the basketball one?” Omar asked him, yet he was already writing Jacksons name under that one.
“Uh, yeah, I guess.” Jackson wrote Omar’s name down below the box he said to.
“Make sure to go to people other then your friends!” Mr. Ojo spoke up, probably after realizing everyone was only heading to their friends. A couple of groans were heard from around the class, but then sounds of chairs scraping against the floor filled the room as everyone decided to listen to him. Jackson followed in suite with everyone else, going and speaking to a few of his other classmates. Another one of the boxes was “Someone wearing a blue shirt”, as far as Jackson could see nobody was wearing a blue shirt other then Mr. Ojo. Somebody else seemed to notice, and spoke up first.
“Uh.. Mr. Ojo, nobody is wearing a blue shirt except for you.” It was Seth who actually spoke up.
“Huh” Mr. Ojo had to inspect everyone first, before actually listening to the student. “Well, I guess everyone can write my name for that one.”
Which Jackson did exactly that. It was only 5 minutes in when there was multiple people who were close to winning, including Jackson himself, he really wanted the prize. But then this girl named Ava spoke up first, declaring she finished the whole thing.
“Mr. Ojo, I finished.” She said, in a very matter-of-fact way.
“Oh, good job.” Mr. Ojo looked in his cabinets for a prize, then realized he didn’t have one. “Hold up..”
Anyway, Jackson was pissed he didn’t win because Ava had gotten a pop. Rather annoying, but whatever. He had gotten most of them, and a prize didn’t matter anyway. The rest of English class was starting notes (Jeez! Who decided it was a good idea to have the introduction day as the same day you start everything too?)
Math class was just as boring as the day before, who would be using rational numbers in the future anyway? During lunch time, Jackson searched and searched for Josh. He wanted to attempt to talk to him, but he seemingly rushed out of Math class at the speed of light, leaving Jackson behind in the dust. Just to add, that hallway was the worst when your in the last class at the end. It flooded full of kids as soon as the bell rang due to everybody being excited for lunch.
In Social class Josh wasn’t there either, which made Jackson assume he had an appointment or something. Oh well, it left Jackson to daydream about him instead. Which he did, all throughout Social, his option, and on the way home.
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Omar wasn’t sure how much he was going to like this school year. He liked Jackson as his friend, yet Omar could tell Jackson really wanted to be friends with the new kid, Josh. Omar thought Josh was nice, but clearly not as much as Jackson does.
It was early morning, Omar arrived at school only 10 minutes before class started. This morning they had English instead of gym, which Omar would much prefer gym, but he doesn’t get to pick and choose.
He walked into his supposed English teachers room, Mr. Ojo, setting his bag down on a desk near the edge of the classroom. Mr. Ojo was sitting in the back right corner of the classroom, not saying anything, just typing away on his computer.
Omar walked out of the classroom to go on his phone, and wait for anyone else who was going to arrive anytime soon. When the first bell rang, and nobody he wanted to talk to was there yet, he finally decided to just sit down at his desk. Since Mr. Ojo wasn’t saying anything about where he was sitting, and did not have a seating plan posted up on the board.
A few minutes after the bell rang, Jackson walked into the class. Omar showed him a small smile as he walked up to him to sit by him.
“So, what’d you do last night?” Omar asked him, it then took Jackson about a whole minute to answer for some reason.
“Uh, not much, mostly just played some games.” Omar nodded at the response, relatable, that’s all anyone wanted to do after the first day of school because fortunately, there was no homework after the first day. Though, it felt like their math teacher may give them homework today, Omar dreaded 2nd period now.
“That’s fair, I played games too, cause what else is there to do after school?” Omar was talking, yet he could tell Jackson wasn’t paying attention despite being less then 2 feet away from him.
Omar glanced over, and Jackson was paying attention to him. Josh. Omar groaned internally, he did not get Jackson’s newfound obsession with this kid. Sure, it was a new kid. Sure, he was slightly interesting, but not that interesting. It pissed Omar off, just a bit. Then he spoke.
“Hey Jackson, mind if I, uh, sit with you guys?” Josh asked, only glancing at Omar for a split second before looking back at Jackson.
“Uhm, yeah, yeah of course. Come sit beside me.” Jackson gestured to the spot directly beside him, and Omar noticed him looking at Josh with something in his eyes. Whatever.
Mr. Ojo introduced himself with a presentation. Omar wasn’t listening, he was kind of pissed off at Jackson. Was he, jealous? No, why would he be jealous? He was only best friends with Jackson, and Jackson wanted to be friends with Josh. Nothing odd, or weird about that. Then suddenly Mr. Ojo was handing out a sheet of paper, Omar looked at it, some sort of bingo sheet. He turned to Jackson, but Jackson was already talking to Josh. Gee, he kind of was obsessed with him. Omar turned to Amule, who was sitting beside him, discussing only briefly about what to put. They each put their names on each others papers.
Afterwards, he turned back to Jackson, listening to Josh’s and his conversation. They were putting each other down, Josh and Jackson were wearing the same shoe colour, and Jackson liked to play basketball.
Omar tapped him on the shoulder once they were done talking. “Put my name down under the person who lives in a house, and I heard you say your doing the basketball one?” He was already writing Jackson’s name under it.
“Uh, yeah, I guess.” Omar watched Jackson put his name under it. Good, at least they were talking.
Mr. Ojo was of course looking around the room, seeing how and what everyone was doing. Just to realize, of course everyone was going to their friends. “Make sure to go to people other then your friends!”
Half of the classroom groaned, but everybody’s chairs scraped against the ground as they stood and began exchanging what they were doing, and grabbing what everyone else was doing
Omar was talking with Seth, before he heard Seth mutter something. “Nobody’s wearing a blue shirt except for Mr. Ojo.”
He glanced around the room after he heard Seth muttered that, and it was true, only Mr. Ojo was wearing a blue shirt. “Huh, maybe tell him that.” Omar thought he’d walk up to him privately to tell him, but no. He decided to just say it in front of the whole class.
“Uh.. Mr. Ojo, nobody is wearing a blue shirt except for you.” It made Omar wanted to slap his own face in slight second hand embarrassment.
“Huh,” he glanced around the room, just as Omar had when Seth had mentioned it. “Well, I guess everyone can write my name for that one.”
As soon as he said that, everyone turned to their paper and wrote his name there. Omar didn’t really have much motivation to talk to anyone else. It felt pointless to continue, cause he wasn’t interested in getting to know where everyone lived, or if they were born outside of this city. I mean, he was, but nobody ever found that too interesting.
This girl in 9-6 spoke up very suddenly, her name was Ava. Omar had talked to her a few times before this school year, but other then that not really. “Mr. Ojo, I finished.”
Omar didn’t really get how that mattered, but then Mr. Ojo spoke up. “Oh, good job.” He paused for a second, looking through his cupboards. “Hold up..”
Then he reached into this mini fridge he had, and pulled out a ginger ale. He walked on over to her, handing it to her. “Good job.”
Omar didn’t realize they’d win a prize if they finished the whole thing, if he did realize that, he would’ve been done quicker then she was able to finish. He glanced over at Jackson, who, surprise, was talking to Josh about “how unfair this was”, and Josh was staring at him in a weird way. Ugh, so weird.
Soon enough it was 2nd period, and they had math. Unfortunately to Omar’s luck, he was right. Mrs. Lp told them to do page 10-15 for homework that night, or work on it in class right now, but that they’d have to stay in their own spots. Fortunately for Omar, he was by Jackson and a few other of his friends.
Once Omar looked at it though, he came to the realization that there was no way anybody was going to finish all this homework in this class. Not when there’s only 20 minutes left and seemingly 1000 questions to answer.
Jackson still only paid attention to Josh, trying to talk to him from halfway across the class. It only managed to bring Omar’s annoyance level up a tenfold.
Even during lunch, when Josh wasn’t there, Jackson wouldn’t stop talking about him. At this point, you’d think the man has a crush on him. Other then Jacksons annoying blabbering, which Omar would normally gladly listen to when it wasn’t about Josh, lunch was pretty peaceful.
Social was boring, their teacher, Mr. Hogg’s was nice but rather boring to listen to others then when he got into talking about some random topic. It also didn’t help they were learning about the Canadian government, who wants to learn about Mark Carney?
By the end of the day, Jackson really got on his last nerve. It made Omar so mad, that even when he walked home, he was thinking about it. Even when he got home, and worked on his stupid math homework, he was still annoyed at Jacksons behavior all day long, and how obsessive his became over Josh in just over a day.