Chapter Text
The thing about routines is that it is made to be followed. It’s a structure for otherwise non-structured day-to-day living of people. Normal people. Routines are normal, okay, even if it’s more apparent to others. Routines are an okay in normal human society.
Another thing about it is that it varies from person to person. This is where it might not be okay.
“C-c’mon,” Jeremy Heere grumbled, fingers twitching and leg bouncing sporadically with impatience and some sort of anticipation, “load!”
Cerulean blue eyes squinted at the dimmed screen of a laptop, focus completely trained on the slowly—ever so painfully slow—buffering video. His eyes darted down on the laptop’s clock every now and then, cursing under his breath as another minute passed by and only the icons have successfully loaded.
Jeremy huffed as 7:23 AM changed into 7:24 AM, “S-stupid, crappy internet. Stupid, cra-appy a-ads.”
Of course, this was a kind of normal start for the day of one Jeremy Heere. Watching porn (and—yes! the thumbnail has finally loaded) is pretty normal, considering the lifestyle of teenagers.
Normal. Okay.
But, well, masturbating in the morning before going to school? The moment the entirety of Middleborough High finds that out, even someone with Chloe Valentine and Jake Dillinger’s social standing would crumble into a harassed heap of high school embarrassment, unable to climb back up the social hierarchy.
“Gah!” Jeremy nearly jumped out of his skin as a vibrating buzz snapped him out of his thoughts. His knee collided with the table and he winced, “Fuck.”
He picked up his phone—the cause of that annoying buzz—and unlocked it irritably, opening the notification that popped up in the screen.
Received [7:36 AM]
I’m Player ONE!!: dude wer u rn?
I’m Player ONE!!: im outside
I’m Player ONE!!: im… heere ;D
I’m Player ONE!!: hah. dude
I’m Player ONE!!: jer
Jeremy’s eyes widened.
Shit.
Right, Michael was picking him up.
Jeremy bit his lip, coming into a hasty decision and slamming his laptop close instead of waiting for it to shut down. He was in the middle of pulling on his pants when his phone buzzed again. Quickly tucking in his shirt, he opened the messages and made a noise of embarrassment, his entire face flooded with heat.
Received [7:38 AM]
I’m Player ONE!!: dude
I’m Player ONE!!: r u srsly
I’m Player ONE!!: jacking off rn
I’m Player ONE!!: ;)
Sent [7:39 AM]
NO
MICHAEL
I’m coming down now
With haste, Jeremy slipped on his cardigan (sparing a moment to nervously brush his fingers on the soft fleece), ran a hand through his unruly hair in an (futile) attempt to tame it, grabbed his backpack, and bolted down the stairs. The mirror in the hallway was not given a glance, the passed out form on the couch given the same treatment.
Michael’s PT Cruiser was easy to spot what with its Bob Marley-ish color scheme that still somehow managed to blend in with the other student cars unless it was singled out. It was a phenomenon Jeremy can never understand.
“’Sup!” Michael called out from the rolled down window, a grin stretching his lips. “Need a lift?”
Jeremy quirked a smile, hands and toes curling. “Y-yeah!”
“C’mon then you ass,” Michael gestured with his head, rolling his eyes and raising his eyebrows. “We’re seriously gonna be late if you don’t, like, move now.”
Jeremy hesitated only for a second before darting over to the passenger side and buckling up in a practiced manner.
“Thanks, uh,” Jeremy fiddled with his backpack before jamming it between his legs. “You didn’t have to pick me up.”
Michael snorted in a non-derisive manner, “Yeah, well, you kinda asked? Last night? I’d be such a bad friend if I ignored your groveling. But you were. A bad friend. I mean, you were jacking off.”
“I-I was not!” Jeremy was sure his face is entirely red by this time. Michael wasn’t wrong but that doesn’t mean Jeremy had to agree even if both of them knew the truth. Still, it was highly embarrassing causing Jeremy to pinch and pull at the hem of his sleeves.
“Suuure,” Michael cracked up laughing and Jeremy shifted uncomfortably. Pulling into drive, Michael let Jeremy stew in his embarrassment with the lively notes of an indie rock music blasting through the radio.
Teasing was normal between them; hell, they’d pretty much humiliate each other every time the opportunity presented itself. Perks of being friends—best friends—for more than a decade include a lifetime of blackmail material. But it comes with the unspoken (and unbroken) promise of keeping it to themselves. Not that they could share it with anyone else.
Because here’s the thing about Michael Mell and Jeremy Heere:
They are the school’s outcast. Generally, the whole high school population ignored them; and more specifically, no one actually took the time to make conversations with them. It was better than being targeted by bullies though. Because even bullies ignore them. Hardly does anyone take notice of them unless they actually had to.
Case in point, when Chloe Valentine sniffed in disgust as Jeremy desperately gestured to his locker slightly red-faced that morning when they finally arrived at school. And then completely ignoring his stuttered apologies. Even David From Spanish Class received a glare of disdain from the popular girl.
(Okay, so maybe David was a complete pervert and a nerd and even Jeremy made it a point to avoid him. But still.)
Seriously, it wasn’t his fault they were gossiping right in front of his locker.
“What’s up with her?” Michael had his headphones on but was blinking at Chloe Valentine’s back.
Jeremy shrugged even though he knew Michael wouldn’t see it. He’d never understand the way other people’s mind worked.
He turned back to face his locker and unlocked it, shuffling through his things and gathering the books he will need before closing it. Just as he was done, the bell rang, high and shrill, and somehow Michael didn’t hear it. The other teen still stood there, eyes closed and head bobbing to the music blasting through his ears at probably the maximum volume.
Jeremy bit his lip as a smile caused it to twitch, eyes rolling in exasperation. He reached up and tugged at one side of the gadget. Michael startled with an indignant ‘hey!’ and Jeremy quirked an eyebrow, letting the white headphones haphazardly settle around Michael’s neck.
“L-let’s go Michael,” Jeremy pulled on Michael’s arm. “We g-gotta get to class.”
Jeremy didn’t bother to look back at Michael and instead continued on his way to their class.
His hand never did leave its place until it had to.
+++
Classes were a flurry of inattention and taking down notes. Jeremy certainly wasn’t top of the class—never had been, never would be—but he managed to get by. He does great, if he says so himself. Straight B’s with a couple of A-‘s here and there while barely paying attention to the teachers. Michael does better, though. Only a smattering of B+ in a sea of A’s (hah!) even while sleeping in class.
The ‘How the fuck’ is drowned by in-relation-to-being-his-awesome-friend pride. And also the fact that both of them actually had to do some work to get those grades. Just… not in class. Not having a social life besides each other frees up time for something other than video games and movies. Michael’s already blurred eyesight could only take so much blue light.
Lunch came as reprieve from the stifling atmosphere created by restless students.
Unlike Michael who can actually sneak out of campus for his seven eleven fix, Jeremy had to fall in line with other students to buy lunch at the cafeteria. The food sucks, the people serving it sucks—
“Yo watch it, tall-ass!”
Jeremy stumbled back, barely managing to find his balance as he was pushed out of the line by another boy. Automatically, his mouth opened to the mumble out stuttered apologies. But then the boy continued on to talk without another acknowledgement sent his way.
“Hey Jakey-D, what’s the story about Madeline?”
And smoothly, as if he hadn’t pushed another person out of the line, the boy—Richard Goranski, primary asshole, secondary jokester—sidled up to Jeremy’s previous position, fist bumping with Jake Dillinger.
Anger bubbled up Jeremy’s guts but quickly deflated into shame and acceptance.
Right.
He eyed the other students, all completely indifferent to what happened.
The line was still long and the aspect of being in there longer than he already had made his stomach quiver unpleasantly.
He wasn’t in the mood for food anyway.
Jeremy trudged on to the table he and Michael usually invaded, hands flexing and anxiously rubbing over soft fleece and hard polyester. The table stood at a corner; too small for two people but held three chairs and close enough to the doors that it gets smacked whenever a student became too enthusiastic in entering the cafeteria. Isolated enough to almost be called an island.
No one ever sits there but the two of them. It wasn’t the Loser’s Table; no, that name is reserved to the thoroughly vandalized piece of work near the storage closet. But it was their table and Jeremy refused to further examine that attachment.
He sighed and dumped his bag on the chair closest to the door before plopping down the one with its back to the wall. He fumbled with his pockets, eyes squinting as he tried to find his phone.
In the end, he had to look through his bag before finding it. Quickly plugging the earphones and jamming the buds in his ears, Jeremy buried his head in his arms and vaguely hummed along the notes of whatever song was on.
By the third song, his hands stopped trembling and his shoulders lost the tension it held all morning that was worsened by Rich Goranski’s almost-public humiliation (if Jeremy hadn’t been too much of a nobody, everyone would have made a deal out of it).
He was startled from the sort-of-trance by a heavy weight draping over his shoulders.
“Jeremy, my buddy, how’s it hanging? Lunch is bangin’. Had my sushi, got my slushie and more!”
Immediately relaxing (and having an embarrassing screech die at his throat) as he recognized Michael’s voice, Jeremy untangled one hand from his head’s nest and half-heartedly pushed at where he thinks Michael’s head might be. He was speaking in Bob Marley tunes again.
Michael laughed but continued on his song, making a drum beat at Jeremy’s out stretched hand, “The roll was negimaki and I’m feeling kinda cocky ‘cause the girl at Sev’ Elev’ gave me a gen-e-rous pour.”
Jeremy twitched and sat up straighter, raising an eyebrow at Michael, “Marley again?”
Michael nodded enthusiastically and made a little jiggle with his hands and feet. “Oh, I’m listening to Marley and the groove is hella gnarly and we’re almost at the end of this song!” He made another drum beat, this time on his own legs before dropping down on the free chair in one smooth movement that would have had Jeremy tripping many times over had he be the one to do it. “And that was the end, now tell me friend; how was class? You look like ass. What’s wrong?”
Jeremy shrugged, “Nothing, really.”
“Where’s your food?” Michael frowned at the empty table.
“I, uh,” Jeremy stammered, already knowing how much fuss Michael would raise if he found out what happened. “I a-already finished?” He winced as his words ended in a high note that sounded more of a question than anything. “B-but anyway!” Frantically, Jeremy searched for something to change the subject, eyes eventually landing on the poster put up by Mr. Reyes earlier in the day. “I-I decided to s-sign up for the play!”
“The…play?” Michael sounded as incredulous as his face expresses. “The play?”
“Yeah!” No, Jeremy did not want to sign up for the play. “Y-you know, maybe it’ll help? With- with everything?” Why couldn’t his stammering mouth shut up? He’d die if he joined the play, not help with anything at all!
“Yeah, I guess.”
“B-besides,” I don’t even want to do anything in front of other people, Jeremy wants to say but apparently his mouth wasn’t his own anymore. “Look who’s signing up!”
Michael’s bewildered face slowly turned to do just that.
Christine Canigula stood in front of the poster, hand poised to write her name.
And then he—well, Michael melted.
And then Jeremy—Jeremy fisted his hands so tightly he was sure it would bruise; gritted his teeth until it creaked.
Because here’s another thing about Michael Mell and Jeremy Heere:
Michael Mell has a crush on Christine Canigula the size of New Jersey.
Jeremy Heere was pretty sure he is in love—because God save his bleeding heart—with Michael Mell. His best friend. His player one. His Michael Mell.
“M-maybe you could sign up too?” What in the fuck?
Michael blinked and then the blitzed out expression disappeared and was replaced with a contemplative look (complete with a hand rubbing at his chin, the absolute dork). His eyes darted to Christine and then back at Jeremy. “You sure you wanna join the play?”
No. “Y-yeah!” Jeremy mustered up his best encouraging smile. If nothing, Michael would have a chance to be close with Christine (he ignored the sharp pang and the knots that formed in his stomach—he hadn’t eaten anything since this morning, that was it). And yeah, the play might help with Jeremy’s anxiety. Face your fears and all that.
“Okay, yeah, I’ll join the play.” Then Michael slung an arm across Jeremy’s shoulder, pulling him in a half-embrace. “Can’t leave my player two to be eaten by the sharks!”
Jeremy forced out a laugh, hoping it didn’t sound as mechanical as it felt, “I’ll beat that title out of you soon.”
“Dream on!” Michael full on cackled, arm still holding Jeremy in place. “I’m Player One!!”
“Yeah, yeah,” Jeremy huffed. “Just you wait, Michael.”
“Oooh, quoting Hamilton on me?”
And then Michael shrieked because Jeremy decided that biting him was the best retort.
“Fuck, ow! Jeremy!”
It was Jeremy’s turn to laugh, burying his red face on his arms. He emerged, grinning from ear to ear. His eyes caught sight of the sign-up sheet and his grin felt strange on his face.