Chapter Text
“My name’s JJ, and it’s short for ‘none of your business’. I’m nine and a half, I like guns, cars, dirt bikes and the color blue. And I was raised by wolves.”
Pope stared at the blonde boy across the classroom from him. He sounded tough, but looked friendly and he wanted to be his friend immediately, even though he was pretty sure JJ wouldn’t look twice at him. Most kids usually didn’t, but especially kids like JJ.
“Thank you, JJ.” The teacher said. “Next?”
Pope spent the rest of the class staring at JJ, wondering how it was possible for someone’s eyes to be so blue. He watched as he ignored everyone else’s introductions to scribble in his notebook with his blue marker, big sweeping motions like he was making waves. Or a storm.
When they were all squishing outside to go home at the end of their first day of fifth grade, Pope found himself face to face with JJ, staring into his blue eyes.
“Whatchu looking at?” JJ said, in a friendly voice. “Take a picture, it’ll last longer.”
“Sorry.” Pope said, embarrassed but JJ laughed and put his arm around him. “I’m Pope.”
He felt awkward with his arm around him, wondering how such a tough kid could be so happy to pal around with a random geek like him.
“I know. I heard your introduction. And I know you from fourth grade. You did the thing at the talent show where you recited all the bones we have, right? I’m JJ. I’ve got one friend. John B. But I think you should be our friend, too.”
“You saw that?” Pope asked, surprised. He hadn’t thought someone like JJ was watching that, or would remember a year later.
“Yep. It was cool as shit. Can you teach me?” JJ said. Pope was shocked that he said ‘shit’. He said it like he said it all the time.
“Yeah.” Pope answered as they walked towards his bus. JJ hadn’t even asked if he rode the bus, but he did and he wondered when JJ had started to as they got on and sat down together. “Were you really raised by wolves?”
JJ laughed and Pope memorized the sound. “My dad’s like a wolf. He’s mean and scary and he attacks at night.”
Pope thought that was the scariest thing he’d ever heard but JJ laughed again and got off the bus, right as it got ready to move. “See ya, Pope!”
Pope didn’t realise until later that JJ had known what bus he rode.
All he cared about was the fact that he had a new friend with the bluest eyes in the world.
“I’m JJ, and I like to make shit with wood. That’s why I’m here. Oh, and I wanna sell what I make so I can buy better weed.”
Pope laughed with the rest of the class at JJ’s introduction in shop class, but he was staring at his Adam’s Apple bob up and down when he laughed, too and how his blue eyes lit up from the approval and the way his lips curled into a side smirk when the teacher rolled his eyes. He avoided looking at the fading bruise on his cheek. He had been avoiding looking at it for the past week.
“Alright, alright, settle down.” The teacher said, bored. “Next? Introduce yourself and why you’re taking shop this year, please.”
Pope was sitting next to JJ now. They’d been friends for five years and he knew lots of things about him. He knew what made him mad, what made him laugh, how much weed he needed to feel better after a bad night at home, that he ate any food put in front of him and that he loved his friends more than he loved himself.
JJ gave it ten minutes before he leaned around Pope to talk to John B.
“Boooring.” He dragged out, singing the word under his breath. “Let’s ditch. Pope, take our notes, will ya? I wanna go get fucked up.”
Pope tried not to feel hurt that he didn’t even ask him to come, even though he always said no and would say no this time. He watched his eyes wander around the classroom before fixing back on John B’s face.
“Bro. Let’s go.” JJ said, looking more desperate. There was something in his eyes that Pope hadn’t noticed before. Like a caged animal.
“It’s the first day, JJ. I’m not leaving. My dad actually wants me to learn how to do this shit.” John B answered, taking notes and avoiding JJ’s stare.
JJ laughed a little and tried to play the dismissal off, raising his hand to go to the ‘bathroom’ and shoving his binder into his backpack. The teacher didn’t look twice when he left the class with his bag.
Pope bit his lip, chewing on it, his stomach twisting with nerves before he shot his hand up in the air.
“Yes...Poe?” The teacher said. He tried not to feel bad that the teacher hadn’t even thought JJ had a question. He had just waved his hand so he could go to the bathroom. But for Pope, he didn’t assume that.
“It’s Pope. Can I use the restroom?” He said.
“Go ahead. Everyone’s doing it.” The teacher mumbled and Pope got up quickly, snatching his backpack and heading towards the door before he could change his mind. He avoided John B’s stare and the vibration of his phone as he texted him. He wanted JJ to himself.
He had never skipped with JJ, but he heard the tales and he knew exactly where he was. He found him in the trees by the football field, smoking a badly rolled joint. He knew he waited there for John B and he guessed he was holding out hope that he would come through.
He almost dropped the joint when he saw Pope.
“The hell?” He laughed easily, running a hand through his hair and turning his hat around. “Are you the hall monitor? Are you giving me detention?”
“No. I’m skipping. Let’s go before I change my mind.” Pope said, heading confidently towards the forest. He didn’t want to change his mind and if he stopped to think, he definitely would. He had grades to keep up and parents who would freak out if they found out about this, which they definitely would.
“My man! Hey, you want some of this?”
Pope knocked his hand away, and JJ almost dropped the joint.
“Testy.” JJ said. “Hey, let’s go check out those new houses on Figure Eight.”
“Hey, let’s not. I don’t want to go to prison. I’m trying to go to college.” Pope replied.
“No one’s there on Tuesdays during the day.” JJ said confidently. “My dad told me. He steals steel from there and sells it on the black market. I help him.”
“I did not just hear that.” Pope shot back. He knew he should say no, but JJ’s eyes were so blue and his smile was so real and there was that little spark of desperation in his eyes and he wanted to have something special, just the two of them.
“Steals steel. Get it?” JJ laughed, putting his arm around him. He did that a lot and it took Pope’s breath away, but JJ never seemed to notice.
“We can go, but if we get caught, you’re doing deliveries for me for the rest of the year and giving me your wages.” Pope said.
“Deal. We ain’t getting caught.”
They got caught.
“Introduce yourself, please.”
It was tenth grade and JJ was in a standoff with their Art teacher. He had come into the room and put his head down and he hadn’t picked it up and Pope knew something was wrong. Not that JJ told him that. He only told John B his secrets. He wasn’t jealous though. Maybe a little. Maybe a lot.
“JJ Maybank, sit up and introduce yourself. Coming to school hungover is not an option. It’s not a ‘get out of introductions free card’ either.” The art teacher said in front of everybody.
JJ picked his head up at that. Pope saw the black eye and he saw the art teacher staring at it like everyone else and he saw the anger in JJ’s eyes but he also saw the hurt.
“If you know my name, why the fuck do I have to introduce myself?” He said and some of the kid’s laughed. Others gasped. Pope wished John B was there, but he wasn’t in their class.
“Office, now!” The teacher said, pointing towards the door. Pope knew that’s what JJ wanted and he knew he wasn’t going to the office.
“Your wish is my command.” JJ said, saluting the room with a certain finger and she yelled after him.
Pope waited two minutes before politely asking for the bathroom. The teacher barely looked twice, but they never looked twice at him.
Pope was very much concerned about his scholarship and his grades and getting in trouble, but Pope was also very much in love with JJ.
Even though he couldn’t admit it to himself, he knew it deep down. Well, not so deep.
He found him on the bleachers, smoking a joint and laying on his back, ignoring the gym teacher yelling at him to go to class. Pope yelled to the teacher that he would get him and sat down with him instead.
“You okay? That was a little extra for the first day, huh?” Pope said. “I thought you and John B didn’t unleash your full potential for wreaking havoc until day five.”
JJ didn’t answer and Pope tried to look at his blue eyes but his hat was covering them.
“You good?” He pushed.
JJ ripped his hat off, revealing his black eye and his bruised cheek and the tears on his face.
“Ok, you’re not good.” Pope said awkwardly. “What happened?”
They were in the awkward place where Pope knew what his dad did to him, but he didn’t talk about it to him. He said it when it was him and John B, but when it was him and Pope alone, he always said it was a fight.
He waited patiently for that lie to roll off JJ’s tongue, but it didn’t.
“My dad popped me cuz I messed up at the Salvage Yard. He hit me three times right here and punched me here.” JJ said, pointing to the different parts of his face, staring into his eyes.
Pope knew it was the moment he’d been waiting for. The moment where JJ decided if he could confide in Pope or if he would lie to him, like he lied to Ki.
Pope had been prepared. He’d been studying JJ for years. He knew what made him happy, what made him mad, what made him sad. He knew that if he asked about what he had just said or showed any sign of sympathy, JJ would never tell him again and would cover his face with his hat again.
So he said the only thing he could say to get closer to JJ.
“Want to ditch?”
JJ’s blue eyes lit up. His slow smile that caused his dimples to come out came out. He sat up and was right in Pope’s face. He could see all of his eyelashes and he felt like he couldn’t breathe. Suddenly the word scholarship was erased from his brain.
“I thought you’d never ask.” JJ said, offering his hand to Pope.
When it came to JJ Maybank, the boy who was raised by wolves and loved dirt bikes and liked to make shit out of wood, Pope Heyward was completely and utterly powerless.
He just wished he loved him back, even if they couldn’t do anything about it.