Chapter Text
Jake liked to think his life was simplified into a state of perfection—a form in which he had, of course, deserved. Through thick and thin, rough and smooth, Jake preferred the idea of standing above his problems over the looming thought of his problems standing proudly above him.
Every road has it’s bumps, it’s jagged, off-put stones between dented, dirt pathways; but his so-called goal setter had what others could only dream of: ignorance of the inevitable—why fear the future when you can face it head-on?
He ended up in the best place possible and couldn’t ask for anything better. The reign of tyranny was finally over, he could just let his life roll ahead of him and let fate take it’s course—and he confidently does so in the form of, what he liked to call, the Three I’s: Innocence, Integrity, and Implacability for change.
He’s not ashamed to share that he specifically wrote this most recent moral inside a journal, it’s own page and everything. He keeps the journal in his locker, cautious of wandering eyes as he basically jots down his life values in the form of pen on paper—he’s working on being more, as said on page twenty-six in his journal, undeniably Jake: a concept that he both finds difficult to understand and to grasp.
Ever since then he’s been able to comfortably allow his mind to drift in subconscious conversations without the worry of what might slip out, mentally, he’s been stronger in what one may call self-esteem—more information can be found on page sixteen on this topic, exploiting the change of pessimism to optimism.
Experiencing the reassurance of having everything planned out is possibly the best thing he’s ever felt, he loves the notion of predictability. It is strange how he can both despise the future while simultaneously planning it out—but you can’t fear what you can predict, after all.
So then why is he trying to explain the whole idea to himself for the thousandth time?
Well, apparently, the other half of his consciously divided brain is setting off the alarm bells that connect to his poorly hidden emotions that relate to what exactly made up the road in the first place—the supposedly-moved-on-from past.
Oh, how he hates the lurking mishap of him having a movie-inspired dramatic flashback, an unplanned event that resolves in creating a lingering string, winding and twisting around the surface to crush it under a certain guilt, of sorts—at this point in time, he wouldn’t be surprised if that very string finds it’s way toward the chosen performance for that day, the way in which he chooses to talk, walk, and act.
So that’s probably how he found himself in this very room, a room with two decent-looking chairs and a small, round center table. It’s simple. It was meant to be simple.
“So,” a voice breaks him out of his thoughts, “will you two be alright if I leave?”
Would he be scrutinized for leaving out the one simple detail of having that one other person inside that very room? Most likely. He named all the objects in the room without a second thought, it’s undeniably arrogant to purposefully ignore the reason for why he’s there in the first place—but it’s not like anyone’s going to ask, so he’d rather keep that concept of ignorance alive.
Maybe that’s the reason as to why he didn’t register the person opposite him nod, stiff and oh-so-predictable. That could possibly be the alibi for the many other things he did during that period. One being the way he subconsciously glares daggers toward darkly shadowed features, hair creating wisps of shade over a brown emotionless gaze.
The person across from him does not seem to register his obvious attempt at intimidation—either that, or he blatantly does not care, keeping his back muscles aware with how he maintains a yearly built-in posture, hands resting appropriately in the centre of his lap.
From the way he, himself, is sitting, he would rather bury himself alive than keep up a somewhat polite facade: back drooping toward his evenly spread legs, elbows effectively leaning on his knees to balance out his entire upper-torso.
His hands pick nervously at the sleeves of his jacket. A sudden urge to count all the cracks that lay across the wooden classroom floor made it’s way to the forefront of his mind as she continues through all the formally reciprocal steps of how their situation is going to very predictably fold out.
By the time a distinct click is heard from the creaking door behind him, the eyes have travelled from the planked floor to the bland wallpaper that lines each corner of the room—a dull beige, matte.
It’s almost humorous, he thinks, how he still can track the stress level of what was meant to be forgotten, dust in the whirlwind that was supposed to only be a once in a lifetime opportunity. Jake doesn’t even think that this person deserves that title, it’s too excitable, too joyous to be counted as something he can be characterized as.
He finds himself growing angry with each bounce of the other’s leg, fingers curling into a physical demonstration of what’ll happen to his sanity if this situation doesn’t bend in the way he wants it to. He left a whole page inside his journal for this moment, bullet points left and right to display an emotional outburst for what will seemingly rectify itself as the outcome.
He makes the first move, a plan previously memorized to reassure a satisfactory phase of action. “Explain.”
The other boy raises a confused eyebrow. “Explain what?”
A sigh escapes his chapped lips before he leans forward even further than he already was, muting the thoughts of wanting to promptly shove the eyebrow-raising asshole into the beige entourage behind him. He locks eyes with a stark brown, all hesitance gone in the promise of answers.
“Explain,” he all but draws out, “why you did what you did.”
Jake’s given him a wide range of opinions, he’s given him options.
The repetitive sound of quickening leg bouncing abruptly stops and he’s met with a level stare. The confidence has apparently left to find it’s way into the other’s figure, it seems.
“Oh, I did,” he remarks, speaking in a tone that will most likely end up next to one of the many bullet points in Jake’s journal. “Plenty of times, in fact.”
Jake knows he’s being difficult for the sake of it—it’s obvious in the way he straightens his posture in what comes across as a condescending gesture, shoulders reeling backward as his nose pointedly tilts upward in an act of hierarchy.
The other boy’s eyes leave his own. “It’s not my fault that you decided to ignore my apparent “excuses”,” he very distinctly lifts two fingers on each hand to represent two passive aggressive quotation marks, “in favour of believing the first thing you were told.”
Fighting the instinct to call out the stubborn outcast of, what Jake prefers to call, cursive conversation, he decides to make this easier for the both of them, unnecessary questions aside.
Preferring to try and bring the other’s eye-contact back to the direction of himself, he throws up the outstanding relationship ender. “Why did you send that recording?” he pauses, choosing to take this further. “Give me a reason as to why I shouldn’t think it’s you who did it.”
A heavy tension enters through the gaps between the four corners of the room, circling around them in an attempt to see who would be the first to break, and who would be the second. But Jake lets it settle, the curiosity lies deeper in his desires than the urge to leave it all together.
The other boy’s head snaps back to his. “I didn’t send that stupid recording,” he breathes out, frustration evident in his voice. “And when I supplied all those possible theories, I was desperate—”
“Desperate?” he interjects. “Desperate for what?”
Ironic how he asks the question with the same amount of desperacy that is told to be a reason for… well, he doesn’t exactly know—he interrupted. Which, foreseeably, results in the tension hastily growing.
Glare hardening at Jake’s interruption, the other decides to poke at the impulsive cut-off. “This is exactly what I mean.”
He takes a breath, slipping two fingers on either side of his nose. “Sorry, continue.”
Not the most tactical move on his part; now he’s just creating an even larger divider between the two already exceedingly clear sides. He tried to encourage a sensible reason to excuse his sudden outburst, but he comes up with only one singular cause: a lack of self-restraint—screwing his prior preparation skills.
“I was desperate,” he’s once again broken out of his spiralling emotional crisis, “for an excuse”—excuse, a way out—“to keep you as a friend. I know it was wrong, and I hate myself for it, but it was the one way to maintain a reliable relationship, a loyal one.”
The beginning of a boiling anger simmers under his skin. He manipulated him, he toyed with his emotional state only to feel sorry for himself? Either that or he’s simply telling Jake what he wants to hear, a manipulative nature that can’t possibly mean otherwise.
Jake narrows his eyes. “Seriously?”
The other boy raises a confused eyebrow. “What?”
“You decided to do all that… stuff because you felt sorry for yourself?” Jake asks, on the verge of physically displaying what it truly means to be on the receiving end of an unwelcome message. “I’m sorry, are you serious right now?”
He seems to catch the other off guard with the way his eyes widen for the first time during the whole rendezvous, finally letting the mood of the situation settle in. He stammers in his response, trying to keep up this idiotic calm facade that never truly redeemed itself during these past few weeks—Jake found a certain relief in finding that the other didn’t think of the situation as a blatant casual event.
“No, no! That is not what I meant—”
Sometimes it’s nice to cut other people off. “What else could it mean, Drew?”
Said boy brings visibly shaking hands up to cover his face, resting his cheeks inside the crevices of his palms. “That you were the first person that actually meant anything to me.”
Silence.
Jake sits up slightly at the sentiment behind the surface of such a delicate confession before rerunning the conversation in his head, guilt leaking into his chest, a string winding it’s way through his pounding heart that sends blood rushing toward deaf ears.
A sharp breath brings his eyes to the hands that mask all the detailed features of what would surely be disclosing the central emotion behind the strategically planned move the moment before—he raised them right before his face could show a matching vulnerability. Guilt once again wraps itself around a broken shell.
Another exhale is heard, the hands shaking from a chill that seemingly runs down his spine. “God, I’m just gonna—”
He cuts himself this time off by rushing toward the classroom door, swinging it open with no hesitation. Jake hears a vague conversation between him and the teacher before the room goes dead silent. Well, he thinks, that ended quickly—and harshly; if that’s even possible in the span of five minutes.
That makes his heart sink.
He yelled at him so quickly, so directly. How else did he expect him to react? He did have the hopeless faith of Drew’s minimal knowledge about serious situations, the little logic that it took to understand another’s side of the story. He’s stubborn, Jake would never expect him to drop all his walls in record time—never mind while having the will to leave the room to most likely escape said situation.
Jake, also deciding to leave the room, walks—unlike the other—with hesitance, dreading the inevitable confrontation he’ll receive as soon as the door’s opened. Jake thought he was one to make the quickest, wittiest plans out of anyone in the school, yet here he is, denying even the slightest aspect of making it out the day alive.
Click, the door opens.
“Jake,” there it is, “what happened?”