Chapter Text
Jayce knew they had reached their destination when he could hear the sounds of other kids his age, and he excitedly looked out of the car window to get a better look at them. Other teens with their parents, saying their goodbyes as they were dropped off for a four week long stay at summer camp. But this wasn’t just any summer camp—it was a science summer camp, one that Jayce had been begging his mom to let him attend for almost a whole year.
Ever since Jayce lost his dad, his mom had always been a bit more…overprotective. She’d been like that anyway with Jayce being the only child of the family, but after his dad passed away, her overprotectiveness only seemed to amplify. He’d begged and begged and begged all year for her to let him attend this summer camp, and it finally took the convincing of his math teacher to persuade her to let him attend. It was still not going to stop her from worrying though.
“ Mijo , wait until I’ve stopped the car before you take off your seatbelt!”
But Jayce was so excited, he’d already unclipped his seatbelt as soon as they were pulling into the parking lot.
The car stopped fully, and Jayce was out of the back seat like a shot, bolting to the trunk so he could get his bag. He saw all the other kids and he felt the twinge of both excitement and nerves at making potential friends.
In all honesty, Jayce didn’t have many friends at school. Okay, that was a lie—he didn’t have any friends at school. His only friend and his best friend was an eight year old girl who he’d known all his life, so she was more like his little sister. But here, at science camp, he was sure to meet someone else more on his wavelength. At school he was usually made fun of for being ‘too clever’.
“Have you got everything?” Jayce’s mom asked as she stepped out of the car.
“Mm-hmm,” Jayce hummed in response, slinging his large duffel bag over his shoulder.
“Let me take a look at you,” she said while standing before Jayce and trying to make sure he was presentable.
Jayce felt the instant heat of embarrassment fill his cheeks and he tried to pull away.
“Mom! I’m fine!”
She put her hands on his shoulders and brought herself down to his eye level; these days she didn’t have to bend down as much as when Jayce was a little kid.
He placed his free hand over her own and gave it a squeeze.
“Mom,” he said a little softer, “I’m fine. I’ll be fine, I promise.”
He smiled to try and reassure her and she sighed, almost in defeat.
“You promise to call me if anything is wrong?”
He nodded.
“Promise!”
“Okay,” she said with a nod before pulling Jayce into a hug and kissing him on both cheeks. “I will miss you Jayce. The house will be so empty without you.”
Jayce felt the slight pang of guilt in his chest and he dropped his duffel bag to the floor so he could embrace his mom properly in return.
“I’ll miss you too mom,” he muttered quietly, so only she could hear, “I love you.”
“And I love you too, mijo .”
She gave him another kiss on the cheek and quickly pulled away, trying to hide her face so Jayce couldn’t see the tears welling in her eyes. He decided not to comment on them as she was making the effort to hide them from him.
He reclaimed his bag from the floor and slung it over his shoulder again, ready to head over to the registration desk and begin this new adventure.
It was two days later, and Jayce was close to throwing in the towel.
Each cabin held four kids, and Jayce had been assigned a cabin with three other boys. The first night had been relatively fine while all four of them got to know each other, and during their first full day in camp, they stuck together. But as the day went on, Jayce got the feeling that the other boys were finding him annoying. Like his way of always knowing the answer to every question, or acting like he was always right (because he usually was ). The same kind of stuff that got on the nerves of the other kids back in high school.
By the second night, it felt like the other three boys in Jayce’s cabin were thick as thieves, while he was just a spare part. In the morning, when they were getting ready for breakfast, one of the boys actually made an offhand comment after Jayce tried to correct a scientific fact he was telling the other two boys.
“Maybe you want to find yourself another cabin, Talis.”
So Jayce skipped breakfast entirely, and instead looked for a member of camp staff to tell them he needed to switch cabins. He could feel the ball of anxiety gnawing away at his stomach as he asked. If he was told no, then he would ask to call home so his mom could come and pick him up, and that would be that.
“Let me take you to counselor Heimerdinger and let’s see what he can do!”
A few moments later, Jayce was with the member of staff in counselor Heimerdinger’s office, explaining that he would like to move to another cabin.
“Jayce Talis…” Heimerdinger seemed to mutter to himself whilst he went through a filing cabinet and pulled out a file, which Jayce could only assume was a copy of his permanent record from school.
Jayce stood there awkwardly, chewing on his lower lip, next to the member of staff who’d brought him in, all while Heimerdinger scanned Jayce’s file and then went through another folder full of papers.
“Well you’re in luck, Mister Talis! We do seem to have a cabin free this year; it is one of our older ones, but I suppose it’ll have to do! However, it’s highly irregular for us to leave one of our students alone in a cabin. You’d need at least one buddy to pair up with you…”
Ah, there was the condition, and Jayce didn’t know anyone else at this camp he could ask to be his roommate. He balled his fists, ready to ask to call his mom, when there was a knock at the door.
“I’m so sorry to interrupt counselor Heimerdinger, but we’ve got an…issue.”
It was another member of staff, also accompanying another kid. He was a tall lanky kid, about as tall as Jayce, with longish brown hair with a streak of dyed green running through the fringe. He wore a knee brace and used a crutch, and he looked about as anxious as Jayce felt.
Heimerdinger seemed flustered by the sudden appearance of so many people in his office. The new member of staff walked in and whispered something to him that Jayce couldn’t hear.
“I am so sorry Mister Talis, could you please wait outside for a moment with your fellow student?”
“Sure,” Jayce replied, and he closed the door behind him leaving the two members of staff with Heimerdinger whilst he stood outside with this other kid.
“Hey,” Jayce said awkwardly and he did a small wave, immediately regretting the action as soon as he’d done it as the other kid shot him a curious look.
“Hi,” he at least replied.
“I’m Jayce. What’s your name?”
After a short delay, the other boy replied.
“It’s Viktor.”
“Cool. Nice to meet you Viktor.”
Jayce chanced giving Viktor a smile, and Viktor gave an awkward one in return. Well, it was better than nothing.
And just as Jayce was trying to come up with some topic of conversation, the door opened behind them and Heimerdinger beckoned them both in.
“Well my boys, you’ve both been rather fortunate today! You could even call it serendipitous! It seems you are both in need of new lodgings, and we have a spare cabin for you! And as I was saying earlier to Mister Talis, I can’t really leave one student alone in a cabin, so it’s quite lucky you’ve both appeared in need of a new cabin at the same time!”
It was a very long winded way for Heimerdinger to say that there was a spare cabin for Jayce, and Viktor would be his new roommate, but he was already bubbling with the nerves and excitement, hoping this placement would go significantly better.
Jayce and Viktor were excused from the morning activities so they could take their belongings to their new cabin. It seemed to be one of the cabins usually reserved for staff rather than the camp attendees because it was a little further away from the other cabins and it even had its own private bathroom. Jayce was starting to think this was actually a blessing in disguise—it meant he wouldn’t have to use the communal showers with all the other boys.
One of the members of staff took them to the cabin, but then allowed them to get on with their unpacking by themselves, reminding them what time lunch was at the canteen.
Jayce was glad to finally be left on his own, and hoped to get to know Viktor better, especially as they would be spending the next four weeks together in this cabin.
There were two bunk beds in the cabin, and Jayce was about to ask Viktor whether he wanted the top bunk or bottom, but thankfully he stopped himself from asking in time, realising what a stupid question it was.
There was probably no way Viktor would want the top bunk with his leg the way it was, and besides, two bunk beds meant they could both use a bottom bunk each, so it wasn’t even a question worth asking.
So Jayce slung his bag onto the mattress of one of the bottom bunks, and as he expected, Viktor took the other bottom bunk, which happened to be opposite Jayce’s.
They began to unpack in silence, each moment Jayce tried to think of something he could say or ask, desperate to get to know this other boy better.
At some point while Jayce was shoving clothes into a drawer, he turned to find Viktor sitting on his bunk, his head almost grazing the bunk above his.
“I like the green streak in your hair,” Jayce blurted out.
He wasn’t sure if it was the best thing to say, but it was a compliment, and surely that was a good start. However, Viktor looked back at him with his eyebrows drawn together in a quizzical expression.
“It’s not green… It’s blue,” he replied.
Jayce felt like a weight was sinking in his stomach.
“S-Sorry!” he managed to stutter out, his cheeks growing warmer by the second.
He wanted to kick himself for being so dumb. But then Viktor was pulling a handful of the coloured hair in front of his face to inspect it for himself.
“Eh, I suppose it has faded quite a lot since I dyed it at the start of summer.”
And Viktor shrugged and gave Jayce a slight smile. He would take what he could get and he smiled in return.
“What happened to your hair?” Viktor asked with an eyebrow raised, gesturing with a nod towards Jayce’s slightly spiked up hair.
“Um,” he felt his face burn under the scrutiny, “I got frosted tips at the start of summer vacation…”
It was the trend that year for boys to get frosted tips, and Jayce had pleaded with his mom to let him get them done. She caved and took him to her regular salon once school was over for the summer.
Jayce had been so excited about it, but as soon as the hairdresser was done and styled his hair by spiking it up with gel, he saw himself in the mirror and hated the drastic change. He lied though, despite absolutely hating lying to his mom, and told him he loved it. In any case, there was no way he was going with the alternative of shaving all his hair off to get rid of the bleached blonde tips, so he would just have to suffer through it until his hair grew out enough for another haircut.
“I would, eh, try to reciprocate the compliment,” Viktor said, trying to suppress a smile, “but it doesn’t suit you.”
Jayce let out a sigh, almost one of relief.
“I know. I absolutely hate it.”
Viktor cracked at that and began laughing, even holding his belly while he laughed hard. It was infectious, and Jayce couldn’t help joining in.
He got a good feeling that he was going to get along better with his new roommate than his previous ones.