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Jay wasn’t sure when he started glancing at the tiny silver-haired freshman when he and his blue-haired friend walked by. On welcoming day, he high-fived the kid as a dare from Mal before tangling his fingers with the younger’s and proclaiming him as Jay’s boyfriend. It was meant to be a joke, but three weeks into the year and the tiny freshman greets him with a cheerful “Hey, bae.” when he walks by.
Jay figured he only noticed the kid because of the bright white hair, starkly contrasting with the natural hair colors of most of the freshmen in the school. But somewhere in between the quick glances and the adorable greetings, he starts counting the freckles on the younger’s face.
“I dare you to actually talk to your little boyfriend.” Mal says with a grin one day when she’s over at his shop avoiding her mom for the umpteenth time.
Jay rolls his eyes and motions for her to hand him a smaller wrench. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Mal snorts as she passes him the tool, “Yeah right. You’ve looked at him 457 times this week Jay. I know, I counted. Plus he greats you bae, Jay.”
Jay feels the tips of his ears warm and shoves himself under the car he’s working on.
“Come on Jay.” Mal says with a vaguely amused smirk, “I’ll buy you groceries for a week.”
Jay comes out from under the car and glares at her and she looks back triumphantly. She knows he won’t pass on a week’s worth of food. Not in the middle of a big job like this car which meant about a week and a half of no money.
“Well?” Mal says with a smile, holding out her hand.
“You’re a piece of shit, you know?” Jay replies, taking her hand and pulling himself up.
He gives her hand a firm shake once he’s on his feet, “Those better be some good groceries.”
“He’s staring at you. Your bae I mean.” A teasing laugh follows.
Carlos shrinks a little more, hunching his shoulders and curving into himself.
“He’s actually more like glaring at you.” Evie says with an amused smile. “The cute purple punky one just nudged him in our direction.”
Carlos groans, “Oh my god what if he hates that I greet him all the time I mean we’re just freshmen Evie and he’s the hot as hell rebel Jock that happened to decide to tease me the first day of school.”
Evie rolls her eyes and pats Carlos’ shoulder lightly, “I’m sure he at least thought you were cute to do that to yo- Oh I think he’s coming over.”
“Shit.” Carlos says as he turns way too fast. Carlos can’t decide if the expression he saw on the Jock’s face was nervousness or Winter Soldier death glaring.
Carlos doesn’t even have time to hope it’s the second when Rebel Jock’s face is now towering above him.
“Hey bae, the team’s having a start of the year party and I was wondering if you and your friend wanted to go.”
Carlos blinks, cheeks warming when the older calls him bae even if Carlos jokingly greets him that every time Carlos notices Jay looking at him.
“Sure, Carlos and I would love to!” Evie says for him when Carlos doesn’t say anything for like 10 seconds.
“A-are you sure? Your friend seems either scared or dumbstruck.”
“Yeah, I’m sure. He’s just a bit shy. Evie by the way, and your bae is Carlos.”
Rebel Jock laughs and shakes Evie’s outstretched hand, “I can’t believe the guy who calls me bae all the time is shy. I’m Jay. Well, hope to see you at the party. It’s on Friday, 7PM is technically the start but you can come by whenever even right after school. Here’s the address and my number in case you ever get lost.”
Rebel Jock – Jay, oh my god Carlos knows his name now – waves goodbye and flashes a peace sign before heading back to his own table.
Evie snaps her perfectly pristine fingers in front of Carlos’ face to shake him out of the half-trance he went to.
“Your welcome, C,” Evie says with a smirk, “I just kick started the next part of your little romcom.”
Carlos groans as he tries to hide his reddening face in his arms.
“Are you sure I look okay?” Carlos asks again, tugging at his shirt again.
Evie rolls her eyes, “I can’t believe you’re questioning an outfit I approved of.”
“You’re right,” Carlos says apologetically, “I should never have questions the queen of fashion and her approval.”
Evie smiles, “No, you shouldn’t have. Now come on, we’re gonna be late for your bae’s little welcoming party.”
“Ugh,” Carlos mumbles, “I really shouldn’t have kept that up after you knew about it.”
Evie laughs, “Yeah well it was either that or have your little dorky crush think you started hating him, according to you, so I guess your nonexistent relationship is more important than a little teasing from me.”
Carlos sighs. “You got me there. God I’m so pathetically desperate.”
“Don’t worry C,” Evie says cheerfully as she opens the door, “Pathetically desperate is cute on you.”
Jay is anxiously tapping on the kitchen counter. He’s been feeling weird all night. Not up to his usual shenanigans with the rest of the team.
“What are you doing in here moping?” Mal says as she pops in suddenly.
Jay shrugs a bit listlessly, “I dunno. Just not feeling up to partying.”
Mal snorts, “You? Not up to partying? Really? Did the sky explode and you stole my 2008 personality or something?”
Jay chuckles and stretches his arms, “Ah, whatever, maybe I just need to roam around a little.”
Mal rolls her eyes but follows Jay anyway as he turns to step out of the counter, but not before grabbing a cup full of strawberries.
Jay walks out the kitchen and looks up to see someone entering the house.
He almost trips over his own feet when he sees who it is and a rush of blood immediately goes to his ears.
It’s the freshman, Carlos. Holy shit, Jay thinks as he faintly feels someone bump into him, did the kid model for an alternative fashion magazine or some shit? Have his own personal stylist??
Jay swallows thickly as he takes in the freshman’s appearance. A shirt that hugged his figure but not that it looked tight, just that it fit him amazingly. A leather jacket with sleeves pushed up to his elbows showing off slender arms and ripped black jeans that made his legs look like they were molded by God.
“Holy… fuck…” Jay whispers to himself. “I’m fucked.”
Someone flicks his ear and he turns around quickly, “What the shit?”
“Yeah yeah, I’m fine by the way, thanks for asking.” Mal says with a frown, “What distracted you five steps from your mission of roamin- Oh, ohhh, damn Jay, your bae cleans up good. And so does his friend.”
Jay gulps and feels a different kind of anxiety from the one he felt in the kitchen.
“Dare you to play the game the cheer squad set up with him in it.”
Oh my god, Mal’s dares were gonna be the death of him, Jay thinks to himself.
“What?! That’s, like, almost always a shitty making out game!”
Mal just laughs, “Exactly, come on, don’t tell me you don’t feel like mackin’ on white-top over there. I can see it in your face Jay.”
Jay just sighs and concedes. Carlos is just too beautiful to not want to mack on.
Mal grins when Jay gives a defeated look. “Heh, I’ll hold you to that loser. I think I see Ben in the kitchen so see ya later.”
Jay just groans a little and goes to the nearby couch and flops onto it. He can’t believe he agreed to another of Mal’s stupid dare.
“Hey, bae.”
Jay’s breath hitches.
“Um… Is this seat taken?”
Jay looks up to see Carlos shyly gesturing to the rest of the unoccupied couch and Jay can’t get his vocal chords to work so he decides to just wave as a universal sign for “Yes fucking please sit next to me you divine being sent from the heavens.”
Jay’s sure the wave doesn’t truly convey all that but he feels it should for Carlos.
Carlos smiles (and Jay kinda dies inside) as he sits down. “So this is a cool house, is it yours?”
Jay untangles his brain enough to laugh a little, “Nah, I live downtown. This is Doug’s place. His family’s a huge mining business so they can afford big ass houses like this.”
Carlos nods and Jay’s unsure if relief is the feeling on the younger’s face, “So where do you live?”
Jay hesitates to say that he lived alone, moved out and working a shop because of shitty circumstances.
“You don’t have to tell me,” Carlos says after a few seconds of silence, “I know the feeling of not wanting to talk about home.”
Jay smiles at how sweet Carlos is being to someone who’s barely an acquaintance, “Nah, I live in a run down apartment near the plaza. I run my own shop to keep up with the bills.”
“Oh, sweet,” Carlos says with a grin, “I’m a minor so I know jack shit about cars.”
Jay laughs.
“Maybe you just don’t go out enough,” Jay says teasingly, “When I was your age I was hot wiring junk yard cars.”
Carlos snorts, “Woah there, seems like I nabbed myself a bad boy.”
Jay feels his face warm. Oh shit, was that the wrong thing to say? Oh my god, of course it was. Great job Jay just advertise your illegal childhood some more-
“I hacked into a government site and changed all their images to a meme face when I was twelve.”
Jay blinks. Carlos smirks at him.
“What, you think you’re the only bad boy?”
Jay laughs, loud and genuine, “Oh my god. I think you’re a bit too small to be a bad boy, bae.” Jay says while ruffling the younger’s hair.
“Excuse you,” Carlos says with a pretend huff, trying to look annoyed but failing to keep the huge smile off his face, “Do you see this leather jacket, it’s the epitome of bad boy.”
“I don’t think you say you’re a bad boy while using words like ‘epitome’.”
“I’m a very well-educated bad boy, shut up.”
The two of them continue talking and laughing and generally loving each other’s company as the party droned on. Soon enough Mal comes by with a familiar blue-framed face on her arm looking a bit smitten and a lot conniving.
“Uh oh.” Jay hears Carlos whisper to himself.
Jay leans over to the younger and stage whispers, “Is your friend looking at you like she’s got an evil plan in mind like mine is looking at me?”
Carlos gives a surprised giggle, “I don’t think ‘friend’ is the word I used for her with that face.”
Mal rolls her eyes, “My, my, two hours and it seems we’ve been replaced Evie.”
“Nah,” Evie says with a smile as innocent as could be, “I don’t think I’ve ever given Carlos those big doe eyes, have you Mal?”
“You’re right, E!” Mal says with a dramatic wave, “I don’t think I’ve given Jay such a look before either.”
The girls snort and laugh as the boys start blushing profusely.
“Now come on Jay, you’re gonna miss you daaare.” Mal says with a smirk once she and Evie catch their breath.
Jay can feel his dignity die as he remembers the dare and lets himself be dragged upright.
“You too C, come on, you’ll thank me later.” Evie says, hooking her arm under the freckled boy and heaving him up.
Two minutes later and they’ve sat down in a circle with increasing dread at the obviousness of the situation.
“Hey guys welcome to Seven Minutes in Heaven,” Says a cheerfully high voice from the other end, “Staple of parties like this, spin a bottle, whoever you land on gets locked in a closet together for seven minutes doing whatever they wish.”
The tension starts from the moment Carlos gives Jay a nervous smile and Jay can feel his brain melt.
Oh god what if I actually do get Carlos? What if I don’t?? Jay thinks to himself as he forces down the anxiety building up. Get it together, Jay, it’s not gonna be the end of the world.
Jay spends about 15 minutes working himself up as the bottle gets passed around, going from person to person fairly quickly as nobody really wanted to wait there were about 5 timers beeping at random intervals as people’s turns timed out and others were sent to fetch them.
All too soon Jay ends up with a bottle in his hand and a frog in his throat as he spins it with a bit too much force, sending it spinning for about thirty seconds before slowly landing… on Carlos.
Typical.
The world hated (loved?) him and he ended up with the adorable nerd that he has a crush on and maybe it’s not too bad because duh, they’ve talked to each other now an-
Somebody (Mal) shoves him into Carlos, “Get on with it, nerd.”
Jay feels his already hot face warm even more as Carlos gives him a shy smile and offers a hand to help him up, “Welp, guess we gotta go, huh?”
Jay takes the smaller hand and pulls himself up, blushing all the way to the closet and kind of shrinking into the corner once they’re there.
“So,” Carlos says after a couple of seconds, “Do you come here often?”
Jay blinks and laughs in surprised, “Was that supposed to make this feel less awkward cause all it did was make you look like a nerd.”
Carlos chuckles himself, “Well at least you’re not acting like I’m gonna murder you in ten seconds.”
Jay laughs, “Sorry, you’re kind of intimidatingly hot- holy shit did I just say that out loud. I meant adorable. No- dorky. Yeah. Dorky.”
Carlos blinks and looks dumbstruck, “I’m intimidatingly hot? You’re the one with the toned muscles and bad boy vibes!”
Jay blushes and retaliates, “What? No! Well kinda! But like, you look like a model and your freckles are kind of really adorable!! Also your outfit is like really fitting you and it’s like really hot!”
Carlos blushes deeper, “W-well! You’re a jock! And also a mechanic! So you’re like really tan and athletic! And your hair is like unbelievably amazing I kinda want to touch it a lot… Oh…”
Carlos trails off and Jay notices that they’re an inch away from each other, moving closer as their weird complement-argument went on.
“Um… hi…” Jay says softly, feeling Carlos’ breath on his lips.
“Hi…” Carlos says, eyes flickering from Jay’s to Jay’s lips and back up again.
“So… uh… are we gonna cliche make out?” Jay says, raising his hand up to touch a freckle on the younger’s cheek.
“That depends, are we gonna be cliche boyfriends after?” Carlos mumbles, putting a finger on Jay’s lip lightly.
“If you want to…” Jay whispers, leaning closer.
“Ditto.”
( They end up spending more than seven minutes in the closet and as such Evie and Mal have about 20 blackmail photos each. )