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The hallways on this side of campus were empty, the exact reason Scott decided to take this detour. However they weren’t entirely quiet, this is in part thanks to the unfathomable amount of cicadas on the trees outside screaming like lunatics, it’s also in part due to the fact Nom walked beside him and he eternally jingled. His bag decorated with various shiny charms and accessories, you’d think someone would try and steal it. And you would be correct because they have. Tried that is. They very much did not succeed on account of Nom punching them in the stomach. A reasonable reaction. Admittedly Scott’s bag also jingled lightly, a consequence of being Nom’s friend was occasionally you would also get a trinket or two. The ones hanging from his bag were more consistently thematic, mostly little metal charms of plants and keychains of flowers.
One was a coin that had a tree on either side, one side with leaves and the other without. It was sort of messily attached to the small chain that hung it. Not like Nom was a professional now or when he’d made it. Despite it’s definite imperfection it was quite firmly his favourite. If someone where to force him to dispose of all his little accessories, he would probably fight them on it of course but if he had to he’d choose that one. One day Scott would figure out something to give him in return but he wasn’t quite sure what yet.
His eyes cast out the window as he thought. fingers tugging at a loose thread in his shirt. His gaze landed on a flower bed sat against the wall, sort of shaded. A rather large collection of rose bushes, mostly red and pink. Somebody seems to have dyed a section of them blue and frankly done a terrible job. More concerningly so they were so obviously infested with bugs. His eyes narrowed and he slowed to a stop. The constant jingling from beside him died out.
“Oop- he’s pissed,” Nom head poked over his shoulder, dark hair poking into his vision. It tickled. “What we lookin’ at?” He wondered, squinting in the direction of the flowerbed.
“There’s a whole load of bugs on them.”
“Ah..”
“It’s kind of sad, nobody seems to be actually taking care of them.” Scott sighed, he went to pull his phone from his pocket, intending to check the time.
Nom simply started pushing him towards the nearest exit, “Okay, so why don’t we do something?” Which was sweet, however he had none of the things that would really help here… except maybe a water bottle and some tenacity. Unfortunately much like usual Scott found himself unable to fight the idea. Nor could he fight the smile that crept onto his face on the way towards the flowerbed, even if he shook his head.
Now stood in front of the flowerbed, literally crawling with bugs. Several kinds, including many he couldn’t particularly do much to stop entirely in this moment. He’d have to come back tomorrow with a proper spray bottle, some insecticide. Among the collection of bugs were an absurd amount of caterpillars. Those would have to be picked off. They’d be important. Which isn’t to say the other insects weren’t important at all, he’s sure they were. It just wasn’t here. So they had to go.
“I’m realising i didn’t come over here with an actual game plan,” Nom admitted, scratching his cheek. “So… any ideas?”
“Well, we can start with the caterpillars, the rest will have to wait until tomorrow, when i have the stuff to deal with them properly.” He tilted his head, spotting a few more caterpillars nestled deeper in the bush, “We can pick them of… do we have any sort of containers?” He turned to Nom. “If we just toss them on the ground they’d just crawl back up…” Scott mulled over the possibilities of where to put tens and tens of caterpillars.
Meanwhile, Nom’s bag jingled intensely as he rifled through it, sharply pulling out a simple black plastic lunchbox. He cracked it open. Scott emerged from his train of thought as he shoved the lone granola bar into his mouth at frankly concerning speeds. It was gone before he could even wonder what brand it was. Mouth empty Nom held up his open lunchbox, “This work?”
Scott immediately acknowledged the simple fact he would be sharing his lunch come the actual time they were supposed to have lunch. “Did you even chew?”
“You literally saw me chewing.”
“Did i??” Scott breathed, it was mocking him a little bit. Harmlessly.
“Okay then, fine. Next time i won’t offer my containment services.” He pulled the container back, holding it to his chest like he were scorned.
“But yes, that will work. If you want caterpillars in your lunchbox.” he relented the bit. Allowing a moment a pause for the other to think .
“Yeah.” His arms relaxed, “That’s fine. It means i can scare Katie if she tries to poach something from it.” There was a moment of pause as Nom considered a very visible caterpillar. It was not small by any means. “Or i could throw one at her—”
“Don’t.” Scott said firmly, he had to cut that off before it went anywhere.
He exhaled the word, “Finee…” for a stupid amount of time.
Scott looked back to the bushes and plucked a caterpillar from one of the stems. Deftly dropping it into the container with a small ‘tonk!’ Their attention quickly switching to that of pulling bugs from the folliage. Nom held the container in one hand, removing one here and there.
“They’re kinda hard to spot, huh.” He muttered.
Scott hummed, eyes scanning the leaves, “Yep.”
Neither of them were particularly paying attention to the time, nor their surroundings. Whatever bell to signify the start of their next class blending into the chorus of lunacy provided by probably several hundred other insects. Their focus rendered them silent for quite a while.
Before Nom broke it with, “If i were a bug, what bug do you think i’d be?” And for a moment Scott pondered. Swiftly moving past the initial joke thought of calling him a stink bug. He let it sit for a second purely to muse on the reaction it would get. Then he moved to thinking about it more considerably.
“Hm…” A hum escaped his pursed lips. “Maybe a ladybug or a grasshopper.”
“Huh,” Nom sounded in acknowledgement, face scrunched minorly in contemplation, his glasses made their way up his face.
“Or a scorpion if you’re feeling edgy.” Scott added absentmindedly, dropping another caterpillar into the box. They were starting to run out of space. There was only so many caterpillars that could fit, they were all wiggling about, probably more confused than either Scott or Nom had ever been in there lives.
They both stared into the box. “You think we got enough of em’?” Nom asked, pushing the lid from beneath the container.
“Yeah, i don’t think we’re gonna get anymore in there…” He watched him close the lid careful not to catch any part of any of the the various bugs in there. Scott, now very much freed from his absurd focus on ridding a flower bush of a bug infestation fished his phone out of his pocket, intending to find out the best place to put them. What he also saw was the time. The time that meant the class period had been going for about forty minutes. He sucked in a breath.
Nom looked up from the container, "Hm?”
“We’ve missed most of class… uh…” Scott turned the screen to face him.
“Oh!” Nom grimaced for a split second, expression smoothing out almost immediately, “Well, what are you gonna do? At this point we may as well just not go.” Scott had never really considered skipping class before, but he supposed if there was anyone that could get him to… that and the idea of trying to get into a class forty minutes into the lesson was actually horrifying to think about. “It’s basically over anyway.”
Scott inclined to agree said, “Yeah…”
“What now? “
Well Nom asked him a question so why not bring it back around, “What bug do you think i’d be?”
He watched his expression morph, mouth opening into a small ‘o’ shape as he thought. Like were going ’ooh!’ but without the noise. “Firefly.” Interesting.
“Oh, why?” Scott asked head tilted to the side, hanging just above his shoulder.
“Why am i a ladybug? or a grasshopper?” He asked back. Ah. There it was, the part where Scott now had to acknowledge the fact maybe he thought too hard about the bug question and should’ve picked the joke answer instead. This is one of those moments he wished he could go invisible. At least then he wouldn’t be able to see him if he admitted to something. Something that was… well.
How exactly was he supposed to go about this? He could just say the reasoning, hypothetically. In reality he’s pretty sure he’d somehow eat his own tongue and die. Very attractive. He could settle for a fake answer, he couldn’t lie to him though. Bad idea. Sort of mean too, really.
His mouth acted before he could second guess, “I like them. A lot.” Nailed it. “Probably my favourite bug.” Lovely.
“I’m your favourite bug?” Nom asked, a baffled and sort of playful tone.
Scott was entirely sure he hadn’t quite hit the mark, he’d probably figure out the energy behind that later and then it’d be awkward or something. Better to get it over with. “Yep. You’re my favourite bug and i like you.” He could feel the heat creeping up the back of his neck. There was something deeply embarrassing about this. Probably because it was really dumb!
There was a sort of painful moment where they stared at each other. Watching it occur to Nom that it was meant a certain way was… potentially worse than saying it in the first place. Like sure, he didn’t think he’d take it badly by any means but even if he was nice about it it’d still make things weird for a while.
“Oh. Oh! Wait— like…” He made a vague gesture with his hands, a few caterpillars rattled about in the jostled container. His eyes flicked sheepishly to them for half a second and then back to Scott. “That?”
“Yes.” Scott breathed out shortly.
“Gay?” Nom asked, smart.
“Very gay.” He replied with a nod. Scott watched his face tint pink.
He looked at the wall with a cough, “Cool. Awesome.” What even— “Well uh, i like fireflies too. Favourite bug for sure.” Oh.
“Oh, good, i mean nice. That’s… yes.” Scott said, definitely able to string together a coherent sentence. He was perfectly fine. If anything he was excellent. “You wanna go sit in a corner for a while and… re… recuperate?”
“Yeah,” Nom’s eyes cast around the corner of the building, free hand fidgeting with one of the charms attached to his bag. The ones closest clinking softly. “Should probably figure out what to do with all these guys too.” He raised the caterpillar box up a fraction.
He nodded, “I’ll look it up.”
They both trailed around the corner of the building, hidden in a definitely out of bound alleyway between the building and the wall of the school. Even with the interesting energy between them they still managed to sit as physically close together as possible in the shade. Shoulder to shoulder. Scott searching up what to do with caterpillars, without killing them. Free hand settled on the concrete between them.
Nom despite his definite interest in these caterpillars right now noticed his free hand in the corner of his vision. His eyes didn’t move from the container, settling on the small hole in one of the corners. His own free hand however, scooted towards Scott’s and sort of tentatively linked fingers. He waited. His patience was rewarded by a very gentle squeeze.