Chapter Text
The bus smelled like wet jackets, chips, and those weird rubber seats.
Fabian was sitting by the window, watching the town disappear behind them.
Three days.
That was how long they were going to be at the campsite.
Three whole days without homework. Three days away from parents. Three days in the mountains.
Everyone seemed pretty excited.
Everyone except Jarin.
He was sitting across the aisle with a book open on his lap.
Fabian had known him for almost two years, so he knew Jarin wasn't actually reading.
He'd been staring at the same page for like fifteen minutes.
Fabian leaned over. "You're not reading."
Jarin looked up. "I am."
"You've been on that page since we left school."
"It's a really good page."
Fabian laughed.
Jarin smiled.
And, for some reason, Fabian immediately looked away.
That smile was becoming a problem.
Not because there was anything wrong with it.
It was just... he liked it way too much.
They'd been friends for almost two years. Best friends, probably.
But lately, things felt different.
Whenever Jarin laughed, Fabian got this weird feeling in his chest.
Whenever Jarin accidentally touched his arm, Fabian would think about it for the rest of the day.
And recently, he'd started noticing Jarin looking at him differently too.
Neither of them talked about it. They couldn't.
Not here.
Not in their town.
People weren't exactly nice about stuff like that.
They'd both heard the jokes at school. The comments. The slurs people said when teachers weren't around.
Neither of them wanted to become the next person everyone talked about.
So they pretended everything was normal.
At least for now.