Sunday morning of his school’s football finals match, and Gabe Saporta was pumped. Mind bubbling with tactics, he shouted encouragingly at his teammates, who were looking at him eagerly. He had a dull worry at the back of his mind, like always, questioning his life and wellbeing.

Where am I going in life?

How am I going to get anywhere?

But distracting as they were, he would not let something like this get in the way of the big match. He had ages until he would actually have to deal with it, right? He naively thought that he would just party the whole of high school, and put off all his problems.

~

After half time, the team were winning the challenging match. 10 – 8, their way, and they were still working hard. Adrenaline pumped through their veins as the match continued. But despite the team’s compliments on his playing, he was not giving it his 100% efforts.

I’m going to go into a college focusing on sport, where I’m going to excel. Then, I’m going to join the national football team and become rich and famous. Then I don’t have to have one of those boring office jobs or anything and I’ll be able to party like always—shit, the ball’s coming. Focus!

He was not fully prepared for the opposition to come running, and tried to tackle him, but landed wrong. Feeling pain shoot through his ankle, he clutched it and figured he had just sprained it. He was appalled at how easily he could be taken out of the game, especially as he saw the tackled teen smirk smugly at him.

Soon enough, he managed to hobble to the sick bay, but found that the sick bay lady was already busy tending to someone else’s injuries. Letting out a sigh, he waited a moment until she noticed me, then leaned her head towards the door and calling out, “Hey, Will, can you just come over here for a sec?”

Blocking out his surroundings momentarily, he thought about the game, until he heard his name being called and looked up, faced with two brown eyes. ‘Must be that Will guy she just called over’ he thought, realising that he had just been asked something, and said, “Sorry, could you repeat that?”

Smiling politely, Will replied, “I was just making sure that your name was Gabe. So, what’s the problem?”

“If you’re a student, why’re you in the sick bay?” Gabe asked curiously, ignoring the question at hand.

“Uhh, well she just needed some assistance and asked me if I could help her out.” Will said nonchalantly and paused for a moment, then seriously asked, “Where are you hurting?”

“Ohh, just the ankle. I probably just sprained it or something, you know, nothing major,” Gabe said, motioning to the spot.

After a while he was treated, but they just kept on talking. As the conversation progressed, the popular fullback had noticed every difference between him and the straight-A’s student who, despite this, didn’t seem to care. He had all his goals set out, knew what he had to do to get there, and was already doing it. He was not good looking at first sight, but was great in his own way, and Gabe realised that he had never gone into this much detail before, and had no idea why he was now.

But he knew that he wanted to get to know this person much better, and without truly realising it, he had just begun a quest to change his life.

…

GABE’S POV.

I walked the path down to McDonalds shop right at the end of the street, eyes watering slightly in the cold, morning air. It was his weekend now, and I had nothing better to do and no one to cook for me this morning, so here I was. Okay, maybe I can just be pretty lazy sometimes – but that’s not the point. Walking through the doors of the infamous food chain, I took in a deep breath, taking long strides to the registers.

“Hi, what would you like?” The voice of one of the workers asked, and if I had really been 100% awake, I would’ve noticed that single voice instantly. But no, I had not gone ten minutes without yawning, and I was still looking through my wallet.

“Hey, can I please—uhhhh.” Upon pulling out a $10 note and looking up, my eyes caught those of Will, and all I could do was gape, mouth wide open, making rather blunt noises.

“Ohh hey, Gabe, was it?” Will smiled at me, making me just that little bit more stunned. I remember thinking to myself at the time, ‘Oh he remembers my name! But he wasn’t sure still… is it still a good thing? Ugh, he probably thinks you’re an idiot now.’

“Uhh. Hi… Will…” I had managed to say after regaining composure. Yeah, I was smooth. Real smooth.

“Yeah, nice to see you.” He said with a smile, slightly turning me to mush; but after a moment’s pause, he was all serious again and continued, “So, what was it you wanted?”

After I managed to order, I found myself wanting to talk to him more and more. So, well, I did. I can be pretty persistent when I want to, you know. “Uhh, so, what are you doing here?” I said, because I’m an idiot. But still a smooth idiot, nonetheless, right? Yeah… I wish.

“Working. And you?” He replied, with a bit of a chuckle. Obviously.

“Just… eating, you know.” I said, lamely. He laughed, which made me laugh – I couldn’t help it. And there it came. I got this gut feeling, a plan, and I just knew it was great. Like all my plans, you know? Anyway, I thought of this way to be with him more and get to know him and everything, and it was flawless. Genius. So, without thinking twice, I asked, “Hey Will, how can I get a job here?”

Well, okay, maybe it wasn’t quite genius. But… who cares?

…

“You did what? For who?!” My best friend, Brendon, exclaimed to me. “Wait, that means you’re gay, doesn’t it? Why didn’t you tell me!”

“…Oh, you’re right.” I hadn’t really thought of that side of it yet, it just felt sort of… right. Like when you just know it’s right.

“’Oh, you’re right’? Is that all you can say?” I was afraid that he would be mad at me for a moment, but then I saw him smile slightly. Anyway, he was Brendon, and Brendon was too nice to hold a grudge against someone.

“Well… you just have to help me out with this! I can’t mess it up!” And oh no, I know that face. It’s his ‘Ha HA, I’m planning something evil but also awesome and I’m not gonna tell you!’ face. But his plans are always pretty good, so I wasn’t worried or anything about it. It was my best friend, after all. “Bren, what are you thinking?”

“Nothing…” he replied with a smirk, dragging out the ‘n’ to make it sound even more suspicious. After a second he said, “I’m pretty sure you can talk to him, anyway. It can’t be that hard, can it? He did say ‘nice to see you’ and all that, so I’m sure that he wouldn’t mind talking to you.”

“Yeah, but… What if I creep him out or something! It’s not like I’ve ever acknowledged him before in class!”

“Now you’re being irrational. Gabe, I’m sure he won’t mind you talking to him. Seriously.”

“’Kaaaaay.” I wasn’t quite sure what to say, and whining wouldn’t solve the problem. So, I just waited until the end of lunch, watching the people around us. And oh, look, there was Will sitting at a table under a tree, talking to his friends.

Damn his friends, getting to talk to him. I watched him talk, which may have sounded a bit stalkerish[1], but, well… no one has to know.

Oh, and same with the weird fantasies that were playing in my mind, they probably weren’t necessary.

…

Walking into my maths class, I saw Will already sitting down. I decided to be bold – hey, I could be when I wanted to… Well, sort of – and I took a seat next to him, trying to smile at him. My face felt kind of cold, so I must’ve been blushing, but I just hoped that he hadn’t noticed. He just smiled at me and said hi, and just as I was about to say something to him, the teacher came in. Damn teacher, ruining my smooth conversation starter. But I digress.

You know when you can’t stop noticing and focusing on someone’s every move when you’re not meant to be? Yeah, it was like that with Will. The whole lesson. When there were finally five minutes of the lesson,  I sort of just couldn’t take it anymore, so I wrote a note to Will.

Hey! Ugh, maths is so boring! I gave the note to him, and he read it, then wrote his reply.

Well, I guess that’s just ‘cause you’re not very good at it. No offence. He smirked and passed it back to me. I wasn’t quite sure what to say, but I managed to get a response.

Well, yeah. I’m pretty bad. But that’s cuz I can never quite get what’s going on and I don’t really want to ask any of the teachers. Well, it was kind of true. But that’s because I sort of just couldn’t be bothered. And it’s not like I’m going to tell him that.

Well… why don’t I tutor you or something? I’ll talk to you about it later or something, I don’t want to miss anything. Well, that was unexpected. I think I might’ve given him the biggest and goofiest grin ever – I didn’t care, I was happy. Luckily, the bell went pretty much right then, so I just had to wait for him at the door.

“So, when’d you want to come over?” He asked me first, which I also wasn’t expecting. But at least it meant that he didn’t mind me or something, right?

“Oh… well I’m free pretty much every day.” I said after a moment of thought.

“So, today it is then. Meet me at the school gate, see you later!” He said with another of those smiles that made me melt inside, and I was glad that I had lunch next, so I could just tell Brendon all about it.

…

“See, I told you that you could talk to him!” Brendon said with a ‘well, obviously!’ look on his face. I was going to tell describe Will in even more detail, when the subject of our conversation decided to walk past where we were sitting.

“It’s Will!” I managed to shout out, meaning only to point out to Brendon, but catching his attention aswell.

“What? Oh, hey Gabe!” He realised who had called him and turned to me, who was frozen in place in my seat. Luckly, Brendon saw my awkward stance and took over.

“Hi, so you’re the Will that I’ve heard so much about!” He said with a smile, standing up and shaking his hand. Brendon has the best people skills ever, seriously. Okay, so maybe letting him talk wasn’t the best idea. Infact, it was terrible, and I was completely shocked. But I acted cool about it, ‘cause I’m Gabe Saporta, and I’m totally smooth.

“Uhhhhhhh. Noooooooo. What are you talking about?... Heh.” I said awkwardly, which was followed by a nervous laugh, and a long, awkward pause.

Yeah, so smooth… just not in this sort of situation.

Anyway, using his totally epic people skills, Brendon managed to save us from the awkwardness, saying, “So, I hear you’re gonna be giving Gabe some maths tutoring!”

“Oh, uh, yeah…” Will stood there awkwardly, not sure of what to say next. But after a couple of seconds he added, “I mean, just a bit to help his grades… you know.”

“Yeah, that’s great! He’s pretty bad at maths, though, so you’ll have to be really patient.” What? Me? I wasn’t that bad at maths… just not that good, either. But whatever.

They both turned around to see the indignant look on my face and laughed, and at that moment I decided they would make great friends. And the worst thing is, I felt jealous about it. But I shouldn’t have, what was wrong with me? But Brendon was obviously more worthy of his friendship than me, so I guess I couldn’t really complain. And he was smarter, too – Will probably liked smarter people, so he wouldn’t like me, anyway. I remember thinking at the time, “Is there really any point in trying?” but figured it was totally out of personality for me, and told myself to just stop it.  

…

“So, why can’t you add those?” Will asked, testing me after I had asked him about it not once, but a couple of times that afternoon.

“Because they’re not like terms. They can only be simplified by multiplication.” I recited after a moment, thoughtfully.

“Oh good, you’re learning!” Will smiled playfully, and I thought that even if it takes work, as long as he was proud, it was all worth it.

“Awesome.” I said, tiredly, caught up in the moment and not really reacting.

“Well, that’s enough for today and all. You wanna hang out or something?” And at that moment I figured I would be satisfied with friendship, if that’s all he wanted.

Oh well, I was persistent – I’d give it my best shot, and wouldn’t go down without a fight.

Well, okay, not a fight, but… just a good try, and then most likely a long sulk, knowing me.

…

“Gabe, I think we should really stop doing this.” Will told me one of those afternoons, and I felt like I had just been winded in the stomach. It had been weeks that we had gone to each other’s houses every couple of days, and now he just tells me this, totally out of the blue.

Or maybe it was just all my (possibly creepy) hints made at pretty much every chance I got. But I thought he was mostly oblivious, except for the times when he would blush slightly, pretending to not have noticed. I had figured out a lot about him in those couple of weeks. Hell, I even knew that a large proportion of his underwear was red. But, well, that's not the point.

“…What. Why?” Stunned, I watched him as he guiltily looked around the room.

“Umm… I can’t say.” He mumbled after a moment.

“…Why not?” I asked, dumbfounded, ignoring the way he twiddled his fingers together, not caring whether I was making him even more awkward or not.

“Because… I can’t do it.”

“Uhh…  you’re doing a great job, why can’t you continue?”

“…Because.” By this time, I had figured out that sure, he was confident and everything when having the usual, day-to-day conversation with him, but when he was awkward, you could really tell. And, for some reason, it affected me, too.

“Well, how about we just hang out, instead?”

“No, I can’t be with you anymore.” ‘Oh, it’s like being dumped, but before you’re even dating,’ I thought to myself.

“Uhh, why not?” I watched nervously as he carefully chose what to say, expecting an ‘I hate you’ or ‘you’re a jerk’, or something else equally bad, if not worse.

“Oh well, it won’t matter anyway, but I umm,” he paused and sighed, looking at his hands, then blurted out suddenly, “I think I really like you.”

I swear something exploded within me, and I felt a strange combination of excitement and disbelief, writhing in my stomach, and then only thing I could say was “Uhh, what?”

“Umm… bathroom.” He almost squeaked and ran away, but I caught his wrist and pulled him so that he was sitting on my lap. If people could die of embarrassment, he probably would’ve already.

“And what’s so bad about that?” I asked, trying to contain a smile.

He looked at me weirdly, but his face was overcome with a look of understanding. With a shy smile, he asked, “You don’t… hate me or something?”

“Course not.” I said, triumphantly, holding him closer. But then he freaked out slightly, surprising me.

“I can’t date you! Or anything! Like, how will I be able to concentrate on school and everything! And uhh. My grades will go down!” He spoke so quickly that I almost missed what he was saying.

“Oh, come on… I’m sure that you’ll be able to study by tutoring me, you know.” He thought about it for a second, then smiled approvingly at me. I never really thought of studying as a way to have a boyfriend, but then again, I hadn’t really thought that I would get a boyfriend, anyway.

“You know, I think that might just work” He mused happily, jubilant, and I couldn’t remember a time when something like this had seemed affect me so much. But he was happy, which was more important than anything, really.

We talked until later than evening, when I had to go home. Giving him a short kiss, I walked out of his house, walking for a minute, when I remembered to do something. Grabbing my mobile out of my pocket, I found my Brendon on my contact list and called him, waiting for him to pick up.

“Yo, Gabe, what’s up?” He finally answered, just before I unintentionally let out a giggle. Yeah, that’s right, I giggled. “Uhh?”

“Oh, my God. You will never guess what just happened!”