Somewhere in the darkness, someone was calling his name:

    "Mister Bautista. Mister Bautista."

    There was something uncomfortable about the way he slept, and he couldn't tell what it was exactly. All he knew for sure was he didn't want to wake up yet. Not now, please. Later. A chorus then started to echo in his headspace, something that sounded like a popular Green Day song, Wake me up when detention—

    "Mister Bautista, wake up. It's past twelve o'clock. Detention is over."

Damien's eyes flew open, and he sat up, his head spinning for a moment from the sudden rise. He glanced down, catching sight of a wet spot on his Math questionnaire, his answer sheet safe and dry underneath it. Then he looked up, his eyes meeting his Math teacher's bespectacled brown ones. Everyone else had left, save the both of them.

    Cheryl had left as well.

    Dang it.

"Good morning, Mister Bautista," said the teacher, a witty smile etched on his face. "Hope you had a good night's sleep."

Damien merely nodded. It was a strangely vivid dream—the good kind.

"Oh, hey, Damien!" said another voice. "You're up."

Damien darted his eyes over to the teacher's table, where a tall sophomore boy with messy brown hair was fixing some papers. "Max," Damien managed to say, "what are you doing here? You don't have detention." A pause, a sudden thought. "Do you?"

"Nah," said Max, setting a pile of papers down on the table. "Just spending some time with my dad. He told me he's substituting for Mister Grisham. So I asked if I could come over."

    Damien simply nodded.

The teacher's eyes flitted from one boy to the other. Then he said, "Mister Bautista, your questionnaire and answer sheet, please?"

Damien handed the papers over to him, without a word.

The teacher walked over to the teacher's table, sorted Damien's papers—the stapled set on one pile, a single sheet on the other. Then he looked up at his son, and said, "Max."

"Yeah, Dad?"

He lifted one of the piles, the one with less papers, placed it carefully into Max's hands. "Kindly bring these up to the faculty room. I'll follow with the other pile, after I talk to Mister Bautista here. Then we'll head over to The Raven's Nest for lunch with your mom and Brienne. All right?"

    Max nodded, glancing for a second at his friend who stood in the aisle, a bewildered expression on his face. He shifted his sights back to his father, and then said, "Yeah, sure." But there was a tinge in his voice, Damien noticed, that didn't sound sure—that sounded nervous.

    "Thanks, Max," said the Math teacher, patting his son on the shoulder.

    With that, Max exited the classroom, but not before shooting his friend a worried glance. Damien caught sight of it, though, but in a second of a heartbeat, he gave Max a reassuring look, telling him he'll be all right. Max understood.

    The teacher breathed in. "Mister Bautista," he said, gesturing that his student come closer.

    Damien obeyed, walking over to the teacher's table till he stood directly in front of Mr. Gascarth.

    A brief glance at the topmost sheet of the pile. "Damien, isn't it?"

    The brown-skinned boy nodded. "Yes."

    "You're friends with my boy, Max, aren't you?"

    Damien nodded again.

They ate lunch at the same table in the cafeteria every weekday, walked together to school in the morning with stories and jokes to tell, did strange dance-walks along the pavements just for the stupid fun of it, and, last night, played Paranoid Android—an acclaimed sci-fi dystopian video game, definitely worth the online hype—with the rest of their friends till the small hours of that morning. (Jack stopped playing at midnight, though; said he had basketball training at six in the morning. And Lyn declined the offer to join, despite Max's persistent messaging. She just didn't do video games, she said.) Heck, Damien found it surprising that Max managed to wake up before noon to meet up with his dad.

What more evidence did anyone need to prove that all five of them had become this close knit of friends over these past two weeks?

"You've been spending a lot of time with each other lately—you, him, and your other friends. That's what I observed," said Mister Gascarth. "Walking to school together. Eating lunch together. But I'm going to ask you one thing, Damien."

    Damien already knew, yet still he asked, "What is it, Mister Gascarth?"

    The teacher heaved a quiet sigh, looked Damien in the eye. "I've heard about you from the other teachers. You've got a reputation."

    "So you don't want me to be friends with Max anymore?"

    "No, no, that's not really what I'm getting at," said Mr. Gascarth, to Damien's surprise. "You can still be friends. But all I'm asking, Damien, is that you leave Max out of your mess. Don't drag him into it, please." A pause. "Your other friends were expelled. Those who caused a lot of headaches for Mister Grisham and the other teachers, as far as I've heard." He chuckled. Damien nodded in response. "This might be your chance to start over. My boy's a good kid—"

    "He is," interjected Damien, with a small smile. "Max is a funny kid. He talks a lot, laughs a lot. He's got a big heart."

    The teacher smiled fondly at his words. "Yeah, he is. And, yes, he does. Then there's Christopher, too," he went on, referring to Sander. "A bright academic scholar from a humble background. A smart kid from a lower middle class family vying for valedictorian and a scholarship for college. The teachers like him. So it was really a surprise when you two started eating at the same lunch table." Another pause, as if he was trying to remember something—or someone. "And there's Miss Taraschi as well," said Mister Gascarth, remembering the mouthful of a surname. "All of us teachers agree: she's a quiet kid, so quiet none of us noticed her at first. Then the papers and tests started filing in, and we noticed—she's a standout, academically."

    Damien chuckled quietly to himself. Mister Gascarth talks a lot, like Max.

    "And I'm telling you, Damien," Mister Gascarth was saying, "you aren't bad yourself. Miss Taraschi and Miss McKenna do well in my class, but I'm being honest here, Damien, you actually do better than they do."

    Damien shrugged. "Math's just my thing, Mister Gascarth." Always has been.

Mr. Gascarth nodded. "The point is, it isn't too late to change for the better. And I'm not just saying this as your teacher but as a father to a teenage son as well."

Damien nodded, his eyes now fixed on his sneakers. He didn't want to show it, and he was good at hiding things like this, but there was a familiar pain in his chest, the emotional kind. "Max is lucky to have you, Mister Gascarth," he managed to say.

Mr. Gascarth sensed something wasn't right, and Damien noticed, reading the expression on his teacher's face. A father's instinct, perhaps. The teacher opened his mouth to speak, maybe to ask, maybe to say some sort of encouragement. But Damien never knew, and he would never know, because Max showed up that moment right outside the door and said, "Dad, Mom says we better hurry up. They're waiting for us in The Raven's Nest."

Mr. Gascarth quickly turned his attention to the papers on the desk, lifted the pile up, and said, "Tell your mom we'll be there in a while. I'll put these in the faculty room, and run back down." Momentary silence, a sudden thought. "Or you can head over to The Raven's Nest right now. It isn't very far. Tell your mom I'll catch up. It'll just be a little while, I promise."

"Yeah. Sure, Dad," said Max. Then his eyes glanced down to the papers in his dad's arms. "But don't you need help with those papers? Your back isn't getting any better with age, you know."

Mr. Gascarth laughed. "It's all right. This isn't much. Just go ahead. We wouldn't want Mom worrying, would we?" he said, with a knowing smile. Then he turned back to Damien, and whispered, "Remember what I told you." And with that, he made his way to the door and out, leaving Max and Damien to exchange puzzled looks for a moment before getting a move on.

    "So," said Max, as they stepped out the front doors of the academic building.

    "So?" asked Damien.

"What'd he tell you?"

    They moved down the steps, onto the concrete walkway.

    "Nothing bad," said Damien. "He didn't tell me off. Not really." He glanced sidewise at his friend. "Your dad knows I've got a reputation. The other teachers told him. He told me to keep you out of my mess."

    "But this mess we're in," said Max, as they walked down the pavement, "it's different. You didn't cause this. It's not your fault. None of us wanted this. Besides, I was involved in all this way before I met you."

    Damien chuckled. "Try telling that to your dad."

    Max shook his head. "You said it yourself, no one's going to believe us."

    "Yeah. No—"

    "He's Mister Lonely," someone sang, a bit off-tune.

    Damien and Max halted in their tracks, their eyes flitting over to the left. A group of boys were crossing the road, walking over to where they stood.

"He has nobody," sang another, "for his own." The boys came to a halt before Damien and Max, and one of them did an obnoxious mock sob, wailing like an overgrown infant. The others erupted in derisive laughter.

    "Bautista," a new voice called out. A tall boy with dark hair and sharp, angular features stepped forward, to the front of the group. There was a bandage over the bridge of his nose, and, unlike his posse, he wore a button-up shirt and a pair of dark wash jeans, the kind of clothes never suitable for football practice. "How's it going?" He held a hand out, rested it on Damien's shoulder. "I'm so sorry to hear about your friends. And your girlfriend. Must suck to be you."

    Some of Ronny's friends sniggered behind him.

    Damien realized then that he hadn't seen any of them in detention. They were at the party, yes. But detention—he would've noticed Ronny straight away, or any of his posse, he was sure of that. As far as he can recall, nada—none of them were there.

For a moment, he wondered. If they weren't in detention, Damien thought, that meant the police didn't arrest them, and that only meant they weren't—

    Then it made sense.

    "It was you, wasn't it?" asked Max, the very same words running through Damien's mind. "You called the police."

Ronny removed his hand off Damien's shoulder, placed it on his chest. "Are you accusing me?" he said, feigning a mingle of surprise and hurt.

Damien's hand clenched into a fist. "He isn't just making an accusation, Bowers. He's stating a fact."

A smug smile appeared on Ronny's lips, and he stepped closer, stooping down a little to look Damien in the eye. Prove it, he dared.

Damien said nothing, and he didn't need to, because just then one of Ronny's friends announced, "Teacher incoming. Let's go."

All eyes glanced over to Mr. Gascarth walking in their direction. And just like that, Ronny and his gang ran across the road, straight to the school's athletic building that housed the indoor basketball court and varsity locker rooms.

    Mr. Gascarth paused in his steps, his eyes following the group of football players as they darted into the double doors. Of to practice, a probable explanation. But Damien and Max could see the bewildered expression on the teacher's face, before he shifted his sights over to his son and his friend and jogged over to where they stood.

    "Are you all right?" asked Mr. Gascarth, the second he approached them.

    "Dad, we're—"

    "Were they bullying you?" said Mr. Gascarth, his tone grave. He pointed a finger in the direction Ronny and his gang had sped off to. "They wouldn't be running like that at the sight of a teacher if they weren't doing anything wrong."

    "Dad, we're okay," Max assured him.

    "But still," said Mr. Gascarth. "Max, tell me the truth. Were they bullying you?"

    Max opened his mouth to speak.

    "They weren't bullying Max, Mister Gascarth," said Damien, before Max could say another word. "They were after me."

    Mr. Gascarth took a deep breath, shook his head.

    Max recognized the disapproving look on his face. "Damien didn't do anything wrong, Dad. He actually did something right. They were bullying one of our friends, Sander—"

    "Sander?"

    "Christopher," clarified Damien.

    "They were bullying Christopher, but he stopped them, and that humiliated them. That's why they're after him, Dad, because he did something right."

    "Still," said Mr. Gascarth, his eyes on both boys now. "The next time those boys bully either of you, or any of your other friends, let me know, okay? Promise me that." He exhaled a breath. "Kids like them won't listen to other kids their age who go against them, even if they're doing the right thing. You might need an adult with authority to take care of this.

    "Now," said the teacher, shifting his attention to Max, a gentle smile appearing on his face. "We better get going. Mom and Brienne are waiting for us. And Damien," he said, turning to the stocky, brown-skinned boy. "Would you want to join us for lunch?"

"I, uh—"

An arm draped around Damien's shoulders. "I think that's a good idea," said Max, smiling. "Thanks, Dad." He looked at Damien, who, in turn, looked back at him with a bewildered expression. "C'mon, this is a chance for my family to get to know you—you you, and not the bad kid all the other adults make you out to be."

Damien scratched the bridge of his nose. A moment of thought, then he decided. "Yeah, sure," he muttered.

"Then let's get going," said Mr. Gascarth, taking his steps forward. "They're waiting for us."

Lunch out with the Gascarths was just as Damien expected—a wholesome, normal family event. And that's precisely what sucked about it—it reminded him of how his family used to be, now some faded dream at the back of his mind. He couldn't deny that watching them—their conversations, the smiles on their faces, the laughs they shared at Mr. Gascarth's dad jokes, saying grace as a family, Max and his little sister's banter—made him jealous. They would include him in their conversations, ask him questions that didn't regard his reputation as the school troublemaker. He wasn't left out, and they never made him feel like some ghost or an unseen stranger that just sat amongst them, and that was a good thing. But still.

If only his dad hadn't—

"Hey, bruh. You all right, man?"

    Damien blinked, rubbed the sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand. He glanced to his left, catching sight of the expectant look on Jack's face. Damien nodded in response. "Long walk," he said. "Man, I'm out of shape."

    Jack chuckled. Although drops of sweat ran down his temple, he didn't seem tired.

    "Athlete," scoffed Damien.

    Jack laughed. "Yeah, boy!"

    They—Damien, Jack, Sander, Max, and Lyn—were hiking up a trail in the forest, and it's been almost twenty minutes since they met up outside the boys' dormitory. Sander walked ahead of them, holding a map out before him, something the group entrusted to him for safekeeping. ("Was your idea in the first place," Damien had reasoned, during the previous Saturday afternoon in Mr. Brighteyes's cabin. And everyone else agreed.)

    Lyn glanced at her watch—a little half past one. She let out a sigh, looked up through the spaces between the foliage, at the expanse above them. The noonday sun hung high above them, caressing everything it touched in its light and warmth, drawing beads of sweat from their skin.

    "How far more till we get there?" asked Max.

    "We're close," said Sander, "I think."

Damien chuckled. "You don't sound so sure."

    Sander glanced back at Damien and the cheeky grin plastered on his friend's brown face. Then he said, "Looking at the map and recalling how long it took us to get there the last time, I think we're close."

"Guess so," muttered Lyn, noticing how the trees had thickened around them as the minutes slipped past.

"This way," announced Sander, as they came to a fork in the path. "Left. Once we turn here, all we've got to do is walk straight ahead, then I'm guessing in five minutes, more or less, we'll be there."

The second they came into the clearing, the cabin coming to full view, Max sprinted past everyone toward the facade, up the steps, onto the front porch. Then, eyes cast down, he began his search, studying the floorboards, doing some sort of tap dance in front of the door.

"You seem excited," remarked Lyn, brushing a stray strand of raven hair off her face, as she and the others came under the shade.

Max looked up at them, flailed his arms over a specific space on the floor. "Help me!"

Jack screwed up his face, lost. "Help you what?"

Max straightened up, hands held out. "You remember that time Mister Brighteyes first brought us here, and last Saturday after breakfast at The Raven's Nest?"

"Yeah."

Damien, Sander, and Lyn simply stared at him.

"Yeah, so, if any of you noticed, he just taps his foot down somewhere here"—Max gestured to the floor beneath his feet, right in front of the door—"then the door just swings open."

Sander blinked, understanding what his friend was getting at. "So you're trying to open the door?"

"Yes!"

"We could just walk over to the door, push it open."

"C'mon, Lyn. Where's the fun in that? Dudes?"

Damien shrugged, walked over to Max. Jack, Sander, and Lyn followed.

For a moment, five of them stood in a circle, ten eyes staring down at the floor.

"Pretty sure it's somewhere here," Max muttered.

Jack shook his head. "Bruh, I see nothing."

"Okay, what if we spread out a bit?" suggested Max. "Widen this circle?" he added, his hands waving out in front of him.

They all moved back a few paces, then resumed to studying the lines and marks and flaws of the floorboards.

Sander checked his watch. A little less than twenty minutes before two. "See anything yet?"

Damien shook his head. "Nada."

Lyn heaved an exasperated sigh.

"Mister Brighteyes probably made sure that it's well-hidden," said Sander. "With those bad guys out there, he should have."

Damien smiled. "So there's only one way to find out." And with that, he began stomping his foot down on the wood, a dirt-stained Stan Smith sneaker pounding the floor in varying directions.

And everyone else followed. A cacophony of beats echoed around them, disrupting the tranquil air of the forest.

Unbeknownst to them, two people stood by the steps to the porch, watching.

"So," said one of the men. His skin was brown, and his hair was dark with strands of silver peeking through; his face bore a perpetual austerity. His eyes flitted from one youth to the other. "These children are the ones our people have been hoping for."

Mr. Brighteyes chuckled. "Do they amuse you?"

"They are prancing around like fools."

Mr. Brighteyes turned his sights to the man beside him. "You do trust me, don't you?"

The brown man could only heave a sigh.