As Callum walked home with his friend, he took a moment to admire her outfit today. The skinny jeans and t shirt accentuated her figure. He was enjoying the view. Until she turned around. She blushed slightly, and slapped his arm saying, "Is mah hair frizzy still? "Nah, you just have a massive caterpillar crawling down your shirt.", he replied. Rayla jumped, giving a slight squeal.

          She had been afraid of caterpillars ever since Aaravos, her boss at work, had tried to put one in a customer's food as a joke. He was fired shortly after the incident. It wasn't as bad as her fear of water, but it was funny seeing her jump. Rayla glared at him, saying, "Do ye want to have yer crease kicked again, like on th' first day of school?" He flinched, remembering the misunderstanding involving underwear, many kicks, the principal's office, and locker rooms. That was a painful memory, quite literally.

          Now back to the fact that he was staring up his friend. Yeah. He was 15, and in the middle of puberty. That's good enough reasoning. He liked her a lot. Rayla did track and field, and parkour on the side, and was fit as a fiddle. Not to mention being trained in martial arts by her adoptive parents. She was badass in every way. Not to mention her fired up, sarcastic personality. Her accent just made it more cute.

"What are ye blushin' for?", she said curiously

"Oh, uh, nothing. I was just thinking", he replied

"Thinkin' about Claudia?", she said, grinning wickedly

He froze and coughed loudly. Claudia. She was cool, sure, and he did have a crush on her at one point, but not at the moment. "No, I wasn't. I was thinking about, the uh, chemistry homework.

"Callum, we don' take chemistry."

"Oh"

"Hey, twinkle toes, what's on your mind?", she said in a worried tone

"I just- I really-"

"Really what?", Runaan, said, rounding the corner and giving him a death glare.

          "I REALLY GOTTA GO HOME BYE SO MUCH WORK TO DO-", Callum said quickly. He ran down the road with his face bright red in fear and embarrassment. Runaan hated him. It was a racial prejudice of course, but he wasn't coming around any time soon. Oh no, Runaan would hunt him till the end of time if Rayla didn't stop him. He could hear Rayla calling out, but he kept going. Callum dashed in the front door, grabbed a jelly tart off of Ezran's plate, and ran up to his room,  locking the door behind him.  He collapsed on his bed.

          He heard something move. Callum jumped up. Ezran was crawling out of the air vent with a butcher knife in hand. "Bitch don't take my jelly tarts.", he said. Ezran pointed it at him, charged, and snatched the delicious treat from his hand before smoothly sliding back in the vent and locking the grate shut behind him. Callum stood there in shock, hand still clenching around a nonexistent treat. His mind wandered, he imagined his hand clutched around Rayla's luscious be-. NOPE. Stop being so thirsty Callum.

          He walked over to his desk and started his homework. Math wasn't that hard, but took him an hour. His che- physics homework was definitely weird today. Callum got a feeling that he was being watched. Harrow was standing in the doorway. "Dinner's ready"

          He got up and walked down the stairs. Dinner was quiet, it always was. Ezran began a steady conversation with his father, talking about his day at school, and Bait. Nobody said anything much anymore. Harrow was stressed out.

          There were racist bigots insulting elves, riots had begun. His step father was the middle man. The only person that kept the family's energy up was Ezran. His brother was a big ray of sunshine, after a cloudy day. Except for Rayla, he didn't have friends. He was a lonely idiot. There wasn't anything on TV, so he sat down, and drew. He needed to think about something else. He worked and worked, and then he finally got out of his chair, stretched, and looked at his handiwork. It was a figure in several different poses, so he could use it for reference.

         Ezran walked in, probably to borrow his Xbox to play some Minecraft with his friend Ellis. His little brother walked over, and looked down at his desk, and his cocoa face broke into a smug grin. Callum looked at him, befuddled at the smugness emanating from him.

"Hey Callum, what'd you draw?", Ezran said

"Oh, it's a pose guide, so I can copy things over easier", he replied

Ezran looked at him with absolute bewilderment. "Take another look at what you drew big bro, "

Callum rolled his eyes, "What are you talking abou-".

He looked again. He had drawn Rayla, all over the paper. In every pose, it was one of her outfits. In every figure, it was her smile, face, and horns, her a-. NOPE. Bad Callum. It was getting worse and worse. Ezran sat down one one of his bean bags and turned on the Xbox, and the calming music soon filled the room. Ezran laughed at something Ellis said. Slowly, it faded into background, as he fell asleep, and dreamed about chemistry. Yep, chemistry, not anything else.