"So, what'd you and Josh get to after I left?"

Tyler shrugged, tapping his pencil against his notebook as he leaned back against the wall. "Not much, really," he answered, stretching a bit. "We watched some more vine videos and then fell asleep. He left before I woke up."

Brendon laughed good naturedly as he turned completely sideways to face his friend. "Not so fun being on the receiving end of that action, is it?"

The brunette let out a soft laugh through his nose. "Shut up, you troll," he said, throwing a piece of torn paper at him. The two were currently sitting in their free period of the day, occupying the corner behind the two desks in the back of the room while the other seven people in his free period were strewn across the floor in the front as they gossiped with the teacher. Everyone in the school had an assigned free period classroom, and everyone had different free periods based on what extracurriculars they were or weren't taking. The two boys had athletics first period and band fifth period, so that landed their free period right before lunch.

Just as they were about to continue speaking, there was a knock on the door and in came their Vice Principal with Josh in tow behind him. "Sorry to interrupt," he said to Miss Brown, "this is Joshua Dun, this is where he's supposed to take his free period."

"Not a problem, Mr. Marnier," she answered, happily waving as the man left Josh standing at the front of the room. "So, Josh, this is your free period room. I don't care if you're on your phone, just put it up if someone comes in, and please don't be loud and disrespectful. Do you know anyone here?"

"Uh," Josh started, trailing off as he looked around before spotting two hands shoot up behind the desks in the corner. He immediately smiled and pointed to the two boys, nodding at Miss Brown. "Yeah, I'm good."

She nodded, going back to talking to the girls in the floor as Josh walked over to Brendon and Tyler. "Hey guys," he said as he plopped down on the floor next to them.

"What's up, J," Brendon said with a fist bump as the boy sat down. "We were just talking about you."

Josh raised an eyebrow, looking over to Tyler who was rolling his eyes. "Oh yeah? What about me?" He leant in, poorly whispering to the brunette through a smirk, "Is it about what your mom said?"

Brendon's attention immediately shifted to Tyler as he gave him a wide grin. "He met your mom? Oh my god, what happened?"

Tyler rolled his eyes again as he blushed gently. "My mom caught him trying to sneak out of my room so he didn't wake me up."

"Awe, how sweet," Brendon said, fawning dramatically.

"That's not what I was talking about, and you know it," Josh said, pointing at Tyler with a mischievous glint in his eyes.

Brendon let out a laugh. "Oh god, what happened?"

Josh smirked, not looking away from the blushing brown eyed boy. "His mom thought we were sleeping together."

Brendon immediately sputtered out a laugh before burying his face in his arms as Tyler covered his face. "I hate both of you," he mumbled behind his hands. "This is bullying."

"God, Ty," Brendon said, shaking his head, "I can't believe your mom is so used to you sleeping around that she just assumes anyone who comes out of your room has had sex with you."

Josh smiled at the younger boy, cocking his head to the side. "How many people have you slept with?"

Tyler blushed again, shrugging his shoulders as he looked down at his lap. "I don't really keep count," he said. "I know it's more than ten, though."

"Definitely more than ten."

Tyler sent a swift kick to his friend's leg, making him groan in pain. Josh took the information in, nodding gently. "Okay."

"Does that bother you?" Tyler asked gently.

Josh shook his head, slinging an arm over his friend's shoulder. "Not at all," he said with a smile. "Although," he continued, "now I'm curious what all the fuss is about, so I might be next."

That caused the three of them to let out loud laughs, shoving each other as they did, causing the rest of the class to look their way amusedly before going back to themselves. "Seriously, Ty," Josh said, "I don't give a shit how many people you've slept with. You use protection, right?"

Tyler nodded. "Yeah, always."

"You don't make people do something they don't want to do, right?"

The brunette adamantly shook his head. "No, of course not."

"And you don't let anyone make you do anything you don't want to do, correct?"

He shook his head again. "No."

Josh shrugged with a smile. "Then who cares? As long as everything you do is consensual between you and whoever you decide to be with and you're being safe, what does it matter how many people you sleep with?"

Tyler smiled gently, laying his head against his friend's shoulder.

Brendon was smiling too, both in adoration of how understanding Josh is and how happy his friend looks. "I like you, Dun," he said. "I think we're gonna keep you around."

Josh nodded, leaning back against the wall and closing his eyes. "Good."

-

After school, Brendon and Tyler were over at Tyler's, lying together in his bed as they passed a joint back and forth and talked shit over videos they were watching. Before too long, a notification popped up on Tyler's phone with a message from Josh.

josh dun👽: hey, wanna come hang out? i have to watch my little sister while my mom's at work and jordan is at soccer practice, but i wanna hang out with you 😩

Tyler laughed under his breath as he took a hit off the joint and passed it back to Brendon before typing out a reply.

yeah, i'd love to. is it cool if bren comes?

josh dun👽: yeah, of course!

"Bren," he said, "wanna go over to Josh's? He just invited us over."

Brendon looked at the time, seeing it was a little past four and he shook his head. "Nah, I'm gonna go hang out at Dallon's before I gotta head back home. Rain check?"

Tyler nodded, sitting up and putting his shoes on. "Yeah, no problem."

"I'll take you over there, though," the raven haired man added. "I don't know where he lives, but I don't want you walking either."

"Thanks man," he said, sending a message to Josh that it was just gonna be him.

The two boys climbed into Brendon's car, each lighting a cigarette as they drove off. Tyler gave Brendon the directions, and as they started toward their destination, Tyler looked at his friend seriously. "So what's going on with you and Dal? You've been making sure you make time for him almost every day, and I know y'all aren't as close as you are with me. What's up?"

Brendon sighs, shaking his head gently as he blows smoke out of the window. "I think I really like him," he said, "but I don't want to ask him out, so I'm just trying to spend as much time with him as I can."

Tyler looked confused. "Why don't you want to ask him out? Y'all would be great together!"

Brendon sighed again, sadly this time. "Yeah, I thought so too, until somebody asked if we were dating, and he very seriously laughed it off and denied it. Like, man, all I want is to be around him and hold his hand and kiss his stupid face, but it seems like he doesn't want that with me."

"Well," Tyler said softly, thinking over his words, "have you talked to him about it at all?"

The raven haired man scoffed. "Yeah, right," he answered. "It was bad enough hearing him laugh off the idea of us dating, but I think having him shoot me down to my face would hurt even worse."

Tyler nodded, but also rolled his eyes. "That's a risk you're gonna need to take, Bren," he said. "Even if he doesn't want to date you - and that's a big if - that doesn't mean you have to stop being his friend. You know Dallon, he doesn't hook up with just anyone, and he wouldn't have hooked up with you if you didn't mean something to him." Before his friend could answer, they were pulling up in front of Josh's house and Tyler was unbuckling his seatbelt and stubbing his cigarette out in the ashtray. "Just think about it, yeah? You might be pleasantly surprised by what could happen."

Brendon hugged out a soft laugh as he dabbed up his friend. "Go have fun," he said with a smile. "I'll be by to pick you up in the morning."

"Have fun at Dallon's," Tyler shot back as his friend drove away. "Make good choices!" He laughed out loud as he saw he was being flipped off through the window, and turned to make the trek up Josh's sidewalk. Letting out a breath, he knocked on the door and stood rocking on the balls of his feet as he heard footsteps on the other side. As soon as the door was pulled open, he was met with a smiling Josh and a wave of mint filling his nose.

"Hey, Ty," the boy said softly. "Come on in!"