Bold- Cyrus
Italics- TJ

It is currently a beautiful Monday morning, a nice breeze, a blue sky, and a Buffy banging on my door. And I know what she's pissed about. I was supposed to meet her at the Spoon. I can't tell her I was hanging out with TJ. She would kill me then TJ. I hurriedly slipped on my shoes and stepped outside

"So is there a reason why you missed our Sunday Spoon Days." Her arms were crossed and she had a resting bitch face on. She's mad.

"I- uh- I had a family event." She didn't look like she believed me. "I forgot to call, I'm really sorry." Her arms dropped and she sighed.

"It's fine, let's just get to school." She grabbed my hand and pulled me off my porch. "What type of family even was it?"

"U-uh a family game night, anyways, did anything happen yesterday I don't know about?" She nodded her head excitedly, her face turning from tense to smiley in a second.

"Yeah, but it's not my place to tell. You're going to figure it out when we get to school." She started to sprint ahead, her bag hitting her back with every step. "Come on, we're gonna be late."

"Buffy, you know I don't run!"

🌼—🌸—🌼

"And she took me to this beautiful field and told me that I was amazing, and then she asked me out." All of us looked at Andi with shock. It's not that we don't think that she's get a girlfriend, but it was shock that it happened this quick. I mean, they just reconnected two days ago.

"Where are you guys going?"

"Amber said it was a surprise." Andi's face was completely red as she was explaining the story of how Amber asked her out. Her eyes were big and sparkly, she really does like her.

"Cyrus owes me ten dollars." I groaned really loud which caught attention from quite a few of our classmates. I could feel blood rushing through my face. My head fell into my book with a loud slam.

We are currently in Free Period which I love because our teacher doesn't care what we do. He isn't like the math teacher that if you're in her Free Period, you're doing math work the whole time. You're not even allowed to do other homework until all your math work is done. And Free Period is on thirty minutes long.

"I'll get you the money soon." My words were muffled by the pages of my history notebook. I wear studying for my huge history test but I got really distracted by Ambi. That's the ship name do Amber and Andi that Buffy and I made up on our way to Free Period. I get distracted easily. I will go from talking about one thing then I will talk about something else that relates to the first subject but barely relates to it anyways. Uh... never mind.

Soon, the bell goes off signaling we have to go to fourth. Me, being the LUCKIEST person, have to go to math without any of the ghc. At least I have TJ... who probably won't talk to me because he never talks to anyone.

"See ya later CyGuy." Jonah waves to me when the whole group splits in the hallways. I wave back with a smile but when I turn around, my head goes down.

It's so crazy that one day, you'll like someone then the next day, it's like they're a complete stranger. And it doesn't happen over night, it's just always been there and you never knew about it. With Iris, I knew the moment I kissed her. With Jonah, it just happened. My heart stopped beating, my blush knew how to control itself.

Before I know it, I arrived at math class. Since the late bell didn't ring yet, the class was going insane. Kids were sitting on the desks, talking to their friends. And it was so freaking loud. Eventually, it calmed down and all the kids took their seats. TJ already had his head down before our teacher handed back our test.

She gave every student in my row there papers with it facing up, the grade visible to every eye. But TJ's paper was folded and tucked under his arm. TJ didn't even budge, this is always how he got his math tests. He pays attention during class but he avoids attention when tests comes around.

"Ok, let's start on two step inequalities." I was going to open my notebook when my eye caught a pink post-it not on my notebook.

hi :)

I look at TJ. He was writing down notes and he had the tiniest smirk on his face.

yo nssbg

I hear him stifle a chuckle once he sees my response.

this class is boring and meaningless

Classic saying. Math isn't that meaningless, but it is extremely boring. I study enough to get a passing grade but that doesn't mean I'm the best at it.

whatever you say. did you get any sleep?

He shook his head and responded.

i didn't, i was up all night doing math homework

it was half a page of one step equations

doesn't mean it doesn't take a long time

so off the topic from math, how has life been since the last time i saw you

you know, a lot has changed in the hours i've been away, i got married, had two kids and died

He now had a huge smile on his face. His notebook was completely filled with doodles and the notes that were on the board. But none of the example equations were written on his paper.

you're such a dork

and you're not?

I rolled my eyes and giggled. The post-it note was now filled up so I reached into my pencil case and grabbed a green post-it note.

anyways, i wanted to ask, do you want to go to the spoon today

im there underdog

"TJ Kippen, pay attention." TJ sighed and slumped in his seat. "And I need to speak to you after class." After that, he stopped passing back the post-it note. But he still had a smile on his face, and it looked genuine.

-

"I'm happy you invited me, Amber is having a sleepover with Andi and I didn't want to be there." I giggled sat down at a booth. He sat in front of me and took off his hoodie.

"Andi is probably going to be over there a lot now that they're dating."

"Yeah, I'm happy for them. They're a cute couple." And soon enough, a certain pink haired waitress comes up to our table.

"Hey TJ, and hello guy that was here a couple days ago."

"I'm Cyrus." She giggles and holds out her hand.

"Nice to meet ya Cyrus." I shook her hand. "Now do you want the usual?" She turned to TJ.

"Of course." He turns to me and smiles. "What do you want?"

"Baby taters..."

"And a vanilla milkshake. Thank you." She walls away with a slight smile. Seriously though, her hair looks extremely soft.

"Anyways, I know you told me the reason you were tired in math class, do you need help with your homework?" He shook his head and his face softened.

"I'm good but thanks. Like I said, I got stuff."

"Do you want to talk about it?" He shook his head once again. "Anything else interesting happen lately?"

"Not really. Kira has been trying to get me to go to this college party with Reed and Lester but I really don't want to go."

"Then you don't have to, just tell her no."

"The thing about Kira is, she doesn't take no for an answer." Then CJ returned with our order.

"Two baby taters, and two vanilla milkshakes." Huh, TJ and I have the same order. CJ placed the food down and put the check in the middle of the table.

"That would be ten dollars." TJ placed down the money before I could even say anything and CJ took the check.

"She shouldn't drag you around like that." He waved it off like it wasn't a big deal. A girlfriend should respect her significant other opinions, and the other way around. Your significant other should respect decisions you make unless it's a really bad decision. "I'm serious TJ, you should be able to do what you want to do."

"I might just lie and say I'm sick."

"Or you should tell her the truth, don't be afraid to actually tell her you don't want to do something. She should trust you to make your own opinions, and you should trust her to respect what you tell her."

"It's not a big deal, it's a tiny lie. I won't go to jail." He takes the cherry off the top of the milkshake and bites the top off.

"I'm just saying, when you truly like someone, you will listen to what they say to you." I take my cherry off and put it on top of his milkshake. "I don't like cherries."

"More for me then."

"Technically there's only one for you at the moment."

"Stop going all technical on me, Underdog." He chuckled. I stuck my tongue out at him.

"It's the truth." The whole time was spent making stupid jokes and talking about weird childhood memories. It feels nice to make friends outside of the GHC. I love them, it's just nice to be out there a bit more.

Now TJ and I were walking home. We were really close. Like, our shoulders were touching. Our hands occasionally hit each other, which actually felt really nice. I'm never this close with people, and if I am, it's really uncomfortable. But I don't even know how this happened, we were just walking and we got closer to each other.

"Cy." TJ has stopped walking now. We were in front of his house, and there was a nice sunset. "I need to tell you something."

"What's up? Are you ok?"

"M-my brain, it doesn't work like others." I furrowed my eyebrows. "I-I... I have this sort of math dyslexia. I can read perfectly fine but my brain, i-it mixes up numbers."

"You have dyscalculia." He looked at his shuffling feet.

"Yeah." I walked closer to him and put my hand on his shoulder.

"Do you need a tutor?"

"What I need is a different brain." He mumbles.

"Hey." He looked up at me, and looked me right in the eyes. "There's nothing wrong with you." His shoulder relaxed a bit and so did his facial features. Now he was just looking at me, and the softness on his face was obvious. "Thanks for telling me."

"I trust you." He walked up to his front door. "How about a tutor session every Monday at my place?" I smiled and nodded my head.

"I'm there." And while he was walking in the house, TJ looked at me once more before going in.