Keep It Secret, Keeps Us Safe

Thursday Morning, March 17, 2011

Alex fixes his dark blond hair once again before he turns around to spot that empty desk, mocking him. Every time he turns around he keeps expecting that fucking black haired boy that wears his heart like a fucking tattoo to be sitting there.
Where the fuck is he?
To say Alex is concerned would be an understatement. No one has seen or heard from that asshole since Monday. Alex doesn’t even like to imagine where Jack is, it sends shivers down his spine, scaring him into the next day. He only sees the next day as a chance to see Jack again. Of course that son of a bitch isn’t at school though.
Alex turns around again, not even trying to keep it a secret anymore. At first he’d tried to be discrete about it but since the fourth time he’s given up. Discretion isn’t in his nature, it’s never been his nature. If Jack was here he wouldn’t want Alex to be discrete.
“Alex, would you like to pay attention.” The teacher snaps, and Alex knows it’s not a question yet he finds himself answering with more sass than needed.
“No, now would you like to mind your own goddamn business?” Okay, a lot more sass than needed. Alex blushes a deep red and turns around to still find an empty desk.
“I know you and Jack were close so I’ll let you off the hook. Please try to focus, Mr. Gaskarth.”
The teacher doesn’t even understand the extent of the closeness Alex and Jack had and Alex hates her for it at the moment. He can’t help but figure she doesn’t understand there is a reason for his sass so he brings more to the table. “I love the asshole who hasn’t been to class since Monday so excuse me if I keep looking over my fucking shoulder, hoping to see the boy I love perfectly fine. He’s my whole life and if he’s not okay I’ll never forgive myself. So fuck off!” Usually Alex’s words are more poetic, more thought-out, more than a string of words held together by a swear word. His silver tongue is usually more dynamic, keeping it articulate so a listener doesn’t feel harmed by the blade his words hold.
“Go to the office, Mr. Gaskarth and don’t come back until you feel ready to concentrate. I don’t care if Mr. Barakat was your lover, you shouldn’t be talking to me like that and you certainly shouldn’t be in school if all you’re doing is worrying about Jack.” The words are meant to cause fear in Alex’s body, but they don’t. He doesn’t even care.
“Gladly!” Alex chucks his blue Hurley backpack over his right shoulder and makes sure to push the chair as hard as he can so it hits the desk and topples over. He exits the classroom, making sure to slam the door behind him, even though he knows the teacher really doesn’t care anymore.
He makes his way to the office and signs himself out, telling the secretary not to worry about it. Honestly, at this point, he doesn’t care how much trouble he can get into. Jack has never missed a day of school in his life, obviously something was very wrong.
And Alex, like the hero of the great movie he was in, planned to find out where Jack was and why he was there. He wanted to know what had happened Saturday and Sunday and he wouldn’t stop pressing until he did.
Jack didn’t stand a chance against a determined Alex.

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Jack fixes his hair once more as he holds a cigarette between his fingers, deciding whether or not he should actually try it. He’d always been turned off by this sort of thing but the idea behind getting high was turning him on. He wants to forget everything, to feel less stress, to feel light and happy and carefree again, but he can’t do that with the weight of thoughts.
“Just take a small breath. If you don’t like it, you don’t do it.” Christofer tells him simply.
Jack nods and takes the cigarette between his lips, breathing the smoke in. He felt it fill his lungs before he let it all out again.
“Not too bad?” Christofer asks watching Jack repeat his actions with the rest of the cigarette.
Jack shakes his head, finishing his cigarette in what Christofer considers record time for a virgin stoner. He feels a bit better, some of his thoughts were subsiding. The brunette wishes he would have discovered this earlier.
“Don’t get hooked too early or you’ll turn out like me.” Christofer jokes like he knows what Jack’s thinking. “Now c’mon, I wanna show you something.”
Only Christofer knows where they’re going. The older boy doesn’t care though, he’s just stoned enough to know what he’s doing but not completely comprehend it. It’s just how Christofer wanted him and exactly how Jack wanted to feel.
Christofer tugs on his hand, pulling him harder and further behind the coffee shop they’d been situated at. It wasn’t smart to follow such a young boy into wood that Jack wasn’t acquainted with, but for the moment Jack trusts him with his life. The pale boy didn’t look too suspicious in his tight black jeans with holes at the knees and his black Ramones shirt covered by a plaid flannel. Tattoos littered his body, his feet were bare, and his brown, kind of red hair, was a perfect mess. But Christofer didn’t seem to care about his appearance in the least.
“C’mon Jacky!” Christofer pulls Jack into his chest to which Jack responded with a fit of giggling. Christofer smiles and pushes some of Jack’s hair away. “We don’t have too long.”
“Then let’s make the most of it.”
Jack presses his lips to Christofer’s and almost immediately their tongues are battling for dominance. For that moment, that perfect moment, thoughts of Alex ooze out of the older boy’s head leaving him to take in Christofer’s skinny body. It’s all the half-stoned boy can take in and it’s all he wants to.
Right now, there’s no pressure. It’s just Jack and Christofer. There’s a mess of fumbled touches and sloppy kisses. The dirt on the ground should ruin the mood but Jack’s half stoned and Christofer had drank a few beers at the coffee shop. There were no expectations, it was just meaningless sex that meant the world to Jack.

When Jack wakes up an hour or two later he's alone. The boy he'd been with before, the boy he'd had beautiful sex with was gone. That should've been expected though and Jack knows that. But he can't help but feel disappointed by the actions. Sure, Christofer had told him straight to his face that they didn't have long, but so short a time Christofer left without even a goodbye. 
Jack feels like a right foot sock, dirty and abused with his mate lost somewhere out there. Somewhere out there was the boy he still loved, whether or not he should be he knows he is. Love isn't what's fueling Jack though, it isn't now and it won't in the future. All that keeps him going is the pity he feels for himself and the depression he's sinking into.
He pushes himself off the dirt ground to his feet and uses his hand to get out some of the dirt and leaves from his hair and clothes. If anything he's almost more disgusted with his appearance than he is with his actions. 
Not that he's trying to think about what he did. All he wants to do is block out everything he did with Christofer who probably doesn't even remember his name anymore. What Jack did was a mistake and why he did it, he doesn't know. He can't blame it on being stoned because he was hardly stoned. 
Jack sighs and begins to walk towards what he believes is the way out of the wood. He doesn't know how to get out and that furthers his regret to let Christofer pull him out here. Now he's dazed, confused, depressed, and lost. His life was spiraling downward fast and he didn't know what to do anymore.