Should I Write Myself Out of the History Books?

That night, Jack still hadn’t put Alex’s number in his phone. He was pacing his bedroom, the worksheet in his left hand and his phone in the other. It just felt weird to him, putting the number in; he had barely spoken a word to the boy. In a skewed kind of way, he didn’t think he deserved to have the other’s phone number.

He sighed and flopped onto his bed, felling stupid over this stupid boy and this stupid crush. He groaned and lifted his phone to eye-level: shaking a little, he put the number into his address book, then threw his phone into the corner of his room. He let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding and, finally, gave out a giddy laugh.

“Oh my God.” He sighed, grinning, and flipping over.

Jack was pretty sure he had fallen asleep because, the next thing he knew, his phone was ringing and the clock that was tipped over on his bedside table read 4:53 in blaring green numbers. He scrambled around, hunting for his phone, when he realized it was on the other side of his room. He jumped up, pouncing on the offending object and pressed ‘answer’.

“We’re coming over.” A voice said: Jack registered it as Rian.

“Uh. Okay?” He said, wiping sleep out of his eyes. “It’s like five o’clock on a Tuesday.” He informed bluntly.

“Yep. We have a pizza.”

“One pizza?” He asked, eyebrow quirked. Rian sighed on the other line.

“We have breadsticks and Mountain Dew, too.” Jack grinned.

“You may proceed.”

*

No more than five minutes later, Jack heard his mother’s laughter and Rian and Zack’s voice. Jack sighed as the boys walked inside.

“You guys are such suck-ups .” He exasperated. The pair just grinned, dropping a styrofoam box of breadsticks on his lap. “But it is to be excused.” He said, popping open the lid and bathing in its aroma.

“So what’s up, Jack-o?” Zack asked, taking a swig of the Mountain Dew.

“I was sleeping when you assholes rudely interrupted me.”

“With breadsticks!” Rian reminded him, attempting to grapple the soda from Zack’s hands. Zack shoved him back, taking another sip. Jack just grinned, shoving one in his face. Then, Zack’s eyes widened.

“Dude, what’s that?” He asked, picking up Jack’s worksheet. Rian gripped the soda from Zack’s hands, grinning triumphantly. Jack gave a confused look, then realized what he was holding.

“Oh. Uh--”

“Dude, is that the TA’s number?” Rian exclaimed, peering over Zack’s shoulder.

“It totally is. Man, what did you even do to make that kid so interested in you?” Zack laughed and Jack gave him an indignant look.

“Hey, I am plenty interesting!”

“Sure, sure, but he doesn’t know that.” Zack laughed again, throwing the paper at Jack.

“He said I’m cute!” Jack explained and the other two laughed.

“So’d you text him?” Rian asked, pulling a slice of pizza from the box. He had once again lost purchase on the soda and was now shooting daggers at a smirking Zack.

“No...” Jack said sheepishly, chewing on another breadstick. Zack’s mouth dropped.

“What the fuck, man? The kid gave you his number and you haven’t even texted him? What is the point of anything ?” Zack exclaimed.

“You’re being melodramatic.” Jack said, rolling his eyes.

“I am not .” He said. “I just think talking to him would better your situation.” He said slowly.

“What situation?”

“I dunno, just...” He waved helplessly at Jack.

“I think he’s talking about your virginity.” Rian helped, stifling a laugh. Jack’s mouth dropped.

“Not everything is about sex!” Jack exclaimed.

“That’s what virgins say!” Zack exacerbated, watching as Jack turned beet red.

“Oh God, shut up, shut up.”

“Here, give me your phone, Jack.” Rian said, putting his hand out.

“Uh, hell no? You’re just going to do something stupid.”

“C’mon, you can trust me. I’m not Zack. I just think you need a little push, you know? Since you’re obviously stupid over the guy.” Jack sighed, slipping his phone out of his front pocket.

“Don’t embarrass me.”

“Like you don’t do that by yourself.” Zack replied and Jack shot a half-hearted punch to his chest. Zack just laughed, of course.

“I’m just gonna say ‘hey’, okay? Can’t go wrong with that.” He promised, looking down.

"Don't forget to remind him it's me!" Jack said, and Rian nodded, looking down and typing out what Jack had instructed. The trio waited in silence for thirty seconds before Jack’s phone was buzzing; the boy’s heart stopped momentarily.

“What’d he say?” Jack asked meekly.

“He just said ‘hi’, with a smiley face.” Rian said. “Don’t have a fucking heart-attack.”

“Dude, what is up with this kid and smiley faces?” Zack said, peering over Rian’s shoulder as he typed.

Rian shrugged, fingers moving fast.

“What are you gonna say now?” Jack asked.

“‘What’s up?’” Zack read out.

“No! Wait. Say, uh--”

“Here,” Rian handed him back his phone. “The student must now become the master.” He said solemnly making Zack laugh.

“Okay.” Jack said, typing a few things before pressing send.

“What;d you say?” Rian asked and Jack looked up sheepishly.

“Uh, I just ended up saying ‘what’s up’...” Rian sighed.

“Alright, alright.”

And their night went on like that. Rian and Zack monitored Jack, making sure he didn’t make a food of himself like he normally would. After about an hour and two dozen or so responds to Alex, Jack came to a dead end.

“I dunno what to say.” He said, flashing the screen to his friends. ‘we should hang out sometime’ the text read. Zack and Rian grinned.

“Fuck yeah. Say yes!” Zack exclaimed.

“Say yes!” Rian iterated.

“Uh...” Jack picked up his phone. ‘sure’ he texted back, before tacking on a ‘shit sorry i have to go’ just to save himself from actually having to go through with making any plan whatsoever. He flashed his phone to the pair in front of him.

“Jack!” Rian scolded. “You were so close, what the fuck, man?” Jack whimpered, falling onto his bed with a thud. 

“I don’t wanna fuck it up,” he explained.

“If you haven’t fucked it up so far, I think you’ll be okay.” Rian interjected. Jack sat up a little and gave him an unimpressed look.

“Why must you hate on me so much?” He asked and Rian just laughed, ruffling his hair.

“Because Zack could probably beat me up.”

*

The next morning, Jack was kind of terrified to walk into History. He didn’t want Alex to actually talk to him. He groaned, plopping down next to Zack, who gave him a little nudge before nodding his head in Alex’s direction. The boy was hunched over his desk, hair hanging in his face, efficiently hiding it. Jack thought it was pretty adorable.

“Shut up.” Jack said, pulling out his binder and a pen. Zack just breathed out a laugh.

The rest of the period went on pretty monotonously. It mainly involved Jack trying his hardest not to look in Alex’s direction in fear of making eye contact with the golden-haired boy. He thought he was doing a damned good job at it.

Luckily for him, there was no worksheet that day; therefore, there would have to be no shameless flirting and no attempts at setting up a date for their...well, date. When the bell rang, Jack packed up as quick as he could, planning on bolting as soon as he could. Zack watched him the whole time, looking like he wanted to say something but taking it upon himself to laugh as Jack fumbled to shove his binder into the endless abyss of loose papers and empty water bottles that was his backpack.
‘Come on,” He urged Zack once he had everything in his bag. Jack was eyeing Alex a little as he stood up. The boy was still packing up, so Jack felt as if he had time to make a clean run for it.

“I dunno man, I’m feeling the vibes in here, aren’t you? Maybe we’ll stay a few minutes. I mean, our next class is pretty close, you know?” Zack said, still lounging in his chair. Jack groaned, tapping his foot.

“Come on, Zack, please?” He begged, already walking towards the door. He watched as Alex put his last notebook into his backpack and had a minor panic attack. Zack just laughed.

“Fine,” he said, standing up. The feeling in Jack’s chest loosened when he watched Alex walk up to Mrs. Winson’s desk to speak to her. “Let’s go.” Zack said, grabbing his elbow like he always did.

*

Jack liked English. They didn’t really do much in that class, just read stupid books and had stupidly long conversations about them. Jack didn’t really pay attention, however, which definitely took a toll on his quiz and test grade, but he actually read the books, which not a lot of the kids in his class did. The quizzes just always had stupid shit on them about the ‘in class discussions’ as opposed to stuff that was actually from the book .

Another thing Jack loved about the class was how he got to choose seats. Usually, Jack and Zack tried to get seats next to window with Danny and Josh, but this time they were actually a little late, due to Zack protests of ‘oh, it’s such a perfect day for a stroll!’ as he walked Jack down the hallway slowly.

Jack groaned as he walked through the doors, noticing that the only seats open were a group of three in the back near the door.

“I hate you.” Jack said, plopping down into the middle one. Zack jsut ruffled his hair. The bell rang and Jack turned to Zack to flick his ear, already checking out for the next fifty-three minutes.

About fifteen minutes later, the door opened. Jack was too preoccupied with kicking Zack under the table to notice anything, really.

“Hello, uh, who are you?” Jack heard his English teach say. It wasn’t in her usual boring droll, so Jack looked up, interest piqued.

“I, uh, my name’s Alex Gaskarth...” Jack’s chest tightened and he groaned, inching towards Zack. “The put me in this class, even though I’m not even a Junior, and, uh, the office said they’re too swamped to fix my schedule, so they just told me to go to the classes on my schedule until they can get it fixed.” Jack watched as his teacher’s eyebrows furrowed.

“Why don’t they just let you attend your normal classes...?” She asked, holding out her hand to take the office note Alex was holding. Alex shrugged. “No worries, just go sit back there. You can work on homework, or something.” She said waving to the back of the class. That’s when Jack realized he was in the back of the class, next to the only available seat in the class, and Alex was making a beeline for him.

How perfectly cliche.