Chapter Text
Hallways. That’s all this building was to Neil. An endless maze of hallways.
All of them were the same. White, cold, mostly empty. Corkboards with ripped flyers pinned over older ripped flyers, dusty yellowing windowsills, cracked tiled floors. Wherever there was paint it was peeling, and wherever there was wallpaper (for whatever reason you would put up wallpaper in a place like this) there were water stains. It gave Neil the creeps when he was alone, but it was the only place in town there was studio space.
After climbing one more flight of stairs than he originally thought he had to, and turning a few extra corners, he finally found it. A360. He hadn’t remembered the room number, but he could spot Meeks inside.
“Crashing our rehearsal again?” Neil asked him teasingly as he entered the room. Meeks grinned.
“Late to rehearsal again?” he shot back, shoulder-checking Neil as he passed. Knox, who was on the other side of the room tuning to nothing but his off-key brain, rolled his eyes.
“What’s with all this ‘rehearsal’ talk??” he shook his head. “I thought we agreed on calling it ‘practice’.” Neil contemplated this for a moment before shrugging.
“It can be both,” he decided. “I think they basically mean the same thing, don’t they?” Knox screwed up his face in frustration.
“It’s like calling halftime intermission,” he mumbled his argument. Charlie scoffed.
“Yeah, okay Mr. Sportsball,” he reached up and harshly ruffled Knox’s hair, earning a glare and a light shove from the latter. Charlie dodged any further attacks, ducking past him and towards the back of the studio, falling onto his stool. He rolled backward, hitting the wall with a loud thunk that made Cameron wince.
“Charlie, if we put a hole in the wall, we have to pay for it,” he scolded him, fiddling with a wire he truthfully didn’t exactly know the function of. “And they’d probably be wary of letting us rent the space again.” Cameron’s warning was only met with the bird from Charlie as he rolled back towards his drumset. Neil stretched, setting his school bag down on a plastic chair by the door. He didn’t really need it. But if one wants one’s parents to believe one is at the library studying, one brings one’s textbooks to band rehearsal.
“If I’m so late, why didn’t you just start without me?” he asked, shrugging off his zip-up sweatshirt and draping it over his bag. Pitts piped up as quietly as one can.
“We sound too thin,” he murmured, adjusting the shoulder strap on his bass. “It’s too empty with just the three of us. We’d maybe be able to practice whatever songs we do with Ginny if she was here, but this is the rehearsal she doesn’t come to. ‘Cause of colorguard.” Pitts was aware that everyone in the room already knew all that, but he found explaining it to himself helped him remember the schedule better.
“Yeah, colorguard. Where I should be right now,” Cameron sighed, picking up an overly tangled patch cord. “Why do you even need me here? You know how this shit works a lot better than I do…”
“Because if we have somebody deal with that for us, we can set up faster, and get through ‘rehearsal’ quicker,” Knox made his way over to Cameron’s side, leaning down beside him. “Here, you plug the thing into the thing and then turn it on.” Cameron scowled, disgruntled.
“I can’t put the thing into the thing if this is all tangled like this,” he grumbled. Meeks noticed his struggle and came to Cameron’s side as well, swiping the cord from his hands and undoing the mess of knots with ease. He handed it back to his stunned friend.
“Neil also talked about having us film something today,” All three boys fiddling with the cord shifted their attention to Neil. “Are we still doing that? It’s not really the weather we wanted outside.” Neil shook his head.
“We also don’t have the time since my bus was late,” he sighed, walking briskly over to where his friends were next to the equipment and grabbing a mic stand. “We should really just run through our set minus the stuff Ginny’s on and tweak some minor things to make sure we’re ready for tomorrow night.” Everyone flinched as a loud pop echoed through the studio. Knox lightly smacked the back of Cameron’s head.
“You plug it in and then you turn it on,” Knox told Cameron, earning an eyeroll and mumble halfhearted apology. Neil tapped the microphone, which was now on, and sighed as Meeks and Cameron cleared the middle of the room.
“Alright,” he looked over his shoulder at his bandmates, who were now all standing at attention. “We ready?”
----------
“Todd??” The calm urgency in his older brother’s voice caught Todd’s attention. He turned to Jeffery, who was leaning against the doorframe of Todd’s bedroom. “I asked if you were ready.” It took a moment for the words to register with Todd before he nodded.
“Mhm,” he murmured, sliding on his father’s old brown leather jacket. “Almost.” Jeffery eyed the jacket distastefully.
“I don’t understand how you actually like that thing,” he said, shaking his head. Todd shrugged, joining him in the doorway.
“You didn’t want it, and I take what I can get…” he sighed, looking down at the too-long sleeves, studying the way his fingertips peeked out from under the fabric edge. He looked up at Jeffery through his hair (God, when even was the last time he had a haircut?), who tilted his head at him.
“You got your gear?” he asked. Todd nodded.
“It's still in your trunk, I think,” he answered, thinking back to the last time Jeffery had driven him to practice.
“What about your jersey?” He looked over Todd’s outfit. “And you’re not wearing jeans to practice, are you?” Todd shook his head.
“I have my jersey on under my sweater. And I have shorts under my jeans.” He looked down at himself, double-checking that his real outfit wasn’t visible. Jeffery nodded and slung an arm over his shoulders.
“Alright. Let’s go.”
Their parents were sitting in the living room, eyes glued to whatever was on television, so they had to pass them before they left. Hearing their children enter, they tore their gaze away from their show, eyes landing on Jeffery. But not on Todd. Never on Todd.
“Where are you going?” Both boys stopped at the sound of their father’s voice. Jeffery answered.
“Out,” he said. Their father nodded before their mother spoke up.
“Are you taking Jane with you?” Jeffery frowned. Todd didn’t flinch.
“Yes,” Jeffery answered in a slightly colder voice. “I’m bringing him with me.” Their mother nodded calmly, still avoiding looking at Todd. Her ignorance was well-practiced. Both parents returned to the television and Todd followed his brother out the door and into his car.
The drive from his home to the warehouse was about half-an-hour, which Todd was thankful for. None of the other kids on his team lived in his neighborhood. None of them went to his school, as far as he knew. Since he signed himself up, nobody, not even the coaches, knew his legal name. None of the team parents had ever met his parents, at least not that they were aware of. No feeling out of place. No painful cases of mistaken identity. And a great outlet for any lingering harsh feelings towards the people in his life outside.
It was perfect.
After confirming with his brother the time to be picked up and grabbing his skate bag from the trunk, he headed inside. One of the older women who ran the league stepped up to him. “Name?” she asked. The smile came easily to Todd’s face as he recalled the name that Jeffery had come up with for him.
“The Transgressor,” he told her, watching her put a check park next to his name on the sheet. She looked up at him with a smile of her own.
“Go on and get geared up, honey,”
Todd took in the sight of all his teammates scattered on the floor around him, lacing up their skates and buckling their helmets. Slim Speedy laughing at a joke on his phone, Ragtag a few feet away from the rest of the group practicing plows. They all knew, of course. Cis men weren’t allowed in the league. But none of them cared. They were all weird anyway.
“All right people,” Crusher, his team’s lead coach, called out to them. “We’re about to start warmups, so gear up as fast as you can and get on the track!” One of the assistant coaches already on the track turned her head.
“Two minutes! Every ten seconds over is five laps!” Everybody immediately started moving faster and Todd hastily removed his jacket and sweater.
----------
English was one of Neil’s favorite classes. He had never been much of a writer, but he loved the way the material was taught. Most of the Junior class had Keating, Welton being such a small school, and they all loved being in his class. Plus, it was one of the only classes he had with all of his friends.
“Did you finish your essay?” Meeks asked Charlie as they entered the class in front of Neil. Charlie cringed.
“Shit,” he sighed. He quickly waved it off, though. “Whatever. I’ll get an extension.” Pitts scoffed.
“Yeah, you’ll ask for an extension, that doesn’t mean you’ll get one,” he nudged Charlie with his arm. Charlie raised an eyebrow.
“Yeah, okay. Did you finish it?”
“No,” Pitts shook his head. “But it’s legally required that I get an extension if I need one.” He grinned.
Neil followed his friends into the classroom, seeing Knox and Cameron were already there. He walked to his seat and was about to sit down when he noticed.
New student.
Not new to the school entirely, he knew who he was. He must’ve switched English classes. He forgot their name, but he knew he was related to Jeffery Anderson who had graduated a few years ago. He wore an old white t-shirt under a worn blue flannel, loose jeans and black hightop Converse that looked like they were four steps away from falling apart completely. He had shaggy blond hair that he seemed to constantly be pushing back out of his pale blue eyes.
Jesus.
Sure, Neil had seen him in the halls before, but now that he was really looking at him he swore he could’ve fallen in love right there.
Neil slowly lowered himself into his seat, continuing to watch the boy out of the corner of his eye.
Small Win: I Sit Behind The Most Beautiful Boy I’ve Seen In A While
The class went by quickly. Between his moments of staring at his newfound crush, he was able to catch little bits of information on what new unit they would be transitioning into, small jokes from Keating, comments on who completed their essays and who didn’t…but none of it really registered. After it was over, and the bell rang to dismiss them, Neil practically jumped up from his seat and went straight to the desk his gaze hadn’t left once in the past hour.
“Hey,” Neil smiled brightly and eagerly greeted the boy, who jumped at the sudden attention. “Oh, sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you. Uh, you weren’t in this class before. Anderson, right?” The boy swallowed.
“...Todd,” he said finally. His voice was soft and light. “It–It’s Todd.” Neil nodded, tucking the name away in the back of his mind.
“Well, I’ve switched classes before, and I know it gets hard to catch up with the other class’ curriculum sometimes, especially when it’s so different like this one,” he took a breath before continuing. “So if you ever need any help with an assignment or anything really, you can ask me.” Todd stared at him, blinking.
“Uh,” he nodded slowly. “Yeah. Okay. Thanks.” Neil’s smile never faltered, if anything getting brighter, as he waved and left to catch up with his friends. It wouldn’t occur to him until he was halfway down the hall that he had probably come off like an overly-excitable dog, but he couldn’t bring himself to care. He was happy just to have spoken with him.
----------
“Todd,” Todd removed his gaze from the doorway at the sound of his name.
“Yes captain?” he answered, meeting his teacher’s gentle gaze. Mr. Keating smiled kindly at him.
“I know this is short notice,” he began, fishing a paper out of his desk drawer. “But I need you to write an additional article for the newspaper this week,” Todd frowned, standing up and taking the paper. “Amelia was going to go and write about this for our local events piece, but she’s sick and can’t go. I hope you’re not too busy tonight.” Todd looked down at the paper. It was a flyer, a grainy copy of something originally hand-drawn with smudged pencil, for a foodtruck collective about fourty-five minutes away. Todd thought over his brother’s usual schedule for a moment before nodding.
“I can go. My brother will take me,” he said. Mr. Keating smiled apologetically.
“Sorry to put this on you so late. Do you think you’ll have it ready by Monday?” Todd nodded again, returning his teacher’s smile with a small one of his own.
“I can have it done by then, it’s no problem,”
“Thank you son,” Keating said before returning to grading. Todd exited the room and took out his phone.
[Todd to Jeffery]
Need you to drive me to thing tonight
For newspaper
Bring food money
Thank you
:)