"All ready, Hank?" Stan Zipzer asks. It's three minutes until Hank's two best friends normally arrive. To anyone on the outside, seems like a normal day, but for Hank, and someone else just across town, this day will change everything.
"Alright, Hankster?" Frankie says, concern etched into his face at Hank's refusal to be his usual bubbly self on the way to school.
"Are you coming down with something? Do you want me to check?" Ashley rushes.
"No! Leave it! I'm perfectly fine," replies an exasperated Hank. At that moment, he sees McKelty ahead of them. The two boys make split-second eye contact, sharing in a secret that won't be secret much longer.
An hour or so later, they're in Ms Adolf's English class, getting their tests back from the previous lesson. Stalking around the room, Ms Adolf suddenly throws Hank's test onto his desk. He knows he did well. He just does. Not looking over the other side of the room, he hears the slap of paper hitting the desk, and smiles. It's all falling perfectly into place.
At break, the class are discussing their results, something they were 'explicitly forbidden' to do during the lesson.
"What'd you guys get?" Hank asks, grinning out of the corner of his mouth.
"A*," Ashley says, blushing modestly, while Frankie rolls his eyes.
"B minus," Frankie groans, "What about you, Hank?"
"A," he replies, and, as if by magic, someone appears at his shoulder.
"A? Bit low, isn't it, Zipzer?" scoffs McKelty. However, the usual jeer saved solely for Hank is missing.
"Get lost, McKelty," says Frankie defensively.
Acting as though he hadn't heard Frankie, Hank turns around.
"Higher than normal, thanks to you. I would've done better, but the sun glinting off of your hair put me off. You really need to get that sorted, " Hank laughs.
"Aww, come on, that's my secret weapon!" McKelty replies.
"What, one day you just thought to yourself 'I'm bored. I'm going to see how many people I can blind with my highly reflective hair'?"
"Maybe..." Here the two boys broke into fits of laughter that echoed around the silent room.
"Hang on," Ashley says, "Did you just say 'thanks to you'?"
"Oh," says Hank. "Yeah. Might've done."
"What, you haven't told them?" McKelty says, trying (and failing) to look scandalized.
"Told us what, Hankster?" Frankie asks.
"Okay," says Hank, breathing deeply. "Here it goes. To cut a long story short, I haven't always been doing homework when you call for me. I've been hanging out with Nick. Also, I've been telling my parents I'm going out with you, when really, I've been meeting with Nick."
" He's been getting help with classwork. Mostly. Apart from when we went to the cinema. And the park. And the shops. And everywhere else," cuts in Nick.
"So you two are..." Ashley puzzles.
"Gay? Yeah. Boyfriends? Guess you could say so," says Hank, a steely note in his voice saying he'll take no opposition on the matter.
"How long's this been going on for?" asks Ashley, speaking for both her and Frankie, who can't seem to get over the revelation.
"A fair few months," says Nick. Finally, Frankie finds his voice.
"We don't know, and, to be honest, we don't care," Nick replies. "Come on, Hank."
They leave the room hand in hand, not only Westbrook's most unlikely pairing, but the school's first 'out' couple, leaving the rest of the class to try and figure out what just happened before them.
A/N: Right, so here's my thinking behind this. I was reading quite a few Harry Potter Drarry (Draco/Harry) fanfics, when I realised their real relationship is much like Hank and McKelty's, so if you can ship Drarry, why not Hank and McKelty? Leave comments in reviews, does it work? Also, they need a ship name, so far I've got Nink and Nenry, but... y'know. They're REALLY BAD! Leave ideas in reviews too. Bye! G.3.0.R.G.A xx