A/N: Written for two challenges on "The Anime and Manga" Challenges forum: "The Diversity in Writing" challenge and "The 52 Pickup" challenge. Also, this AU was inspired by Tumblr. This will be a multi-chap with eventual slash. Updates will be as frequent as possible.
The first year of Matthew Williams' college experience was, in short, hell. He realized that cursing made himself sound melodramatic, but it was a necessary way to describe how he felt. Matthew took pride of his calm demeanor, and the fact that he rarely lost his temper. He made an attempt throughout his life to make sure his emotions stayed even. Matthew knew that success was the best, most important option in his life. His ambitions made him want to work with the amount of diligence that made others gape at him in awe.
The way he approached life was through taking that heated desire to succeed and applying what he learned to something more tangible, where he'd achieve results through sheer force of will. Matthew's mindset leaned toward the idealistic, romanticized version of ambitious. It got him through the weeks and months, so at least it acted as a solid way to motivate himself to be the best version of himself. He wasn't perfect, but Matthew liked himself well enough.
Regardless of his inner thoughts, Matthew felt like he was the most overlooked student in his entire school. It was an exaggerated thought for even the most reserved introverts, such as himself, to say. But Matthew couldn't help but feel as if it were true. The first day of classes exactly one year ago as a freshman fresh out of high school (he was an adorable freshman, if Matthew said so himself), for example, everyone called him by his older half-brother's name, Alfred Jones.
Looking back, he wasn't so sure why he attended the same college as his half-brother. Matthew and Alfred were different as water and oil. Cliches aside, Matthew's ambition level was entirely different than Alfred's, Alfred wanted nothing more than to get a two-year degree and focus full time on his music. This was an utter insult to their parents, who wanted the best for their babies. Matthew supported Alfred's band by not trashing it publicly. On a good day, Matthew would sometimes convince their parents that it wasn't a terrible idea for Alfred to make a band in the first place. It was a waste of talent to not play.
Being mistook for each other started a little after Matthew's mother married Alfred's father when Alfred was two years old. Matthew would've thought that the age difference, which was a noticeable gap in children due to varying growth and emotional milestones, made some difference. However, Matthew and Alfred grew up together in a sleepy, quaint suburb near to the bigger town, where everyone was engrossed in their own lives and obsessing over the gloss of their white picket fences, where whoever had the most lush garden of flowers (Matthew grew up around bushy lavender, vividly magenta azaleas, pale pink heather, and a rainbow of bougainvillea) and whether or not their grassy lawns were the proper shade of green. They loved each other like brothers, even if they were as different as night and day.
Despite being half-siblings, they looked remarkably, strikingly similar. Matthew, in the most grudging manner possible, admitted that he could understand why people would frequently mistake them for each other. They both had blonde hair, bright blue eyes, and fair skin, with lanky limbs, and a towering height without an intimidating build to match. Matthew grew his thick, wavy strawberry blonde hair to his chin in spite, even if his mother disapproved of this decision every step of the way. He attempted to dye it a redder blonde at one point, but that was a disaster because the dye ended up making his hair look like the color of blood. Much like his decision to grow his hair, his mother disapproved of the dye with a louder sense of disapproval. Alfred laughed along at the mix ups, but that was because he still retained his identity in the process; nobody seemed to call Alfred Matthew, and that fact made Matthew resentful as a child and even as a teenager.
Matthew wouldn't have minded the current mix ups in college, if it wasn't for the fact that each professor in each and every class he took that semester mistook him for Alfred. Taking fifteen units over the span of five classes was difficult enough to handle as a freshman. Having the difficulty of a constant reminder that nobody could get his name straight made class much more depressing. He hated the loss of his identity; being engulfed by Alfred's impossibly long, wide shadow made Matthew feel a pang of sadness buzz through his veins. Whenever a professor looked Matthew in his bespeckled blue eyes, and made no attempt to remember the differences that made them unique, felt like a slap in the face. It took eight weeks for the professors, which was about the time of midterms, and when grades started truly mattering, for Matthew to be Matthew. It took three discussions with his academic advisors, three separate discussions with each of his five professors and a near sobbing panic attack on Matthew's part in order to help his professors remember he was Matthew fucking Williams.
After figuring out the fact that Matthew was indeed his own person, he faded into the background even though he joined an active book club and the quite successful hockey team. It was a shame that he was only noticed when his peers desperately needed to study for an important test. When Matthew was feeling generous, which was all too often, he let people cheat off of him during tests. Being overlooked had its perks, like being able to afford to skip class with minimal repercussions. The very first time he ditched class, he missed a pop quiz that was supposed to help everyone essentially failing the second quiz of the semester; he somehow secretly convinced his professor that there were no cheaters in the class with those who cheated off of him didn't get suspicious grades. Matthew did well enough that they passed the test without too much suspicion; any discussions the cheaters had, Matthew overheard but pretended he didn't know a thing.
With that in mind, it was a fact that he didn't use curse words to describe such broad concepts like school in a light or trivial manner. Overall, it could be said that Matthew was an optimist, and a reliable one at that; at any given moment, he'd find a way to see the best in life, even if the cynical, snarky pessimist hiding deep within nagged at him from time to time. However, it was a more reliable outlook to may even become his downfall. Anyone could trust him to act in a reliable manner. Events that didn't go horribly were still noteworthy, because it meant there was a spark of positivity to cling on and remember. On an academic level, school wasn't difficult. If anything, Matthew didn't feel challenged enough. He had to take basic general education courses his first year and a half of college, not because he wanted to but he had to in order to graduate. Matthew hated that he felt these classes were more like fluff rather than anything worthwhile to keep in his brain.
Once Matthew learned to accept that he would be forgotten and overlooked, he realized it was a good thing to remain undetected. Staying under the radar meant he got away with more than the average sophomore. Matthew drank alcohol every so often. Despite his lanky frame and height of five feet and ten inches, he was able to hold his liquor, plus he was able to be picky because he didn't get drunk easily. This opinion arose, not because he particularly strong feelings for the drink, but because campus was strict about their students consuming any substances that could cause any damage at all. The part of Matthew that was too easily influenced by Alfred liked the adrenaline rush of being rebellious.
In this moment, as Matthew had a bottle of tequila in hand to walk back to his dorm and get himself through the next few difficult political science papers, an unfamiliar body rammed into Matthew's own.
"Watch where you're going, asshole!" Matthew hissed. No response. He would've hated to interact with anyone before a paper.
Tonight would be a long, long night, Matthew thought as he sipped tequila before settling down to write his multitude of essays. This wasn't how he imagined spending a Thursday night. It wasn't like he had much better to do as he got comfortable sitting at his dorm-provided desk, which was too short for his height, an annoyance he was forced to deal with.
After forty five minutes of writing his essay engulfed by the ambient music playing in the background, Matthew heard a loud barrage of screaming without any warning. Matthew became alarmed when he heard a screeching, high pitched scream. He ran out of his room, not caring that he was wearing his rattiest jeans and his most stained shirt. It was laundry day, and he was out of quarters, which explained his appearance; that was his excuse, and he stuck to it.
What Matthew saw stunned him into a frozen, fearful silence for a brief moment. From what Matthew could see, the unfamiliar body was being harassed-no, attacked-by some angry, drunk juniors.
He knew he recognized the unfamiliar body because it was the same one that rammed into him earlier. The scuffed, black boots with chunky buckles, faded blue-black jeans and black band tee with dyed silver-blonde, roots showing through, was a distinct look at an otherwise bland college; he looked grungy and unwashed, and having a split lip, a black eye and bruises and cuts everywhere didn't help make him look any better.
Before Matthew had the sense to think logically and realistically, he jumped into the fight to defend the grungy looking boy. He barely survived with a lot of bruises, cuts, and scratched; the juniors stumbled off when he threatened to call the campus police. Matthew looked a little worse for the wear, but at least he wasn't looking like he ran through death like the grungy dude had.
"You okay?" Matthew asked, tentative. He cursed himself for asking this. Of course he wasn't okay! He was just in a fist fight.
"I suppose I could be worse." At least the grungy guy had a sense of humor through it all. Matthew couldn't help but smile at this.
"Wanna crash at my dorm for the night?" Matthew deliberately trailed off to learn the grungy guy's name.
"Name's Gilbert, don't wear it out," Gilbert wheezed, then grabbed Matthew's hands to lean on his body. This must've been Gilbert's way of accepting Matthew's offer of crashing for the night. Matthew's face got hot; he hadn't ever been this close to a strange guy since Alfred set him up with that disastrously hilarious date with Francis last year.
As Matthew dragged a limping, bruised, bloody Gilbert to his dorm, Matthew thanked any holy deity that would listen upon realizing he would be in for a long night taking care of a stranger.