AN: I've been having a hard time uploading this...but thanks for the reviews on this! I am having a fun time writing this, probably from my seceret love of writing teen dramas. :P
Disclaimers: I don't own Degrassi: TNG or Hoobastank. I don't know if it is ever mentioned what their history teacher is named, so I just made it up. That will be the extent of OCs in this story. (I really dislike OCs)
Part 2: Control
I've done everything as you say, I followed your rules without question
I thought it would help me see things clearly
But instead of helping me to see, I look around and it's like I'm blinded.
I'm spinning out of control...
- "Out of Control"
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It hurt.
It was like a gaping wound inside of his chest that no one else could see.
It was like someone had shot him with a shotgun directly in his chest and then he had pulled a
shirt over the hole and no one could see the blood yet.
Marco del Rossi knew that feeling like this was to be expected, he had even looked on the internet
about the possible reactions from parents when their child came out. And yes, his parents'
response was scenario two.
They disowned him, kicked him out, and left him to his own devices.
It felt odd to be right back at school the very next day. But he knew that he had to move on, he
wasn't going to flunk out of school just because his parents were being pig-headed. He had tried
to explain that to Dylan and Paige on the ride over to Degrassi, but he could see the pity clouding
their eyes as they stared at him through the rearview mirror as he sat in the backseat of Dylan's
car.
They didn't get that this was just a hurtle. He needed to focus on other ordinary things so that this
hurt inside would go away. If he dwelled on it, then he would be drawn into the dark.
Watching Dylan walk the other way to his own class, Marco felt the hurt more acutely that ever
before. The hallway suddenly seemed vast and empty.
Yet looking forward, he saw he saw Ellie standing there waiting for him. She was late again and
she had seen that he was too. For a moment, to Marco at least, she seemed to be superimposed
over the Degrassi backdrop. Like when they had dated to cover his sexuality, once again she
seemed like a base for normality. As of right now, no one but Paige and Dylan knew what had
happened last night and seeing Ellie that morning made him want it to stay that way.
As long as Paige didn't open her mouth to Spinner.
"Hey." Ellie greeted as Marco came up beside her. "Why so late?"
Marco shrugged, "I was talking to Dylan, guess I wasn't paying attention." Better blame any
strangeness today on a crush, right?
Ellie seemed to buy it, "Dylan huh? Are you guys....yet?"
They began to finally make their way to history as he shrugged again. "I don't really know."
Ellie threw her head back and groaned. "Will you two just please get on with it? It is completely
agonizing to sit there at lunch or in the halls or at the front office and see you two throw those
sexual-tension laden looks at each other!"
"'Sexual-tension laden looks'?" Marco gave her a fish-eyed look.
"Yes, sexual-tension. Laden. Looks." they had reached their classroom, "Now you go in first so
Mr. Young can yell at you and I can sneak in."
Marco paused with his hand on the classroom door. "Thanks," he commented dryly, "you're a
true friend."
Ellie gave him a little push inside, "You know I am."
---------------------------------
Spinner Mason hated history. It was a proven fact that if you took one Spinner, put him in one
desk, in room 12 for 90 minutes of boring dates, he'd be asleep in under five minutes or less. It
was almost like some strange math equation.
S plus 1(12R plus 90D) = minutes until sleep
Or something like that. Maybe all that studying with Jimmy and Marco was paying off when came
to his algebra. Paige had volunteered to help him with his history but when ever they settled down
on a couch to study they always ended up making out instead. There was just some sort of
magical connection from the rise of Communism to kissing.
At least he thought they were learning about Communism. Something about red, Soviets, and
war. Now he didn't mind hearing about world annihilation, but he wasn't a complete idiot; if they
had destroyed the world in the past, he'd know about it.
Well, maybe not, seeing as how he wouldn't exist and all. All the more proof that they didn't blow
up the world whenever Young was talking about.
Why were they learning about this anyway?
Deciding that flipping his pen over his thumb was infinitely more exciting than whatever was
being droned on about, Spinner began to count how many times he successfully flipped his pen
about without dropping it.
His highest count so far had been 43.
The door to the classroom opened to reveal a tardy Marco del Rossi and Ellie Nash. Their
teacher, Mr. Young paused in his lecture about....whatever he was lecturing about...(was it
something about missiles?) to give them both a stern look.
"Mr. Del Rossi, Ms. Nash, class started well over 5 minutes ago. Do either of you have a late
slip?"
They both shook their heads and slunk off to their desks with Young's threat of detention if it
ever happened again. Spinner's interest was piqued; Ellie was always late, but Marco was a
stickler for rules and never seemed to have been late before.
What he had privately dubbed his own personal 'spidy-senses' kicked into gear as he turned
slightly in his desk and shot Marco a questioning look.
The Italian just merely looked slightly embarrassed and shrugged in response.
"...on your projects." Young's voice broke into Spinner's attempt of mind-reading.
Whoa, wait, projects? Spinner's hand shot in the air.
"Yes, Mr. Mason?" Young sounded slightly exasperated.
"Projects? What projects?" Spinner was confused.
"If you had been listening Mr. Mason, instead of focusing on that pen of yours, you would have
heard that beginning today you will be paired up to work on presentation of an important, pivotal
even during the Cold War." Spinner made to open his mouth, but Young anticipated his next
question, "I will pair you all up."
He proceeded to divide the class up and assign them an event. When he reached Spinner's name
he announced, "Gavin Mason and Marco del Rossi, you'll both have the Cuban Missile Crisis.
Please explain America and the Soviet Union's reasoning behind the event."
Hah, he knew he had heard something about missiles.
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Across the room, Craig Manning's stomach had just filled with lead.
His ears were still ringing with Young's assignment.
"Craig Manning and Ashley Kerwin, you'll both have the Vietnam conflict and it's importance
to the perpetuation of the cold war."
He felt as if he was still right in the middle of his own personal cold war with Ashley still. He had
apologized in the only way he knew how. She didn't fully seem to accept it, but didn't fully
wasn't outright refusal of his apology, so he counted that as a good thing.
But they really hadn't spent 'quality' time together since the band competition (read: they hadn't
been throwing barbs at each other) and in all reality, it really had silenced into a cold war. Now
they were going to be forced into working conditions together.
Trying not to be too obvious, Craig glanced over his shoulder to see how Ashley was taking the
news of their partnership.
She was currently leaning across the aisle to whisper to her friend Ellie. He bet she was trashing
him, or declaring how horrible this project would be, how he'd ruin her perfect score, how much
she was going to do all the work, how incredibly attractive he looked today....okay probably not
the last one, but the others seemed plausible.
He wouldn't deny it, she had several good points. Okay, she was mostly in the right; all in the
right. But she would have to deal sooner or later right? And she would needed to swallow her
pride quickly because he needed to get a good grade on this thing if he wanted to pull his grade
up from dismal.
----------------------------------------
Emma Nelson sat in her desk staring at her book in front of her. Liberty Van Zandt was currently
in the front of Ms. Kwan's room giving her book report. Inside, she was debating on actually
tuning down her anti-abortion-filled report just so Manny wouldn't feel as if she was being
attacked.
But when had she ever censored her views for anyone else?
"Emma?" Ms. Kwan's voice broke through her inner debate. "Are you ready for yours?"
Emma nodded and slowly walked to the front of the room; she knew what she needed to do. Why
should she edit what she believes, whether Manny took it as an insult or not; besides, it's not like
they were friends now anyway.
-------------------------------------------
"That is totally brutal!" Paige commiserated as she sat down at the lunch table that Ashley Kerwin
and Hazel Aden already occupied. "Working with Craig? Can you do it without killing him?"
Ashley rolled her eyes and smiled softly, "It's not like that anymore. I mean, we've reached a
truce almost."
Paige and Hazel stared at her with disbelieving looks.
"Alright, I still can barely stand to be in the same room as him, but at least we aren't at each
other's throats." Ashley shook her head, "Can we please get off of the Craig topic?"
"Lets move on to why both you," Hazel gestured to Paige, "and your brother look like you've
been up all night. Plus you were late meeting me this morning."
Ashley turned her attention to Paige and eyed her critically, "Y'know, she has a point. You look a
bit exhausted."
Paige sighed and abandoned her food in favor of her diet soda. "Look, something happened last
night that I don't think I'm suppose to talk about. At least not yet."
Hazel groaned. "You can't just reveal that much and not tell us!"
Ashley nodded in agreement, "She's right Paige, you've said this much, you're committed to
telling us the rest."
Paige looked over her shoulder at where Dylan was eating his lunch by himself. He looked like
Hazel described, like he had stayed up all night long. There was dark circles under his eyes and his
hair was more unkept than it normally looked. Not to mention he had abandoned any other drink
in favor for mas quantities of coffee; he was acting like the only thing keeping him going was the
caffeine.
She didn't know where Marco was, but she was betting that he looked just as tired as they were,
probably even more. He had seemed the epitome of exhaustion during classes earlier and she
swore she saw him dozing off during Armstrong's lecture on factoring.
But she didn't think that he would want everyone to know what had transpired late last night just
so people could understand why the three of them were tired.
"Guys, I just can't say anything right now." she finally responded to the disappointed looks of her
friends.
They both looked as if they were going to press her for more information but luckily at that
moment, her boyfriend Spinner Mason and Hazel's boyfriend Jimmy Brooks dropped their greasy
food covered trays on their tables.
"I don't know man, but Sheila's food keeps getting more and more questionable." Jimmy pointed
out as he took a stab at the shapeless lump on the center of his tray.
Spinner already had a large mouthful, "I 'fink 's goo'" some chewed food sprayed onto the table
much to the other's disgust.
"Spin!" Paige cried, though she was thanking for her boyfriend's timely, if gross, distraction to
divulging the occurrences of last night.
Hopefully they've already forgotten.
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In zone one: Dylan Michalchuk, possible boyfriend, though all the fine details have yet to be
worked out and one who knew of his crap-tastic situation.
Zone two: Paige Michalchuk and her following. Less obvious than Zone One, but still would have
to endure the silent looks of pity thrown across the table. More than one if she spilled already.
Zone three looked the safest. Ellie Nash sitting her normal reclusive corner. Luckily Ashley was
spending her obligatory one day a week with Paige's crew so Ellie was alone. Once again Ellie
became his shield.
Marco gripped his lunch tray in an white knuckle hold as he started over to Ellie's solitary table.
But before he reached there, Sean Cameron appeared in all of his white-rapper-wannabe glory and
made his Zone Three inaccessible.
He turned directions quickly so Ellie wouldn't notice his attempt to join her; he was well aware
that she would welcome him but feeling like the awkward third person was not a feeling he
wanted to add into his already mixed emotions.
Deciding on Paige, he quietly joined the group. Paige was currently berating Spinner for doing
something gross (which he was personally glad he had missed) and Hazel was making starry eyes
at Jimmy who was returning them full force all while Ashley sent subconscious glares over at
where Craig was eating.
Everyone seemed to self-absorbed at the moment to notice if he was acting strange today.
Paige gave him a pointed look as he sat down. She was worried, he knew that. On the drive over
to school this morning, she had asked how he was doing at least five times in that many minutes.
Dylan had seemed slightly better about, understanding his silence, but he too was pushing.
He ignored the look and let the conversations rise and fall around him and focused purely on the
motions of eating. Being there reminded him of when he went through his first and only pseudo
date with Hazel. Like then, he was feeling trapped; like he was about to lose control. Only now,
he wasn't going to freak, he could take the mixed emotions.
Everything was just fine.