Mark was in the chorus room, waiting for everyone to come in once again. He had his camera in his hands; he's been obsessed with it ever since he found it. All of his focus was on thinking of ideas for a movie or a documentary, or just anything interesting he can film. As he saw students coming into class, he held up his camera and pointed in their direction.

"Um, it's, March 3rd, 1978...7:20 AM, uh, New York Time, no…Eastern Standard Time and…hmm…" he stopped filming. He was starting to have problems trying to get his words perfectly. When he first used the camera, the words flowed right out of his mouth, but now, when there's a bunch of people around to film, the words were stuck. He started the camera again, but decided to refrain from narration.

He panned around the large chorus room. Every girl who saw him filming waved or blew kisses at the screen, and every guy stuck out their tongues or gave Mark the finger, laughing. Except for one guy.

"Collins…" Mark said, unknowingly. He filmed Collins as he was walking towards him, smiling, which made Mark smile back. He was glad that the camera hid a lot of his face so that no one would see him.

"Hey, Mark!" shouted Collins.

"Hey…" the boy with the camera replied sheepishly.

"What's that?" Collins asked. Mark immediately became more confident his face perked up and he sat up straight.

"This is my new camera. Well, it's a really old camera, but I found under my bed recently and I've been trying it out. Cool, huh?" He hasn't talked to Collins with self-assurance like that in a long time.

"Cool…so are you gonna make movies with it and become a famous director?" Mark couldn't help but feel overjoyed at Collins' interest in the camera.

"Well, so far I've just filmed my neighborhood and a little bit here. But, I'll figure out something to do with the footage." Mark pointed the camera at Collins. "Smile." Collins laughed and gave a smile and once again, Mark smiled along with him. He could make the whole world smile with just a grin if he wanted to. Mark thought. He then paused. He was starting to think about Collins in…that way again, as he put it. Instantly, those feelings of insecurity and dismay caught up with him and he became the meek dork he felt he was destined to always be. Soon after, chorus class began and practically instantly flew by.

"Yeah, I was thinking that I could do a documentary of some kind. I think it would be really interesting." Mark said to Collins as they were walking to Gym. Roger tagged along to, cause his locker was on the way.

"What kind of documentary?" asked Roger. Mark shrugged.

"Don't know, but it's gonna be about something important." He replied. They went to a small hallway where a row of lockers was, one of which happened to be Roger's. Mark cranked up his camera while Roger put in his combination. Collins went ahead to gym to get there a bit early.

Mark saw three guys come towards him and Roger and started to film them out of instinct. They seemed interesting; they were tall and looked agitated and intimidating and walked like they owned everything. Definitely seniors. One of them saw Mark filming and stopped.

"What do you think you're doing, punk?" he snarled. Mark stopped filming and cowered, closing his eyes tightly as he held on to his camera and binders. He could hear those seniors laugh at him and then felt his camera being snatched away, even with his firm grip on it; it was taken out of his hands easily.

"What's this?" one of the others asked as he held up Mark's camera.

"Give it back, don't drop it!" Mark shouted without realizing it. They started tossing it around to each other. Mark watched them throw his precious camera around, praying that they wouldn't drop it, and after a while, he couldn't help but try to jump for it. The older boys just laughed and waved the camera in his face. One of them even pushed him against the lockers. That's when Roger reacted.

"Hey, quit it, guys." Roger said. He was a bit shorter than the guy who pushed Mark, but didn't let that faze him. "Just give him back the camera, alright?" The guy who was holding it laughed and pushed Roger back hard and he was slammed at the lockers. The other two laughed. Roger roughly pushed back. The three seniors then had clearly displeased faces. The camera was pushed back into Mark's hands, but the three ganged up on Roger. They started hitting him and pushing him and laughing at him. Mark put down the camera and his binders and tried to help Roger, but the seniors began to beat him up too. Within minutes, people just walking in halls around them could hear screams and loud banging noises and a crowd started to form in the compact hallway. It was a shame that no one tried to help or do anything except cheer and encourage to keep the fight going.

"What is going on here!" yelled the principal, who like the students, heard the noises and rushed over. He blew a whistle that he always had around his neck and the crowd of roused up students quickly ran away. The seniors still continued to hit Mark and Roger even after the whistle blew, resulting in the principal having to call the police and had the seniors handcuffed and taken away.

"Thanks a lot, Roger. This is just what I need on my permanent record." said Mark, spitefully as he pushed a mop back and forth on the floor. After Mark and Roger's incident with those other guys, they were forced to clean up the school after-hours. Roger was wiping the many windows that were around the hallway they were in."Mark, it's not like we got sent to the police station like those stupid shitheads who messed with us in the first place." replied Roger. "Besides, we're only doing this for a week."

"Do you realize how angry my parents are gonna be at me? They could ground me, or never let me get a driver's license, or take away my camera, or-"

"Ugh, shut up, Mark, I'm sure nothing too bad is gonna happen to you, quit being so gay." Roger said. Mark stopped mopping and took in a deep breath.

"Would you just quit it with the 'gay' thing, already?"

"Pffh, why?" Roger replied. Mark tried to keep his voice steady and calm.

"Just…quit it."

"Why?"

"Nothing."

"Tell me."

"It's nothing, Roger."

"What, do you think you're gay?"

"No." he replied, loudly. He gripped the mop handle. This was not the time, but could there ever be a time for something this? Roger gave a grin at the chance to joke around.

"I think you do." he said, snidely.

"I'm not." Mark said, still trying not to overreact. He kept his teeth clasped together and tried to restrain from yelling.

"Mark is a faggot, Mark is a faggot," sang Roger, continuing his teasing.

"I'm not, Roger."

"Hey, Mark, ever think about not being a homo?" Roger was practically spitting out the words and lightly poked Mark, who threw down his mop and grabbed Roger by his jacket and even lifted him up a little bit.

"Would you just fucking shut up, Roger? I'm not!" Mark shouted, he then pushed Roger back and picked up the mop, trying to regain his composure. He breathed in and out deeply, in order to prevent himself from crying in anguish and frustration.

Roger was very surprised and briefly scared by his best friend's outburst towards him and suddenly felt resentment for his words.

"Jesus, Mark, sorry…I was joking, I didn't know you were like, serious." Mark didn't respond. He walked away with his mop and continued pushing it back and forth on the floor. Roger followed and thought for a minute. What's up with him? He's been acting so weird for weeks…ever since Collins came to school…hmm… Roger found his idea odd, but it would make sense.

"Hey…this doesn't have anything to do with Collins, does it?"

"…Why do you think that?" Mark suddenly felt nervous again and paused. How does he know? He thought.

"Well, it's just that ever since he showed up, you've been…different. Like, nervous and jittery and like, frozen sometimes, you know?" Mark didn't say anything. "I mean, it's just what I've seen when you're around him, and it's not like I have a problem with it or anything, but…do you have a thing for Collins?" Mark just stared at his friend with looks of discomfort, then quickly looked away and sighed.

"…No, I don't." he replied, after a while in a low, almost threatening voice. Roger raised an eyebrow.

"Whatever…" He replied. They stopped talking for the rest of the day after that.

"Hey Collins?" asked Roger the next day. He and Collins were in English, not particularly doing anything while the teacher was at the front of the room, at her desk looking for quiz papers.

"Hm?" Collins replied. He was doing Algebra homework while waiting for the English quiz.

"What do you think about Mark?" Ever since yesterday, Roger has been wondering about what Mark and Collins thought of each other because of Mark's strange reaction to the "do you like him" question.

"Mark? What about him?" Collins was a bit curious and confused about why Roger is asking about the smallish boy.

"I don't know, just what do you think of him?" Collins thought for a while, then smiled. He had started to really like the scrawny new filmmaker over the past couple of weeks and was definitely not afraid to admit it, or anything else for that matter.

"I like him a lot." He replied, very casually, not looking up from his homework.

"Really…Why?" Roger didn't expect that answer from Collins. Once again, he was amazed at his relaxed, informal answer to the most controversial of questions. "He's the last person I would think anyone would like."

"Then why do you hang out with him?" Collins asked and looked up at Roger.

"…I don't know, I just do."

"Yeah, same with me. Well, I also happen to think that he's smart and cute and isn't afraid to do a nice thing once in a while." Collins said. Roger rolled his eyes. That's such a gay thing to say. He thought.

"Alright class, I have the grammar quiz ready for you, so do well, this is a big part of your quiz grade." said the teacher. The class groaned.

Mark was having a terrible time in his world history class. This was probably the worst unit he ever had to endure because of its timing in Mark's time of crisis.

"So, everyone, early man and modern man have the same genus, which is the genus homo." said the teacher, Ms. Lessots. Mark cringed. Why do we have to learn this lesson today? He thought. "There's Homo habilis, Homo erectus, and Homo sapiens, which is what we are. And since we are all humans, we are all homos." Everyone in the class burst out laughing, even Mark gave a little chuckle, but then the realization came to him that people were laughing at something that he fears he is, so he became silent once again, lost in his thoughts.

"Mark?" whispered the teacher. She was right in front of him, handing out tests on last week's unit. Everyone else in the room was writing on them. He must've spaced out after the roars of laughter.

"Uh, yes?" Mark hastily replied.

"When you finish the test, could you please come to the front of the room?"

"Why? Am I in trouble?" Mark got nervous, he didn't want to be in even more trouble than he got into yesterday.

"No, I just need you to come to my desk when you're finsihed." Mark nodded and Ms. Lessots walked away. Mark sighed and worked on the test. Very simple questions to him, he finished it in just half an hour, while everyone else would probably take another hour to finish. But he hesitated to take it to Ms. Lessots, cause he was afraid of what she had to say to him, but after ten minutes of worrying, he went up to her desk, he could feel his hands and knees shaking a bit his palms starting to sweat and his feet starting to turn cold.

"You wanted to speak to me?" Mark whispered as he handed the test papers to his teacher.

"Yes, Mark. I just want to give you this." She opened a drawer in her desk and took out a small, yellow piece of paper and handed it to him. It read: Hall Pass to Counselor. "I knew you were going to finish before everyone else so I would like you to go to your counselor's office. He'll tell you everything, okay?" Mark nodded.

"Okay..." Mark was really worrying right now. He left the room quietly and walked down the seemingly long hallways that were empty and still.

"Ah, Mark, come in." said the counselor, Mr. Howard. He gestured Mark to sit down in a small chair across his long desk. "How are you?" he asked. His voice was calm and attentive, something that anyone would imagine a counselor's voice would sound like.

"I'm good…but I don't know why I'm here." Mark replied. He had his camera in his hands and was holding on to it tightly, but tried not to lose grip of it because of his palms that were beginning to sweat.

"Well, it's about your performance in your classes lately. Your teachers have informed me that you've been having problems paying attention and that though your test and quiz grades are great, your homework has been inconsistent for a few weeks now, so I'm wondering, is there something wrong? I know that you're a very good student, so there has to be something that's caused this." asked Mr. Howard. Mark didn't know how to reply. Oh no, nothing's wrong, I just think that I'm gay and I might have a crush on a guy who happens to be one of my best friends and I'm becoming insane because of it! Mark's mind practically screamed out.

"Well, ort of, but it's personal." He finally answered, quietly. Mr. Howard nodded.

"Mark, whatever you want to tell me will be confidential, you don't have to worry. Nothing will leave this office." His words were convincing, but Mark didn't want to admit anything out loud.

"Sorry, but I can't. I just wanna keep it to myself for now." Mr. Howard sighed.

"Alright, if that's what you want, but I'm still concerned. I don't want you to leave without giving you someone to talk to. Hold on." Mr. Howard took a card from a small basket near the edge on his desk and handed it to Mark. "Here. I really recommend that you call. It's very good for teenagers who don't want to speak to anyone face-to-face about their problems." Mark looked down at the card.

"New York Teen Hotline..." Mark said aloud. He's heard of things like these but never thought about or considered them.

"Now, I want you to call that number by Friday, alright? I'm going to have you come in this office every week for the next month so that you can tell me how everything is going. Is that okay with you?"

"Yeah. Yeah, that's fine. Can I go now?"

"Of course. Have a nice day."

"Thanks, you too." Mark walked out the door and put the card in his pocket. He walked in the halls for a few moments then scanned the area to make sure no one was watching . He cranked up his camera and began to film himself.

"Okay…March 4th…1978, 10:36 AM, um…Eastern Standard Time. I just got back from the counselor's office and just got a phone number for a Teen Hotline thing. Pffh, like anyone would want to even talk to someone with my problem." He turned off his camera after that and hurried back to his classroom.

Alright, Chapter 3 is up. Review if you want and tell me what you think.