1... 2... 3...
Danny slowly counted the seconds from inside the cramped space of the locker he'd just been shoved in. Dash had gotten another D, and as usual, Danny was the one to take the brunt of the quarterback's anger. He was just lucky Dash hadn't gotten an F, or he'd be going home with more bruises than he already had from ghost hunting.
18... 19... 20.
Just as Danny was about to phase out of the locker, the door opened and he tumbled out with a yelp. His eyes focused on Kwan's concerned face hovering inches from his own. Danny scrambled to his feet and dusted himself off.
"Uhh... thanks."
"Don't mention it," said Kwan with a small smile. As he turned to leave, a question Danny hadn't meant to ask slipped out of his mouth.
"Why are you friends with him?"
The two boys both froze, the empty hallway silent except for the muffled noise of distant classes. Although Danny couldn't see Kwan's face, he knew the A-lister was considering his question, debating how to answer.
Finally, he replied, "He needs me."
Danny blinked. "What."
"You know how he is... anger issues, and stuff." Kwan shrugged, back still turned to Danny. "He needs me."
What the hell, Danny figured if he was this far, he might as well go all the way.
"But, I mean, why do you... like him?"
Kwan's shoulders tensed at the question. "We've known each other a long time, okay? I've helped him through some stuff, and he's... he's helped me through some stuff too." The anger slowly faded out of Kwan's voice, and it became quieter, almost wistful. "He's not really such a bad guy, deep down. He's just got a lot going on, and doesn't know how to deal." A pause, then, almost too quiet to hear, "I'd do anything for him."
Danny gaped at the other boy's back. "You don't just like him... you like him!"
Kwan whirled around and grabbed Danny by the shoulders, and for the first time the small boy could see fear in his classmate's eyes.
"You can't tell anyone!" Kwan nearly yelled. Realizing his volume, he continued in a quieter tone. "If word got out to just one wrong person, if it got around to my parents..." Kwan didn't need to finish the sentence. His face said it all. The parents of the A-listers expected nothing less than perfection from each one of them. If something didn't fit with their parents' definition of perfect, well... maybe that sentence didn't need to be finished either.
Danny let a small, reassuring smile onto his face. "Don't worry, I won't. I just never really expected you to be gay."
"Yeah, that's... kind of the point." Kwan bit his lip for a moment before mumbling, "Bi."
"What?"
"I'm actually bi," Kwan said softly. "Leaning towards guys, but I've had crushes on girls before."
"Oh."
Kwan didn't quite meet Danny's eyes, but his whole face glowed in the soft way someone's does when they're relieved. "I've never told anyone this before," he admitted.
"Not even Dash?"
Kwan shook his head. "He doesn't even know I like him like that. How could I even tell him? And what if... he says no?"
The two of them spent the rest of the hour talking. Danny learned that Kwan used to have extreme social anxiety, and Dash was the only kid stubborn enough to get to know him. He learned that the relationship between Dash and Paulina was completely fake, meant to throw off any prying eyes, and that Paulina already liked Star. The same went for Paulina's over-enthusiastic crush on Danny Phantom. (Now Danny almost felt bad enough to just let her keep going. Almost.) By the time the bell signaling the end of class rang, the two of them were sitting comfortably on the floor, leaned up against the lockers.
"Oh, man," cried Kwan, "we missed class!"
Danny just sighed as he stood up and dusted off his pants. "What's one more detention for me anyway?" He looked up at Kwan, who still seemed a little stricken. "It was... nice talking to you."
Kwan blinked. "Yeah," he said, as if he were only just now realizing it were true, "I guess so."
"I'm serious," Danny said. "Usually you have on this, this sort of mask, trying to be all perfect. But this was the first time I felt like I was talking to a real person."
Kwan looked a little shocked at that. And then he smiled.
Then the sudden crowd of students blocked Danny's vision, and when he could see again, Kwan was gone.
Ooh man, this story really didn't want to be written right at the beginning of the conversation, but I pushed through because I'm determined to write something for each day of this event week! I'm on vacation the whole time, so it shouldn't be a problem. I have a lot of trouble pulling through and finishing longer stories (sorry for anyone who was waiting for new chapters of any of my other fics!) so hopefully this week-long event will be good practice for me in sticking with stuff.
(For anyone who doesn't know, the DP Side Hoes Week is a list of prompts honoring some of the characters in Danny Phantom who didn't get enough character development.)