Baby boys are growing up. Also, I love Skylor and Karlof.

Zane was the first to arrive, which was not a surprise since he was known to be a punctual, early bird type of person. He patiently waited for his other friends at the front entrance of their school.

Cole showed up about fifteen minutes later. Then Jay several minutes after, dashing across the parking lot.

"Sorry I'm late! Oh, Kai's not here yet?" the freckled brunet pouted. Cole laughed. "Hey, shut up!" Jay stomped on Cole's foot as hard as he could.

"Ow! Why would you do that?!" Cole shouted, lifting his foot off the ground and desperately trying to stay balanced on the other. "If anyone should get cursed, it's you." Jay only stuck out his tongue.

"Speaking of curses... Hello, Kai!" Zane called out, waving at the rapidly approaching brunet, lugging a backpack. "How are you?"

"I'm great! Sorry I'm late, had to take Nya to her school," he explained, panting slightly. Cole gingerly put weight on his foot, raising an eyebrow.

"Elementary kids don't get schedule pick-up days until fifth grade," Cole said. Maybe things had changed last year?

"Well, about that. Nya's skipping fourth grade, so she's a fifth grader now," Kai beamed, slinging the backpack off his shoulders. "I have the rice cakes!" He handed several out and waited. He stared at his friends, who did nothing. He frowned. "Well, what are you waiting for? Eat one." Almost simultaneously, the three boys bit into one of the rice cakes. Zane's eyes widened and Cole and Jay gasped.

"These are amazing, Kai," Zane was the first to speak and compliment. "It's such a simple food yet it's unique."

"You're not gonna curse us though, right? Because I'd rather not have that right now," Jay mumbled with a full mouth. Cole punched him in the back gently.

"Gross," the noiret scolded. Kai giggled.

"Of course I wouldn't actually curse you guys. You're my friends. I love you all." Kai hopped on the balls of his feet. "I usually don't say this, but hurry up and finish eating your rice cakes so we can get our schedules already!" Even as he said this, Kai did not wait and ran for the school's entrance.

When the others finally finished and entered the building, the halls were already filled with chatting and exploring peers, the first-years being completely confused as to what they should do and where they should go. Since this was their second year of junior high, the three boys went upstairs to the second floor. Thankfully, Kai was already by the table set up to hand the students their schedules. He was laughing at something Skylor had said.

"Hey guys, took y'all long enough! Qu'liiy, qu'illy, I wanna see if we have any classes together. I have Home Ec. and history with Skylor," Kai said enthusiastically. He gasped. "By the way, y'all know Skylor, right?" The girl smiled awkwardly.

"Hey," she muttered. She pointed a finger at Zane. "Weren't you that kid that fell off the swing set and almost broke the fake leg in third grade?" Zane blushed, which was a rare sight. Cole snorted and Jay cackled while Kai raised an eyebrow.

"You said you showed Cole and Jay," the brunet questioned. Zane chuckled nervously.

"In a way, I did. It just wasn't planned the way I wanted to." Jay's laughter increased in volume and Cole wheezed loudly. Zane clapped his hands together. "Yes, I am that kid. We haven't spoken in quite some time, Skylor? How have you been doing lately?" The girl shrugged.

"Learning how to take care of dreads. I see Cole has the same mindset in never cutting them 'cause that's what I'm doing," she said confidently. Cole nodded.

"I'll probably wear a man bun pretty soon."

"You do that and I will never be friends with you again," Jay announced in a serious tone. He strutted forward and searched for his schedule. "Found it!" Zane and Cole proceeded to do the same and compared their classes and times.

Cole had history with Kai on Mondays and Thursdays, Jay and Zane had robotics on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, Zane had Home Ec. with Cole on Fridays, and Kai and Jay were together in pre-algebra on Tuesdays and Thursdays. They had fewer classes together, but they understood why. The higher the grade level you were, the more diverse your schedule was.

Jay jumped up and down. "Hey, let's go see our classes! I wanna know which teacher we'll have!" he shouted, skipping down the crowded hallways, apologizing everytime he bumped into someone. Cole and Zane followed, the former shaking his head in fondness. Kai smiled at Skylor.

"Join us?" he invited her.

"Uh, sure. I guess, why not?" she said and followed the brunet.

Jay grunted as he struggled to look over the head that crowded the posters listing the students' names and their classes. Even on his toes, the freckled boy couldn't see.

"Need any help seeing?" Cole teased when he joined his friend. Jay stuck out his tongue and nodded. Cole fixed his posture. One of the advantages of being tall: never having to put any effort into looking over crowds of people his age. Pretty much everyone was shorter than Cole. "Uh, okay... Hey, Jay, Class 2-A! Me too!"

"Yes!" Jay cheered, pumping a fist into the air. Zane, who had joined them as well, looked over people's heads as well. So did Skylor. Kai tried, but he was not tall enough to see clearly. When Zane frowned, Jay poked him. "Hey, why the sad face?"

"I'm in Class 2-B... So is Kai," the blond informed his friends. Skylor stood up straighter.

"Huh, so am I. Sweet," the girl smiled, twirling a longer lock around her fingers.

The three couldn't believe it. Up until this point, Cole, Jay, and Zane had always been together. They always had the same teacher and class. Now, they were separated. At least the classes were next door to each other so they would at least have gym together.

"At least someone will be there to make sure I don't torment the teacher," Kai joked before winking at Zane, which left the others a little confused while Zane smiled and shook his head. Suddenly, Kai yelped when someone from behind him picked him up into an almost suffocating bear hug.

"Kai has same class with Karlof!" the boy screamed as he squeezed Kai tighter and lifted him off the ground. Skylor laughed to the point of having to hold her stomach.

"Karlof... put me... down," Kai wheezed, gasping when Karlof obeyed. He smiled as he regained himself. "Are you serious? That's amazing! How are you doing in reading?" Karlof shrugged, picking at the thick wool of his gloves. No one has ever seen him without the gloves on. Karlof hated his hands and kept them hidden at all times, but no one knew why.

"Karlof does okay in reading. Not good to graduate, not bad getting bad grade and make Karlof restart again. But we have fun in class together, like best of friends," Karlof exclaimed. Kai cheered along. "Where is locker? We neighbor?"

"I don't know. Let's go see!" Kai ran off with Karlof, leaving his friends behind. Skylor shrugged before departing as well. Jay cracked his knuckles nervously.

"So... guess we should do the same. Right?"

It only got worse from there. Instead of being neighbors, the trio's lockers were separated. Cole groaned. He just knew his grades were going to drop, he could feel it in his gut. Jay fidgeted to the point of accidentally banging his knee against the metal of his locker. He was in between two people that he didn't know that well, Neuro and Jacob. The former was more of a weirdo than him, some even calling him psychic or whatever. Jacob was cool though. He was funny and had a quirky fashion sense.

Like Jay, Jacob also knew what it was like to be bullied. He was blind and had dwarfism. However, he never let that get to him and would usually joke around.

"You'll be okay," Neuro suddenly spoke up while figuring out the combination of his lock. He opened it first try. "Let me guess, they changed your lock so you can open it on your own, Jacob?" The boy gasped, dramatically running his fingers through his afro.

"How'd you know? Are you cheating and looking at it?" Jacob questioned.

"No. Jay's blocking so I can't see the lock. It was a guess that I assume I'm correct about," Neuro responded calmly. His grey eyes looked the freckled boy on his right up and down before saying, "Just don't worry, life's not as bad as second grade when Lloyd was there." Jay grimaced.

"Yeah, okay. You're so weird sometimes. Are you a mind reader or something?" Neuro did not answer, only shutting his locker and left without a goodbye, schedule in hand. "Oh my gosh, I finally figured it out, Jacob." The other boy laughed.

"You're funny, Jay. Hey, what class do you have? I'm in 2-C."

"2-A. Maybe we can hang out during lunch or something?" Jacob shook his head and did his best to open his locker again. He was trying to figure out where the indents were.

"Nah, don't want to separate you from your friends. Besides, we can talk while we're at our lockers. Well, if I can memorize and visualize the hallways to and from here and my class," Jacob chuckled. "A-ha!" He finally got his locker open.

Jay smiled widely. He knew he already made a new friend.

So apparently for Jacob's design, he is the only one to have short legs. So that's why I decided that he has dwarfism.

Qu'illy: Come on