Emil being further away from Leon wasn't something he had imagined, he realized, soon as he walked through the front door to their school. Emil had left the house without telling Leon, unlike when he regularly made sure they both were ready before leaving so they could walk out together. However, that day, Emil had left without a single glance back at Leon, and he had to catch up with him on the way to school.

Leon had known it was a mistake telling Emil about his birth gender. Now that he was known by Emil, there should have been less distance between them, but it had only separated them farther.

The first half of the day passed drearily for Leon. Even when he shared a class with Emil and the teacher told them to get into pairs, Leon could see that Emil was pairing up with some other girl who didn't have a partner. Leon had to be in a group of three with two people he he hardly knew. They ignored all of his ideas and he did hardly any work, but that was fine with him.

During lunch, Leon also did not see Emil. He ran towards the forest, trying to remember the path to Emil's shack. After about ten minutes of crashing through the forest, he found the shack and opened the door.

"Emil, you in here?" He asked into the darkness, his eyes still adjusting to the shafts of light through the roof. There was a shuffling in the corner, and Leon stepped up to it, seeing Emil huddled there reading. He sat next to the other. "Why have you been avoiding me?"

Emil glanced back at Leon before turning away and pouting. "I haven't."

"Emil you literally paired up with someone who I've never seen you talk to."

"We were friends two years ago."

"Emil, come on, just tell me."

Emil buried his face into his own shoulder. "Fine. Maybe I have been avoiding you since yesterday."

Leon's heart sank. He just wanted Emil back, and with him. Now they would never be together, and all because of Leon telling Emil yesterday. "Why?" he asked.

"You kissed me… I didn't want…"

That was even worse to Leon. He thought Emil had liked him. Suddenly, Emil turned around and grabbed Leon's shirt, pulling him into a kiss. Leon made a small surprised sound before kissing him back. Emil shifted closer to Leon, until their bodies were inches away from each other. Emil pulled away after a few seconds. "Never kiss me in front of other people ever again!"

"Emil…"

"I want it to be between us, and no one else. It is our special time, ours, and I don't want anyone to take that away!"

Leon leaned into Emil, resting his head on his shoulder. They spent the rest of lunch time like that, the world seemingly disappearing around them, until the bell in the distance rang, and they were brought out of their trance.

They didn't have any more classes together that day, and Leon had to stay after school for a make up test or something like that. Emil wasn't quite sure why, as Leon had not told him the details, but he was sitting behind the back of the school reading his book and waiting for Leon to return when it happened.

"Emil," said a voice from in front of him. It was Arnar, who was unfortunately the stereotypical bully in all of those movies about school. Of course he was always picking on Emil, considering he was short in stature and wasn't truly able to defend himself. First, it was about how "nerdy" he was, then it was about his hair being naturally white. There always seemed to be something. However, Emil had heard through rumors that he had a mother that was abusive and while it provided a reason to why he was like that, Emil truly did not feel like it excused everything he had done.

Arnar grabbed Emil's shirt and yanked him up, causing his book to fall from his hands. "Hey wha- stop it!" Emil protested, squirming to get away.

"I didn't know you were such a fag, Emil," Arnar said, striking Emil in the chest with his fist.

Emil cried out in pain, a breathy and sad yelp. Arnar had never physically struck him like this before, but it hurt like hell for Emil. This was the real reason why he did not want Leon to kiss him in public, because he was afraid this was going to happen.

"What a wimp," Arnar laughed, dropping Emil back to the ground and walking off.

Emil curled up into a ball as tears streaked down his face. How could he live like this? Beaten, overpowered, and broken.

A/N - Sorry for the late update but stuff happened like a lot of homework. Also, Arnar's name basically just came up by googling "popular Icelandic names" yeah hope you all enjoyed it though