AN: Yesterday I almost started to reread Butterfish's American Dreams in an English Village but I started crying to much so I decided not to. I thin everyone should go read that if you haven't! I cry just thinking about it. I don't know why I'm saying all this.

On with the story I guess!

"How about this?" Arthur placed the headphones over my head, his eyes fixed on me as he waited for my approval of his CD of the Sex Pistols. He said his parents used to listen to this music, around the time his mom led protests against anti-nuclear war in the late 70's early 80's. That's how his parents met, he told me.

"It just sounds like noise…" I told him in all honesty.

He looked at me like I just cursed out his religion. "What do you listen to then? Britney Spears?"

Yes. "Well, just whatever's on the radio."

He sighed like he had no more hope for me and shifted himself beside me. We were leaning against one of the walls of the second floor of our school, the outside where the roof is and where teachers couldn't spot us.

I realize that makes us sound like some sort of forbidden couple wanting to make out during classes, but really we were just hoping not to get written up for ditching math to hang out. I had 4th period AP geometry, and on my way there Arthur pulled my hood and dragged me up here against my will. This is the first time I ever ditched a class, and it felt adrenaline rushing. Like in The Breakfast Club when they leave the detention room and try not to get caught by the principal.

Arthur was completely chill with it though, he probably did this regularly. It's not like his grades went any lower, he was smart enough to keep them up.

I really liked the view from the roof, the brick wall behind us sort of hurt to lean against, but we could see the sun rising. Or whatever the sun does at 10 am, I haven't taken Earth science yet. Point is it looked really pretty over the cold, bare trees. They looked almost frozen and I would give 20 bucks to the next person who licked them.

"Its really cold, I can't wait 'till summer." I said to myself as Arthur reached into his bag for a thermos of hot chocolate that we ended up sharing together. It warmed us up when all I was wearing was a blue hoodie with a long sleeve button up underneath and he was wearing a leather jacket with black jeans.

Arthur tucked his hands in his pockets and leaned his head on my shoulder. I was too scared to move even an inch because I didn't want him to think I didn't want him burrowing his face on my hoodie, because honestly it felt like I was on top of the world.

We stayed like that for a few more minutes until we heard the bells ring for passing period. He didn't want to skip AP English and I didn't want to miss our new lab in Astronomy, but I think for that moment we had together sipping hot chocolate and listening to English punk bands I would miss going to the moon.

Once I got home from school I called my cousin Matthew. We had sort of a strange relationship where I hated every single fiber of his body because he was a huge dick, but I also couldn't function without him.

"Matthew? It's Alfred." The phone was still in my room from when I had called Arthur, dad still had yet to figure it out.

"Geez, Al, have you hit puberty yet? You sound like someone just kneed you in the crotch."

Listen here you little shit. "Fuck you, Matt. I need help. I met a guy."

"Good job, Al. I don't care." I could practically hear him patting himself on the back. We hadn't talked since I first moved in, and in guy code when you miss someone a lot you have to be the biggest douchebag to them once you guys start talking again. It's like saying "wow, I haven't made fun of you in a while so I'm going to make up for it by insulting you in every sentence that comes out of my mouth." That's what real love is.

"I think I like him." I spat out.

"Ask him for the D."

"You advice sucks."

"I love you too, bro."

"Fuck off. And by fuck off, I meant tell me what I should do." I was getting really desperate now. I wasn't even sure what I wanted anyway, did I want Arthur to be my boyfriend or something? Was he even gay? If I told him I started liking him, would things change between us?

That last thought scared me the most.

"Hmm." Matthew pushed up his glasses. Well, I couldn't see him but he was. He does that when he's thinking or when he wants to get a closer look at some girl's ass.

"Alright here's what you do," I was paying attention now. "You drop something on the floor, anything. A pen."

"Okay..."

"Then, pick it up. But not just like how anyone would pick up a pen, you've gotta bend and snap."

I paused from pacing around and stared blankly at nothing. "Matt... You're really dumb."

"I grew up with you, didn't I?"

That's when I hung up on him. I wasn't mad at him though (just insanely done), I actually really missed talking to him. Somehow his stupid humor seemed to ease my tension with anything, kinda like when you're in a crowd of people and you finally see someone you know.

That night, I was almost fully asleep when I woke up to the sound of something tapping against my window. I tried really hard to ignore it by pulling the covers over me or crushing my face with my pillow, but it didn't stop. Finally I went to check it out.

Apparently Arthur thought it was a good idea to knock on my window in the middle of the night, once I opened up the blinds I saw him standing on the other side of my window wearing a winter jacket. His face looked really red from the cold.

I let him in by opening the window and pulling him by his hand inside my room. I gestured that my dad was sleeping in the next room over, so we couldn't make any sounds. Instead, we talked in almost whispers.

"Are you okay?" I asked looking at him.

Arthur looked around my room, I could he didn't like how messy it was, and how all the posters on the walls had superheros on them. I even had a Blink 182 poster that came with their Enema of the State CD.

"Yeah, my parent's are fighting though so I needed to get out." He took off his jacket and threw it on the floor, he noticed the chair by my desk and sat in it to take off his shoes.

Ever since I met Arthur, I saw him as someone who was a lot more polite than what teachers thought he was and who was also more friendlier than how other kids saw from his irked face. But I was seeing Arthur with his boots off, the blonde hair at his roots of green hair and his guard off from the cold. I was seeing him escape his own home, the bushy eyebrows that weren't pierced and looked like giant bugs, and the gap between his front teeth.

I started to know Arthur for who he really was. A messy haired kid who liked reading Shakespeare and got confused with Rubik's cubes.

"I hate it when parents fight." I told him, trying not to remember the way my parents did.

"For real." He climbed into my bed like he fucking owned the place.

In the morning I told my dad Arthur had come over because of family problems, and he was cool with it (he just made arthur call his parents so they wouldn't worry), being glad to have finally met Arthur as well. Mostly he asked him really generic questions like what books did he like and what did his parents do for a living. (The good things is he didn't ask about his hair or clothes) Adults are really boring like that. They don't really talk about anything else except for their kids and the economy.