I haven't posted in a while, oh no! I've also gotten in a habit at posting at the strangest hours...I need to stop...
TBH I had so many internet friends on here before I took that long break, and now only a few have come back to read this story. I think it's better than Stand By Me a Little Longer, so IDk. Makes me sad, but I'm going to make this into a regular novel when I'm done, so I guess it's for the better.
XO,
-Tommy
"Oh man, I think I'm failing math…" Caspar muttered, looking down at his notebook, which was lined across the page with problems upon problems of algebra. Gordie looked around the quiet study hall, and then back at his frustrated friend. His eyes squinted at the homework in front of him, exasperated as he tried time and again to figure out the jumble of numbers. His pencil eraser tapped against his lip.
"You couldn't fail math." Gordie laughed. "You're, like, the best in the class!"
"You're better." Caspar muttered. Gordie blushed. "It's just these negative and positive exponents that get me. I don't know what to do with them…"
"It's isn't that hard." Gordie reasoned. Caspar looked up at him helplessly. Gordie sighed, turning the notebook slightly towards him. "Alright, you did most of it." He investigated the problem. "Basically what you have to do is multiply the exponents together…then just carry over and turn it into a fraction. Like this." He held his hand out for the pencil. Caspar handed it over. "You just bring x to the negative fifth power to he denominator, then add a one to the top. Then it's positive. Get it?"
Caspar bit his lip, staring at the page.
"So then what do I do if it's just a negative integer?" He asked.
"You just leave it. You only make it into a fraction if it's a negative exponent."
"Really?" Caspar scoffed. "Well, I've been doing everything wrong. No wonder I keep getting messed up." He looked at Gordie. "Thanks, man! You're a savior."
Gordie smiled modestly.
"Math isn't really my forte…" He admitted.
"Well, you helped me!" Caspar exclaimed. "Hey, you need any help with anything? I'd return the favor if you like…"
Gordie bit his lip. Yeah, He thought, I do need help. With a lot of things. Chris just got a girlfriend, and I can't even admit to myself that I'm a little jealous. I don't know who I am, I possibly killed my own mother without even knowing it, my secrets are coming back to haunt me, I lied to my dad, who's already up my ass, and I really don't know what I'm doing with my life right now. So yeah, I need help.
"Nah, not really." Gordie said quietly. "But if you need any help, I'd be happy to tutor your or something…" He coughed. "Or whatever…"
"Woah, really?" Caspar's eyes widened. "That's actually a really good idea! I'm also a shit writer, and I've heard you're pretty good."
"Oh, really?" Gordie raised an eyebrow. "From who?"
"Around…" He gave on the offhand. "Anyway, would you? It would really mean a lot, and I could get my grades up."
"Uh, yeah, sure." Gordie shrugged. "Why not?"
"Great!" Caspar exclaimed. "So, I'm free tomorrow afternoon. Would you want to meet at the library at maybe…say six? I get out from football practice really late."
Gordie nodded.
"Yeah, sure." He said. "Sounds good. I'm not doing anything after school until baseball games start in a few weeks, so that should be okay. You sure you'll be okay after football? We could do another day if you want…"
"Nah, it's cool." Caspar shrugged. "I'm actually most motivated when I'm kind of charged after practice. Sweaty, which will probably be the biggest problem. But you don't mind a bit of sweat, do you?" Caspar grinned a funny smile, laughing.
"Not at all." Gordie shook his head. "See you tomorrow, then."
"See you."
Gordie hadn't been to the library yet. It was a large building with a dome ceiling and a wall of windows facing the high school quad. Student artwork was splayed across the place. It had two floors, with the second overlooking the first over a balcony around the edge near the window wall. Upon nearly every inch of solid wall, there stood a bookshelf; piles and piles of books, classics, research books, magazines, fiction, biographies and fantasies. Gordie watched them all as he passed, his hand running across the delicate spines, leafed in gold or embossed with the titles and authors, Dewy Decimal system breaking it down to it's finest. If he closed his eyes, he could almost smell it; the smell of trees, the wood pulped and turned into paper which was printed and bound and turned into stories; legends, even. All here at his fingertips. It was almost nerve wracking, the amount of information he had at his disposal; how he could just walk up and pick out a book-any book-and instantly have the secrets of a world not his own right in the palm of his hands.
But he wasn't there right now. Another world. He was in cold reality, in which he was walking quietly across the padded floors to the table he had been sitting at, waiting for Caspar. He had been there since school ended, waiting until football let out. Checking his watch, Gordie confirmed that it was 6:07. He waited, tapping the wristband of the metal Rolex up against the wood. Nobody was around. The library, as it should be, was quiet.
"Hey!" Gordie heard a voice. He turned around in his wooden chair. Caspar approached, his blond hair, as presumed, dripping and stringy from sweat and water, golden strands falling over his face. He had changed into regular clothes; non-uniform, that is. It felt strange, seeing Caspar out of uniform and in his element; Blue jeans washing out a the knees (The kind that you had for years that you could never let go of), grey low top Converse sneakers, and a crisp green tee-shirt with a small pocket a few inches below his left shoulder.
"You are exactly seven minutes and thirty four seconds late." Gordie informed him with offhand smile.
"Sorry." Caspar laughed. "Got caught up in the locker room."
"I was kidding." Gordie rolled his eyes playfully. Caspar smiled as he sat down, swiping his hair from his eyes, which sprayed liquid across the table. Gordie cringed internally.
"Told you there would be sweat." Caspar laughed. Gordie gave him a look.
"That's all sweat?" He exclaimed in a laugh. Water dripped down Caspar's nose. "I was kidding." He said with a smirk. "No, it's shower water. You're safe."
"That's good." Gordie laughed. "Infectious football sweat isn't exactly my favorite hair product."
"God you even sound like a writer!" Caspar said, grinning at him. "Infectious. Could you give me your mental dictionary?"
"I really sound that dorky?" Gordie smiled tightly.
"You are a dork." Caspar replied with a smirk, bending over to reach into his backpack at his feet. After retrieving his books, he popped back up. "But aren't we all? Even I'm a dork. See?" From around the pile of notebooks and pencils, Caspar then produced a pair of thick, square Ray Ban glasses with. He put them on, grinning. His grey eyes magnetized in size, making him look a little disproportionate; however, Gordie couldn't help but notice that he still looked as adorable as before with them on.
"Who would have guessed that Football Sweat Caspar is as much of a dork as I am?" Gordie smiled, shaking his head. "I would have never suspected you to wear glasses."
"Aye! They're reading glasses." Caspar corrected.
"And that just makes it ten times more dorky." Gordie nodded in dork-approval. "Congrats. You are now one of the club. All you need is to wear those 24/7, a collared top and braces and you're good to go."
"Still have to improve my shit math skills before I apply for Dorkdom, though." Caspar added. "And that's why you're here."
"Well, if it makes you feel any better, I got a C+ on my last math quiz." Gordie offered.
"Dude!" Caspar exclaimed, laughing. "You're my tutor! You are officially disbanded from the dork committee."
"To be fair, I think dorks are the lame, clumsy ones and nerds are the academic ones." Gordie pointed out.
"Nerds can be clumsy and lame too." Caspar said with mock horror. "God, Gordie, just look at the examples around you. I'm lame as hell and I fell over about ten times in practice today and I still get mostly straight As except for in math which is why you are helping me. Use the examples around you! The truth is right in front of your eyes!"
"No, I'm lame as hell." Gordie said with brutal honestly. "I mean, come on. I'm tutoring. What's more lame than that?"
"Maybe the fact that I've read almost all the Shakespeare plays ever written?" Caspar offered. Gordie's eyes widened as Caspar's cheeks turned a timid, pale shade of pink.
"Seriously?" Gordie exclaimed.
"Yeah, wouldn't really take me for the type, would you?" Caspar shrugged. "Just another side of me that nobody really knows about."
Gordie gave Caspar a quick once-over before proceeding to slide further towards the center of the table, towards the pile of books.
"Alright, well, we should probably get started. What do you have to work on?" He asked, scanning over the books and notebooks and pencils in front of him. Caspar listed his to-dos of.
"I've got English and math that I'll need some help with…and then I have a history paper to get started, and then a Latin assignment."
"Alright, cool." Gordie picked through the books, noting his friend's neat, blocked handwriting-Caspar D'Anthony-over the front of each item. "Let's start with math. That cool?"
"Yeah, sure." Caspar said, plucking his math notebook from the pile, and a worksheet from a crowded blue folder. He opened to a fresh page, readying a pencil. Gordie did the same. The boys set to work, breaking down each problem, Gordie explaining the steps throughout in perfect formation. At nearly the fifth problem, Caspar got into rhythm, and the two split apart. Gordie's hands moved quickly across the paper, filling out box upon box of math problems, decimals and exponents and fractions mixing around into his mind. Neither of them spoke; the only sound that could be heard was the soft scratching of led on paper. Gordie glanced up at Caspar. His hair hung over his eyes as his head dipped, his neck arching over. He was absorbed in his work, his hand etching out the numbers across the paper. He paused in his work, tapping his eraser on the table like a drum stick as he thought. He bit his lip. Gordie smiled lightly, then returned to his work, but his mind wouldn't work. His mind was further now, maybe across the table with Caspar, or maybe all the way back at Castle Rock, where it all began. Either way, there was no way he was getting back to his seat, there, in the library, so he simply sat. Caspar shifted in his seat.
"Um…" He said softly. "I…" Gordie looked up. Caspar had his head lifted towards Gordie, pushing his blonde mop out of his eyes before looking back down at his paper again. He breathed out quickly. "I…I think I should tell you…what happened with Gavin and I…"
Gordie stared at Caspar, who raised his eyes to meet Gordie's through a curtain of golden hair. He gulped.
"Excuse me?" Gordie asked quietly.
"It's just that…" He sighed. "I really do trust you…and I feel like since you're friends with both of us, you should know." Gordie blinked at him. Caspar shoved his locks away from his eyes, sitting up. He looked at Gordie full on. "I just don't feel like it's right to keep you in the dark, you get me?"
"But…isn't it not your story to tell?" Gordie asked.
"It was his secret he gave to me." Caspar said quickly. "So I'm guessing I can do what I want with it, you know?"
Gordie shook his head.
"I don't know…" He said quietly; because he really didn't. More than half of him yearned to know what happened, the big secret, but a small part of him said it was wrong. Caspar shouldn't be telling him this. It was none of his business… "Seems kind of sketchy."
"What's sketchy about it?" Caspar laughed.
"I don't know…it just seems like you're selling his secret."
"Selling it?" He questioned. "For what?"
"I don't know…for friendship. Trust. Recognition?"
"Don't think this would involve recognition." Caspar said. "I'm really…kind of embarrassed about it to this day, to be honest…"
Gordie looked down.
"Oh." He said, then looked around the empty library; which was just so. Not a single soul was there to overhear. "Go ahead, I guess…what is it?" He averted his eyes, and, in turn, Caspar did the same. They both looked down at their notebooks, waiting for the bullet.
"Gavin's…He's gay." Caspar said quietly. Gordie looked up. His body swam with a warm sting of slight embarrassment. His palms tingled. A secret. He had it. It was his. What would he do? For some reason, it felt uncomfortable. A hot, clammy secret that was slowly beginning to strange him even before he knew the whole truth.
"What?" Gordie blurted. "How…How do you know? Like for sure, you know?"
"Well, I'm almost positive…" Caspar rubbed his knuckles under the table. Gordie got the feeling he was just as nervous-somehow-as he was.
"But you can't be sure, right?" Gordie pressed. "It's just an assumption, right? I mean anyone could get it; he does his hair in this certain way, wears nice clothes, from what I've seen…he's kinda bookish, and…" Gordie trailed off. Does his hair, wears nice clothes, kind of bookish. Was that what defined a gay person, anyway? He never knew one, or, at least, never thought he did. Not one who had come out, at least. But perhaps the most startling thing about tall those attributes was that nearly all of them applied to himself.
"I know…" Caspar answered. "I know because…because he kissed me."
"What?" Gordie spluttered. Now he was really feeling sick. Perspiration pricked his palms, his forehead and cheeks glazed with hot blush, and his lungs melted into his firm chest. He breathed in and out through his nose. "Are you…Are you serious?"
"Dead serious." Caspar mumbled.
"But…what?" Gordie shook his head. Somehow, this barely even came as a shock to him. It was almost like he could tell. But just hearing it, that word, made it all seem so vividly real. And Caspar. Why Caspar? Didn't he understand that he might as well have been the straightest person Gordie knew? Maybe it was because he just seemed so nice and sweet, or maybe it was the way that when the light hit him from the window-wall in the library, his eyes fireworked, his hair sparkled and shadows pulled across his cheeks and jaw, eventuating every essence of his features, or maybe, even, it was the feeling of acceptance no matter what when you were around him. Gordie got it; he saw the appeal. What he didn't understand was what Gavin thought would happen. It was a miracle that Caspar kept this secret for so long.
"Why did you tell me?" Gordie demanded softly.
"Huh?"
"Why would you tell me that?" He asked again.
"I don't know, I just…thought you should know." Caspar said dumbly.
"I just don't feel like it was your secret to tell, is all." Gordie looked down, surprised at his friend for doing something so insensitive. "You're lucky I'm not going to tell anyone."
"I knew that already." Caspar replied honestly. "That's why I told you. If I thought you were the gossip type, I wouldn't have said anything."
"Well, I'm glad you thought correctly." Gordie looked away.
"Sorry." His friend replied after a pause. "I shouldn't have. I just thought that since you're his friend, you might want to know."
"You can kill with secrets like that. You know that, right?" Gordie said quietly. "And now I have this big thing to wield around…"
"It's okay." Caspar said with a laugh. "We can wield it together." Just then, his eyes lit up in a spark of idea. "Wait, how about this; nothing said here leaves this library, alright? I don't tell anyone, you don't tell anyone. Everything is safe. The trust goes both ways. We'll do it for Gavin, alright?"
Gordie shrugged.
"Alright. Nothing passes the library walls."
"Deal."
They shook. And for a moment, everything felt kind of alright.
Just found out that 'fireworked' is not, in fact, a word. It should be. Let's start a petiton. Who's with me?