Ch. 6

My first class is beating the crap out of me. I can't focus. You see, if you remember correctly, I changed my history class to something else and now I'm realizing I hate this teacher just as much as the one I had before. Instead of it being a man that might have been slightly racist, it's a woman that "loves" everyone and it's pissing me off. She's so annoying. She has that kind of voice that reminds me of someone… I can't think of who it is though. Those wrinkles and the fact she tried to cover them with makeup isn't helping me focus either. Oh my god this is painful. I looked over at Ludwig and he seemed fine. Paying attention, writing down notes, talking and I'm over in the corner needing this class period to end.

I still have this nagging feeling in my gut that I need to tell someone about what's been going on in my head but I can't think of anyone.

The bell rang and I was out of that class in less than three seconds. My next class is the one I look forward to every day, art class, the class where I can do whatever I want for an hour and a half and no one will get at me for it. Lud also has this class. I grabbed my sketchbook from my bag with an idea already in mind. I started sketching a male body, with the same muscle structure as Luds. The same face and hair too. I just sketched and sketched and when I saw Lud walking by my table, I closed my book and saw it was almost time for our next class.

"What are you drawing?" Lud asked as he walked by.

"Oh nothing really, just some sketches that I've been working on." My face started to turn red, but not because of him but because I was lying.

"Well, the bell's about to ring, just letting you know."

"Thanks." I smiled as he walked passed me.

The bell rang again. But this time I didn't run out of the class, I walked out, talking to Lud and actually smiling. My curl was bobbing every time he spoke and I started holding it so he wouldn't notice. After this class I can honestly go home. The last class I have of the day is one that's mostly online and attendance isn't mandatory. I never actually go to it. There's really no teacher ever there and who ever runs the class doesn't care either. So we made it to gym class. As I walked into the locker room to change, I overheard some boys talking about what we'd be doing today.

"Dude, I heard it's soccer today."

"Aw man, I suck at soccer. This is gonna suck."

"Ya, but we have all the soccer kids in our group. There's no way we can lose."

"Good point."

I must have gotten distracted because when I turned to my locker, Lud was almost completely changed.

"Hey, Feli, I'm going to go out. I'll see you on the field."

I waved and he ran out the doors. I started to unlock my locker as I was approached by someone I had almost forgotten about, Gilbert Beilschmidt. He was silver hair and red eyes that'd scare anyone and he almost had the same narcissistic outlook on himself as Alfred. He was also a transfer student but from years back. Yet he still had or kept his German accent. He leaned up on the locker beside me.

"So how's everything going for ya? You're having fun with my brother I see. Who knew you'd be the family that'd take him in for his transfer. That's funny." He was almost yelling in my ear. I nearly didn't catch what he said.

"Brother?!"

He looked confused, then realized that I had no idea, "Ga, he's my younger brother. I call him West back at home but I'm not going to call him that here. Beilschmidt, that's his last name as well as mine. You wouldn't think we were related but it's true!" He just started laughing.

"I don't even want to know why he's here with me then. Why isn't he with you?!"

"Pfft, I didn't even know he was coming to this terrible country till I saw him with you and your brother driving home. He must have taken that scholarship that both of us got a few years ago, though I didn't think he'd actually use it. I used mine to get away from everything back east. But I guess he couldn't bear not seeing me."

"Does he know you're here?"

"I don't know. Maybe. Pfft, he never tells me anything."

I could feel my face slowly growing redder and redder the more we talked. I know Gilbert noticed, and if he hasn't, he's about to. I saw him look at my face. I looked up at him and he just had this smirk. A smirk that had "I know something you don't want others to know" written all over it.

"What?" I nervously said.

"You like my brother." His smirk widened, and the look he now had was, 'I was right.'

My face, on the other hand, when from slightly worried to panicked in less than one second.

"Y-you can't tell him! You can't!"

"I wouldn't even go near that psycho bastard. He doesn't really know which state I transferred to. And if he does well, he's keeping his distance and it's pissing me off. You'd think being related and everything, we'd at least care where we went to but no."

As he finished his sentence, our PE teacher walked in and yelled at everyone to hurry up. I quickly undressed and slipped into my loose basketball shorts and school t-shirt. I managed to do all that without needing to take my sneakers off. Gilbert and I both ran out with a crowd of other people and then continued to run on the court and out the back doors. The sunlight pierced my eyes as we all ran out to the soccer fields to meet everyone else already on them. Everyone already knew what team they were on, so we split off into four groups. Two of them ran to the next field over and everyone else stayed on the first one. Teacher gave us our ball and then blew the whistle. We all knew what to do, win.

The game started. Players running back and forth, ripping up the perfectly mowed field, scoring and missing goals, and no one except the goalie was yelling. All you could hear was charging footsteps going back and forth across the grass and players heavily breathing as the passed the ball to their teammates beside them and then, "Gooaaaal!". We play our games in class to 8 points and then we can either start another or call it good. I looked at the large clock we have outside the school, '12:34'. I guess it's time to go in. The bell rings at 1. I heard the other fields' goalie yell, "Goal!" as well and it looked like they had finished as well. Everyone slowly walked back into the locker rooms. Some guys showered, some really needed to but didn't and some just sprayed on more deodorant that they probably should have and got dressed. I just rubbed on some deodorant and put on my original shirt and pants. I was going to talk to Gilbert one last time when I noticed he was talking to Ludwig.

I hid behind some lockers and tried to listen, but sadly I couldn't hear them. All I heard was everyone else talking. I did notice their actions. They were just talking and then it seemed like Gilbert said something. Maybe something he shouldn't have said; that's at least what I got from Luds' reaction. It went slightly red and Gilberts' hands hit his face. 'What did he say to make Lud red like that?'. Lud started to slightly look around. It seemed as if he was looking for a person and then looked back at Gilbert. Gilbert saw me looking out from the side of the locker and shook his head and mouthed something. A sort of smirk rode on his face as he continued to talk to Lud… and then it hit me. What he said… "He knows now, sorry."

I stood out from my hiding place and just looked at the two. I almost felt like crying. I almost felt like ripping Gilberts' lips off. Gilbert ran over to me and put his hand on my shoulder.

"Dude, Feli, I didn't mean to. I swear. He just started talking to me and it slipped!"

Lud started to walk over. I took Gilberts' hand off my shoulder, turned around, grabbed my pack from the ground and ran out the doors. I kept running till I made it out of the school and kept going till I made it half way home. I stopped on the side walk, heavily breathing and looked up at the sky with tears running down the sides of my face.

"Dammit, dammit, dammit! I shouldn't have said anything! I should have just kept my mouth shut!"

I looked down at the concrete sidewalk and watched with blurry vision, my tears falling on to it and soaking each one up. I then started running again and didn't stop till I made it home. I opened the door, slammed it shut, dropped my bag at the foot of the stairs and ran into my room. I slammed my door and locked it. I belly flopped on my bed and dug my face so deep into the pillow that I physically could no longer breathe. I lifted my head up and took a huge gasp of air and balled into my pillow. I cried so hard that I couldn't even get air into my lungs.

It was about two hours later when I woke up to someone getting on my bed. I was hoping for my mom but when I sat up to look it was the only person in the world that I didn't want to see. I laid back down and pretended that I didn't see him.

"So I didn't know my brother was going to this school either. Funny how he never said anything until today in the locker room. We got to talking and he might have slipped a few things that maybe were supposed to stay out of the light and you know what, that's ok… I'm not going to judge you on what someone else said. I want to hear what you have to say."

I ignored him. He kept talking.

"And I can never believe what he says half of the time and that's almost one of the reasons why I was happy that he left, you know?"

I was silent for a while and then I sat up and looked at him. There were still small tears glued to the sides of my eyes.

"For whatever he said to me that I wasn't supposed to know, I'm sorry."

I just looked at him. I couldn't even say anything. Why is he apologizing to me? He didn't do anything wrong but, it's nice to hear him talking. If he knows, I think I'm okay with it. I think I can get over it. I just, I wanted to tell him, not Gil.

"It's ok. Whatever he said to you is probably true. And you know what, if you want…."

I was trying so hard to look him in the eyes but I couldn't. Why can't I see him as just a friend? Why does it have to be more than that? I'm sorry. I bet you're not even gay. That's the hard part. I bet he's straight as a square. I looked down at my sheets. I then felt his warm arms going around me and him pulling me closer and closer to his chest. Without skipping a beat, my arms automatically put themselves around him and I, uncontrollably, started to cry into his shirt. I didn't even know why at that point. I was so happy, so confused, and so relieved I could have died.

Maybe he does know. Maybe Gil told him something different. Maybe I was overthinking everything. Or maybe he does know and doesn't care. This is making my crush worse yet at the same time, I still wish I had never met him.