Chapter Text
I didn't fall for you, you fucking tripped me.
- Unknown.
The idea of having dreams, of having aspirations, was a little weird to him. At least, it had been when he was a child. Not that he thought that was overly terrible, anyway.
He had never dreamed of much; a child's overactive imagination was crushed by the will of his parents and the looming presence of the Lord. He had nothing to think about except when he would be allowed to leave the children's choir, when he would be allowed to sleep, and what to do when prayer was finished.
That was just his usual.
It carried through his whole life, mostly. A lack of freedom left nothing to the imagination. Maybe he should have dreaming more of running away, of being free, of a mother's gentle nurturing or something, but he didn't. He'd known it wasn't possible, so he hadn't dared to ever entertain the idea.
He thought of nothing. It should have be impossible, but really, his head was consistently empty. Prayer, Bible study, choir, school work. That was mostly what he had gargled thoughts about in passing—other than how much he disliked his classmates and those church pamphlets.
He'd never been really allowed to hang out with other kids his age unless they were in his stupid little church group, and he didn't want to hang out with those people anyway.
Most of his life was a little dictated. He didn't get to decide when he's hungry, nor when he's tired, and definitely not when he didn't want to do something. Everything in his life was included in a weird type of rule book.
One thing about him: he despised rules. He despised everything to do with them, he despised the lack of freedom—as if he actually thought he would do anything if he had it anyway. Maybe it was just because he didn't like the potential punishment they implied.
Everyone in his life had always seemed to take religion more seriously than he ever had. His family ministry had been horrendous to attend when he was younger. The Lord knew everything—supposedly, He saw all—but he really hadn't understood what the big deal was.
Travis wasn't allowed to do anything, so He wouldn't see anything anyways. Or, he remembered bitterly, so he had thought.
The scripture, or the verses, didn't say anything about his thoughts, either. If he kept them inside of his head, he wasn't being sinful. If he lived life by his father's orders, he was a perfect child of God. He had thought that was that.
Oh well, tough shit.
He didn't really understand what the seriousness of the church was about. Why they took it so overly seriously.
At least, for thirteen years of life he thought so. Up until now, he had thought that it was easy, that it was simple. He wished it had remained that damn easy, because whatever this stupid thing was, he seriously hated it.
Out of nowhere, literally nowhere, his brain had become overactive for seemingly no reason. It interrupted how he lived his life. He used to think of nothing but prayer, used to feel nothing but soft dissatisfaction with his boring life; now he thought and felt too much about everything he knew he couldn't have. Everything he knew he could never have.
He wished it was boring again. God, did he wish sometimes.
Even his dreams haunted him these days. Always the same stupid, nonsensical boy. The same stupid boy he'd met in that stupid eighth grade hallway. The same stupid boy he really just could not stop wishing was dead.
Every single night, if he ever managed to eventually fall asleep—an unlikelihood in and of itself—he was there in his head, haunting him with his sickly sweet voice, with words sounding like true temptation coming from the Devil himself. He couldn't even call them dreams—they were nothing but nightmares to him.
So he started taking church more seriously. He did his prayer with a stupid eagerness. Perhaps his father assumed he was finally seeing the ways of the Lord, that he wanted to participate, but really he just wanted to stop thinking so much.
Honestly, screw whatever it was he was really doing. He just wanted to stop being tormented; he was born and raised Christian and his thoughts weren't looking too holy as of about two years now. They only seemed to be getting worse.
He had lived his life how he had been taught and it wasn't saving him. He did everything his father said. He didn't stray from the lines, and yet here he was being tortured. It wasn't fair at all. His head was a fucking swamp now, consisting of pink, white, and blue.
Fucked up American flag, if you asked him. He wasn't feeling too patriotic about it. He'd never wanted to burn a mental image more.
He had wished praying more would help him keep himself in check. God did not grant him any miracles. Nor did He grant him any mercy.
He woke up sweating again. He shot up from his bed, clutching his single blanket and dry heaving. His head didn't ache like it usually did, but the way his heart raced was making him nauseous. It wasn't even his actual body making him sick—he was fine in that regard. It was his brain.
It was becoming the same dream, ever since that dumb thing last year. It was warm, enticing—hell, it was everything he'd never even thought about until now. Lips and skin and so much more, more than he's ever had in his entire life. He'd never even seen, really; he didn't like being that close to people if he wasn't causing violence.
He swallowed, took a final heavy breath, and quickly collapsed off of the bed into a heap on the floor. His body ached, crying out in retaliation and anger at his having fumbled off the bed again the like fool he was.
His fingers shakily rushed to clasp each other as he bowed his head, his hands tilted towards the ceiling. He squeezed his eyes shut, as tight as he could, and recited his morning prayer. He begged for whatever was going on to just stop. He recited it three more times after that, but he didn't dare say it aloud. He never had.
The prospect of his father finding out was more horrifying than God's wrath. It certainly scared him more; he didn't know why. God could send him to Hell in the afterlife, but his father could make his life a hell on earth. God may be able to forgive him, but Father never would.
When you put them side by side, he saw a selfish appeal in the possibility of God's existence, or maybe in the possibility of His lack of one. Travis wished he could feel that small ounce of doubt in both of them.
He didn't know what was going on in his head most of the time. Between fear, disgust, and his weird sense of want, it was hard to manage. The looming presence of a pastor made it worse.
Boys didn't feel this way about other boys, he knew that much. He'd written about it, hoping that he could get the thoughts out of his head, but even seeing it on paper wouldn't make it go away. Boys only liked girls, and girls only liked boys. Anything else was wrong. It was how the world populated; it didn't make sense for it to be any other way.
It made so much sense in his head; it made so much sense for him to be attracted to the beautiful girls in his classes. Their long hair, their bodies, their eyes and their silky voices. It was right.
His only guess was that he just wasn't. He didn't know what was wrong with him these days. Instead, he felt all of that towards another male, which was definitely too far away from right thing to feel.
To make it worse, he didn't even know what the boy's face looked like. If he did, maybe his brain would be able to rationalize it—despite his father's judgment, he knew boys could look incredibly feminine, all the way down to the bone.
If it was like that, he could excuse it to a certain extent He could say it was just a pretty face confusing his tired and pathetic brain, but it really wasn't. He couldn't even see the boy's face, so what was even the point?
It was definitely the boy's attitude. How he carried himself. How he spoke to others, almost like he didn't have the ability to be mean towards other people unless they truly deserved it. Which Travis did, really.
His voice was a little part of it, maybe his laugh. The way his hair swung slightly on the days he forgot about his style, how his pigtails would bounce when he walked. Strangely enough, how he dressed; how his nails were painted black some days, even if most of the time the boy looked like a damn lunatic.
It was him. Travis wasn't attracted to a mere face, because he couldn't even see the damn thing. It wasn't an accident, it wasn't even his own fault. That stupid fucking boy had just always caught his attention and no matter how hard he tried to forget about it, he wanted the boy's attention.
It was sinful. It was just dirty. He shouldn't think of another boy like that. He had tried to pray it away, tried to pray for forgiveness, to beg for it go stop for it it to just go away, but he had never received an answer. It got worse by the damn day. It had been for years now. He used to be only ever angry, his hands used for nothing but punching, and only venom on his tongue. Now he was here mooning over a damn boy.
Deflecting hadn't worked, somehow. Trying to scare the boy away didn't work. Nothing seemed to work; nothing to be able to make him just go away and disappear. If not from his mind, then at least from his life.
Travis had given up on it a few months ago after having spent a year and a half attempted to beat the shit out of him for something that wasn't even the boy's fault. Instead, he began praying as hard as he could for it to go away, to make it go away.
He couldn't tell anyone about it, either, couldn't get it off his chest in at least some capacity. Not the people at the church, definitely not his Father, and he didn't have any friends he would go to for this kind of thing. He couldn't get it off of his chest in any way that mattered to him.
He had tried to confess to God himself, but it had felt entirely half-assed when he did. Like he wasn't talking to anyone who was actually listening to him.
He just wanted to be normal. Being.. homosexual... wasn't right, and he knew that, but knowing what was right and what was wrong—and this was definitely wrong—didn't make it end. It was like some sick game he was being forced to play. If there was one thing he hated, it was being forced.
He crawled up off of the floor. His body groaned at him as he walked towards the closet, finished with reciting his fifth prayer in the back of his mind as his thoughts had once again wandered to the twisted dream he'd had.
His brain thought the boy was a good kisser. Which, from a logical standpoint, made no sense to Travis, because he'd definitely never kissed anyone himself. He wasn't sure he would know what a good kiss was anyways. The commotion his brain made about it made him want to hurl himself off a cliff.
He took a momentary glance out of the window. It was much too cold out to wear shorts this time. He opted for a pair of jeans, and a white button up shirt, one he typically wore to church. He had to do laundry, but he didn't have the time for it this morning, as much as he wanted to wear a sweater.
He felt way too dressed up, but there was nothing he could do about it. He wasn't the best at keeping track of things. Father wouldn't complain about the his choice of clothes—he would probaby say something about it making Travis look like a "proper boy" that "knows his worth" and doesn't dress in "peasant clothes."
Which also didn't make sense to him. Travis liked his sweaters. Sometimes even the purposefully ugly ones.
After doing the last button on the shirt, albeit leaving the first two undone so he wouldn't choke himself out, he walked towards his dresser. He snatched his golden cross off of his dresser, which he had cleansed in holy water the night before after he had gotten his clothes dirty.
He did it once every week in sheer hope of keeping it sanitary. Not that he thought boiling the hell out of anything actually worked, because it definitely didn't work on him.
Travis secured the clasp around his neck and adjusted the cross to sit neatly on top of his shirt. He unrolled the cuffs on the shirt to cover his wrists and unrolled the little edges of his jeans. He really did feel like he was getting ready for an outing, rather than class, no matter how hard he tried to dull it down. He needed to go fishing for his winter clothes.
Travis hated formal clothes, but Father adored the piss out of them. He didn't understand why, but it wasn't like he was about to argue with him over it. Sometimes Travis wished he had a uniform to wear, so that he wouldn't have to worry everyday about picking something up to standard.
He glanced down at his boring jeans as he walked out of his bedroom. He wasn't allowed to keep any jeans that had the slightest threads coming out, or the jeans that had begun to fade out heavily from use or the sun. Father thought they were too ugly that way. Too improper.
Absentmindedly, he felt his thoughts start to drift back to the blue-haired boy. He definitely dressed in "peasant clothes." Ripped red jeans and his sort-pf stained black sweater were his trademark outfit. It wasn't exactly stained, or at least Travis didn't want to think so, but it did look like it had been through the washer quite a few times.
Whatever that boy was, he was Father's worst nightmare. Travis thought his father would piss himself if he ever saw the guy.
Sal had a lot of piercings, too, but only on his ears. He didn't know the names of them, but they looked nice. They fit nicely with the rest of his clothing. Kenneth would have torn them out if he ever had the displeasure of laying his eyes on Sal, which didn't help his guilty conscience. Not only was he attracted to a boy, he was attracted to a damn demon.
His mind brought itself into a loop as he entered the bathroom. Sal also wore shoes that maybe gave him half of an inch more in height. He stared at them a lot for no particular reason. Maybe just to avoid looking at the rest of him.
He sort of understood it. Sal was incredibly short, for someone the same age. He was tall personally, but not as tall as his father. Travis looked almost identical to him; from his nose, his coily hair, his height, his body, you could definitely tell he was a Phelps.
From what his father said, Travis had gotten his mother's eyes. Theoretically, they should make him look approachable, but his father ruined that for him anyway.
He didn't know when his face turned mean. Maybe it was trying to get his Father's approval, copying his scowl and wearing it as his own, his eye bags heavy and his eyebrows always furrowed. He wished he was more like Sal sometimes.
He didn't like his face, but then again, he wasn't sure Sal could say he liked his face either, especially if he's so adamant about that ugly mask. They were similar in that way, at least. He kind of loathed it some days, just mildly mulled it over on others.
He turned on the bathroom light and stood in front of the sink, threading his hair into something his father would deem proper, and tidied his face to the best of his ability.
No matter how much time had passed since the original bruise, his right eye remained the same. It bothered him only sometimes—it hurt if he touched it too hard, and that was a pain in the ass.
He washed the rest of his face before setting the towel down, putting on deodorant and some type of cologne before he finally walked out of the bathroom, avoiding much else.
He didn't eat breakfast most days. Father didn't like it when he did, saying proper meals would be eaten as a family, and that Travis would put on weight if he ate too much. Which was stupid to him. Sometimes Travis thought he was too lanky, with the way his feet slightly dragged against the kitchen tile.
The house was dark and quiet, which was mildly surprising.
He glanced around the empty kitchen, wondering why Father wasn't in here today. Usually he was sitting at the table, waiting to do his daily judgment on his appearance. It was weird but not all that unusual; maybe he left earlier this morning because of the church.
All it meant to Travis was that he got to keep his sanity a little more intact for a little longer. Lucky him.
The rest of his morning after that was boring and a lot more rushed. Between taking advantage of the lack of Father to eat something, changing his hair into something he thought actually looked better on him, and a fruitless attempt to find different clothes, he ended up running out the door late.
He had thrown in a load of laundry, making him snatch his bag off of the floor and throwing it on, his feet pounding as he began his journey to his bike. Given that it was still summer season—though barely—he could bike to school for a while longer until the cold weather would force Travis to get a ride.
Unchaining and hopping onto his bike, his feet worked hard that morning. He was stressed he was going to be late, even though his Father never cared to check his attendance anyways—'The teachers make mistakes,' Father had said. 'An accidental absence just shows the lack of ethics in teachers.'
Sometimes he thinks his father just likes pretending he's not that terrible of a son.
This was going to be a long day. A horribly long day and he knew it.
A bad day always started off with sinful dreams and strangely calm mornings. He swore he would punch Sal in the face today if he saw him, because he was furious that the boy had managed to dig beneath Travis's skin without even meaning to, without trying at all.
That was a lie. He hadn't laid his hands on Sal in months. He tried to see if just ignoring Sal's existence would work to make it go away, deciding their talk in the bathroom was the perfect place to get cold feet without seeming like he cared or anything.
It didn't really work, go fucking figure. If beating him the fuck up didn't make it go away, if ignoring him didn't make it go away, what the hell was he supposed to do now?
It was Sal's fault for being so likable. Maybe if Sal was a little meaner, a little harsher and cold, Travis would have reasons to hate him, but he really didn't. He couldn't find any.
If he could go back to the times Sal wasn't in this town, he would in such a heartbeat.
Whatever happened those two years ago that made him move here, he wished every day that it never happened.
Sal yawned, wishing he could rub his eyes. He hadn't slept much last night, but then again he didn't expect anything else. His fault for not taking his sleep medication. Oops.
He glanced up as his friends finally came back to join him at their morning lunch table, where they mostly just chilled until they decided it was time to get going. Larry had to piss, and then he went on his journey to pick up Ash from the parking lot.
Sal had waited, not wanting to do much today because he was tired right now. Though he had missed Larry terribly in his absence, he was even more relieved to see them both together.
"Hey, little dude." Larry laughed loudly, approaching while dragging along a scowling Ashley. Sal matched her scowl as a hand began ruffling his hair roughly, quickly attempting to swat away the offending hand.
He hadn't put his hair in their pigtails today, since he didn't feel like dealing with the tug they gave his scalp sometimes and because of how utterly exhausted he was. And now Larry was trying to ruin his hard work at making his hair presentable.
He didn't mean to grow a shitty version of a mullet, without the shaved part. He just liked his hair long, and he had to keep his bangs short and hair layered because of his prosthetic. It was a lot of work having to constantly trim them so they didn't grow over the holes in the mask and make him completely blind.
He looked up at the brunette's unspeakable height, seeing Ash next to him laughing now as she abandoned Larry's side. She was very pretty today, but she was tall for a girl too. He seems to be the only one cursed with gnome syndrome here.
"Hey guys. It feels really weird to sit at the table alone like this." He smiled, hoping it showed through his eyes as the other two took their places at the table next to him. Larry made a horrific face and pouted his lips. "Aw, did you miss us that much?"
"I don't miss you anymore, that's for sure." He huffed, before turning his attention back to Ash. He had already had enough of talking to Larry for today. "Good morning. Did you end up finishing that project of yours?"
Her eyes brightened as she nodded, clasping her hands with infectious excitement. She got so excited when talking about her projects, the same way Larry did. "Yeah! I love what I ended up doing. I should show you—want to come over after school?"
He heavily considered tha, but in the end decided he didn't want to put a damper on someone else's good mood with his sulkiness. "Sorry, I'm exhausted. Maybe tomorrow, if that works with you?"
She gave him a sympathetic look, her hands unclasping each other as she reached for his intead. "That's fine," she said quickly, though obviously uncaring about that. "What's up?"
"Just haven't been able to sleep lately. Lots of shit going on up in my skull again, don't worry about it." He explained lazily, watching as Ash's hands grabbed his, her long nails lightly poking his skin as she rubbed them. Her hands were always incredibly warm and he was honestly jealous. His body was completely unable to regulate itself half of the time.
"What's going on? You haven't told me anything." Larry piped up beside him, and he glanced over, letting Ash continue to warm his chilly hands.
Yeah, they weren't going to leave this alone. Not with the way they were looking at him.
He usually would tell the guy, but it sounded really stupid when he put it in perspective. "It's… wouldn't say personal, but wouldn't make a difference if I told you guys or not."
"We're your friends, dude. You can tell us," Ash said, and he felt his hands get squeezed a bit. He rolled his eyes, not knowing how to explain something like this to them. There was a lot he had to say, but absolutely none of it was correlated.
He wasn't really worried about school—he loved school—but it seemed like a lot more work to just get out of bed these days. And even when he does, he doesn't have even have the energy to hang out with his friends, his attention focused on something else completely.
Sal had been focusing on Ash's face, her pretty and wellkept hair, her long eyelashes and well done makeup. She was so pretty it kind of hurt his eyes. He tried for a long time to actually formulate any thoughts, but his eyes drifted as he caught sight of a person moving behind her that stood out from the other crossing students.
He swallowed harshly, since it was the thing his attention has been stuck on for some absolutely forsaken reason. That did not help him formulate any more understandable thoughts.
Travis. He looked pretty tired as he walked today, his feet dragging more than normal and his head facing the floor rather than the rest of the school. His hair looked different today, and he was in his churchie getup instead of those horrendous blue shorts.
He looked good today. Sal liked it when Travis dresses like that. It was more appealing to the eyes. He had thought a lot about what the dude would look like dressed how Sal's friend group did, and it didn't look too bad in his head, but there was no way Travis would ever dress like them.
He watched as Travis walked by, not even glancing in Sal's direction. Sal wished he could run over to him and ask him all types of questions.
They didn't talk much. Freshman year was a nightmare, really—the constant verbal assault and the amount of times he had to go home and treat new bruises from his mask banging into it. He couldn't find it in his soul to hate Travis for what he did, though.
He thought about their talk in the bathroom a lot. He meant every word. It was also pretty much confirmation that Travis' dad was pushing all of this shit onto him and fucking up his head. He didn't feel anything but worried for Travis, despite the fact Travis had done nothing but hurt him, which was stupid.
The talk must have done something though. It was at the end of the year, and then when summer break was finally over and they were back in school, it was like a 180°.
Travis didn't yell at him anymore. No more arguments, and no more of them very lazily fighting. If anything, Travis was just avoiding him entirely.
Maybe that was the best he could have hoped for. After all, Travis had said he didn't hate him or his friends. Maybe he was just trying to not lash out again, and avoiding what was hurting his brain was easier than coping with it (because something was going on in that dude's head).
It just didn't make sense to him, though. And he really had tried to let it go. There wasn't a single reason Sal should want to talk to him. He was barely able to let that stand anymore, though—he had so many questions he felt so inclined to ask Travis. He was always curious.
He had let Travis sneak away for months now, and if anything, Travis had just seemed worse every time he came to school. Obviously whatever was going on was still serious, and if he could still see out of his singular eye, he knew Travis was actively avoiding him as much as possible, despite how long it had been.
He had seen Travis actually speed walk away from him once. Flat out turn around in the hallway and go the other way. He refused to meet Sal's stare in class, rather than yell at him about it. One time when they were supposed to be partners for a project in English, Travis had been gone half of the days until the teacher told him he could work alone if he was sick for any longer.
He could say it pissed him off. Travis had no reason to ignore him, after everything they said last year. He just wanted to talk to him like a civil person and he' had suffered the brunt of Travis's nonsense. He thought ought to be allowed to know at least something about the other boy.
He wouldn't let Larry or Ash just avoid him if they were going through it. And Travis was definitely going through… something, after Sal had caught him with his pants down sniffling. Sal might be stupid for saying anything at all, but he does care about how he's doing. He cared about everyone on the planet.
Except for really shitty people. He didn't think Travis was that bad, though. Being the son of a pastor was obviously the worst thing on the planet, if this was any evidence.
"Hey, Sal? You good dude?"
Sal sat up straighter, his eyes snapping over to Larry who was staring at him with eyebrows narrowed. He guessed he zoned out again; he was getting really good at doing that all the time lately.
"Yeah, sorry, I'm good," he said, smiling in hopes of it reaching his eyes. "Just thinking really hard."
"About what? You completely zoned out when we said you could tell us." Ash sighed gently, and he realized she was still holding his hands. He looked back over at her, nibbling on his lip as he thought about wording once again.
"Come on, Sally," she said after a few seconds. "This is making you act super weird, and you're weird enough."
"It isn't really anything huge. I'm not dying or something. If anything, you guys will call me crazy," he finally admitted, glancing between the two. Honestly, he felt a little crazy for it. Travis avoiding him was like a blessing sent from the clouds abov. It didn't feel like it though.
Larry got an offended look on his face. "Dude, we would never think you're crazy. Probably. Just tell us what's up, we'll try to help."
"Yeah, what Larry said."
Sal really didn't know what to say to them, but he didn't want them to worry over nothing. It really wasn't that big of a deal, at least not to them. It had been a big deal for him, kind of, since he'd been considering multiple ideas. "It's nothing, really. I've just been thinking about Travis."
Yeah, he shouldn't have told them before he had a clear objective. The pair's expressions twisted up in confusion in some sort of sync, Larry quick to speak before anything else. "That fucker? What about him?"
Good question. If someone could give him a good answer, he'd appreciate it.
"He just… he's been really weird." He shrugged, staring at the table in front of him as he tried to think about it. "You know, he's avoiding me and shit like that. He doesn't avoid things, and he's definitely never left me alone for this long."
Ash was now gripping his hands, a bewildered look on her face. "Okay, maybe I lied. You are crazy. Why the hell are you worried about him? It's better he's ignoring you. He's been nothing but a dick."
Sal lightly brushed off her hands and sent her a pointed look. He knew these two had perfectly valid reasons to hate Travis and wish the worst on him—more than valid reasons, honestly—but he still felt angry when they said it so proudly. It wasn't like Travis killed somebody. He didn't deserve anything so absolutely shitty and terrible.
"Yeah, I guess, but you know, I told you. Shitty home life and stuff. I guess I'm kind of worried about it," he tried again. "I told him he could talk to me if something's wrong, but obviously that's not happening. He's just a dude."
He glanced at Larry, biting his tongue. He knew this wasn't usual for the person who was relentlessly bullied by the kid in question, but he really didn't think it should warrant the looks he was getting. Todd agreed with him. People who act like that are treated the same way.
"That's a death wish, dude," Larry quickly interjected after a second, and Sal could tell by his heavy voice he wasn't saying what he wanted to say. "He's probably going to lash out or something. He's our age, he can handle himself."
Travis Phelps handling himself. He almost wanted to laugh about that. Yeah, right. He didn't want to go into a whole talk about his ideas on the blonde's mental health right now, but it felt necessary to be able to get them to understand why he's even thinking about it.
If he thought Travis was a bad person, Travis would have been long gone from his head by now, but they didn't really seem to get it. Something might be up, and he was curious about it. He'd never been ignored by him before. That probably calls for concern, right?
Maybe he just wanted an excuse to talk to him. Sal didn't go through all of that bathroom workaround just to get ignored like Travis hadn't done anything to him at all. He was probably allowed to be a little pissy about it if he wanted to be.
"I still want to try to be friends."
"I don't like that idea at all," Ash said, her eyes narrowed. Yeah, the two of them definitely didn't like his idea. "He's just going to be a pain in the ass. I know I should support you, but this isn't worth it. I mean, he fought you, dude. He's just a homophobic dick."
"For the record, I–" Sal cut himself off. If it turned out Travis really was just homophobic, Sal would give up, but he really did think there was something else going on, especially with the way Travis had been acting.
He shouldn't say anything about it. The ominous note he had kept from last year's bathroom talk sat on his desk, and he was pretty sure Travis was the one who wrote it, so that was… special.
"Nevermind. You're kinda right," he said dismissively. He didn't feel like getting into an argument over the logistics of Travis when he was already exhausted. He could worry about it later. "We should probably just get going. Just, he's been cool this year, so I think we should give it a shot."
Neither of the two replied to that. No shot for now, then. Understandable. Larry's been dealing with Travis for fucking ages, and the dude's always been a little bit of an asshat. Not that Sal had ever heard the full story.
It was pretty silent as the three of them scooped up their bags. He knew they wouldn't agree with him on the idea, but he didn't expect them to react like he had spoken the worst possible idea imaginable. It was incredibly awkward, given everything else.
Everyone deserved a second chance, he thought. Which meant Sal was going to forcefeed the guy a second chance until he got an answer about what the hell happened over summer break. It was probably a little dumb, but Sal was more used to being bullied than flat out avoided like the plague.
Crazy thought—if he could get Travis to at least not insult him while speaking, he could call them friends, and then Larry and Ash would ease up. Sounded like a good plan. He liked having friends, and he wouldn't mind having a few more.
The three of them began towards their classes. Ash and Larry had a weird habit of walking him to his classes, so they walked down the hallways, switching the topic to something random about music. It was mostly Larry trying to lighten the mood again before class; he'd discovered a new metal band, and Sal decided he would listen to it later after school. Though Sanity's Fall was still his all-time favorite, and he was never letting that go, he had fairly broad music taste.