10: As Unaware As They Were

"Hey, Soybean!" At the sound of my nickname reserved only for Millie's lips, I scowled as I debated whether or not I should respond to it. Because the person who spoke it was definitely not her. "Soybean!" He sang.

I stopped walking to my next class, turning to see what the big deal was. Sam & Co. were all gathered off to the side of the hallway, talking to each other about something I had yet to understand. It was Dennis who called me over, which checked out. He had no regard for his pride or mine. In fact, he was probably the most shameless person I had ever met.

"What the hell do you want?" I snapped.

He seemed to be amusing himself, because he was smiling dumbly. "To get the hell over here, Soybean."

As tempted as I was to keep walking just to piss him off, I forced myself to stop. I had a bad feeling that whatever they wanted to talk to me about had something to do with the druggies. I approached them, taking note of their various expressions as I hoped they would just get it over with. "What is it now?"

All four boys looked at each other as though to decide how to begin the conversation. That only made me more suspicious. Sam was not quite meeting my eye, obviously wanting anyone other than himself to deliver the explanation. It was Friday, so our trial period was officially about two days in. So far we were doing a fairly civil job at not wanting to kill each other over every little thing. It was a development that I definitely did not expect.

It was Caden who finally decided to speak. "It's about the situation. Y'know, the drug related stuff." He leaned in closer and whispered that last part. I just stared at him, because I wasn't stupid. I knew exactly what he meant from the start.

"What about it?" I turned to Sam. If it was bad enough that he didn't even want to be the one to deliver the news, I was going to force him to. One could say that it was for the sake of communication, but it was probably more because I still wasn't used to trying to be entirely nice to him. It was going to take a while to adapt to the change.

He sighed, chewing on his lip as he debated how to say it. "I woke up this morning to a fun text of my own."

"They seem to like those." I sighed. I wasn't sure that I wanted to know what it said, judging by the solemnity of everyone's expressions.

"Yeah." He nodded absentmindedly. "They want some of the money later tonight."

"How much?"

No one moved to answer, all four boys avoiding my gaze as though it was the plague.

"Hello? How fucking much?"

"That doesn't matter." Sam spoke up.

I shook my head. "Like hell it doesn't. How much do you owe them in total, and how much do they want tonight?"

"They just want some of it tonight. I have the money, so don't worry about that." He just ignored my questions.

"Anyway." Dennis cut in, looking between the two of us. "The point is that we think you should come with us."

I just stared at him.

"Just to be safe." Caden added.

I laughed. I couldn't help it. "Safe?"

"Sam tried to give them some money about a week ago alone, and they jumped Brian and I to use us as collateral." Caden explained, glancing at his tall and silent friend as he spoke. I furrowed my brow, looking both of them over. Caden didn't seem to have any visible bruises, but since I was studying Brian for the first time, I noticed that he had a subtle mark on the side of his jaw.

"And you want me there so that I can't be used that way?"

"Pretty much." Sam nodded.

"Wouldn't it also be dangerous to have me there? How late tonight?"

"It could be more dangerous, but at least we'll all be there to try to help you out. It'll be around seven or eight, it all depends on when they decide to show up."

"My mom will be home by then." I had no idea if my dad was going to, but it was better than nothing.

"And what if they drag her into this too?"

He made a point, and that annoyed me. It was becoming increasingly apparent that they had no idea what to do, and how to minimize the effect it had on those around them. Sam was clearly just trying to keep everyone as safe as possible, and as much as I did not want to go with them, I was equally as unaware as they were.

None of us had any idea what we were doing.

"Okay, okay. I guess I'll go." My voice did not sound at all certain, since I was immediately thinking about how I was nearly choked to death less than five days ago.

"Alright." I could tell that Sam was nervous about it too, but he didn't protest nor suggest something else. It was obvious that he didn't know what else to suggest. "I'll explain the rest to you after school."

I nodded. My eyes wandered back to the hallway. "We're late for class."

"Yeah. Hopefully we don't get into too much trouble for that." Sam chuckled, and we all began walking to our respective classes. It was biology for most of us, but something else for Caden and Brian since they parted ways. The second that we all entered the classroom, everyone turned and stared at us.

My face heated as the teacher scolded us for being tardy, and I went to my spot beside Millie as soon as humanly possible. She sent me a quizzical look, but she waited to bombard me with questions until after the teacher gave the lesson plan for the day.

"What was that about? Is everything okay?" Millie began the instant that she could. Her short brown hair was pinned back by a large barrette, framing her sharp features serenely. She was beautiful, that much I knew. What would life have been like if I fell in love with her? That was what our parents always expected of us. Things were too confusing sometimes.

Why was everything always so complicated?

"It's alright, don't worry." I told her. Every time I said something like that, I felt like a worse friend. "How has your day been?"

She mustered up a soft smile, knowing damn well that I was trying to change the subject but still letting it slide. "It's been alright. I got my essay due in Spanish done, so I count that as a win."

Relieved to see that she was trying her best to be patient with me, I smiled as well. "Thank god I'm not in that class, my grades would be worse than they already are."

"You take pre calc to make your grades worse, you definitely don't need to write a six page paper on the Spanish Inquisition to help with that. Also I'd love to see you try to speak a different language." The teacher was passing out some paper with instructions on the lab we had to do. Millie grabbed it from her, then I followed.

"I feel like I'm shit at English as it is, I do not have to butcher someone else's language on top of that. You're good at that kind of stuff, though."

"Unlike you, I've been taking Spanish for five years now. It'd be depressing if I was still horrible at it." Millie then started reading out the instructions for the lab we were supposed to complete.

My thoughts began to wander as I tried to answer her questions and pay attention to what we were supposed to be doing. I was very good at distracting myself. In fact, next to forgetting people's names, it was probably my best talent.

I was right back to thinking about nearly dying. Being watched. Sam. A cycle that is starting to make me dizzy from the constant spinning in the back of my mind.

The past few days have been surprisingly nice. We managed to get along with minimal arguing. Sam really liked to kiss me, and I was disturbed by the fact that I sort of liked that about him. Even though I suppressed that feeling deep inside of myself and tried to dodge his advances. Mostly because it aggravated him, which was every bit as satisfying as one would think.

But then the cycle continued to spin, and my mind landed right back on the endless problems that followed him.

Not only was he a boy and that would cause plenty of complications on its own, but it was also dangerous for me to be with him. There was no telling how much worse those druggies would become if they knew about Sam and I. Just the idea of it made me nauseous.

To add to all of that, I had Millie sitting beside me, going on and on about a movie she really wanted to watch with me in the theaters a few weeks from then. It was pleasant, idle conversation, but who knew if things would be fixed enough by then for me to even be able to do that.

As I looked at her, I wondered what she would think about Sam and I. Would she hate me? Would she be shocked? It was hard to tell what exactly she thought of our rivalry, other than the fact that it annoyed her. But she hinted at speculating that maybe I liked Sam all along. Did she actually know? Or was that just a joke?

Above all else, I wondered if I really was attracted to boys as a whole. It was never something I thought about before. The world simply expected me to be straight, and I assumed that I fell in line with that. However, I wasn't stupid. I definitely liked Sam, and there was nothing straight about that.

Strange, yes. Straight, no.

My parents didn't raise me to be homophobic, and I didn't think that Millie's did either. Honestly, I kind of wished that I knew a gay person so that I could ask them about how they knew they weren't what society wanted them to be. How did they cope with that? Was it as confusing for them as it was for me?

I was more distressed that it was Sam who caused all of this confusion inside of me than anything else.

I wished that things were more linear. Maybe they were supposed to be, but I guessed that was why it was called gay and not straight.

And to add to it all, I had to worry about whether or not I was going to make it through the night. Would the druggies try to kill me again? Would they succeed?

I supposed that I was going to find out.

•O•O•