i hope yall like this one,,, its my favorite so far tbh

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The time is 2:26 pm. Ryan is sitting in chemistry, ready to bash his brains out on the cold black lab table. He has no idea how light works, or how to calculate the frequency of the ray to determine its color. This leaves him very frustrated and staring at his worksheet and calculator without actually doing any of it.

Bryce, from besides him, giggles at his frustration. “Having fun there?”

“Shut up,” Ryan groans. “I'm thinking very, very hard here. Let me do my thinking in peace.”

“The answer to number one is green, by the way,” Bryce giggles. “I have the answers if you want them.”

Ryan perks up at this. “Really?”

“Yup! But, you only get them on one condition.”

Ryan cringes slightly at this. He doesn't know Bryce as much as Jonathan or Ava does (and surely less than Luke), but he's seen the shit this giggly, baby-faced boy is capable of. He's not sure how comfortable he is with making deals with the devil. “What condition?” Ryan asks anyways in spite of himself.

“You gotta come over for games and movies tonight. Today's Thursday, and this is how we spend our Thursday nights.” Bryce must have seen Ryan's hesitancy, because he immediately frowns at Ryan. “Please? It'll be fun! So much fun, I promise!”

“Uhh…” Ryan doesn't know how to explain what he wants to say. He wants to tell Bryce no, I'm not coming over because I'm willing to bet Luke's there too and I don't know if I'm down for whatever awkwardness is gonna come up with him. But you know what comes out of his mouth? “My anxiety gets dog separation.”

Bryce bursts into laughter, and a few of their classmates turn to look at them weirdly. Ryan feels his face grow red at the sudden attention. “Oh my gosh,” he says in between gasps of air, “What the heck is that even- Oh, oh my gosh- Ryan! That's awesome, that's great. You're so silly.”

“Shut up,” Ryan repeats. He puts his hood up and finds himself staring down at the table. “I- I meant to say that my dog has separation anxiety and I don't wanna leave him alone.”

“Yeah, right. You told me yesterday that he went missing for two weeks because he chased a green school bus once. I'm pretty sure that's, like, the complete opposite.” Bryce gives Ryan a smug grin. He knows he's right.

“Well… maybe I don't wanna get sassed by Luke. Ever thought of that? He barely tolerates me! I tried to repay him by buying him coffee and he just gives me the evil eye half the time!”

“I doubt it was the evil eye. He's just grumpy in the mornings, that's all. Look,” Bryce says. He turns to face Ryan fully and gives Ryan the most serious look he's seen all day. “Look. When school ends at 3:30 today, I am going directly to your class and taking you to my house so we can all be friends, okay? You are gonna come over and play games with us, you're gonna make friends with Luke, and you're gonna stop being a big baby about this.”

Ryan doesn't do anything other than nod silently. Persuasive boy, Bryce is. He sure did win Ryan over. Totally not forcing him, nope. He's almost thankful when the bell rings for class to end. Almost.

“Turn in your papers and calculators on your way out,” the teacher up front says. “We're going over them tomorrow as a class, and Monday we'll have a test. Bye y'all!”

Ryan curses to himself as he stuffs his unfinished paper into his backpack. He'll finish it tonight and pretend he just forgot to hand it in. He hurries after the horde of students in the hallway, letting himself be swept away with the ever-moving crowd.

He sleeps all through his English class with very little shame. He already knows the language, isn't that enough? What's studying old literature going to do for him when he's paying taxes and other adult things?

(The answer is absolutely nothing, in case anyone's curious.)

When he wakes up, it's to Bryce's smiling face. “Hey sleepyhead!” Bryce pauses to put a piece of gum in his mouth and brush his hair out of his face. It takes Ryan a moment to realize that they're alone in his classroom- not even the teacher is here. “Come on! We're gonna be late!”

Ryan is quickly pulled out of his chair and dragged into the hallway. “What? How- how can you be late to your own house?” He worries that he heard Bryce wrong earlier today, and that he's actually made them late for something that seemed rather important to Bryce.

But Bryce gives a small laugh and says, “Skills,” and Ryan is confused all over again.

“What-”

“We're gonna be late for the pizza guy,” Bryce explains. “I ordered a pizza and we gotta get there before the pizza does or else it'll be really awkward. Also because Delly don't have keys to my house and they're probably trying to force a window open right now.”

Ryan nods again, and then they're off to the parking lot where they find Luke standing by his car with his arms crossed. Ryan feels a wave of dread wash over him as he sees Luke's face contort into some kind of scowl. “You really bringing him?”

“Of course! I can tell you're faking that angry face. You just don't want someone who's better than you at Siege.” Bryce opens up the passenger's door, only to be stopped by Luke.

“Since you're so insistent on me and Ryan over here being buddies, why don't you let him sit up front? Luke's voice has a strange edge to it which Ryan can't place. He does catch the side glance Luke gives him, however, and it seems to explain enough.

“Yeah, Brycey,” Ryan says as nicely as possible. “I'll sit next to him and we'll be friends.”

Luke nods his head quickly, moving to the other side of the car and getting into the driver's seat. “Yup, it's official. You're sitting in the back, Bry.”

Bryce looks visibly offended. “What?! But how am I supposed to pick the mus-”

Oh. So that's why I'm sitting next to Luke. Is Bryce's music taste that bad?

“Sit in the back? Like this!” Ryan rushes to the door closest to Bryce, opening it for him like a gentleman. “Here you go!”

Bryce seems saddened as he sits in the backseat with defeat. Ryan sits up front with Luke, looking at the oldest curiously.

“He sings,” Luke whispers, almost too quiet for Ryan too hear. “He skips through every station constantly, gets mad when his song isn't on and never lets me pick. And that's bullshit.”

Ryan understands completely. He finds himself smiling a little as he reaches out to the little radio button cautiously. “Am I allowed to pick?” He asks playfully. He's still wary of Luke's supposed “angry side,” as Tyler put it once.

Luke narrows his eyes, his hand hovering right above Ryan's. “Depends. Do you like cheesy, kinda annoying pop songs like somebody?”

“Depends. Is Queen cheesy pop?” Ryan fires back at him with ease, a grin spreading across his face.

Luke chuckles softly, shaking his head and placing his hand back on the wheel. “Nah. You're good, do as you please.”

The rest of the ride is spent in a surprisingly comfortable silence. Bryce is pouting in the backseat on his phone while Luke and Ryan are chilling up front, enjoying whatever music came through from Luke's playlist. He might not know what song this is, but it's a very nice remix and that's enough to make him happy.

They arrive at Bryce's house and Bryce immediately bursts out of the car and to the pizza delivery guy who pulls up a second after they do. Luke walks off to the side of the house, grumbling to himself about something or other. Ryan exits the car too, awkwardly looking up at Bryce's house.

It's a big, two story, pale yellow house that is surely bigger than Ryan's and looks nicer than anything Ryan's ever lived in. It stands out a bit from the other nice houses on the street thanks to a strange patch of what appears to be dead grass. Ryan doesn't question it and follows the others up a little stone pathway and to a white front door. Bryce unlocks it, two mewling kittens running around their feet the second it opens.

He nearly trips over them, as do Luke and Jonathan. Bryce moves through them with ease. “Please don't track mud inside the house. Mom already disapproves of you guys enough as is.”

It takes Ryan a moment to notice that a fifth person has joined them, and the sudden realization nearly gives him a heart attack. “Tyler? When did you get here?”

Tyler waves. “Hey. Got here with Del. Was promised pizza.”

“Is that why you told me to order an extra pizza?” Bryce sets the pizzas down on the counter (that is, mind you, spotless, like nobody's ever even looked at it before).

(In fact, this entire house looks like something out of a magazine. Everything in the house is clean as fuck and the furniture is all matching, hell, there's not even that nasty cat litter smell despite Bryce clearly having cats! Ryan briefly wonders if anyone's actually lived in this house before they arrived here. This place is too clean, too empty, too dead for Ryan to handle. He's not sure how Bryce handles it if he's home alone, because Ryan is here with a group of people and he feels uncomfortable.)

“Okay, so…. I just realized we have nothing to drink,” Bryce announces. “Does someone wanna take me somewhere to buy something?”

Tyler opens his mouth to speak, but Jonathan is faster than him. “I got you baby, come on!” Jonathan grabs his hand and they're gone before anyone can object. Tyler's expression shifts slightly, as though he was a bit upset. It fades away as soon as Luke opens up the pizza box, however.

“Those dumb shits left us alone with the pizza,” Tyler laughs. “Means we get to eat it all!”

Ryan makes eye contact with Luke for a second as he looks around the room. Luke returns his stare for a second before shrugging and reaching for a piece. Ryan simply does the same, and the three of them stand around the pizza box, eating right there like the bunch of dumbasses they are.

--

“What's the kick button again? I need to get this cone off of me.”

“Bryce! Stop your damn- damn flyin’! You're a chicken!”

“You didn't yell at Luke for flying, why me?!”

“Bitch, I'm a fox god! Of course I fly!”

“Why the fuck is my head stuck?! Oh my god! One of you fuckers get off your tiny dicks and help me!”

Ryan never thought it would come to this. He's playing some cute fighting game with four other guys in a bedroom bigger than Ryan would ever consider a bedroom, getting his ass kicked by a half-naked Jonathan and a giggly fucker in a cat onesie.

Not to mention Luke managing to glitch the game and Tyler constantly laughing so hard he ends up wheezing like he's about to die. Gang Beasts is a wonderful, wonderful game. Highly recommended if you enjoy watching cute squishy people get run over by trains and/or trucks.

The pizza is long gone, and so are some of the many drinks they bought. Ryan's not sure where the hell Bryce and Jon went to, but they brought iced tea and chocolate milk, so he's not complaining.

“Oh god, Luke, save me!” Ryan laughs as he watches his little dinosaur-suited character flop over a railing and right next to a grinder. Luke's fox guy whips his body around dramatically, tiny arms flopping in the wind.

“I got you! Grab my hand!”

Ryan frantically smashes buttons, giggling the whole time. “I can't, I can't! I'm unconscious!”

They all laugh as Ryan and Luke both end up getting killed, ending the round with a draw. Ryan is giggling hysterically, flopping over to the side. It takes him half a second to realize that he successfully flopped right into Luke's side, and he pulls away with a small snicker. “Fuck, my bad,” he says in between little giggles. “My sides hurt, oh my god. This is great.”

“Another round?” Jonathan grins excitedly as he holds his controller up. “I need revenge on Bryce for killing my people!”

“I'm good,” Ryan says, now calm. “I wanna go find food. I'm hungry now.”

“Me too,” Luke says. “But I also wanna kick ass some more.”

Ryan nods. “So I'll go eat on my own then. That's fine.” As if it was nothing, he stands up and exits Bryce's room. It's far from nothing though, because halfway through the process of heating up a random burrito when he realizes he has no idea where the plates are.

Thankfully, Luke is right behind him. He hands Ryan a plate and gives him a smug grin. “You're a midget, you know that?”

“I am not,” he grumbles. “I'll have you know I am of only slightly below average height.”

“Mhm. Is that what your momma tells you?” Luke watches as Ryan puts the burrito in the microwave. “Be careful, it's a really strong thing. Anything more than forty seconds will burn it.”

“Thanks,” Ryan says. “And for your information, it was actually my dad who told me that. What are you even down here for?”

“Food, obviously. It's getting gay up there, and I'm not prepared for Bryce and Jon's love session.”

Next thing you know, they're eating on Bryce's couch, side by side and watching tv together. It's quiet and, honestly, a lot less tense than Ryan was anticipating. The couch is big and squishy, the kind of cozy that makes Ryan's eyes feel heavy and his mind fuzzy with drowsiness. It's a good feeling. The burrito helps out a lot, though he's not sure if he can finish it.

He isn't paying much attention to the tv. It's playing rather quietly, to the point where Ryan can hear Bryce, Jon and Tyler upstairs. He sets his burrito down on the coffee table, and looks over at Luke.

Luke is looking back at him, which surprises Ryan ever so slightly. His tired mind doesn't quite process the fact that, you know, it's a bit weird, and instead focuses on Luke's face.

“You have something on your face,” he points out sleepily. Sleeping right here and now is becoming more tempting than ever. He giggles dazedly as Luke fumbles with the crumbs on his face and reaches up to brush some off his shoulder. “See? There you go…”

He smiles at Luke the best he can, struggling to keep his eyes open. His eyelids feel heavy on his face and he feels like he could just melt into the couch with how comfortable he is. Ryan is sleepy, sleepy, sleepy, and god, how he would love to sleep on this magical couch…

The feeling of a hand stroking his cheek pulls Ryan back to reality, though just enough to keep him awake. He vaguely registers that he's been staring at Luke this whole time, and doesn't bother moving his body or looking away. He blinks, once, twice, three times. Keeping his eyes open is a battle he's not gonna win.

And maybe, just maybe, that's why his eyes finally close as someone presses their lips against his.