Reid Keegan

It was an unusually hot yet wet October day when I realised that all my friends were as.sholes.
I also discovered I was ga.y.
Maybe.

We were lounging at our usual haunt, a small fenced playground on the outskirts of town surrounded by dense oak thickets. Somewhere private for teenagers seeking refuge from the wagging, disapproving fingers of the law. The town had just suffered from a massive flood. The flooding had been a complete disaster which had cost millions of dollars worth of repairs along with two lives. One of which was a ga.y man named Barny, a decent chap of 24 who was swept away before he even realised what was happening.
Blake Silverstein was at the playground, with his cheap hair dye and smug smile. The kind of kid who ran things, an alpha. His cronies were here too. Jake Kano and Brandon "Beanpole" Murphy. They sat at the top of the bird-watch slide, their legs hanging from the edges, cigarettes pressed loosely to their lips. blowing smoke from their noses like teenage Shamen.
Blake was mad.
But then again Blake was always mad, always behaving as if the universe owed him something. As if having children cower as he strutted down the corridors in slow motion like a tv astronaut was somehow not enough. He was insane. It's what we all liked about him, a wild party animal. Or maybe just an animal. He'd grit his teeth and clench his fists, the veins on his head pumping. He'd skulk and sulk and throw tantrums like a child, which was rather entertaining. He was also a beast on the board. That I could appreciate.
What he was mad about today, however, had finally tipped me to the edge.
I never liked him, but his following words made me hate him, and myself for that matter.
It had to do with the small LGBTQ community of our school. His favourite prey. Now that i thought about it, I wasn't exactly a saint either. I'd tormented and bullied. But I wasn't sick. Not like Blake
He was mad about the amount of sympathy Barny's death had accumulated over the past couple of days. The support and love his family got was surprising coming from our little conservative town. But to Blake it was disgusting, insulting. It was blow to his honour and his town pride. to his masculinity and role of school bully.
Silverstein yelled out,
"I swear to bloody god this town's becoming fruitier by the second! If i see another f@g walk 'round like he owns the place I'm going to kill him!"
He hit the frail wooden frame of the slide, before receiving rowdy complaints from Jake and Brandon above him. Clinging in a desperate attempt to not fall off the edge. I was slouched on the ground by the foot of the slide, my face scrunched up into a painful grimace when I heard those words.
"Leave those little ga.y boyos alone Blake. Come on pass us a smoke will ya?" I ask him
and as soon as the words leave my lips, I couldn't help but think of Laura.
And her hair that smelled like apples.
"Standing up for queers are we? Hope you get cancer then." he scoffed in reply, he handed by a cig and continued to kick the slide's legs to annoy the boys perched on top.
"Guess what i heard.." Brandon started, but was interrupted by the soft footsteps of a young girl.
Laura.
She was new to the school, moved from America and was the sweetest thing to ever grace this playground.
She walked fast, trying to avoid attention from us,
The bad crowd,
her hair was bobbing in beautiful blond waves, with what looked like piano books pressed tightly to her loose, pink jumper. I didn't know where to look, it was all too much. She was a princess... elegant and gorgeous like the actresses living in hollywood.
And as soon as she was, she left. Gone. A faint smell of apples left in her place.
"What did ya hear bout?" Jake asked,
Brandon paused, he did this a lot. Not the sharpest knife in the tool shed. "Now don't take my word for it, just some word a little birdie told me. That kid Robyn up to somethin', think it were like a club yeah? For que.ers?"
Blake snorted, his face plastered with amusement, he sat down next to me, wrapping an arm around my shoulders, "BS Beanpole, Robyn's straight as a ruler. I can vouch for that." He was too close. I wanted to throw up, his breath smelled like alcohol.
The rest of the conversation was a blur. A blur in which my mind was else where.
Images of Laura. How i felt about her... That cute preppy thing she had going on...
Images of Blake hurting her sending angry chills up my spine.
What if he found out about me?
Of course there was nothing to find out, right?
And most of all i was thinking about a club. A club where maybe answers were available. A club that, if it existed, would probably never except me. A predator turned prey, a wolf in sheep's clothing. And i knew that the following morning at school i was going to ask around, subtly so as to not bring around suspicion. But i had to know what was wrong with me.
Or maybe there was just something wrong with sick people like Blake.
Maybe this whole conservative town were the devil incarnates and not the people who just wanted to
love.

Archie Harris

(OOC: what I lack in determination to finish my form, I'll make up for in terrible puns and high quality posts)

"Hi Archie." I jumped as a pile of books thudded on the picnic bench next to me, closely followed by a girl.
"Oh- hey Laura." I stuttered a reply, accidentally writing an l instead of the number four on my maths homework. I then made the mistake of pressing down too hard when I scribbled it out. A metallic ping rung out when the tip of the pencil snapped off, ricocheting off of the metal supports of the table. I could already tell my face was going red as I buried myself under my arms, groaning in defeat. The table was cool under my forehead, which would have been nice, except it was freezing today. "Bad day, huh?" Laura giggled, and I felt her sitting next to me. "How's your mum?" She was trying to be nice, but I really didn't want to talk about it. we lived in a bad part of town, and the flood hit us pretty hard. Parts of the carpet are still damp, but we can't afford to move out anywhere while we wait for it to dry. Dad can't even send us any money, so we didn't bother telling him- It'll be months until he visits anyway. I mumbled a response that sort of got tangled in my mouth and became a freakish hybrid of 'fine' and 'great'. Well, today was just going swimmingly. I peeled my damp maths homework off the table and crumpled it into my pocket. I wasn't doing anything at lunchtime anyway, and I guess detention will keep me out of the cold.
"Don't you need to finish that?" Laura pointed at the watery square left on the table from the paper. Her eyes were large and mesmerizing. No wonder Reid kept making eyes at her whenever she walked past. "I mean, you can't have detention, you have that thingy-" She trailed off, distracted. She kept looking over her shoulder at Reid.
"What?" What have I forgotten about this time?
"You know- " She leant down and lowered her voice- "The g@y thing?" I choked on laughter.
"NOOoooooooo." I suddenly decided that I was quite late for form, and was in a rush to get there. Even if it started in fifteen minutes. What idiot would out themselves at a school like this? To prove my point, one of Blake's henchmen shouted some sort of insult at me as I passed. I guess me. I outed myself to the school. I'm the g@y kid. And now, everyone knew. And next time my Dad visited, he would have to know. The temperature dropped even lower, and the thought of the disappointment on his face shot down my back like an icecube. He was in the army. He didn't want a g@y son.

Erin

I sat on Archie's bench table. He looked straight at me and sighed.
"Let me guess, your pencil snapped and you need a new one."
I gave him a real stare back. He looked away, urging Laura to leave the table.
"Look," I sighed." Long story short, I mayyyyy of left your laptop in the library after you let me use it for my Art assignment.
"Your Kidding." He threatened " I'm gonna KILL YOU!!!"
"Sorry!" I chuckled. He immediately hopped out his seat and dashed to the library. I sat opposite Reid.
"Any Gossip?" She asked. I shook my head.
"Nope, apart from last night I saw Blake with his mum in the kebab shop."
"HOW THE HECK IS THAT GOSSIP!!" She exclaimed.
"Sorry!" I laughed " I needed to break the silence. Then I heard footsteps
"Talking of the devil." Reid sighed. Blake walked along, Archie panting not far behind. I looked behind my shoulder. An angry Archie looking at me. I couldn't help put giggle. We stood up and walked out the corner.

Reid Keegan

Erin was a nice girl
She was friends with Archie,
She was also friends with Laura, not that that was important.
I wasn't what you'd call a nice girl. I went to school hungover and wore week old makeup. I'd empty my guts in a toilet bowl. But there we were, the bad girl and the good girl with one thing in common
A g@y club that doesn't exist.
I gathered my things as she followed Archie. The only publicly *** kid I knew about, the one person I imagined would know about the mysterious club. When I'd asked Erin about gossip, I was hoping she'd tell me something, anything.
To be honest, I wasn't sure what I was looking for and what I'd do if i found it. I was sure that the information i was looking for wasn't Blake and his mother's shopping habits.
I wondered whether she could smell the smoke off my jumper.
I tried again, blocking her from her way to her locker.
"What are you doing after school Erin-kins."
"I need to get to class Reid-"
For a fleeting moment i saw red, I imagined grabbing her by the collar, pushing her against a locker, spitting at her face, forcing the information from her.
That thought terrified me more then anything Blake could ever do to me.
My thoughts were abruptly disturbed by a teacher, Mrs Silverstein. Blake's oblivious mother.
"Is there anything wrong girls?"
I didn't even bother to answer, I flicked my sleek red hair, clicked my tongue and slinked away. leaving Erin wide-eyed and breathless. Unsure if i was bullying her or being friendly.
Laura sat next to me in class and i bit my tongue. the taste of metallic blood nowhere near as powerful as the smell of apples.
I asked to leave class and cried in the bathroom.

(OOC) Sorry for the shortness :O

Archie Harris

I'm going to have to go to the library now. For fu@ks sake. My mum will kill me if I lose that laptop. Guess I'll be in detention tomorrow as well, for skipping class. At least, since classes were on, he wouldn't be in there. I froze as soon as I stepped up to the wide glass doors of the school's library. I was w r o n g. He was stacking books by the main desk, ohhhwooowwww. I stepped back, breath shaky. I had to get my laptop. But was it worth my dignity? Yes. That laptop was worth more than my life, let's be honest. Deep breaths, Archie.
I pushed open the door of the library, as silently as possible. WAs I seriously about to try and sneak past him?
Yes. Yes I was.
"Archie?"
It didn't work, incase you were wondering. He turned quickly, discarding the book in his hand on one of the many tables he walked past on his way to me. He was walking towards me. I stepped back on instinct.
"Heyyy." I smiled awkwardly. It 100% looked like a grimace. "John..." I added, trying to make things less awkward. I failed.
"You're here for your laptop, right?" He grinned, and pushed a strand of long black hair out of his deep blue eyes. It looked, Quite perfect. He leant over the librarian's desk and pulled out the Adventure time laptop case. "This is yours, right?"
I would have given anything to be able to say no. Literally anything. My verg'nity. But I didn't have that anymore.
I nodded a quick yes, took the laptop and turned to leave.
"Can we talk?" He asked quietly. Good, I can pretend I didn't hear. "Because, you wanted to- I mean, we both- Archie, please stop ignoring-" The library doors clicked shut behind me. My hands were trembling, and I knew my skin would be patchy and red. Looks like i would be missing ALL of English Lit today.