I thought it would be painful to go back to school. But to be honest, all I really did yesterday while at home was just dwell and worry about things. I think the best way for me to move on from this will be to just get back into the routine of things. Still, I feel exhausted. I guess it is a good thing that there’s only one more week until Christmas Break. Except I guess that’ll just end up being more time to sit around the house and brood. I need to come up with something to do over the break…

With track practice presumably being suspended for the rest of the year, I don’t bother getting to school quite as early. Still, I am there early enough to have some time before English starts. And as I often do, I end up bumping into Mason. He once again has that red ring on his face, so he must have just been practicing.

“Hey man. Good to see you,” he says as he sees me.

“Thanks.”

“Hey, one week and one day and we're outta here. I can't wait.”

He turns his back towards the band hall. “But before that I got region phase 2 tomorrow, and then a band concert.

“Oh, you have a concert? When is it?”

“The Tuesday of next week, 7 PM.”

“Maybe I'll go. It'll be nice to get out of the house for a little bit.”

He smiles approvingly. “Nice, dude. It’s free, you might as well.”

Just then, a couple of other boys come up to us. Not guys I know super well, but they are on the track team with me. One of them greets, “Hey, sup Kevin?”

“Uh, not much?”

Mason scowls at them. “Oh jeez, I knew it. How about you guys buzz off?”

“What's the matter?” responds the other boy indignantly. “We just want to talk to him.”

“Yeah, we just want to say congrats!” the other one says, grinning mischievously.

“Oh, screw you!” Mason says, waving at them as if trying to ward off pesky flies.

“What are you talking about?” I ask, dreading what they will say.

“Good job ‘getting some.’”

“Yeah, we're really impressed. How'd you do it?”

“Uh, do what exactly?” I question.

“You must have some secret charming technique to get to a teacher.”

My stomach clenches. I had a nasty feeling it would be something like this. “That's not what happened.”

“Oh come on. Just tell us the story.”

“I don't want to talk about it.” I say firmly.

“You idiots!” Mason interjects, rolling his eyes. “Who would want to do it with a teacher! Just quit reminding him of it already.”

“Hey, she was still in her 20s,” one of the boys argues. “If it had to be a teacher, she'd be a pretty strong candidate.”

“Well, let me tell you something,” Mason snaps back, pointing at the pair aggressively. “Unlike you sickos Kevin wouldn't have ever done that; he was forced to do it. So why don't you go and kiss a girl- and I mean one who's your age- and maybe you'll start to understand some things about real life. How about that?”

Their joyous attitude drops away, and now the boys look mad.

“What did you just call us?” one of them asks sharply.

“Do you wanna fight, man?” the other says, clenching his fists.

“Yeah, I’ll fight you!” Mason responds, looking gleeful that he got under their skin. “That’s what you get for acting shitty to my friend!”

“No, we don't need to fight,” I interrupt quickly. Onlookers are starting to stare at us. “Let's just get out of here, please.”

“Well you got nothing to fight about,” one of the boys says. “You have to be the luckiest boy in the whole school right now.”

I sigh. “I sure don't feel like it.” I grab Mason by the shoulder and walk him down the hallway.

“Oh, you should've let me beat them up!” he complains as I drag him along. “Those perverted kids piss me off.”

“No. We don't need an incident. I just want everyone to forget about this as soon as possible.”

He pulls my hand off of him, and leans against the wall, now trying to appear indifferent. “Oh well, just forget all of them. Their words mean nothing.”

“It's gonna be pretty hard to forget them given that they're in athletics with me. When soccer starts up next semester I'm gonna have to deal with them in the locker rooms. And those conversations were already weird enough.”

Mason grimaces. “Oh wow. Uh, that's gonna be awkward.”

“Yeah.” I sigh again, and my spirits sink along with my body as it slumps to the ground. “I was thinking about it yesterday, and I honestly just want to quit.”

“What?” Mason says, startled. “No, you can't quit! You love that stuff.”

“It's just too painful. How am I going to go for those jogs around the school after knowing that someone had been watching me, plotting how to trap me in some j- er, her classroom?”

“Uh… I dunno. But you can’t just totally quit sports,” Mason insists.

The bell rings to signal us for class. Still grimacing, Mason tells me, “Look, we’ll talk about this later. Maybe there’s some other way. See you later.”

“Yeah, see you,” I say.

I vaguely wonder about what Mason has in mind for me as I amble off to English class. When I arrive, I see Ashley and Zoe seated as usual. They don’t look happy at all. Ashley looks up at me as I enter the classroom. She doesn’t say anything, but her pretty green eyes give a questioning look.

I know why. I was added to a group chat with Ruth, Ashley, and everyone else who went to that jungle. The people in cahoots with Ms. Truman know about us; Ashley was left a very pointed threatening message. And apparently, a previous group that tried this had all their members killed off or something. Pursuing these people is a path that is clearly dark and dangerous, if not outright deadly.

Will I continue along with them? Ruth has already agreed to do so. Personally, I haven’t made up my mind yet. It’s hard enough to motivate myself to do the things I liked doing before. And as fascinating as that adventure was, it was more than a stone’s throw from what I’d call “fun.”

Now that school’s out for the week, time to do something I’ve been meaning to do since Wednesday. I lay flat on my bed and open Skype to message Lily. I dunno how this is gonna go, but here it goes.

hey

hey nova

how is it going man

uh, yeah

about that

have you heard anything about the batshit week we've had

no, did you find that pedo teacher?

uh yeah, we found her alright.

her???

so ye. long story short, it was this english teacher bitch, and she wrote that post like she was one of the coaches to frame him,and he got arrested but then she started being creepy towards this guy, and well, she kinda got him, partially at least, but me and my friend were there and we explained what happened and then she was gonna get arrested but then she died like with that black slime just like ehat you said about your auntie.

whoah whoah, slow down

wait what they got her with that poison? i wonder why

well she was probably involved with some group

okay wait first i need to explain something else

so this whole thing goes kinda deep and is such a conspiracy

which is why I need to talk to you

oh no way, did you find something out?

well okay, I need to start from the beginning.

i mean i'm probably not supposed to tell anyone about this stuff.

we've never told anyone so the others might be mad.

so just don't repeat this to anyone or tell anyone you got it from me

okay now i HAVE to know it

okay

have you ever heard of these people it's called the thieves in the night?

yeah of course that's like conspiracies 101

i saw the blameitonjorge video about them

well they're real

no shit they're real

there's tons of evidence

uh, well

do you know how they did their stuff

yeah they knew occult magic and they could cast spells on people

uh kinda

but there is more to it

wait no

how do you know

they use this other world where people's thoughts and shit can form things also i know because i went there

oh no way I KNEW I overheard you and anja talking about some shit.

so wait what is that like the field consciousness?

uhhhh idk what that is we just call it the metaverse

oh like in the matrix. cool reference

yeah so basically that's how the thieves in the night people changed shit and when that custody thing was happening with my mom my friends came and were like hey nova we can use this to make that judge change his mind and then we did it and then we used it on some pastor and that pedo teacher

oh yeah

nice going

can i join the team i have a lot of useful talents

uhh well we kind of already have a lot of members but you can be like our informant

cool cool anything for you my homie.

okay well on that note. when we were beating the pedo teacher lady she said something like i got this app from a group and if i say anything they'll kill me and then after we changed her heart she started confessing to everything and that's when she died so my theory is that group was the one who did it but i don't think it was poison i think it wa s just she got killed using the metaverse

that would tie everything together

the government would definitely have access to crazy supernatural stuff like this

that's why we invaded iraq to make sure we still have control of the iraqi stargate

Huh. I have to wonder for a moment if Lily is gonna have the most reliable person to be asking about this stuff. I mean, she always is able to dig up the weirdest shit, and I’m never sure what to believe about it…

uh, right

sjndjdks

okay i need to do research into this this is too much info to take it

i'll bring out the whiteboard and try and figure this out

i'll get back to you if i think i made a breakthrough.

thanks.

oh yeah, there's another thing i wanted to ask you about

oh another conspiracy?

no it's about anja

what about her

i have a huge crush on her and idk how she feels about me

she likes you, obviously

wait you think so

yeah she is crazy about you

holy shit

how do you know

i could tell from when you came over

she never acts that way towards anyone else

what way

she was like petting your hair and shit man how retarded are you

oh yeah

sorry i don't understand that girl stuff

girl stuff???

yeah that's why i wanted to ask you

dude i don't care about any of that girly shit

fuck that

oh i just thought you would know better since you're a girl

dude don't lump me in with other girls i never cared about the stupid shit the talk about

i would rather hang out with guys like you and nattie

So she’s still friends with Nattie… he was a mutual friend of ours from New Braunfels. Tall, awkward guy who liked to stare at women’s butts. Fun to play Pokémon with, though.

okay sorry

well whatever. talk to you later

bye

I frown. Why did she get so mad about that? She’s being stupid. She really doesn’t like getting lumped with other girls? I mean, she was really never that feminine. I don’t care, I’m not exactly super masculine myself, so it’d be kinda hypocritical to care a lot about gender roles for other people. I just didn’t realize it was such a sore spot with her. I guess I better be careful with that stuff.

I take a look around my room… Kat is standing in the doorway.

“What do you want?” I ask her.

She yawns and stretches. “Yeah, I thought you should know. You know that one girl you're friends with?”

I blush immediately, thinking of Anja. “Uh, which one?”

“The blonde one.”

“Oh, you mean Zoe.”

“Yeah. Well, she’s got a little brother who goes to my school. And he’s gay. And he has a gay boyfriend and they’re going to meet up this weekend.”

“Oh yeah. She mentioned something about that once.”

“Yeah. And, I’m going with them as the third wheel. I think Collin is worried his parents will be suspicious if he hangs out with just one other boy all the time.”

“Oh, okay. Are you gonna enjoy the show?”

She snickers loudly. “Maybe. I mean, boys making out is pretty hot.”

“Yeah, it is.”

It slipped out without me thinking about it, and I realize my mistake as she points at me jubilantly. “HAHA! I GOT YOU!”

“Shut up.”

“I knew you were gay. No straight boy spends that much time hanging around girls.”

“Hey, I hang around guys too. There’s…” Hmm. Come to think of it, I basically am friends exclusively with girls. I guess there’s like, Kevin and Mason? But I haven’t talked to either of them all that much. And I can’t really use Ted as an example to Kat. “Okay, well by that logic you must be gay because you’re hanging around boys.”

“Nah. I’m straight,” she says confidently. “It’s fun to have a gay best friend. Also, Collin is hilarious.”

“Maybe I got so many hoes cause I’m a real ladies man. They just flock to me.”

“Yeah, that’s why they’re all lesbians. Idiot.”

I sigh. “Okay fine. I’m bisexual. Not like it matters.”

“It doesn’t matter. All that matters is that I finally got you to admit it,” she says, smirking at me annoyingly.

“Well, you got what you wanted. Now get out of my room.”

“Hold on. We need to talk about your crush too.”

I frown. Has she been reading my Skype conversations? “How did you know I have a crush?”

“BECAUSE YOU JUST TOLD ME, FOX BOY!”

I chortle at this. “Oh, fuck off.”

“You’re so easy to manipulate. And by process of elimination, I know that it’s Anja. Am I right, or am I absolutely right?”

“Why do you care?”

“Because, man. You haven’t told her yet. You’re too pussy.”

“You better not do anything stupid.”

“How could I? That’s your job.”

I grab my pillow and hurl it at her, causing her to dart away from my room giggling.