The faint hum of Pelham's phone vibrating on the coffee table woke him up the following morning. When he opened his eyes - still drowsy - he was utterly and reasonably baffled on why he wasn't looking up at a particular ceiling clock that usually told what time it was. Instead, he was facing a television that was currently playing a movie he didn't recognise. Oh, he thought to himself, as his brain started to fine-tune, realising that he had fallen asleep when he was watching Nightmare: On Elm Street during the previous night, to which he watched with Lucio-

He came to notice that there was a weight pressed against his shoulder - relatively hard, too, almost like a rock. His eyes wandered down to his left and was fairly startled to see Lucio - who was currently fast asleep - on his side, and that his own arm was wrapped around the boy's shoulder. Pelham deliberately extracted his arm from around him, recalling at once that Lucio had been beyond petrified when they were watching the horror movie the previous night and had ended up snuggling - inadvertently, as it seemed - against Pelham, who simply watched Freddy Krueger without a trace of fear.

For one, Pelham wasn't afraid of horror movies. It isn't as if they'll burst out of the screen and kill me, right?

He picked his phone up and saw that he had received a text message from Roshon, who was informing him that his sojourn in New York was extended to two more weeks. At this information, Pelham felt himself smiled and sigh at the same time; smile, because he was pleased to hear that his best friend was making a rather brilliant progress; sigh, because that meant he wouldn't be seeing Roshon for another few weeks.

Who is going to help me with Chemistry, then? he asked himself, somewhat downcast at the prospect of having to work out some chemical equations all by himself without the aid of Roshon's brain.

It was still early around six in the morning, though Pelham resolved that he and Lucio should get ready as early as dawn. He directed his attention towards Lucio, who was still snoring softly at his side with his mouth slightly parted, his pink lips puffy. He had seemingly abased himself in front of Pelham by letting out an earsplitting screech the previous night when Freddy Krueger dominated the entire screen of the television, jump-scaring both boys - though, Pelham jumped in shock only because Lucio had accidentally elbowed his ribs.

On the one hand, Pelham couldn't help but think Lucio looked fetchingly endearing in his big grey jumper, what with his raven hair that was tousled in every direction as he snuggled against Pelham, as though Pelham was a pillow.

After all, I'm gay, Pelham thought to himself, not giving a hoot about his feelings. Doesn't mean I can't look at a boy and think he looks cute.

Be that as it may, it wasn't as though he was completely drawn into Lucio. Ultimately, that was one of the inexorable things that he had to put up with. Pelham couldn't exactly blame himself for being charmed by someone of the same gender. Besides, be couldn't blame the boy for looking winsome without trying to.

"Wake up, Alves," Pelham shook Lucio gently.

Lucio snored in response.

It took him around a minute before deciding to give the boy a little pinch on his side - a hard one, really. As though a switch had been flicked, Lucio's eyelids snapped open, and he jolted upright with a strained hiss.

"Morning," Pelham greeted.

"W-what was that-" Lucio abruptly got off Pelham's side once he noticed how close-packed they were. "Uh ... sorry about that."

"It's cool,"

Lucio rubbed the sleep out of his eyes with the heels of his palms, before asking in a groggy voice, "Did we both fall asleep while watching a movie?"

"I thought it's obvious" Pelham shrugged, too tired to come out with a sharp-witted remark. "C'mon, we have to get ready."

"It looks early ..."

"Exactly."

Not exactly knowing why, Pelham ruffled Lucio's hair - messing them even more - before getting up to stretch his limbs.

Their breakfast in the cafeteria later on was considerably quick, for before that they had to take out their bags, make sure the cabins were cleared of all of their belongings, before handing the keys over to the teachers who will in turn return them to the landlord. The rain poured as early as seven on that Monday morning than any of them had expected. Upon seeing this, Pelham realised that his raincoat was packed in his bag - which was already loaded in the bus.

"I have a raincoat," Lucio offered. But Pelham shook the offer, stating that Lucio might need it more than he did. "Oh, come on. I'm big enough not to suffer from hypothermia."

"That's a big word - where'd you learn it?" Pelham asked, feeling the corner of his lips twitch into the faintest of grin. He was still slightly put out with himself for not stuffing his raincoat inside his backpack instead, seeing as he was going to carry it to the bus.

Lucio stared up at Pelham as though the answer was already right in front of them in bold, italic fonts - in other words, he stared at Pelham as though Pelham was downright dimwitted. "Biology," he said a matter-of-factly.

"You pay attention in class," Pelham observed, and honestly didn't know why he even said that.

"Don't you?"

"Hard to say. I don't take that subject anymore, so it's an irrelevance,"

Lucio snorted in response.

Pelham had no choice but to run in the downpour without any umbrella with him as he headed for the bus later on, Lucio trotting at his side, completely safe and dry under his already drenched yellow raincoat. Some other students who were as careless as Pelham and had no umbrellas or raincoats did the same; running amid the heavy pour, greatly swashing the puddle of water around their feet and sploshing them in their wake. They ended up soaking the aisle of the bus, much to the driver's discontent. It was warm there nonetheless, and Pelham immediately slumped into the seat at the far back of the bus, just near the windows, with Lucio following suit.

"You might catch cold," Lucio pointed out, removing his dripping raincoat and folding them up.

"Then I don't have to go to school tomorrow,"

"Fair enough," Lucio nodded whilst watching the other students file into the bus.

Pelham observed the droplets of rainwater as they dribbled down the window, silently supporting one raindrop as it trickled past the other one. "You coming to school tomorrow?" he asked without averting his gaze from the cool glass.

"Of course,"

"Don't you want to rest, at least?"

"I'd love to," said Lucio, a soft sigh escaping his lips. "But we'll see about that."

Pelham nodded, watching as more raindrops race down the surface of the window, the sound of rain itself pattering against the roof of the bus.

"Pelham ..." he heard Lucio say, and there was something meditative - almost vacillating - in Lucio's tone that caused Pelham to turn his head to face the boy.

"What's up?"

Lucio was gnawing his bottom lip, eyes staring ahead. "What happens to school as soon as we get there?"

Pelham couldn't help it. "Zombie apocalypse, so all of us have to be evacuated," he said. When he saw that Lucio looked brooding, he said, "Hang on, d'you mean us? Or ...?"

Timidly, Lucio nodded. His cheeks turned a shade crimson, and he tried to hide it with a forced smile. "Because," he said, his voice hardly a whisper, "this week has been - I gotta be frank - the best with you and Roshon. I don't have any ... you know, real friends here - except this one girl - till you two showed up. Okay, technically, I showed up, but still. I mean - yeah - you know what? Forget what I said ..."

By this point, Lucio's cheeks were scarlet that Pelham couldn't help but beam. He was flattered, if he were to put it that way. "We'll hang out," he said reassuringly, a soft smile replacing his wide beam as though his face could contain all of the adjectives for 'smile'. "Besides, I need more friends."

Lucio looked at Pelham and cocked an eyebrow, almost laughing.

"Come on, you're a cool guy!" Again, Pelham ruffled the boy's already messy dark hair. "Why are you so worried anyway? I don't get it. It's not like we're making a business deal."

Lucio inhaled. "Scared, I guess,"

Pelham frowned. "Scared? 'Cause you're, what, foreign?" he said. "Anyway, you said you have a friend. A girl."

"Yeah, that's because she was the first one who approached me since I moved here last year," said Lucio.

"So you've never tried approaching other people?"

"I'm afraid to."

*

Lucio regretted ever saying that. He really did, as soon as the words left his mouth. It slipped out without conscious and deliberate thought. Now Pelham was going to bombard him with questions. There was no doubt about it.

Perhaps the horror of Lucio's unfiltered words was evident on Lucio's face, because Pelham - after squinting at Lucio - as though reading his mind, asked, "Is it something personal?"

Lucio had never been this appreciative. He nodded.

"All right, then."

To Lucio's relief, Pelham didn't press on the matter. As the bus began to move, the two of them simply discussed and analysed random things that they saw along the road; pointing out some flaws of nature they could discover along the way, or simply wondering why the sky was blue instead of white in the morning. Lucio didn't expect Pelham to be the type of boy to know so much about nature, the type of person who was full of wonder, much less relating them to his life.

Pelham was far different from the way Lucio had initially pictured him before they became closer than acquaintances, who only passed each other in the school corridors a couple or more times a week. He was soft and genial, definitely charming, quick-witted, had a sense of humour and knew what to talk about when he saw that their conversation was coming to an end, so as not to put either of them in a numbing boredom. It was as though Pelham couldn't go a day without a single speech. The thing was that it wasn't wounding anyone up.

Lucio wondered whether Pelham had a heart of gold.

It didn't help him in any case at all, however, seeing as he could feel himself growing more attached and infatuated with Pelham. He has a girlfriend, he kept telling himself whenever such thought was about to surface into his mind. He would try to push the thoughts away - all of them - no matter how frequently they popped back in. He kept failing nonetheless.

Talking to Pelham was undoubtedly different than talking to his classmates. Pelham made him feel as though he was involved in everything, like he was being hauled into Pelham's realm without either of them much noticing it. It was as though one simple glance from Pelham propelled Lucio into that wakefulness of having a true friend - maybe a best friend. It was, again, as though Lucio got back his best friend that he had lost, because that was what Pelham did; he made everyone look like his best friends.

So much that Lucio felt really included. So much that Lucio started to miss his own best friend.

That was, if that friend still wanted him in his life.

That so-called best friend who had turned his back on him and let his new cronies do their task, thinking that Lucio deserved such pressure that he was forced to move out of school, out of the country. Lucio was lucky enough to land himself in a private school, thanks to his aunt. "It's safe." his aunt had assured him during the previous year.

She wasn't quite correct.

Thinking back, though, Lucio didn't care whether he missed him. Didn't care whether he was safer here than in his hometown. He just wanted to survive.

*

It turned out that they were being dropped straight home from the buses. There were no more than fifteen students left in the bus now as three o'clock rolled in. Pelham had phoned his father a while ago that he would be home soon, and that his father didn't need to tire himself by picking him up from school.

He was thankful that Lucio was still in the bus with him, otherwise he would be bored to death. He reckoned it was still a long journey to arrive at Lucio's place. Though, Pelham was half-hoping that Lucio would be dropped earlier, so that he would know where the boy lived.

That was when, after a while, Lucio's phone rang. Feeling that Lucio would need a little privacy, Pelham plugged in his earpieces and shuffled into his playlist, giving Lucio the sense of ease at talking to whoever had rung him up.

Pelham was nodding along the beat of the music as he stared out the window, watching as the street and trees and houses blur past, the droplets of water on the window already evaporating. He didn't hear Lucio calling him until he felt one of his earpieces being yanked off. "Sorry," he said, pausing in the middle of 21 Guns and turning his attention to Lucio. "What's up?"

"Er ... God - I shouldn't have ... you know what? Forget it," Lucio was saying, waving his hands dismissively.

"You keep saying 'forget it' and it is starting to wind me up," said Pelham with a smile.

"No, it's just ... never you mind," Lucio murmured.

Pelham shifted and turned in his seat, before bending his head lower so he was looking directly into Lucio's face, who laughed.

"You didn't pull my earpod off and interrupt me from being emo for five minutes for nothing,"

"Yeah, I'm starting to regret that,"

"You wanna ask something? Spit it out," Pelham instructed, as he shoved his phone into his pocket.

"My ... uh, my parents," Lucio sighed. "They thought I was coming home tomorrow so they went out of town for a while."

"Oh,"

"Yeah,"

"Okay," Pelham nodded slowly. Then it clicked into place. "Oh! You mean to say ...?"

"They said the house is locked and I don't have a spare key and ... and I thought-"

"You wanna come over for a while?" Pelham jumped in his seat like an excited seven-year-old about to have a sleepover.

Lucio raised his eyebrows. "Are you sure?"

"How long will they be gone?"

"They'll be home tonight,"

"Brilliant! Then I can hang out with you for a bit," Pelham grinned. "Then you get to meet Oris!"

That was how, after chatting about random things in the bus for another ten minutes, Pelham and Lucio hopped off the bus and heaved their belongings along the pavement, heading towards Pelham's house, which was already swelling into view.

At the moment, Lucio was adjusting the strap of his bag over his shoulder, and he didn't hear the clatter of his phone as it fell out of the unzipped pouch of his bag and onto the ground. Pelham gritted his teeth (That's gotta hurt, he thought) before bending down to pick it up for him. Lucio's phone was facing upwards, unlocked, so there was a shortcut of a contact in his homescreen.

There was a name there: Miguel.

Pelham frowned. Who's Miguel?