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“Tanner Milton to the principal’s office” everyone hears over the intercom as Tan sits in class. packing his things Tan leaves class going to Principal Taylor’s office. “Tanner thank you for joining us” the principal calls him in.
“Thank you for having me?” he replies confused as to why he’s back here again.
Sitting in the chair next to Harris across the principal, Tan waits for her to speak. “Tanner Mr. Wheeler has informed me that he works for your father”
“That is a fact yes.”
“Well, you two must be acquainted then?”
“Here and there” Tan replies “quick hellos and goodbyes really.”
“Ok well Harris is our new in-house lawyer, and since you two are acquainted I figure who better to give him a tour of our school.” BAD IDEA!
“As fun as that sounds I was actually in the middle of class”
“Don’t worry about it I’ll talk to your teachers, just show Mr. Wheeler around and bring him back here when you’re done.” She basically handed them a pass to fool around on school property.
Standing up Tan turns to the man who has a sneaky smile on his face, “right this way Mr. Wheeler”
“Thank you Principal Taylor” Harris reaches his hand out to shake hers.
And she stands up shaking it “don’t be silly call me Romona” she smiles shocking Tan, no one’s ever seen her smile before “and you’re very welcome.”
Tan backs out of the room freaked out as the principal watches them leave still smiling. “I can’t believe she smiled” Tan whispers as they’re walking
“Rare?”
“Try nonexistent.” As they walk Tan asks “why would the school need an in-house lawyer?”
“I can’t tell you”
“Of course not.”
“How are you? With me being here and all” He asks knowing him being there can’t possibly be easy for Tan
“Fine I think… my friends won’t shut up about you, they’re calling you Adonis” Harris laughs, “I thought it was fitting.” They walk around as Tan pretends to show him the school “weren’t you supposed to be working for a teacher?”
“I was, but when I came in this morning Romona just hired me on the spot”
Tan scoffs “Romona… she won’t even let me call her PT but she’ll let you call her Ramona”
“PT?”
“It’s an acronym for Principal Taylor! How does no one get that?”
“Are you ever going to actually show me anything in this school?” Harris asks chuckling
“Yeah wanna go check out the boiler room in the basement?” Tan asks raising an eyebrow
“Why would I want to see that?” Harris asks and Tan stops walking staring at him till he gets it “ohhh”
“How are you a lawyer?” Tan walks away and Harris follows. They go to the boiler room and Tan shuts the door. “That’s a nice tie you got there,” Tan says as he grabs Harris by the tie slowly pulling him closer, “it would be a shame if someone wrinkled your nice-“
“Expensive” Harris adds
“Expensive, tie.” Coming to each other Tan and Harris starts to kiss trying to be as quiet as possible “how bad of an idea is this?” Tan asks as they kiss each other madly
“On a scale of 10 to definitely will get caught, I’d say about a 12” they continue anyway.
Until the bell goes off indicating the first period is over “we should get back upstairs before the halls get flooded.” Picking up his briefcase he dropped, Harris and Tan leave the boiler room going back to the school’s main floor.
They continue to walk around as if nothing happens until they hear “BOOBIE!” Lin yells Tan’s nickname as she runs up to Tan “what happened- oh my god!” She stops in front of them when her eyes land on Harris. “You look even hotter up close” she’s too taken by the sight of Harris to realize what she just said.
“Lin!” Tan barks
“Sorry- sorry that was inappropriate” Harris smiles “what are you doing boobs?”
Tan sighs “please stop calling me that, and Principal Taylor asked me to show him around”
“Is that what the intercom thing was about?”
“Yes,” Tan nods.
Looking at Harris as she grins trying to flirt “hi I’m Linda but you can call me Lin”
“Harris, nice to meet you” he smiles being polite
“It’s so nice to meet you too.”
She stands in front of them awkwardly staring and smiling at Harris “get out of here Lin” Tan pushes her
“Ok well I’ll leave you two to it” she backs away eyes still locked on Harris.
She’s finally out of sight and Harris turns to Tan “Boobie?” He asks smiling
Embarrassed Tan answers “we have horrible nicknames for each other and mines just so happens to be boobie all right, don’t make fun of me.”
“Of course not I wouldn’t dream of it, Boobs” Harris laughs. “She one of your friends?”
Tan nods “my best friend since elementary school”
“It’s nice meeting your friends.”
Taking Harris back to the principal’s office they stand in front of her door “and that’s the end of your tour” Tan says obviously joking. “Make sure you give me a raving review.”
“Will do”
“If Principal Taylor asks just tell her I showed you our awesome pool and the gym where the cool kids like workout.” As soon as he said gym something popped into Tan’s mind, or at least someone.
“Got it, call me later?”
“I will bye.” Harris goes back inside the office and Tan walks away.
He knew there was a reason he was so calm even though Harris was at his school, Sven’s not around. This is the second day he’s missed, and at first Tan was hurt because he thought Sven was avoiding him, but now he’s worried that something might actually be wrong.
Taking out his phone he searches for Sven’s name and starts to type a text ‘Hey where are you? I feel like I haven-‘ he stops and erases it starting over ‘Hey is everything ok? Kind of worried’ sending it Tan puts his phone back in his pocket and goes to class.
“You lucky bastard!” Ronnie says as Tan walks out of class and both Erica and Ronnie are out there waiting for him. “What’s Adonis’s name?” They walk next to him
“Harris” he answers
“I think I’m in love with him,” Erica says
“Can you guys stop talking for one second? Sven’s not here again I’m really worried about him”
“Tan he’s fine,” Erica tries to reassure him but it doesn’t work.
“How do you know? He hasn’t posted anything anywhere in the past 4 days.”
“Well we’re at school so what can you do?” Erica asks
“Ron, can I borrow your car?”
“To go to his house are you crazy?” Ronnie asks replying “maybe he just wants to be alone Tan” Tan knows Sven and he knows this isn’t like him.
“If I can prove something’s wrong will you let me borrow your car? I’ll be back before school ends”
“How are you gonna prove it?”
Looking around Tan looks for Sven’s best friend “Josh!” He sees him walking “come here”
Josh walks up to Tan and the girls “what’s up Tan?”
“Hey is Sven ok? No one’s heard from him in days”
“Don’t know” he shrugs “we were supposed to hang out but he hasn’t picked up his phone or answer my texts so…”
“Ok thanks, Josh.” Tan turns back to his friends “see now can I borrow the car?”
“Fine but be careful with her Tan” Ronnie gives Tan her car keys “and text us if you find out anything.”
“Ok, I will.”
Skipping school Tan drives to Sven’s house, Sven’s car is here so he’s probably home. Knocking on the door Tan waits until Sven opens it. Shirtless, with messy hair, and bags under his eyes, Sven opens the door for Tan. “Hey” Tan greets him looking at how much of a mess he looks
“Tan, what are you doing here?”
“I came to check on you, you haven’t been at school the past two days and no one’s heard from you”
“Come in” stepping aside Sven lets Tan in and shuts the door. “I’m fine Tan can’t you tell?” He walks away and Tan follows him to his bedroom where Sven climbs in bed and Tan stands by the door. Remembering what happened last time he climbed in his bed, Tan stays far away “that was nice of you but you didn’t have to come check on me.”
“I’m worried about you”
“Why?” Sven asks in denial
“Because we’re friends and friends worry, you can talk to me.”
“Can I? Because you made it obvious you didn’t want anything to do with me after Friday”
Shocked “why would you think that?”
“You ran out of here Tan and you practically ignored me the rest of the night. I ruined our friendship and I’m sorry for-“
“Stop it! You didn’t ruin anything, Sven, if you did I wouldn’t be here right now, standing in what I’m hoping is your room” Tan jokes looking at how messy his room is.
Sven shows a weak smile “so you don’t hate me?”
Dropping his bag Tan picks up Sven’s trash can walking to his nightstand and starts to put what he thinks is trash in the can “no I don’t.”
Tan continues to clean up and Sven asks “not even after what I did on Friday?”
Especially not after that “I can never hate you, Sven.” Tan tidies up his room a little bit and looks over at Sven who’s quiet staring into space. “Are you gonna talk to me? What happened?”
“Exactly what I thought would happen, my parents voiced their disappointment, I haven’t heard back from any schools yet, and I just feel like I let everyone at school down.”
“Your parents like all parents suck and don’t worry there’s a school out there that wants you just be patient. They look at each other and Tan still stands away from his bed “and as for everyone at school they hate Tommy not you, no one’s even talking about the game anymore.”
“Is that true?”
“Not at all” they both chuckle. Walking to his bag Tan takes out the yearbook “this will probably get me in a lot of trouble but I want to show you something” Tan hands him the binder.
“Is that the yearbook?” Sven takes it
“Yeah the final version, well before I make the changes Principal Taylor wants but that’s beside the point. Go to page 24”
Sven flips the pages until he gets to 24 “my page” he looks over at Tan smiling
“Yep now read the featured paragraph at the bottom of the page.”
After reading it Sven looks back up at him “Knoxville High’s MVP deemed to make it to the NBA or further,” he reads a sentence from the paragraph to Tan. “Not sure there’s anything further than the NBA but did you write this?” Tan nods, finding it the nicest thing anyone’s ever done for him Sven asks “what would I do without you, Tanner Milton?”
Tan smiles “you never have to think about that. When the scouts see this they’re going to have to give you a scholarship so don’t worry.”
“You’re seriously the best” Sven gives him the book back
“I try” Tan puts the binder back in his bag. Sven lays back down, Tan is helping but he’s still depressed. “Tell me what to do,” Tan says watching him in bed wanting to climb in but knows he shouldn’t.
Sven shrugs “I don’t even know what to do Tan, basketball is all I have and if it can’t get me into college then that’s it.”
“No, it isn’t” Tan replies “I honestly don’t know what to say that’ll fix this, but you’ve never given up on me so I’m not going to give up on you.” Thinking till he gets an idea Tan demands “get up”
“Why?”
“Because the first step to getting better is to shower so get up” he walks around the bed grabbing Sven’s hand. “If you shower I will make you my famous grilled cheese, known for curing any illness.”
“Any?”
“Any” Tan says serious and Sven chuckles
“Okay.”
Getting out of bed Sven takes a shower, and Tan walks to the kitchen looking for all the ingredients he’ll need to make the grilled cheese. As he’s cooking Sven walks into the kitchen shirtless with wet hair throwing Tan off his track. Trying to keep his eyes on the pan, Tan ignores the naked chest standing very close to him. “Smells like cheese” Sven comments
“Hmm, I wonder why” Tan answers sarcastically.
Putting the sandwich on a plate and cutting it up for him Tan hands Sven the plate “thank you” he smiles. Sitting at the table as Tan cleans up “woah there’s bacon in here!” Sven is surprised after taking the first bite “why are you so good to me?”
“So the next time I’m in a shitty mood you’ll cook me your specialty”
“Hope you like cereal”
“Lucky for you I do.”
When he’s done Sven walks to the kitchen where Tan is standing and puts his plate in the sink, “that was delicious thank you” he stands in front of Tan.
“Anytime” Tan smiles. Leaned against opposite walls they look at each other with fond eyes “how do you feel?”
“Better” everything was shifting between them, “not a lot of people would skip school to make a grilled cheese for just anybody.”
“You’re not just anybody Sven.” They continue to stand across each other with a smile, too into Sven Tan decides to look away trying to not make it obvious how much he wants him right now. “I should head back Ronnie needs her car before school ends.”
“Or you could stay…” Sven inches closer “I mean there’s an hour before school ends”
“Yeah but I think my work here might be done”
“What if it isn’t?” Looking at the floor Tan sees Sven’s feet moving closer making him nervous, Sven knows what he’s doing but Tan’s confused. Sven continues until he’s close enough, bringing his face to Tan’s Sven moves in until their lips are close enough to kiss.
“What are you doing?” Tan whispers against the counter with Sven close enough to smell the fresh shampoo from his shower.
Sven lowers himself touching his forehead with Tan’s, and just being so close is cutting the air out of Tan’s lungs. His lips part “can I?” Sven asks grazing the boy’s lip with his finger. Reaching around his neck Tan runs his fingers through soft wet hair waiting to be kissed.
Sven doesn’t disappoint, taking Tan’s lips between his they start to kiss each other and Sven didn’t expect it to be this good, the taste of Tan’s lips surprised him.
The tension between them heats up faster than both boys expected, Sven picks Tan up sitting him on the counter as he stands between his legs.
This should be perfect, Tan’s getting exactly what he wants, but maybe it’s not and it might be too late to stop it.
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