Date: Fri, 7 Dec 2007 16:36:04 +1100 From: Sakura Kangen <sakurakangen@gmail.com> Subject: Waiting for the Music Chapter 3 (of many) [gay/highschool] Hi Everyone! Sorry AGAIN about the MASSIVE delay, things should pick up now though :) COPYRIGHT NOTICE Please note, this copyright notice is retroactive to all stories I have previously posted on Nifty. They are distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 Australia License, Copyright (C) 2007. DISCLAIMER This story involves relationships between males aged 15-19. If you do not approve of this, why the hell are you even reading it now? If you are a parent reading through the Internet logs of your young child, do not punish your child for reading these stories. He/she clearly has some questions about his development, and it is YOUR responsibility to answer those questions truthfully and honestly. If this material is illegal in your area, leave now. Blah blah blah blah blah blah. You know the drill. If you aren't supposed to be reading this, Don't (although some flames would be lovely to publicly dissect :)). This story and setting are based on events in my life when I was 17 years old. Names and places have been changed to protect the privacy of individuals. Obviously most (but not all) of the relationships are made up. All of the ones involving me are. The real relationship I had when I was 17 is too painful for me to want to recollect, as it ended in a horrible tragedy due to Pancreatic Cancer. Hence most of my writing here is based on post-Leo time frame, where I was single and looking. I have also removed sections of my life that I have felt would have made the story too multitracked and confusing. I am trying to keep the number of characters to a minimum. I am also avoiding all cliches. Finally this is set in the Australian High School System so if you don't know how it works go look it up. I'm sick of reading about sophomores and freshmen. We don't have that here. Enjoy! Note: This is my first story! So, please write to me and let me know what you think, email: sakurakanNOSPAMgen@gmail.com Of course, remove the NOSPAM there ~Kangen P.S - I would like to thank the following kind people for emailing me letters in praise of my work: "Matt", Andy, Tim, Frances. Special thanks to Mark for giving me the shove along to get this done. And so, without further adieu, --- Waiting for the Music: Chapter 3 I walked in to Mr. Richardson's class for the second time in the one day, this time arriving late enough so as not to be noticed by the menacing eyes surveying the classroom. When everyone had arrived, Mr. Richardson immediately turned to the board and began writing more notes. There was a collective subconscious groan as he started - he wasn't going to give us the second maths period of the day off to do the several hours of homework that he had set the previous lesson. That meant that in addition to the first lesson's homework, he was going to set a SECOND lesson's worth of homework, in addition to all the work I had missed out on from the lesson before last! I felt like my head was about to explode. So anyway, I spent the entire lesson staring at Jacob.. uh.. I mean, writing notes, hehe. Apart from learning about applications of calculus to prove the binomial theorem, the lesson was suprisingly uneventful (and not all that stressful, apart from the ominous feeling I had about all the work I would have to do after Choir that night), so when the hideous bell tolled for me again, 50 minutes onward, I was pleasantly suprised, immediately packing up my books and practically running out the door before Mr. Richardson could set any additional homework. The school consists of one building with three large levels, and houses about 800 students. For that reason, it was usually rather crowded. The younger kids (in years 7-8) are on the first level, the seniors were on the top level, and the intermediate schoolers (in years 9-10) are on the middle level, generally. One exception to this rule was the primary (elementary) kids. For some reason, they decided to put the primary classroom (which consists of only 20 choirboys) on the same level as the seniors. For a little kid to have to navigate through huge crowds of seniors accessing their lockers and moving through the hallways at the end of every period is quite a daunting task, and I spotted one such child attempting to get through the hallway and repeatedly getting knocked around by seniors who were not observant enough to notice him. While little kids usually irritate the hell out of me, I decided I'd give him a hand seeing as he certainly seemed to need it. "MOVE!" Everyone in the hallway stopped moving - how ironic. Still, it allowed the kid to walk through unhindered. "Thanks William!" he said before running off. Huh? How'd he know my name? I dismissed it as I noticed my Catholic Studies teacher already walking into my next class. I walked in to the class and Mr. Edwards had already started talking. "So, Jesse, how was your date with Pete?" I suppose I should explain. There were two religious studies subjects offered at my school, Studies of Religion, and Catholic Studies. Studies of Religion actually counted to your grades and mattered, whereas Catholic Studies didn't. That meant Catholic Studies was usually treated with about as much importance as a grain of salt, and most lessons were spent either watching movies, or, in the case of Mr. Edwards' case, making wild and false (and jocular) accusations about my classmates sexuality. He probably had a decent gaydar as well, because he never made any accusations against me, perhaps in case I would be hurt by them, not that I would have actually cared if he did. Jesse, huge grin on his face, actually walked up over to Pete and gave him a huge hug and a kiss on the cheek, while Pete blushed and cringed in embrarrasment. Jesse was a very big lebanese guy, and him hugging Pete's diminuitive form was rather comical. "We got to.... first.. no.. third.. no.. eighth base!" Jesse said, laughing. Mr. Edwards raised an eyebrow. "Eighth base?" "Well, you see, you need a jar of honey, a pack of condoms and a hot dog.. and then you -" Mr. Edwards interrupted him. "Is this going to make me throw up? I have a hunch that it just might do, in which case, you should stop talking before I give you a detention card." The class was in fits of laughter, and, once it died down and Jesse had returned to his seat, another student asked out of the blue, "Sir, are you gay?" The laughter stopped. Everyone sort of knew that Mr. Edwards was prob- ably gay, but no one asked him because it might land him in trouble (teaching in a catholic school and all). "What's it to you?" Mr. Edwards asked, with a smirk on his face. Clev- er, skirt around the question, and turn it into a joke. "Nothing to me sir, but it'd probably mean something to William." I froze, and made sure that I got a good look at the guy so that I could sock him one one day. I realised that he was new to the school (seeing as I didn't recognize him), and he had obviously found issue with my homosexuality. I had to turn this into a joke, preferably against him. "Aww, come on," I said, "you know you're the only guy for me." The class started laughing, and I knew I'd pulled it off. Those in the class who knew about my homosexuality and supported me found the remark funny because it made fun of the bigot, and those that didn't know about me thought it was all a big joke. The asshole scowled at me. I stuck my tongue out at him - I'd won, and I'm a bad winner, heh. The bell tolled and everyone cringed - someone had set the speaker volume too high. We all proceeded out in a less-than-orderly fashion and headed to roll-call. The teacher that marked the roll for my group in both mornings and afternoons was Mr. Hurley. He was an asshole to every- one except me. He was my computers teacher, and because I was very, very, very good at computers in High School, I would get 99.9% while everyone else in the class got around 40%. Thus, because I did so well, I valid- ated his shitty teaching methods, and he liked me for that reason. Anyways, because he liked me, he appointed me with all the odd admini- strative jobs that had to be done in morning and afternoon rollcall. I was returning the roll to the administration office and, as I returned to class, I came up against a huge crowd of my fellow Year 12s walking in the opposite direction - school had just been dismissed. Rather than risk certain death by trampling, I stood to one side and allowed the majority to pass as I walked over to my books and bag. I just shoved all the books into my bag that I used that day - I couldn't be bothered sorting between which ones I would actually need for homework and which I wouldn't. I hefted my bag onto my shoulders and nearly fell over back- wards. Okay, maybe some books needed to go - heh. As it was a Thursday, that meant I had choir rehearsal starting at 5, effectively giving me two hours to eat dinner and do some homework before it began. I walked up the footpath down the side of the cathedral, and down the stairs to the Crypt Entrance and the choir rehearsal rooms, when I noticed the primary school kid from earlier bounding down the stairs. "Rowan, hurry up!" A deeper, British-accented voice called back, "Do you ever shut up?" as Rowan, dressed in his school uniform (a different school to mine) slowly strolled down the stairs, taking as much time as he wanted so as to irr- itate the kid standing below. I realised then that this kid must be Rowan's brother. They certainly had similar features - blond hair, blue eyes, pale skin, and rather slim. In fact, the kid looked like Rowan did when he was that age. I knew Rowan well when he was younger (13), but he had since gone off for two years to a British International College in Europe, and he had returned with a British accent, a different personality and a deep bass voice. When he returned, he decided not to return to the Cathedral College and instead went to a different school in northern Sydney, starting afresh, seeing as he wasn't very well accepted socially at my school anyway. Rowan was shy. Very shy. Like, whenever I talked to him, he would blush. I found it cute, really. I remembered then that I had actually told Mr. Quentin earlier that day that I was interested in Rowan. At the time, it was a hastily constructed lie to keep Dale off my back, but as I watched Rowan enduring his broth- er's antics, I realised that I would certainly be open to a relationship with the guy - he's certainly cute enough. He continued down the stairs and into the rehearsal rooms, briefly nodding to acknowledge my presence. I sat down on the edge of the stairs, alone to ponder the events of the day so far. I guess that explained how the kid knew my name. But what would motiv- ate Rowan to tell him? I had barely spoken to the guy for 3 years, after all. I dismissed it as a mountains-from-molehills style situation and went into the rehearsal rooms to put my bag down. === That's it for this chapter. More on Rowan in the next! Hugs + Kisses, ~Kangen and remember... emailing is the lifeblood of Nifty. Email me. sakurakanNOSPAMgen@gmail.com removing, of course, the NOSPAM.