To whomever created the idea of putting a bunch of hormonally-charged teenagers in a damp and smelly building; I hope the earth opens and swallows you whole. I cannot think of a more tortuous building that rips you of your sanity and humanity other than school.

Alright, maybe I’m being just a tad bit dramatic. School was boring, yes, but I could think of a million other things much worse than sitting in AP Calculus at 6AM in the morning. I sighed to myself, I wished I was somewhere else entirely right now.

As my mom pulled into the car rider parking lot of my school, I could feel my mood drop instantly. Everything about my high school just felt like it was designed to crush your spirits, from the ugly grey brick walls to the dim fluorescent lighting that made the place seem half-abandoned.

“Alright Ezra, hop out the car,” my mom said. “I’ll see you after school”

She tried to lean in and give me a kiss on the cheek, but not being fond of physical touch, I quickly dodged it. A look of surprised appeared on my mom’s face, but it quickly turned into a knowing smirk.

“Think you’re too big to get a kiss from your mother?” she asked.

I blushed. “I’m almost 18 Mom, it’s a bit embarrassing…”

She laughed. “Ah, I remember when my brother said the exact same thing to your grandmother. Now she lives with him!”

She was referring to my Uncle Rayman, or as he calls himself “Ray-Ray”. He’s my mom twin brother, and somewhat of a big brother to me. He’s only 47 years old, yet he has the spirit of a teen boy. He sometimes came over, and when he does, my grandmother is always right behind him.

My grandmother was either the sweetest woman you’d ever meet or the most evil thing in existence, depending on your personality. She was a 75 year old woman, but she sure didn’t act like it. She was very stubborn and headstrong, but also caring and compassionate. Her and my mom got along very well because my mom was basically a mini-me of her, but it was a different story with Uncle Rayman.

Back to reality, I grabbed my bag from the back of the car. It was heavy, and I grunted a little as I struggled to pick it up, a sign I needed to work out more. Instead of a kiss, I just waved goodbye to my mom and exited the car.

The car rider line, or just the Line, was dotted with teens waiting outside the main door. Friends groups of different aesthetics were bunched up together near the walls. I glanced around, trying to find my friends.

Well, I wouldn’t say friends. More like friend. The friends of the friend I’m looking for are more like acquaintances to me, with some not even registering in my head. Might sound harsh, but honestly I’m not the type of guy to remember someone’s face as soon as I meet them.

I spotted them hanging out by a thin birch tree. It was a group of around 4-5 boys, but I only bothered about one. I approached the group, and he spotted me. A smile crept upon his face as he saw me walk towards him.

“There he is!” he bellowed. It was loud, but not as loud as the chatter around us. Still , it made my face go red with the sudden amount of attention drawn to me, but I kept cool.

“Dude, can you not shout like that? It’s like six in the morning…”

The loud boy was Tsagi, my best friend. As loud and brash as he was, I loved him like a brother. We met in first grade, he had mistaken me for a girl and was showing off his gymnastic skills. I actually never bothered to tell him my actual gender until middle school.

And trust me, his reaction still makes me laugh to this day. He took it in stride, even seeming happier at the fact I was a guy, but that led to problems for me. Now that he had found out I was a boy, he began being more rough. He would try and get me to do sports with him, notably football.

I love the dude, but I hate sports. I like getting physical, most notably I do calisthenics and running, but sports is another can of worms I will never touch. Also, our school’s football team sucked ass. They recently won their latest game, but that was it. And the only reason the won is because Tsagi is a beast of a human.

For a moment, I thought I saw a look of remorse on his face. It was quickly replaced with his signature sly smile.

“Oh sorry, I didn’t mean to disturb the princess,” he playfully mocked.

His friends behind must’ve thought that was the funniest shit they’ve ever heard as they snickered. I would’ve been embarrassed if they didn’t look like the most cartoonishly geeky band of nerds I had ever seen.

“I’d rather be a princess that an ugly ass goblin,”

Tsagi giggled. “Nah I’d actually be a goblin, they muscular as hell. Or Maybe a Hobgoblin…”

As much of a jock as Tsagi looked, he was your typical MMORPG enthusiast. I played sometimes with him, but I personally try not to get addicted to games all that much.

“Don’t worry, you already look the part,”

Suddenly, I felt a hand on my head.

“Yo, you should really put this is a bun or something,” he said.

I smiled warmly. I knew what the guy was up to, trying to shift the tone to something else so I wouldn’t feel bad. Honestly, what a guy. His friends stopped paying attention to us and were having their own conversation, not that I bothered.

“Yeah, you’re right. I have a hair tie in my bag, let me get it,”

I reached into the side pocket of my bag and took out a black hair tie. Before I could begin to tie my hair, Tsagi took the hair tie.

“It’d be easier for me to do it,” he said.

I raised an eyebrow. Tsagi had short dark hair, what would he know about putting a hair tie on?

“Do you know how to use a hair tie?”

Tsagi scoffed at the question. “I have two older sisters, of course I know how to use one,”

He put his hands to work. Honestly, I didn’t know the guy knew anything about grooming. He always put on this rough exterior, but I guess he had a more mature and caring side. Really wish he’d show this side more often, it’d make my life easier at least.

After he was done prepping my hair in a braid, he patted me on the back.

“There,” he said, proud of himself.

I used my phone’s camera to see what he had done, and if I’m being honest, I kind of liked it. It was tied up in a messy but still orderly bun. A few strands of hair fell down on my face, but I didn’t mind.

“Not bad,” I said.

The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

Tsagi grinned to himself. “I help out at my mom’s salon sometimes too, so I know a lot about personal grooming,”

The bell rung before we could continue conversing, triggering the once dotted group of teenagers to swarm the main entrance. I waited until a good chunk of people had gone inside the building before I then made my way to the entrance.

School was in session.

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The day passed like a blur.

Since it was the last day of school, there really wasn’t anything to do. Through the PA system, they announced that students could freely roam the school and go anywhere as long as the teacher allowed it.

So, me being the bored kid I was, decided to travel to my school’s gym. Tsagi was probably there training or goofing around with his buddies. I wasn’t going to the gym to hang out with Tsagi though, but because it was a big spacious area that I could blend in the background in.

Also, you might think I’m some loner with little to no friends. Let me just tell you, I have friends; I’m just very introverted. Unlike Tsagi or my sister, who are both extroverts that love being around people, I enjoy being by my friends.

But even I enjoy the company of people sometimes, hence why I’m going to gym. Though tons of kids are probably there, it’s a big spacious area and we’d all be spread out so I’ll be fine. Hell, as I approached the gym, I could hear the roars of teenage boys.

The roaring and cheering got louder as I got closer to the gym doors, they must be playing some intense game for people to be treating this like the Super Bowl. Whatever it was, it’d make for some good background noise as I listened to music.

I opened the gym door and found the bleachers nearly packed with people. Uh oh, I may have mis-calculated how many people would be here. The gym was a popular spot after all, so of course a bunch of people would gather here.

My eye fell upon the five or so boys on the main arena, it seemed they were playing a very intense game of dodgeball. I think I saw one of the boys with his shirt off, but there was so much happening I couldn’t tell.

Then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw an object flying towards me at incredible speed. It was brown and spherical, but that was all I could make out. But while my mind was racing, my body had already instinctively reacted.

I can’t tell you how it felt, but before I knew it, I saw a whole basketball in my hand. My hand was outstretched, the crowd was semi quiet, and the boys playing dodgeball had stopped to look at me.

My mind eventually caught up though, and the searing pain of shock ran through my palm. It felt like millions of little lightning bolts were hitting my palm all at once, and I dropped the basketball to soothe my palm.

The crowd looked at me stunned, unable to grasp how I caught an entire basketball that was going Mach 10.

“D-Did that girl just catch that big ass basketball?” someone blurted out.

“No fucking way,”

“That girl just went Ultra Instinct bro,”

The crowd, instead of cheering at whatever brutal game of basketball these boys were playing, were now talking about me. I saw eyes looking at me, no doubt the people closer to the door were trying to figure out if I was actually a girl.

I didn’t like the attention of the entire school on me so I just walked to the stairs and into the bleachers. The stairs cut through a section of the bleachers, so I could feel even more eyes on me and heard people murmuring about my appearance and my body.

“Wait, is that even a girl…?” I heard a girl whisper.

No, I wasn’t.

“It’s a dude!” another girl whispered loudly.

Yeah, couldn’t tell?

“She’s got a nice butt, you know her name?” a guy whispered to his friends.

That particular comment made my face go red. I decided to hide my face from the boy; if his friends find out my actual gender, he’d no doubt be ragged on. He’d better thank me later.

I saw an open spot near the edge of the bleachers and sat down. Thankfully, attention towards me had settled down but I still heard some whispers about me. I’m so glad for my caramel complexion, otherwise my red face would’ve gave away the fact I could hear everything.

The gladiatorial game of dodgeball had resumed and caught the attention of crowd once again. From the looks of things, it was an absolute free-for-all with any type of balls allowed. No wonder my face was almost smashed in by that big basketball.

My eyes scanned the gym area, and yep, not a coach or teacher in sight. Usually, our school is super strict about adult supervision due to our campus being a hotspot for…uh, let’s say, illegal activities, so it was weird to not even see one chaperone overseeing this giant crowd of kids.

I saw Tsagi all sweaty with his shirt off coming up the bleachers, with some girls blushing as the came up. Only Tsagi would have a group of girls fangirling at him despite sweating like a dog. His eyes lit up like a child when he saw me.

“Ezra yo! Did you see the game!?”

The group of girl’s faces soured when they saw Tsagi excitedly greet me. I could feel their jealousy radiating from them. They still must’ve thought I was a girl, or worse, Tsagi’s girlfriend. I shuddered, whatever they thought was going between the two of us, I had to end it.

“Is that Tsagi’s girlfriend? Since when did they start going out?”

Yeah no, I had to put a stop to this.

“Sorry man, I just got here,” I said, trying to sound as masculine and manly as possible. “But I bet it was some dumb shit like you trying to hit a backflip,”

It worked. The jealous and catty faces on the girls flipped like a switch and replaced with a look of surprise. They murmured amongst themselves again:

“Wait, that’s a guy?!”

Yes.

“The hell kind of guy looks like that? And what kind of eyeliner does he use?”

Many people look like me, and I don’t use mascara. They scare me.

“Yo Ezra, you good? You look lost in thought,”

I moved my attention away from Tsagi’s fangirls and focused on Tsagi himself. “Oh I’m fine,” I said.

“Just a bit tired,”

Tsagi plopped down next to me and put a towel over his head. “Well, don’t be, after this period we’re going home,”

“Seriously? I didn’t even know that, thank God,”

Tsagi snickered. “It’s a half day, why do you think the teachers aren’t even here?”

“…why aren’t they here?”

Tsagi looked like he was trying to hold in his laugh. “You won’t believe this, but as soon it was eleven-thirty; all the teachers just left!”

He explained how he saw a wave of teachers just exit campus on his way here, even showing me a video he took. And the whole time, the guy was laughing his ass off. The guy’s laugh was contagious, so even I laughed a bit.

“Ah dude, you should come over tonight,” Tsagi suggested. “You know, sort of like a graduation party! We’ve graduated high school, we’re officially men!”

I smiled. It seemed like a fun idea; Me and my best friend hanging out, eating snacks, and generally messing around. My mom and sister were off to visit my uncle and grandmother anyways, so I have nothing left waiting for me back home.

“Sure, I’ll go home to get ready,”

Tsagi did an air pump. “Speaking about your home, I don’t think I’ve ever seen your house. I should come over and see,”

“I mean, I’m just going home to change my school clothes,”

“That’s it? Just do it over at my house,”

Honestly, no. I don’t really like changing in other people’s houses, not even Tsagi. I know he’s a good guy, but I don’t about the others. For all I know, someone in that house could be a pervert and start peeping on me while I’m changing.

“I-I think I’ll pass on that one, bro,” I declined. “But I promise I’ll be quick when changing,”

Tsagi waved his hand around. “Fine, but I coming to see your house. Most importantly your room!”

“Yeah, I am not gonna let you anywhere NEAR my room,”

“Why? You got dirty magazines and posters in your room or something?”

Where the hell-

“No, what? What even gave you that idea?”

“Oh I see… is it magazines and posters of the…male variety perhaps?”

My face went red again. “What?”

Tsagi broke out into a hysterical laughter, luckily it drowned out by the still rowdy crowd. For the rest of the school day, we just watched the chaotic dodgeball game and talked about whatever until the bell rang.