Title: Paseo

Authors: Fae & Calli

Rating: R

Summary: Gabriel and Gabriel appear to have nothing in common aside from their name and a mutual dislike of gym class (and life in general.) So maybe it’s not the smartest thing in the world to skip class with a guy you barely even know and follow him to his house (especially a guy with a reputation like Gaby’s.) But no one ever said Riel was smart… **Calli’s comments: It’s like WiV! Only without the apocalypse or the pope, and Moses is gay…**

Dis/Claimer: Assume that everything in this story is an intellectual creation of either Fae, Calli, or one of their friend’s who has probably, but not necessarily, already given permission for their idea to be used unless (1) otherwise mentioned, (2) obviously does not belong to one of the three aforementioned people, like a band, brand name, ect., or (3) we become a Communist/socialist state when intellectual property no longer belongs to the ones who created it, but the state. Thank you.

Notes: Paseo is a Spanish word—I shall have to get Calli to explain it at some point, because I did not take Spanish, and I do not even fully understand why it is the title of our story. ^^;; Okay, now that I have that covered… There is slash for anyone who didn’t catch that in the original summary. Somewhat explicit male/male action, and a brief mention of female/female. If you don’t like it, then why the hell are you reading something that Calli and I wrote?? Okay, moving on again… Well. This is my first chapter. Hopefully it can pretty much stand on it’s own, no da. Look for a mildly important note at the beginning of chapter two as to the way it’s being written and posted. Other than that, comments much appreciated, I make no promises as to how soon/often this will/will not be updated, and enjoy (or else damnit)!

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Chapter One

There are dodge balls flying past my head. Actually, I’m waiting for one to hit me. Then I can go sit down and stare at the clock until it’s time to change. Ah, gym class… For some perverse reason, the next ball hits the kid next to me, the one desperately trying to dodge. Life sucks.

I change my strategy, catching a ball and then dropping it, a bad imitation of a fumble. Requires a bit more effort, but it seems to work better. I let out a monotone "oops" for anyone watching my performance and shuffle to the bleachers. A ball grazes my ear. Probably the same bastard who pegged me in the face yesterday. Have I mentioned that life sucks?

Retreating further up the bleachers, I leave several feet of space between myself and the sophomore already sitting there. He’s staring at the dodgeball-players with a painfully bored expression, long black hair obscuring most of his face. We’ve been partners before in gym, mostly because neither of us really seems to give a shit and are usually the last two people standing there after everyone else has already teamed up. According to rumors, he’s a homicidal rapist/crackwhore/total mental case/former prison inmate/Satan himself. In a case of extreme irony, I’ve never put much stock in rumors.

"Pointless game, isn’t it?" homicidal rapist/crackwhore/total mental case/former prison inmate/Satan asks after a minute. I turn around, surprise; those are probably the first words he’s said to me all year.

"Uh-huh." I watch him carefully, not sure I should be worried or flattered, and hardly able to summon enough energy to be either. "But then, it’s kinda a pointless class in general…" I return to staring blankly across the gym. Maybe I should have let him try start a conversation, but that might require some amount of effort or friendliness on my part. More importantly, I have no idea what to say to him; I think I’ve forgotten how to hold a normal conversation, if I ever knew.

"So… You seem cynical, depressed, and generally displeased with life... am I right?" he says conversationally. He must really be bored sitting up here… I shrug one shoulder.

"Yeah, that about sums it up."

"Good, I like that in a person." He moves down the bleachers to sit next to me.

"…Thanks." I bite the skin on the knuckle of one of my fingers, leaving little white tooth-marks. Okay, so I do have to say something. "So what’d you’d have to do to get out of participating in this stupid class?" He’s been sitting up here by himself the entire class, while the gym teacher drove the rest of us through the usual torments. I envy him, I really do.

"Cut myself." I can tell just from the way he says it that it wasn’t an accident, and he holds up a bandage-covered arm. I go with my normal response—blink, swallow, wait for conversation to move on. Okay, so I’m a wuss and stuff like that disturbs me. He doesn’t need to know that the sight of it makes me want to curl up on the other end of the bleachers and spend the rest of the day being even more antisocial than usual. In fact, no one needs to know that; I get picked on enough already. "So you want to get out of here? I have our ticket to freedom sitting in my locker." That’s a random offer.

Let me think about this… Stay in gym, have various projectiles thrown at me until the bell rings, and then proceed to suffer through History class, or escape to the anywhere-but-here with random guy who likes to stab himself with sharp, pointy objects…

"What do I have to do?"

"Well, maybe we should get dressed first." The dark-haired boy stands up and stretches languidly before heading casually down the bleachers and towards the locker room. I give the gym teacher a dubious look but follow him, expecting at any moment to be stopped. Hah, like the teacher actually cares.

I get dressed in the corner like usual, despite the fact that the dark-haired boy isn’t paying any attention to me. Yes, Riel Bennett: short, blond, gay, the picture of modesty… Sometimes I hate myself. I pull my shirt over my head, ball up my green and white gym suit and shove it into my locker, resisting the urge to slam the door closed on it spitefully. I suppose rage would be wasted on an inanimate object, but where else do I have to project it at at the moment?

"You need anything from your locker?" I whirl around, and the boy is standing behind me, waiting. Breathe, Riel, there is no reason to suddenly get jumpy. Something about this guy is just creepy. And oddly alluring. (Alluring… English vocab. Ten points for me. What do you know, I actually learned something.) But I’m going to pretend that I didn’t think that. Because he’s creepy… and rather attractive in a disturbing yet sexy way. Damn.

He’s already wearing a dark coat over threadbare jeans; he looks even paler with it on, especially added to the black hair, still loose, that frames his thin face. I shrug my backpack on, a comfortable, familiar weight bouncing against my back. I’m overly attached to this stupid thing; it’s like some kind of security blanket. That, and it has the camera I borrowed from the school art department and a bag of film in it. "I think I have everything," I tell him.

"Good then." The boy digs into his pocket, pulls out a crumpled pass, and holds it up while he explains. "I do this a lot; teachers never check to see exactly what the pass says." He leads me out into the hallway.

He’s right too; we leave right out the main door of the school, flashing the pass at the hall nazi and offering the words "early dismissal" as an explanation. Sad, really, how easy that was. Sadder still that I hadn’t thought of that before. Think about that, a whole four months of school gone by and me with a perfect attendance record when I could have been off somewhere sulking in peace. What a waste…

The dark-haired boy lights a cigarette and we walk in silence for a little while. "You know, I really didn’t expect you to come with me…" I look up. The boy looks back at me. I shrug. "My name’s Gabriel, by the way." He pronounces it the same way my Spanish teacher does.

"…You have my name," I tell him. Only I don’t pronounce it with an evil accent.

"Heh. Small world."

"Yeah." I rub my arm self-consciously. "Can call me Riel though."

He runs a hand through his long hair and seems to be half-hesitating for a second. "Can call me Gaby then." …I’m not sure I would have ever picked that as a nickname for him, but I’m not going to comment. Besides, in some odd way I don’t understand, it does seem to fit him. Somehow. "And you should also have a coat like I do."

I shrug at him, watching my feet carry me farther and farther from that hell-hole of a school. He’s right, I should have a coat. I refuse to wear the coat my mother bought me though; it’s horrible and beyond even my tolerance. And, yes, my mother still insists on buying most of my clothes. Like the horrible polo shirt I’m wearing now. It’s easier to wear this stuff than argue with my mother, which will inevitably lead to arguing with my father, which leads to various other not-so-fun things. So I wear mostly whatever my parents want me to. Beginning to understand why there were dodgeballs flying at my head earlier?

"Dumbass," Gaby mutters. I find a coat shoved in my face and look up at him.

"T-thanks." Yeah, I’m stuttering. I’m not used to random guys rescuing me from gym class, insulting me, and then giving me things. "But I can’t take it; it’s your coat."

"Yes you can take it. You’re shivering." Damnit, I am. It’s January; it’s cold out; what can I say? "Anyways, I’m already sick. There’s no point in you getting sick too." That makes no sense, but I take the coat anyway because I’m starting to get the impression that Gabriel doesn’t give up very easily.

I pause to shrug the coat on. Mm, warm. And now he’s shivering, but looking vaguely satisfied. Maybe I should try to make him take the coat back…

It isn’t until now that I realize that we’re out of sight of the school and headed towards "the bad side of town." The place all the mothers on my street tell their kids never to take shortcuts through because there are gangs there that will shoot them on the spot. I’m not sure how much they are or aren’t exaggerating the danger, but I do know it’s a rather different atmosphere that the McMansion suburb I live in, even if I don’t buy the whole "wrong side of the tracks" thing. "So where are we going?"

Gaby shrugs at me. I have the urge to shrug back. Gabriel shrugs at Gabriel. And here I thought our commonality only went so far as the shared virtues of cynicism and self-loathing. I think I’m staring at him blankly, but he’ll just have to get used to that. "You like little kids?"

"What?" I blink at him.

"I’m taking you to a park," he walks a little bit faster, "because I like kids, and not in a scary, perverted kind of way."

Um… okay?

Apparently it’s a mistake for Gaby to walk faster, because he suddenly stops and starts coughing violently. "You okay?"

"Yeah, I’m fine." He drops the cigarette on the ground and crushes it with a slightly regretful look. Ah yes, I suppose those will do that to you.

"So how far are we from this park?"

"Almost there." Gaby starts walking again, rubbing his arms for warmth.

"You should take the coat back if you’re cold," I tell him, feeling guilty and—ridiculously—self-conscious.

"I’m far more used to the cold that you are, trust me." Coming from someone else, that might have been a brag or an insult, but he’s completely matter of fact about it.

"’Kay." I kick at an imaginary pebble as he lights another cigarette.

"So where you from?" Gaby asks. I watch the smoke drift out from his mouth as he exhales.

"Just around here…" I shrug.

"Mmm, how long you been here then?"

"My whole fucking life…" And can’t you just see how ecstatic I am about that? "What about you?"

"About eleven years now." We’re at the park now, and Gaby sits down on one of the benches built for parents to sit on while they watch their kids. It’s as deserted as the rest of the park at the moment. I guess early afternoon in mid-January isn’t the busiest time.

"Where’d you move from?" I sit next to him, looking over the deserted playground.

"Spain. It was a lot nicer there."

"Cool." I suppose that explains the weird accent on the name.

"Mmhmm." Gaby’s also looking around the playground. "Guess it’s too cold for the kids to be out now." I nod a little, a bit surprised at how disappointed he sounds. Gaby sighs next to me, pulling his legs up onto the bench and tucking them under his chin. I copy the movement, hugging my legs tightly to my chest for warmth despite the coat.

You know, this is definitely not where I expected to end up when I woke up this morning. I’ve been keeping my routine as monotonous as possible since last June. As if anything interesting that could happen must automatically be bad. I wonder vaguely if this situation could even be classified in such as easy terms as "good" and "bad." "Stupid" might work better. "Spontaneous" would be more flattering, but probably less correct; even Gaby himself didn’t really expect me to come with him. God only knows why I did come… Oh yeah, to get out of gym class… And probably more truthfully because…well, because something about this guy… I want to know more about him. Just… one of those feelings you get off people sometimes. As if they’re almost… familiar…

And yes, I think stupid certainly applies now…

Weight against my shoulder distracts me from my train of thoughts. "You’re warm and fluffy… like a pillow…" Oh yay, I’m… fluffy… And yes, he is nuzzling my shoulder… So on top of self-destructive, delinquent, addicted, and stubborn, Gabriel also has very little concept of personal space. Figures…

Now that he’s so close to me, I can feel him shivering. And it’s my fault that he’s out here without a coat anyway. Wonderful. I shrug him off my shoulder enough to pull the coat off, then let him collapse against me again, pulling the coat over both us of.

…This coat was definitely made for only one person. Not that people generally make coats to fit two people, but what I mean is… There is not that much space that it covers and I have managed to pull him even closer to me than before.

…He’s warm. I have the horrible urge to snuggle against him like a little kid. I really don’t want to think about how nice it feels to be this close to someone.

…He smells like those stupid cigarettes.

Good, I think that’s a much safer thought than the ones preceding it.

…Maybe I like the way cigarettes smell.

No, not good! Now I’m getting back into the range of other thoughts…

I have known this guy for less than an hour. I know little more about him than his name. He’s curled against my side, and he’s warm, and the only person who ever gets this close to me is Kat, and she really doesn’t count when it comes to inspiring thought processes I’d rather pretend never occurred since she’s, well, a girl.

"Do you want me to move?" Gaby asks suddenly.

Attention even more heavily on the guy molesting my shoulder. I swallow and attempt to fake nonchalance. "Doesn’t matter." I’d shrug, but he’s weighing my shoulder down.

What do you think, did I pull it off? Probably not.

"You’re not getting rid of me any time soon then," Gaby mumbles, turning his face into my shoulder so that I can barely make out the words.

…What does it say about me if I like the way cigarettes smell?