Hello Fiction Press! So, this story is based off of something that happened to my friends and I last fall. I got bored and felt like writing something so I decided, why not? Also, it's not my best work, but I don't put my best work online. Anyway, I hope you like it!

Sean sat at his desk in school, inpatient. He glanced at the clock every few seconds, although it felt like hours each time. Can this thing possibly go any slower? He thought.

It was a cool Thursday afternoon in early December. The cold weather hadn't completely set in yet, and Sean liked the cold, so he was wearing a thin grey T-shirt and in his locker was a thin windbreaker and a hoodie, he planned on shoving the windbreaker in his backpack and wearing the hoodie when he walked home. He glanced up at the clock again, the bell was supposed to ring in two minutes, although the last thirty-eight felt like months.

His teacher kept on talking, completely unaware of the time. No one wanted to point it out though; this teacher was known for giving out detentions if you annoyed him. Finally, the teacher's pet raised her hand, "Mr. Blue, the bell's about to ring," she said from the back of the room.

The class tensed as Mr. Blue stopped mid-sentence and glanced at the clock. The expression on his face went blank, then to vaguely annoyed. "Alright then, we'll continue tomorrow. Pack up and have a great day," as if on cue the bell rang with its five second bleep, that sounded like a curse word being censored out on a television show. Sean could remember back in sixth grade when he first came to the Middle School and heard the bell. All his friends had made jokes for weeks, all except him. He has a friend one grade above him, and he had made jokes with her about the bell when she was in sixth grade.

Well; she's a little more than a friend you can say. Sean and his friend say they're dating, and in their mind they are and the whole school think their cute together, although his girlfriend's dad, being a dad wasn't fond of it. His girlfriend, Luna, who right now is in eighth grade, is actually six months younger than him to the day, but Sean was held back in elementary school along with a lot of other kids, so he was a grade below her.

Sean grabbed his binder, his folder, his notebook and his pen and dashed from the classroom. His last class was on the other side of the school from his locker, and it was times like this he liked having the seat closest to the door- you don't get caught in the rush.

He took a different route than usual, he'd got out of class faster than usual, and he's very fast- Luna once said that he could outrun a bullet- if he took this path it would take him right past Luna's last class. Luna is a known talker, so he could almost guarantee she'd still be there either talking her science teacher's ear off or gabbing to a friend.

Not to his surprise, when he ran past the room he saw her standing a few feet back from the door with another one of their friends, a boy named Tyler.

"Luna!" Sean yelled bolting into the classroom.

Luna and Sean are exacta opposites in looks. While Luna is on the taller side, Sean is on the shorter side, which is part of the reason he's so fast. While Luna has brown hair like their friend Jake and Tyler, Sean's the only one in their little group with blond hair, and while Sean and Tyler share brown eyes, Luna has blue eyes, like Jake.

She looked to the side at him, stopping mid-sentence and broke out into a huge smile. She would have given him a quick hug had they not been in school, but since you weren't allow to 'touch' each other they high-fived as she came out for the room, Tyler right behind her. The teachers never really paid attention to high-fives, poking (unless someone complained) or girls hugging their girl friends or guys hugging their pals. Guys and girls hugging or holding hands they immediately broke apart.

"Hey Luna! See you on the bus?"

"Yeah, see you in a few," Luna said and turned around to run upstairs to her locker and Sean shot down the hall towards his. He could've sworn he heard Luna call his name but he ignored it, if it was really important she'd tell him on the bus.

The annoying thing was he would later find out that she wanted to tell him that she was staying late today since tomorrow she had a math test she was pretty sure she's going to flunk.

Sean reached his locker and pulled it right open. He usually isn't a fan of speed-lock- where you close your locker without locking it- but at the end of the day he made an exception. He shoved his binder, the folders and notebooks he'd need for homework, his windbreaker and his pen in his backpack, zipped it up, tied his hoodie around his waist and then ran outside. He saw another one of his friends, Jake, and Tyler leaning against the side of the school in the shade of a huge oak tree. He decided to stand with them while he waited for Luna.

"Hey," he said walking over.

Jake looked up from his phone, "Hi Sean," he said.

Tyler smiled and said "Hi!"

Jake is about Sean's height, give or take an inch or two and has bright blue eyes, a shade that seems almost impossible and slightly shaggy straight brown hair. Tyler's a few inches taller than both of them with slightly curly dark hair and dark eyes. He's almost always smiling unless he's pretending to whine about something.

"What's up?"

"Nothing out of the ordinary, class stunk; I can't wait to annoy a few people." Jake said. The thing Sean liked about his friends- they were all either crazy, weird, random or annoying… or all four. (His cousin is one example of all four; Tyler also fits into all four).

"Where's Luna?" Jake asked.

"She's coming, you know she isn't that fast," Sean said.

"Yeah, oh wait! She might be staying after," Jake said.

"How d'you know?" Sean asked.

"Math test tomorrow and you should hear her grumbling in class 'I hate math, oh here come the headache,' at least when she's mad she ducks into the library next period at lunch and cools off," Tyler said. "That or she ducks into Mr. Grey's room to work on our Health project."

That is a relief; when Luna's mad and she can't cool off or vent she's worse than a time bomb.

They were silent for a moment, and then Jake pointed something out that Sean should've noticed when he ran out the door, "Sean isn't your bus on the other side of the school?"

Sean face-palmed, "What do you want to bet Luna's already on the bus waiting for me?"

"My bus is over there too, let's go before they leave," Jake said and the boys started walking around the school. Tyler followed them and yelled "Wait for me!" like he couldn't catch up and the three of them laughed.

None of them was in a rush, Sean knew if he told a teacher he was coming they'd hold the bus for a moment and Jake didn't really care if he missed his or not. Tyler's bus is always late.

When they were about halfway around the school they stopped and ended up doing what all bored teenage boy's do- they started doing whatever they could to pass the time, in this case irritate each other.

Sean came up behind Jake and grabbed the hood of his jacket. He put his hand under to hood so it stood up and yelled "Dinosaur!" Sean called it a 'dinosaur' because when your hood sticks up like that it looks like a scale on a dinosaurs back.

"Haha, very funny," Jake said and gave Sean a little push. Sean smiled and started poking Jake. Jake gave Sean another shove and Sean shoved him back. Then, harder than he meant to, Jake shoved Sean again. Sean stumbled back into a large bush and felt the slightly thorny branches scratch at his face and neck. He fell back and hit the dirt with a thud.

"Oh my god, Sean are you okay?" Jake and Tyler asked a little worried.

"I think I'm fine," Sean said gritting his teeth. He could feel a few cuts wherever his skin was exposed, his arms, his face, his hands and his neck. He felt something warm trickle down his neck and seep into his shirt. He put his hand to one of his cuts, winced and looked at his fingers which now had blood on them. "Jake, help me up and get a teacher," Sean said holding his hand up.

Jake grabbed Sean's hand and helped him to his feet. He stared at Sean's cuts for a second, shocked, then turned and ran to the nearest teacher.

"Oh my gosh your bleeding!" Tyler said, "Does it hurt?"

Sean shook his head as Jake came back with a teacher. The teacher Jake got happened to be Sean's Social Studied teacher from last year and the teacher who runs Board Game club every Friday afternoon, Ms. Connors. "Sean, what happened?" she asked.

Sean's eyes flickered to Jake for a second; he knew Jake would get in trouble, even though it was an accident. It could've happened to anyone, if I'd been standing anywhere else I'd be on the bus know and my back would just be a bit sore, he thought. But the teachers won't care since I got hurt.

"I was standing here talking to Jake and some kid bumped into me," Sean quickly improvised.

"Did you see who it was?" Ms. Connors asked glancing around and Sean shook his head. "No, I wasn't facing him and I closed my eyes when I hit the bus so my eyes weren't poked out or something."

"Jake, Tyler, get to your buses, I'll take Sean to the nurse," Ms. Connors said and pulled a walky-talky from her belt, "Mary? It's Kathy; I'm near the side entrance with Sean. He got pushed into a bush and he's scratched up pretty bad, I'm bringing him in," there was an indistinct voice from the talky and Ms. Connors said "No it doesn't look serious but he is bleeding."

There was more noise from the walky-talky and then Ms. Connors clipped it back onto her belt and led Sean inside. Jake and Tyler stood where they were a moment longer and then went to their buses.

It didn't take long for Sean and Ms. Connor to reach the nurse's office. Sean sat down as the nurse came over to him and inspected his cuts, "Oh Sean what happened?" she asked.

Sean re-told his edited version of the story and the nurse clicked her tongue, "Kids, they have to watch what they're doing," she muttered and went to get a couple of Band-Aids and some anti-biotic stuff. Five minutes later Sean had a Band-Aid on his right arm right where the sleeve of his T-shirt stopped, two on his lower left arm, one right above his eyebrow, one going from the corner of his nose down to his chin and one on the side of his neck where he'd been bleeding.

"Sean do you want to go to the principal's office and write this kid up?" the nurse asked when she was done patching him up.

"How can I write them up? I didn't see them," he said.

"Are you sure? Not even what color sweat-shirt he was wearing or anything?"

Yes, his sweatshirt was dark blue with black stripe designs; he thought but didn't say it. "No, I didn't see anything," he said honestly.

"Alright. Ms. Connors held your bus for you so you can go now. Be careful," The nurse told him.

"I will," Sean said slipping his backpack back on, "See you tomorrow."

"Have a great day!" the nurse called after him as he sped out of the room. Halfway back to the door he ran into another one of his teachers, "Hi Se- oh gosh what happened?!"

Sean stopped and saw his English teacher Mrs. Jones.

"Hi Mrs. Jones, nothing really happened, it was just an accident."

"Well what happened?" she asked again, worried.

"Some kid accidently shoved me into a bush outside," Sean said.

"Did he bump into you or shove you?" she asked.

"He shoved me," Sean said and then realized he just made the story worse. Oh shit.

"Do you know who it was? I can take you to the principal and you can write him up."

"No I didn't see him. I wasn't looking and I closed my eyes when I started falling," Sean said.

Mrs. Jones frowned; it was obvious she wanted whoever did it caught. She started walking away and said mostly to herself "I hope whoever did it gets caught and suspended."

Sean was worried for a second, and then put his worries aside. He knew Jake wouldn't get caught if he didn't squeal and Sean isn't the kind of kid to tattle on a friend, or anyone for that matter.

He then ran outside and got on his bus and rode home.

The morning after that I was sitting in my living room. The clock read seven thirty a.m. I yawned loudly and took another sip of coffee. I hate mornings, I thought. Why can't school start at ten? I won't have to wake up until nine then. I hate getting up a six-thirty; the sun isn't even up then!

I went to take another sip of coffee before Sean showed up only to realize my mug is was empty. Grumbling I stood up and put the mug in the sink. My stomach rumbled, reminding me that I hadn't had breakfast yet. I opened one of the cabinets, grabbed and pop tart and was about to open the little bag when there was a knock at the door. I jogged over and tossed the pop tart on the table as I went. I opened the door and Sean was standing there wearing his maroon and black windbreaker, his cheeks were flushed red from the cold and for the first time this year his jacket was zipped all the way and he was also wearing gloves and a hat. "Hi Sean. Come in, just let me grab my jacket and we'll go," I said turning around. I heard Sean walk in behind me and close the door over. I shrived as the draft hit me. "Cold today, huh?" I asked.

Sean nodded, "Yeah. You can see your breath without even breathing.

I snorted, "How? You're not breathing."

"You know what I mean," Sean said and I laughed.

"Not really but I won't make you explain," I said with a laugh as I zipped up my black jacket and slipped my backpack over my shoulders and slipped on my fingerless gloves. They didn't do much in the way of warmth but my hands are always in my pockets so it doesn't really matter. I slipped my pop tart into my pocket and Sean and I left my house and started walking to our bus stop. "So, had a lot of home work last night?" I asked. My younger brother and I had gone to Sean's house last night and he said he had a lot of homework and wouldn't be able to hang out. 'Maybe later,' he'd said but it was already dark and cold so that pretty much was later.

"Yeah, it seems we get to most on Thursdays," Sean said.

"Do what I do- finish it right before class and at lunch," I said.

"But I have lunch sixth period."

I smirked, "Sucks for you, I got it fourth."

"You eat at eleven?"

"At least I don't have third period lunch, imagine eating lunch at ten-thirty in the morning. On weekends I'm not even out of bed yet."

"I know you're not, I've been to your house on Saturday. I've never heard of a girl getting dressed in less than a minute."

I smiled, "That's what happens when a girl's favorite person and his cousin are at her front door," I said, "Anyway, pop tart?" I asked holding one out to him.

"Nah, not hungry," he said.

I shrugged, "Suit yourself," I said and took a big bite out of it.

We walked to the corner somewhat in silence, every now and then one of us would talk about something random. Once we reached the corner I sat down on my backpack and Sean sat next to me. "Cody said you had a lot of homework last night?" I asked him again, "So did I."

"Your brother is oblivious to a lot of things," Sean said.

"Like what?" I asked. I wonder what Sean was talking about. I couldn't guess- I'd been next door seeing if another friend could play while Cody had gone to Sean's house.

"For one I had to hold Zena back while I told him," Sean said. Zena is one of his dog's and for some reason out of his three dogs Zena's known me the longest and hates me the most.

"Also he didn't see this," Sean said and with two fingers pulled the collar of his jacket down and I saw the Band-Aid on his neck. "When did that happen?" I asked looking at it.

"Yesterday after school,"' he told me.

"Well what happened?" I asked him.

"I was outside after school yesterday and I bumped into some kid and he shoved me into a thorny bush. I've got this cut here on my neck, then this one," he ran his finger along a thin red line that went from the corner of his nose down to his chin, "and this one," he pointed to a couple of tiny red marks above his right eyebrow.

"Does it hurt?" I asked a reached over to touch the long one.

"Not really, it stung though when it happened. I had two more Band-Aids on these cuts but I pulled this one off," he pointed to the long scratch, "because I could like, see it out of the corner of my eye and it annoyed me and the other one kept pulling at my hair."

"Did you see who pushed you?" I asked.

He shook his head, "No he had his jacket hood up and when he pushed me I shut my eyes so they weren't cut up or anything. My parents are making a huge deal out of it saying I should go to the principal but I didn't see the kid so I can't."

"That sucks," I said.

"Yeah. Oh, and where were you yesterday? I waited for you on the bus after I got patched up and you never showed!" he said with fake, playful agitation.

I smiled and rolled my eyes. Here we go, I thought. "Extra help, math test today and I don't think I'm going to do well on it, I honestly can't afford a D or a C right now," I told him. "At least you were awake."

"Oh here we go again; I was knocking for ten minutes!"

Quick story- two days ago I'd gotten out of bed to get ready for school and then fell asleep on the couch. That's what happens when I don't get my coffee in time. Sean picks me up every morning for school and we walk up the block together. Normally if I fall asleep his knocking wakes someone up who in turn wakes me up and I scramble to get ready and we just make the bus but the other day I fell asleep and for some reason no one woke up when he knocked. Twenty minutes later my dad woke me up and I barely made it to school. This is currently our fake argument.

"Yeah well you didn't wake me up!" I said.

"You fell asleep! I was still knocking!"

"Nah!" I stuck my tongue out at him.

"Nah."

"Nah."

"Nah!"

At that point our bus pulled up to the corner and we got on. The whole ride to school we once again talked about random things. Finally we pulled up in front of the school. "So who do you want to bet is here already?" I asked looking out the window.

"Just Jake, I don't think Tyler's bus is here yet," Sean replied.

I looked out the window and saw both of them standing in a circle of grass between the school and the lake next to it, "Nope. Both there," I told him.

I thought I saw a strange look on his face for a brief moment but didn't think much of it.

A moment later the bus stopped and the door opened. Everyone got up and filed out, Sean and I last off as usual. Sean hopped down the three steep steps in hardly a second and I jumped from the top to the cement. The second my feet hit the ground I saw Jake and Tyler running over to us.

Jake reached us first, "Oh my gosh Sean are you okay?" he asked, was that… worry in his voice? That's new.

"Yeah Jake I'm-"

"Sean! I Are you alright? You were bleeding pretty badly." Tyler cut Sean off as soon as he caught up to Jake. Wait, Sean was bleeding? How does Tyler know?

"Yeah guys, I'm fine," Sean said, "This is nothing."

"Dude, I'm really sorry I shoved you," Jake said quickly, "You know I didn't mean for you to get hurt right?"

"Wait, Jake you did this?" I asked. Well, Sean left something out now didn't he?

Jake didn't answer. He just looked down at the ground.

"It's cool, we were just screwing around. Could've happened to anyone," Sean said to him.

"You're not mad?" Jake asked.

"No, why would I be?"

After that I asked Sean for the real full story and he told me. He told me the gist of what happened. "I didn't tell you right away because I know Jake could get in trouble if the teachers find out," Sean said when he finished.

"You know I won't squeal, right?" I asked raising an eyebrow.

"I know, I just wanted to be sure."

That's when things went slightly downhill because that's the last person I wanted to see showed up.

Her name is Ruby but Sean and I call her "Buzzkill," or "Buzz Killington," which we did steal from Family Guy. I guess Ruby is what you could call my 'frenemy'. In elementary school and sixth grade we were best friends. Then we started playing this weird game where she was a vampire and had an evil twin and in my opinion she took it just a little too far, like I'd be waiting for the teachers to let us into school, she'd come over and say something crazy and walk away, than come back and say "Oh was my evil twin just here?" at first it was fun but then she started turning into the wicked witch of the west. Out of nowhere she started telling me to stay away from her and her friends because I would hurt them and one day she would only leave me alone only in class and then act like I was an annoying mosquito the next day. In seventh grade we stopped talking; now she's trying to be my best friend again but I still don't trust her. I know she's a deceptive and malicious little girl on the inside. I can just tell, but I don't tell anyone but Sean my suspicions, only because Sean agrees with me.

Anyway at the point her bus pulled up and she came over to me along with Sean's cousin, Nico, who's in my grade, who went over to talk to Sean and the others.

"Hi Luna!" Ruby chirped in her slightly nasally, high-pitched voice.

"Hey," I said trying to smile.

"What's u-" that's when she saw Sean, "Sean, w-what happened?!" she sounded a little over-dramatic to me.

"Oh, I was standing out here yesterday talking to Jake when some kid grabbed my hood and shoved me into a bush."

"Are you okay?!"

"Yeah, I'm fine," Sean said. "No biggie."

"Did you see who did it?" Ruby asked and Sean shook his head.

Then she turned to Jake, "Did you see who did it?"

"No," Jake quickly said and looked at the ground again and walked away to talk to another friend.

Ruby gave me an I-need-to-talk-to-you-semi-privately look. She took a few steps away from the boys and I followed her, "Did you see that?" She asked.

"See what?" I tried being oblivious. Don't say anything! My mind yelled at me.

"Jake, he couldn't look me in the eyes. He's acting a little suspicious don't you think?"

I shrugged, "Maybe," I said and to avoid further interrogation- which otherwise would've been inevitable- I walked back over to the boys.

Then the teachers let us in. I ran upstairs to my locker and was the first kid into my first class, Health. The teacher wasn't even there yet. Jake walked in a moment later. The room was empty except for us.

"Hey Luna," he called me over.

"What?" I asked.

"Sean… he's really not mad at me, right?" He asked. Wow, he really was worried. I'm not even joking- that's a first.

"No," I told him, "You know Sean, he doesn't hold grudges, plus he knows it was only an accident."

He didn't say anything after that, just nodded. He must still feel a little guilty, that or he's worried about getting in trouble. Either way it must've made him feel better to know Sean really wasn't mad.

Later when the last bell of the day rang I raced Sean downstairs to Board Game Club, held every Friday afternoon by Ms. Connors. She had buss duty this quarter though so Sean and I sat down in the library at a table near the door and waited. I heard Sean re-tell the story of how his face got scratched to several different kids, it got a little worse each time until it was "I accidently bumped into some kid and he grabbed me by my hood and threw me into a bush after school."

Sean, I thought, stop making it worse! It won't help if Jake somehow gets caught.

If Ruby catches on, a voice in the back of my head corrected.

"Sean, you've got to stick to the real story," I told him when we sat down.

"If I tell the real story Jake'll get in trouble," Sean said.

"You know what I mean," I said, then whispered to him "I think Buzzkill is catching on. After you told her what happened she noticed Jake avoided her and looked down when he answered. She's just as observant of things as I am and she knows that's a sign of guilt. I think she's catching on and you and I both know that's she'll go to the principal if she figures it out," I told him.

"She'll have no proof," Sean said, "You know I won't tell."

"Ruby is the queen of getting people in trouble and you know every member of the staff is looking to get whoever shoved you into trouble. You told me the one teacher wants him suspended!"

"I know but-"

"But nothing Shorty," I said. "If anything stop embellishing that story."

"Embellishing?"

"Exaggerating, making it sound worse than it really is. The more you embellish it the worse it sounds and the more trouble Jake'll be in if he's caught."

Sean sighed, seeing I wasn't about to stop this. "Okay fine. Just make sure she doesn't figure it out."

"You know I can't promise anything." I paused for a second, "Oh, and can you tell Jake you really aren't mad at him? He's asked me about it five or six times today."

"You're exaggerating," Sean said.

"No, I'm not. He and Tyler are in all my classes, he had plenty of time."

"He's just worried I'm going to get back at him," Sean said and smiled the way a known prankster would right before a prank.

"He seemed worried, but I don't think he's afraid of you," I said with a little laugh.

"He is, but only a little. And I am going to get him back," Sean said.

"Don't hurt him," I said with fake worry. I knew Sean couldn't hurt a fly if he wanted to. Well he could, but he wouldn't want to.

"I won't, he just isn't going to like it."

Before I knew it the pair of us were laughing. I couldn't wait to see what Sean would do and how long it would take for Buzzkill, ahem, I mean Ruby, to drop this. Either way for now everything was fine and everyone was happy.

Friends, I thought, guy friends, nothing gets between them.

So how did you like this story? Also I know the status says "complete" but if anything else interesting happens I might put another chapter up.

Anyway let me know what you think! I love feedback!

~~~Luna