The sun shone through Alex's curtains, gently rousing his from his sleep. The early summer sunrises had carried on longer than usual this year, so when Alex looked at his alarm clock he saw it was only 6:15am. He figured that seeing as he was already awake, he may as well get out of bed and get ready.

After yesterday lunchtime, Alex was in a Blink mood. He pulled on his black Blink t-shirt and, feeling kinda chirpy, his American print skinny jeans. He did his hair and jogged downstairs to the kitchen. His mom wasn’t up yet, so he grabbed an energy drink from the fridge and drank almost half of it in one go. He searched around in the cupboards and finally found what he was looking for: Cereal bars. He took two out and ate one. He then began busying himself with making his own lunch. The school cafeteria didn’t exactly cater for his dietary preferences, or anyone’s for that matter. How was that stuff even edible? He made a peanut butter and jam sandwich, grabbed a packet of chips from the cupboard and an apple from the bowl on the table and brown bagged it all along with the other cereal bar.

He looked at the clock. 6:50am. He had nearly an hour before Rian and Zack came to pick him up, so he decided to check his timetable, remembering Zack's mishap with Mr Jackson the PhysEd teacher. He looked at the sheet and saw he had music today. May as well take his old acoustic with him today, try and practice ‘Basket Case’ at lunch. Zack could help him out with that.
He ran upstairs to get his guitar case just as his mom came wandering out of her room in her old grey dressing gown, her hair messed up on one side from where she’d been sleeping. She smiled a sleepy smile and yawned.

“Morning, sweetie! I’m surprised you’re up already!”

“It’s quarter past seven, Mom. I was gonna let you sleep a little while longer because I know you don’t need to leave until ten.”

“Oh that’s sweet of you, but what about your lunch?”

“Already covered. I can make a sandwich you know, I’m nearly eighteen.”

“Oh alright then. Well, I’m up now anyway, I’ll just get some toast and watch TV for a bit.”

“Okay, Mom.” Alex went into his room and got the guitar case from inside his wardrobe. As he had some spare time, he sat and strummed out a few random chords for a little while, bit’s of Nirvana and Foo Fighters here and there, until his phone went off on his bedside table.

From; Rian Dawson
- ‘be there in 5, running late, zee's feeling ill’

Alex shoved his phone in his pocket and put the guitar away while thinking about how Zack had been acting yesterday. What had happened over the summer that had made Zack go from the normal, cheerful boy with a booming laugh to the quiet, paranoid, scarred shell that he was now? Alex was determined to find out what was going on.

He slung the guitar over his shoulder and bounded down the stairs, pulled on his converse and kissed his mom goodbye. He grabbed his lunch from the kitchen and shoved it into his bag, then went and waited on the doorstep for Rian to pull up. A few minutes later he heard the choked hum of the Trans Am coming down the road and he trotted down the path to the curb.

“Hey Ri, you alright?”

“Yeah I’m good. Can’t say the same for Zack though...” Rian said, as he jerked a thumb towards the back seat.

Alex opened the door and peered in to see a large black mass huddled up against the other door, hood up and face turned away. The only thing that gave away the fact it was a person was the steady rise and fall of his chest and shoulders. Zack was fast asleep.
Alex climbed in and put on his seatbelt as Rian slowly pulled away from the curb. Alex reached across and gently shook Zack's shoulder, trying to wake him up.

“Zee... Zee, wake up... Zee?”

Zack moaned, then sighed, then flipped over in his seat to face Alex. He yawned and slowly opened his eyes, blinking a few times before focusing of Alex's face.

“Good morning, Princess!” Alex beamed at Zack, who slowly sat up and smiled softly.

“Morning, Lex. Sorry, I didn’t sleep very well, feelin’ kinda lousy.”

“Aw, Ri, did you hear that? Sleeping Beauty didn’t get his forty winks last night... “

Rian chuckled out an “Aw, bless” from the driver’s seat, while Zack sat up properly and readjusted his seatbelt.

“ ‘S not funny okay Alex. You know... Well... You know.”

Rian looked over his shoulder at Zack “Zack, did you..”

“No Ri, shut up. Eyes on the road.”

Alex looked at Zack, confused. “Did you what?”

“Nothing, doesn’t matter.”

“Alright then, but you know you can talk to me anytime, okay? We need to have a chat.”

“I know, I know. Look I’ll tell you another time, alright?”

“Okay, Princess.” Alex said with a small nudge to Zack's side. They both smiled softly at each other and everyone in the car spent the rest of the journey in comfortable silence.

When they got to the school, the parking lot was mostly empty, as they’d been running a little late. As they go out of Rian's old banger, Alex rushed round to Zack's door to help him out. Zack yawned again and leant a bit on Alex, putting his arm around his shoulders just like yesterday. Rian just laughed softly at them and they walked into school like that; Zack draped over Alex like an oversized teddy from the fair.
They walked to their lockers and Alex unhooked himself from Zack, then gently placed his guitar inside the metal locker as he wouldn’t need it until third lesson after morning break. Zack just slumped against the door of his and let his head loll backwards with a quiet ‘thud’. The quiet was a little bit stifling, so Alex decided to do something about it.

“So, Ri, how did things go with Cass yesterday?”

Rian looked up at the mention of Cassaddee's name and his face cracked into a grin. “It was great, really awesome. We went to that little café in town, you know, Elliot’s Bistro?”

“Yeah, yeah, come on, details!”

“Well there’s not much to tell really, we chatted about stuff, music, films, you know, and she’s really nice. We’re going to the cinema on Saturday to see the new ‘Saw’ film. She loves horror so...”

“Well, Dawson, I’ve gotta hand it to you, you’ve done well! A cheerleader who doesn’t mind your hunk-o-junk car and loves horror films! High five, dude!”

They high fived, but then both looked sideways to Zack who was stood there with his hood up and earphones in. They decided to leave him to it until the bell went for first lesson.

“Hey Princess, go to go class.” Rian almost cooed as he yanked out Zack's earphones.

“Okay, I’ll see you guys at lunch, yeah?”

Just as the boys turned around to go to their lessons, Alex was knocked flying by a black and white blur that proceeded to yelp and hit the floor with a thud. He was hurled sideways before he realised what had hit him. When he did realise though, he noticed it was Mr Barakat.
The man scrambled to his feet and rushed over to Alex, blurting out apologies and asking if Alex was okay.

“Yeah, yeah I’m fine, don’t worry.”

“Are you sure? Oh god, I am so sorry Alex, I was just running late and I guess I just wasn’t watching where I was going, are you sure you’re okay?” Mr Barakat held Alex by the shoulders, stooping slightly to look eye to concerned eye with Alex.

“Yes, sir, I’m fine. Don’t worry.” Alex was slightly stunned, not only for the whole being-knocked-over thing, but by the contact. Just like yesterday with the money, Alex found himself transfixed by Mr Barakat's deep chocolate eyes. Now that he was even closer than yesterday, Alex could see the tiny individual strands of rich Caramel and soft, earthy hazel. It felt like forever, gazing, as the world just passed them by, but it was probably only a moment before Mr Barakat's thin pink mouth stretched into a smile and he straightened up and dashed into his classroom, pausing to say a quick “I’ll see you boys fourth lesson!” before disappearing through the door of room 15.

A secondly later, Alex was brought back to reality by Rian's fingers clicking in front of his face. “Yo, Earth to Gaskarth! Come on, places to be, happiness to slaughter.”

“Yeah, sorry.” Alex turned away from the classroom door and made his way down the corridor.

Zack had already taken off, earphones still in, so there was no point in trying to catch up to him. Alex and Rian reached the end of the hall and went their separate ways, Rian to Geography and Alex to Art.

---

“Ah, Mr Gaskarth I presume! How wonderful of you to join us this morning!”

The whole class turned in their seats to stare at Alex as he entered the room. He smiled apologetically at the teacher (a young woman wearing a long gypsy skirt and some kind of floaty shawl, her vivid red hair loosely tied up) and took a seat in the only empty space, right at the back of the room.

“Anyway, as I was saying, I’m Miss Ravenkroft and for this semester, we’re going to be focussing on the human form. You can look at this project title from any angle you want; statues, silhouettes, superheroes, anything you like, so long as it based around people. Today I’m just going to let you get a feel for the subject matter. There are books and magazines in the cupboards near the back, and a selection of action figures and dolls in the box I’m going to put on my desk. Away you go!”

There was a cacophony of chairs scraping and sudden chatter as people crowded around the front desk and cupboards, and Alex did not fancy getting involved in any of it. Instead, he wove his way through the tables, grabbed some paper and went back to his desk. Alex was no artist, but he had developed his own kind of comic illustration style.
He fished a black ball point pen from his bag and set to work. It only took a few minutes for his picture to take shape. After half an hour, Alex's picture clearly resembled a man in formal attire, pictured from behind. The sleeves of his shirt were rolled up to his elbows and his fists were clenched tight at his sides. His head was turned to the side but his profile was slightly obscured by the hair that hung across his face. All that could be seen was a slightly upturned nose and a pair of thin lips, curled up into a smirk.
Alex held the picture at arm’s length to better study his work and took a sudden, short, sharp breath. Alex had drawn Mr Barakat. Before he had a chance to hide the picture in his bag, Miss Ravenkroft appeared at his side and gently took the picture from his grasp.

“Nice picture, Alex. I love the style! Where did you get the idea?”

Trying not to give away the fact that he’d accidentally drawn the attractive young male teacher who gave him heart palpitations every time he looked at him, Alex lied and said, “Oh, I’ve been watching a lot of old Gangster films recently.”

“Well, this is pretty impressive Alex. Keep up the good work!” As she walked away, Alex let out a breath that he didn’t know he’d been holding.

He put the picture down on the desk and put his head in his hands, shocked at his own stupidity. How could he have let that happen? Drawing a teacher, what was he thinking? He put his head on the desk and groaned out of frustration. He had to accept the fact that he had a crush on Mr Barakat. “Fuck.”

“Whoa, what?” someone said from above Alex.

He looked up at the familiar voice. “Oh, hi Tay.”

“Hi Alex. Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine, just... thinking, ya know?”

“Er, yeah, sure. What you got there?” She asked, pointing at the paper on Alex's desk.

“Oh, just a picture, it’s not anything special.”

“This is really good, Alex. Kinda reminds me of ‘The Godfather’ a bit.”

Knowing ‘The Godfather’ was a Gangster film, Alex just went a long with it. “Yeah, I’ve been watching a few Gangster films recently. I guess I must have been thinking about one while I was drawing, I wasn’t paying much attention.”

“Oh, cool. Do you watch ‘The Sopranos’?” Tay asked, pulling a chair over to sit opposite Alex at his desk.

“Yeah, actually! It’s pretty good.” Now that wasn’t a lie. Alex had been somewhat intrigued, and was now hooked. Alex and Tay sat and chatted about ‘The Sopranos’ and music for the next 20 minutes until the bell went for second lesson.

As they were packing their bags up, Tay turned to Alex and asked, “Hey Alex, would it be alright to give you my number?”

“Yeah, of course. Wait... You do know I’m gay, right?”

Tay just looked at Alex and laughed.

He couldn’t understand what was so funny. “What? What did I say?” He asked, laughing a little himself.

“Just... Just... Oh, Alex, of course I knew! The girl jeans were a bit of a give away, and, well, straight guys don’t normally draw pictures of tall, dark and handsome Gangster-types!”

He couldn’t help but laugh at himself: It was pretty obvious, plus he’d been out since before summer started, and when someone comes out, it gets people talking.

“Come on, give me your phone.” Tay said, holding her hand out to Alex. He handed his mobile over and she put in her number and handed it back. “Save it under whatever: Tay, that-girl-from-art, ‘DO NOT ANSWER’, I don’t mind.” She said with a giggle.

Alex just shook his head at her and smiled. “I’ll just save it under ‘Tay’ alright? I’ll text you later yeah? See you!”

“Bye, Alex!”

---

Algebra with Mr Murphy again was a half and half kind of lesson. Mr Murphy was old, as in ‘how is he still alive’ old, and half way through the lesson, he fell asleep. It was all fun and games until one of Jason Tate’s football goons threw a screwed up worksheet at the teachers face and he didn’t even flinch. There was a moment of hysterics when people freaked out and thought he was dead, until someone with excellent aim managed to get an eraser into the teachers open mouth. That nearly did kill him. He woke up coughing and spluttering, but continued the lesson as though nothing happened.
When the bell finally went, Alex practically ran half the length of the school to his locker. When he did get there, Zack was waiting for him. Zack never waited for him unless they’d arranged it beforehand. Alex cautiously approached, wondering if he’d done something wrong.

“Hi, Zee. What’re you doing here? Am I in trouble?”

“What? No! Can’t a guy wait for his mate without his mate getting suspicious?” Zack laughed and Alex grabbed his guitar from his locker.

“Look, we don’t have long for morning break, do you wanna go talk now or..?”

“No, not now. When we have more time, okay. I promise.”

“Okay. Hey Zee?” Alex looked down at his friend, grinning from ear to ear.

“What?” Zack asked, smiling nervously.

“Can I have a piggyback to the cafeteria?” Alex asked, doing his best puppy face again. Zack turned away and looked at Alex over his shoulder.

“Hop on, Lexy-boy!”

Alex jumped, locking his legs around Zack's middle and pointed forwards. “HIGH-HO, MERRICK!”

Needless to say they got some very strange looks as Zack ran down the corridor with Alex doing his best cowboy impression at full volume. But they didn’t care.

---

15 minutes later, the bell went and Zack and Alex headed off to music together. Unfortunately Rian wasn’t in their class, but Alex was secretly glad that he didn’t have any competition for top musician in the class.
The teacher, Mrs Reeves, really didn’t give a shit about that lesson. Most of the class just sat around chatting about their summers and the first day back, but Alex and Zack were off to one side singing along to anything Alex could strum out on the guitar, mostly some classic AC/DC.

Mid ‘Highway To Hell’, Mrs Reeves drifted over and started making requests. Before long, half the class had turned their seats around and were watching and singing along with Alex. Before they knew it, the bell was ringing again. Some people started applauding Alex, so he stood on the table and took a bow to the class, winking at some of the girls which made them giggle. Totally clueless, Alex thought to himself.

Alex and Zack made their way to Dramatic Arts, still singing to themselves, not a care in the world about what people thought. Alex had nearly forgotten about who he was about to spend a whole hour with. As they got into room 15, they slowed down in confusion. All the tables and chairs were stacked up around the edges of the room, the students forming little huddles of chatter.
The two boys looked around for Rian, until they spotted him at the back with Cassadee. She was leaning against the back wall with Rian more or less leaning over her, deep in conversation. Zack and Alex decided to leave them to it and go join Tay, who was fiddling with the hem of her jumper.

“Hey Tay!”

“Oh, hi Alex, how are you?”

“I’m good, you?”

“Yeah, I’m alright.”

“Er, Tay, this is Zack. Zack, Tay.”

“Hi.” They smiled to each other. “Hey, Alex, I didn’t know you played guitar...”

Alex had forgotten he still had the case slung across his back. “Oh yeah, just had music so...”

Just then Mr Barakat clapped and called the class to attention. “Okay, alright people! Come on, pay attention!”
Most of the class fell silent apart from the other two cheerleaders and that Sammi girl. Mr Barakat turned to them before addressing the rest of the class again.
“Girls, come on... Right, thank you. Now, as you’ll know, yesterday didn’t go quite according to plan.”
This produced some laughter from the students.
“Yes, okay. Thankfully I wasn’t too badly damaged and today will, hopefully, run a lot smoother! Today, I’m going to start you off on something easy: We’re going to be reading some extracts from one of the classics: Romeo and Juliet!”
The majority of the class groaned while the group of girls who wouldn’t shut up just squealed in delight.
“So, I’ve chosen a few scenes for you to re-enact so as to prevent arguments. So can you get into pairs or groups of three please!”

A few people just grabbed hold of their best friend from beside them, a few just stood around looking lost (mostly boys) before sighing and joining up with the girls who no one had wanted to work with. Zack, Alex and Tay just took one step closer to one another. Alex looked over to where Rian was stood and saw him and Cassadee stood holding hands, finger intertwined. He nudged the other two who looked over and the three of them ‘aww’ed softly. Alex had to admit, Rian and Cassadee made a cute couple.

They looked back towards the front to see two boys arguing with Mr Barakat, who stood eyes closed and hands raised, as though not listening to what they were saying.

“Boys, I can’t help you! You’re just going to have to pair up together! I’m not going to split up any other groups just so you can be with girls, and that’s that.”

“But sir, that’s so gay!”

“No it’s not, it’s reading a script.”

“Yeah, but it’s Romeo and Juliet! I’m not acting that out with him, it’s gay!”

“Boys,” Mr Barakat suddenly got very serious, his voice dangerously calm, “that is all it is: Acting. It’s not real, and I would appreciate it if you stopped talking about the word ‘gay’ as if it’s a bad thing. I don’t go around calling things I don’t like ‘straight’ now, do I?”

The class went silent, all eyes turned on the teacher. Mr Barakat stayed leaning against his desk, eyes looking back and forth between the boys. They backed up a few steps and muttered some apologies, not looking the teacher in the eye.

“That’s alright boys, just don’t do it again. But, if it really bothers you that much, you can do the scene between Romeo and Tibalt.” He stood up and raised his voice to the class. “Okay everyone, come to the front and get a book. People in pairs read from the page marked with the pink book parks, groups of three from the green ones.”

The class slowly shuffled to the front to collect books, everyone quietly muttering to each other. Alex and Zack looked at each other, then over to Rian, who was already looking at them.

“Did... Did Mr Barakat just say he was gay?” Zack said quietly.

“I think so...” Tay breathed, “Well, I did not see that coming. Anyway, I’ll go get the books shall I?” and she wandered off to get the scripts.

Just then Rian appeared at Alex's shoulder and said in a low voice, “If that isn’t more proof that he has the hots for you, I don’t know what is.” then ran off to get the books for him and Cassadee.

“GOD DAMN IT RI, SHUT UP!” Alex yelled across the classroom, getting strange looks from a few people.

Tay walked back over with the books and they turned to the page marked with the green bookmarks. It was the scene where Friar Lawrence marries Romeo and Juliet. The three looked at each other and all said in unison “SHOTGUN FRIAR LAWRENCE!”

“Guys we can’t all be Friar Lawrence, anyway Tay, you’re the only girl, you’ll have to be Juliet.”

Tay snorted at Zack's comment “Fuck your gender roles, I wanna be Friar Lawrence! I don’t want to marry either of you!”

“Look, guys, we can take it in turns to be Friar Lawrence, yeah? Zee, you can go first.”

So, the three of them acted out the scene with Alex and Tay as Romeo and Juliet first. Alex was really over-acting his part, making Tay blush and laugh at his low bows and hand-holding. Then Zack took over as Romeo, during which time he actually picked Tay up and spun her around, making her shriek with surprise.

“Get off me Zack, you nutter! Put me down!” She shrieked, hitting Zack's arms with her fists, while Zack just laughed and Alex fell onto the floor giggling.

When he did put her down, she re-adjusted her hair and stood with her hands on her hips, looking disapprovingly at the boys. “I don’t know why you’re laughing so much, it’s your turn to marry each other!”

Alex and Zack just looked at each other and grinned, before Alex said with a wink to Zack “Lets’ do this, Princess.”

“Therefore love moderately. Long love doth so. Too swift arrives as tardy as too slow.” Tay read aloud, looking at Alex who was stood across the room.

This was his cue to enter, but instead of walking over and hugging Zack like the script said, he did a running jump and whole-heartedly threw himself into Zack's arms, wrapping his arms around his neck and planting wet kisses all over Zack's face. Now it was Tay's turn to fall on the floor laughing.

“Alex! Get off, Alex! Stop it!” Zack laughed, his arms around Alex's middle, his voice slightly muffled by Alex's face.

To which Alex replied, “No, Romeo, I must have you!”

By now, people were staring, even Mr Barakat, and lots of people were laughing. Zack did the only thing he could think of to detach Alex and tickled his sides, making him shriek and squirm, and finally let go, landing ass-first on the floor with a grunt. This made the class laugh again until Mr Barakat called for quiet and to carry on rehearsing, before walking over to the group of laughing teens.

“Well, well, what’s going on here?”

“We’re rehearsing, sir.” Tay replied innocently.

“We all wanted to be Friar Lawrence so we’re taking it in turns. Me and Zack were just getting married.” Alex said from the floor, looking up into Mr Barakat's grinning face.

Alex hadn’t had a chance to look at Mr Barakat that morning when he’d been distracted by the man’s gorgeous eyes. Today he was wearing black skinny jeans, a black shirt and a silvery-grey tie. His sleeves were rolled up, revealing smooth pale flesh. Alex just wanted to reach up and trace the blue veins that climbed from Mr Barakat's wrists like Ivy. He saw them getting closer, then he realised Mr Barakat was holding out a hand to help Alex up from the floor. He reached out and took it, sparks seeming to shoot up his arm from the older man’s finger tips. Like electricity, coursing from one body to another.

Mr Barakat easily pulled Alex to his feet, then pointed at the guitar case leaning against the wall. “Is that yours?”

“Er, yeah.”

“Do you mind if I...?”

“No, not at all."

"You didn’t say that you played guitar when I mentioned it yesterday.”

“Yeah, I’m not all that good, that’s why I pursued Dramatic Arts rather than music.”

Mr Barakat unzipped the case and took out the acoustic, gently slipping the strap over his head. He stroked the neck a few times before positioning his fingers and strumming out a few random chords, getting a feel for the instrument. Then he cleared his throat and started plucking at the strings, forming and soft, sweet melody.

Soon he began to sing
“Pretty little lady with the swollen eyes, won't you show them to me? I know I'm not that perfect, but if you stay a while, baby then you will see."

The room was hushed into silence as Mr Barakat softly sung ‘When You Can't Sleep At Night’. Alex stood between Zack and Tay, stunned by Mr Barakat's voice. He closed his eyes, letting the music wash over him. The guitar kept to a smooth steady rhythm, each note creating a pulse of auditory beauty, and his voice, gosh his voice. It was soft, but there was something there, a little croak, a buzz in the back of his throat, that gave it a quality of broken splendour, like an angel with a broken wing.
Alex continued to stand with his eyes closed, only opening them when people began to clap. Mr Barakat was stood leaning against the wall, still looking down at the guitar. Alex joined the clapping, and Mr Barakat looked up through his hair, straight at Alex. Alex felt his heart leap in his chest as Mr Barakat walked over to him and handed the guitar back with a small wink. He made his way back to the front of the room through the group of students that had gathered around.

Mr Barakat raised his hands in the air to call for silence as he walked through the group, but there was a sudden yelp of pain. Mr Barakat's watch was caught in Rian's newly grown hair. And Rian did not like it.

“Oh, god, I’m sorry, just.... hang on, let me just... shit.” Mr Barakat muttered as he tried to untangle Rian's hair from the watch strap.

“No, just take off your – OW – Take off the watch, I’ll untangle it.”

People had backed away from the comedy pair as Rian had been flailing his arms around, but Alex hadn’t been paying attention to the group’s movement, and he was knocked backwards, guitar knocked sideways. It landed with a clunk and a twang as two of the strings broke.

Zack heard the noise, and whipped his head around to look at the damaged instrument on the ground. “Oh no, Alex... Your guitar!”

“I know... Don’t worry, I can buy some more strings later. We never did go to the music shop yesterday, did we?”

“No, but I can’t go today, I’ve got that detention with Jackson, remember? I was meant to be yesterday, I’m just hoping he doesn’t make it any worse.”

“Oh alright, don’t worry then... Oh, hang on!” Alex said, jumping up and putting the guitar back against the wall. He walked over to Cassadee, who was helping Rian style his hair again now that Mr Barakat's watch was disentangled.

“Hey, Cass, you know you said you owed me?”

“Er, yeah, why?”

“I was wondering if you could write an excuse note for me. Well, technically for Zack, but it would help a lot.”

“Yeah sure, what do you want writing?”

Alex practically swaggered back over to Zack with the note in his hand and handed it to the boy. “What’s this?”

“Read it.”

“ ‘To whom it may concern, Please excuse Zack from PhysEd as he suffered some tendon and ligament damage whilst working out and is still recovering. I will notify the school when it is safe for him to continue with these lessons. Signed, Mrs Merrick.’ Dude, thank you! Seriously, this’ll get Jackson off my back for weeks! I owe you!”

“Nah, it’s nothing. Cass owed me so I put the favour to good use.”

Zack pulled him into a hug. Alex just laughed and patted his back. Just then, the bell went for lunch.

“Oh well,” Zack said, letting go of Alex, “I guess we’ll just have to get married next lesson.”

“It’s a date, Princess.” Alex winked before turning to Tay, bowing and kissing her hand, “Madame, it was an honour to be your Romeo!”

She laughed and replied with a mock-sigh “Ah, and I your Juliet! Haha, see you around Gaskarth, Merrick...” and she left the classroom and headed to lunch.

As the rest of the class slowly filed out, Alex and Zack turned to the busted guitar. “Damn. I really needed to get the chords right, I was actually gonna ask you to help me.”

“What’s the hold up, boys?” Mr Barakat wandered up behind them, and spotted the guitar. “Oh no! What happened?”

“I wasn’t paying attention and it got knocked over. I didn’t realise strings broke that easily, but to be fair, I’ve never changed the strings on this thing so...”

“Don’t worry,” Mr Barakat put a hand on Alex's shoulder, making him freeze, “leave it with me and I’ll have it sorted by the end of the day. Come by after school and it’ll all be fine, okay?”

“Er... yeah, sure. Thanks, Mr Barakat.” Alex said, blinking perhaps a bit too much looking up at his teacher. Mr Barakat's face stretched out into a grin and patted Alex's shoulder.

“Okay! Now, go enjoy your lunch, I’ll see you later, don’t forget!” Mr Barakat picked up the guitar from the wall and gently smiled at Alex.

As he left, Alex could have sworn Mr Barakat had looked him up and down as he’d walked away.

---

Lunchtime and final lessons had flown by for Alex, as he had his mind focussed on seeing Mr Barakat at the end of the day. He didn’t care about using equations in computer programming, or the deeper meaning in “Anthem For Doomed Youth”, just about seeing Mr Barakat. He had more or less accepted that fact that Mr Barakat was gorgeous and would not mind spending some more alone time with him.
This is probably why he hurtled down the hallways as fast as he could without knocking anyone over as soon as the bell went, ignoring Mrs Fielding’s shrill protests. He got to room 15 before the last of the class had even left the room. Okay, maybe he was a bit too eager. He took a few moments to calm himself down and catch his breath before knocking on the door and entering quietly.

“Hi Mr Barakat.”

“Hi Alex, I didn’t realise you’d be here so quickly, the bells only just gone!”

“Oh, er, I finished my work early.” Liar. “Mrs Fielding let me go a little early.”

“Oh, well good for you! Anyway, your guitar. I pulled a few strings... Oops, pun not intended, and managed to get it fixed. There were a few scratches along the sides to I got them sorted too.” He reached over his desk to grab the case.

Alex couldn’t deny he rather enjoyed the view of Mr Barakat bending over a desk, but he couldn’t let his mind wander too much. He took the case from Mr Barakat and opened it up. He didn’t think his crappy little acoustic had ever looked so good! The strings were indeed fixed, and the sides and neck were smooth and polished, reflecting the old strip lighting on the ceiling. He brushed his thumb across the strings: perfectly tuned.

He turned to Mr Barakat with a dazed smile, “But... how? You’ve had lessons all afternoon...”

“I, er.. used my lunch hour to get it sorted. I went to see Mrs Reeves for the strings. I was an old favourite of hers and when I mentioned it was your guitar she was more than happy to help. I pinched some wood polish from Mr Lancast’s workshop and tidied it up a bit. Nothing too difficult, tuned it myself. Hope that’s alright.”

Alex was shocked. Why would a teacher put in that much effort for, well, anyone, let alone Alex? He just smiled in shocked silence. “I.... I don’t know what to say... Er, thanks I suppose. Thank you, Mr Barakat!”

“No problem, you’re a good kid, and the way Mrs Reeves spoke about you, I knew it would be worth it. Would you mind playing me something? You don’t have to, it’s just, Mrs Reeves doesn’t speak about just anyone the way she did about you.”

“Okay, what do you want to hear? I can do Blink, Green Day, Foo Fighters, Jimmy Eat World...”

Mr Barakat settled himself next to Alex on the table “How about ‘Good Riddance’? Or is that too difficult?” Mr Barakat smirked, obviously challenging Alex, who knowingly smiled back.

“Not difficult at all...” He strummed away, hitting all the notes. He started singing too, which he doesn’t normally do unless he’s home alone, but Mr Barakat made him feel more comfortable. Soon, his teacher joined in, tapping his fingers on his knees along with the rhythm.
As he reached the end, they looked at each other. Alex smiled softly, amazed at how he hadn’t messed up anywhere and how well Mr Barakat's and his own voice had meshed together.

He met his teachers eyes. Mr Barakat was half hidden under his fringe again, but it was easy to see the caramel in his eyes through the curtain of black. His mouth was curled into a small smirk, his bottom lip between his teeth. Alex watched as his jaw slowly relaxed, his lip sliding from the grip.

The man opened his mouth. “I heard you say you wanted to practice some chords earlier. Anything I can help with?”

“Oh, I’ve just been trying to learn ‘Basket Case’ by Green Day, but I just can’t get the finger placement right.”

“That is something I can help with!” Mr Barakat said excitedly. He hopped down of the desk, walked around behind it and knelt up on the desk behind Alex. He reached over and put his hand around Alex's on the neck of the guitar and rested his head on his shoulder. “Right, which chords are you struggling with?”

“This one here...” Alex tried to play the chord.

It sounded terrible, but Mr Barakat must have known the one he was on about. He gently moved Alex's fingers across the frets, one by one. He kept his fingers resting over Alex's on the strings and Alex strummed. It was perfect.

“See! You got it! Try placing your fingers by yourself now.” Mr Barakat said quietly into Alex's ear and moved his hand off Alex's, and Alex instantly missed his touch. Thankfully he replaced his hand on Alex's shoulder as he strummed, and got it wrong. “Here, I’ll help you again, then try to do it alone again, yeah?” he whispered into Alex's ear and he placed his hand over Alex's fingers again.
The warm breath in his ear made Alex shiver. He was sure Mr Barakat would have felt it, he must have chosen to say nothing. For now, Alex was glad he has the guitar covering his lap. What Mr Barakat didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him.

Alex would have stayed there all evening getting every single chord wrong, as long as it meant Mr Barakat kept his hand on Alex's shoulder and whispering into his ear.

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