My Immortal Smile
"I want to say thanks to [devilmaycry] for [his indirect encouragement to make me start writing]*. I hope you enjoy this. If not, feel free to ream me a new asshole. I won't stop you at all."
Comments are encouraged, and please tell me what you think, whether you think it is good or bad. The plan is to make a series out of this. The way it will work is that each story will stand alone, but all will take place in the same town and characters will be shared between them, but no two stories will share a main plot-line or main character. Tell me which of the minor characters you would like me to write a story for. I've already got plans for a few of them.
I have found that music lends a lot of ideas to the plots that I think up. This one is mildly based upon "My Immortal" by Evanescence:
"When you cried I'd wipe away all of your tears
When you'd scream I'd fight away all of your fears
And I held your hand through all of these years
But you still have
all of me"
Enjoy!
*by that I mean his story "Adoption", Its sequel, and especially the conversations we had in the comments of both stories. You should all go read them. they are both really good.
My Immortal Smile
Tyler Hawkins was cold. The hands feeling every inch of the Polar Bear's nearly naked form were, he thought, intruding into his personal space. He didn't like it. He was self-conscious about his weight and it bugged him that, being a Polar Bear, he couldn't get rid of his excess body fat. He worked out a lot, but, no matter how hard he tried, he remained pudgy. He was, as a result, quite strong, even if he didn't look it. He had resolved to lose his excess weight back in middle school after the first and only time he had been teased for it. He had sent the perpetrator to the nurse with a bloody nose and a severely bruised face, and the incident had gotten him suspended for three days. No one had bothered him after that.
The woman with the tape measure never said a word to him as she worked. She was a Mouse of about fifty, who had at one time been a shade of brown but was now going gray. It seemed to Tyler that the years had not been kind to her. After finishing the final measurement and recording it on her clipboard, she abruptly got up and left the room, telling Tyler that he could pay at the register in the main shop.
Now completely dressed again in his usual jeans and stripped polo shirt, Tyler stepped out of the back room and onto the store's main floor. He was slightly annoyed that he had had to undergo such a time consuming ordeal, all for something as trivial as his high school prom, but at least the coupon he had received from school ensured that the tuxedo he had been measured for would be rented free of charge.
The person behind the desk - an attractive twenty-something year old Panther who wore her long hair tied up in a ponytail - took the coupon from Tyler and gave him a slip of paper with a time and date that his tux would be ready. He pocketed the slip and walked out into the brisk spring air. It was a beautiful Saturday afternoon, and he smiled as he walked to his car, a rusty shit-bucket that he had bought for $500 out of a seedy used car lot. Driving home he thought about his life. It was sad, he concluded, that he was getting measured for a tuxedo to go to a dance he did not even have a date for. He knew who he wanted to ask to prom, but he had put off actually asking her for weeks, and now he feared it was too late, that she had found a date, and he would be forced to go to prom stag. He didn't want to go alone, and contemplated not going at all if the situation forced him to do so, but he purged his brain of all thoughts pertaining to this situation. As a rule, Tyler always tried to stay positive.
Arriving at home, he parked his car in the garage and walked inside. There was a note on the dry-erase board on the refrigerator from his mother saying that she was running errands and would be back at three. He checked his watch. It was only one thirty-two. He ate a quick lunch of chicken and vegetable stir fry left over from dinner the night before, and went into his basement to work out with his free weights while he waited for a call from one of his friends about plans for later that night. When the call finally came, he intentionally waited until the second ring to pick up. He did this regularly, as he did not want to pick up on the first ring and have himself come across to the caller as having nothing better to do than talk on the phone all day, and he did not wait longer than that because he might seem too busy to talk on the phone. The second ring was equilibrium, and he figured that things were better that way.
The caller ID said that it was his friend Jack, an enormous brown and white Saint Bernard. Tyler did not wait for greetings of any kind, immediately getting down to business. "What are we doing tonight?" he asked.
"Party. 8:00. Kat's house. Bring beer." Jack hung up without saying goodbye. Conversations with Jack were always like this. He never said in ten words what could be said in three or less, and preferred not to talk at all if he could avoid it. Surprisingly to most people who didn't know him, Jack had always taken all honors classes, and likely had one of the highest grade point averages in his grade. You wouldn't have suspected it by talking to him, but Jack had applied and been accepted to Brown early decision. Jack preferred to remain inconspicuous, which explained his quiet nature. Jack was a mystery to most people in his grade, and only had a few friends, all of them very close. He figured that if a person was willing to take the effort to really get to know him, then they were worth his time. If not, then he was fine without them. Recently however, due to Tyler's recent acceptance into the popular crowd with the aid of his brother's easy access to beer, Jack had been dragged up the social ladder with him. Jack now found himself with many people who considered him their friend while he in fact had the opposite opinion. His current situation bugged him, but Jack lived with it because it got his parents off his back for not being social enough.
Tyler wondered how big this one would be, and whether Danielle would be there. She was a pretty Lioness who had been the object of Tyler's affection for a few months, as well as one of his close friends, yet he had never gotten up the courage to ask her out. Tyler did not like rejection, and he hated the embarrassment that came with it. He feared that he had put it off for too long, and promised himself that he would ask her to prom that night at the party regardless of his cowardice. If he didn't do it then, he knew he never would.
The rest of the day passed quickly. His mother came home at exactly three o-clock, just like she said she would. Tyler had inherited his obsession with perfection from her, regardless of the fact that she was not his biological mother. He and his brother Garret had been adopted by the family of Wolves when they were seven and six respectively. The brothers had refused to be adopted by a family that only wanted one of them, and as a result had become the two oldest in the orphanage while they waited. Finally they were rescued. When Mr. and Mrs. Hawkins showed up out of the blue one day looking for two boys, Tyler and Garret had been the obvious first choice. The two brothers always told each other everything, and so it was not surprising that Tyler was the first person that Garret came out to when he realized that he was gay. Garret was currently away on a week-long school trip to London and would not be arriving at Logan Airport in Boston until the following night, and Tyler felt lonely without his younger brother to keep him company.
Tyler and his mother were open with each other, and she had allowed him to drink whatever he wanted since his fifteenth birthday. She figured that he would be less likely to go completely nuts when he got to college if he was accustomed to drinking when he got there. She had used the same strategy with her first child to go through college, Andrew, and it had worked out exactly as she had hoped. He had graduated from Bentley University with a degree in business management the year before, and now owned a liquor store not far from his mother's house.
When Tyler told his mother about his plans for later that night, she gave him the OK, but made him promise not to drink too much, not to drive drunk, not to stay out too late, etcetera. All of the generic warnings that mothers usually give their children. Kat, the Tiger who was hosting the party, actually lived within walking distance of his house, so Tyler planned on walking over. This eliminated the chance of him getting into a car with an inebriated driver, not that there was ever much of a chance of this. Tyler never drank more than he knew he could handle, and usually nursed a single drink for an hour or more. Leaving plenty of time to walk over to Kat's house, as well as pick up some drinks at his brother's store, he changed into clothes that he did not care about (in case of an accidental beer spill by one of his drunken classmates), though they were still as nice as his usual clothes.
Tyler gave his mother a goodbye kiss and walked the short distance to his brother's liquor store. His brother, luckily for Tyler, was at the counter, and greeted Tyler warmly. "Hey, bro! What's up? As if I didn't know why you were in here." He said with a smile. "Max! Cover the counter for me for a few minutes!", Andrew called into the bowels of the store, causing a cry of annoyance from somewhere deep in the storage room. An aggravated Lizard took his place behind the cash register as Andrew took Tyler into the back room, where there were no cameras that could get either of them in trouble.
"Hey, man. There's a party tonight at a friend's house, and they need some beverages. I assume you can help me out?", Tyler asked while they walked through the store.
"What exactly did you friends have in mind?" Andrew asked.
"My friends will drink it so long as it exists. I'll take a case of Corona, and", he paused, thinking, "why not, a keg of Heineken." Tyler took out his MasterCard, which his mother had given him on his eighteenth birthday.
"No," his brother insisted, pushing the card away, "This one is on me. Besides, the card scanner is in the store, and you can't exactly be seen buying alcohol, now can you?"
"I'll pay you back," Tyler promised as he walked out the back door of the store, arms full of beer. He made sure not to walk on the street, where cops might be driving looking for teenagers with alcohol to apprehend, and instead took a shortcut through the woods directly to Kat's house. He arrived in her back yard at exactly 8:00. Tyler had gotten very good at estimating how long things would take, and he prided himself on being punctual. He knocked on the sliding door in the back of Kat's house and shouted "It's Tyler! I come bearing Corona and Heineken!" There were shouts of joy from within the house and Kat, as well as other eager guests, wandered into the kitchen to greet him. Tyler was well known at school for always being able to get beer from his brother.
He set the beer on the table, and left it for someone else to deal with while he went to see who was there. He saw lots of people that he recognized from school, as well as a few he did not recognize who probably went to private school or were visiting from out of town. He did not see Danielle. He gave up looking and sat down next on a couch next to Jack, who took up half of the four person couch, and his friend Bret, a Pit Bull who happened to have been the smartass who had insulted Tyler in middle school. Bret had since then reformed his ways, and the two had become close friends, even though he still joked about Tyler's weight. Tyler let it slide, most of the time; he knew that Bret was only kidding and that Bret was fucking scared of him when Tyler got mad. Like Jack, Bret had not been popular until Tyler's brother opened the liquor store. Unlike Jack however, Bret had completely accepted his rise to popularity and had drifted away from most of his friends.
The three talked about nothing in particular for a while, but Tyler was distracted. Every so often he would glance towards the front door to see if Danielle had arrived yet. He didn't want to miss her if she did. Tyler had not even gotten anything to drink yet. He wished that she would hurry up and arrive already, so he wouldn't die in anticipation. He was about to get up and see if he had missed her, when the door opened, and in walked Danielle, in the loving embrace of one of Tyler's classmates. Even as he watched, the boy, whose name Tyler couldn't remember, leant down and gave Danielle a kiss on the cheek. Tyler was shocked. How long had this been going on? He couldn't ask her to the prom now, or ever; he would look like a fool if he were to ask out a girl with a boyfriend. Tyler would rather avoid that situation at all costs. Tyler excused himself, mumbling something about needing some fresh air, and he walked outside, back through the woods the way he had come, and into the town center.
The night was cold, unusual for spring in Massachusetts, but it didn't faze him. Being a Polar Bear had its advantages. He wandered through town, lost in thought, cursing himself for waiting so long to ask her out. He eventually found himself in the town common, a pitifully small excuse for a field with a large tree in the centre and a few scattered benches. He sat down in one of the benches, and relaxed, trying to clear his mind and enjoy the beautiful spring night.
That was when he heard it. It sounded like crying, and when he turned to look, he saw a girl in his grade, a bookish, quiet black Rabbit named Cordelia, quietly sobbing to herself as she walked through the park. Instinctually, Tyler got up to see what was wrong. She froze when she saw him. They were acquaintances, but had never had a real conversation before. There was an awkward pause for a few seconds, before Tyler said, without asking what was wrong or even asking if it was what she wanted, "I'm buying you some hot chocolate." Cordelia was stunned. She had never been anywhere with a guy before, and here was one of the more popular guys in her class insisting that he take her out. Before she could answer at all, the Polar Bear had put his arm around her and guided her towards the nearest Dunkin' Donuts. He sat her down at a table near the back and went up to the counter, returning shortly with two drinks in his hand.
Cordelia was silent for a while, but she drank the hot coco. Tyler was right, she did need this. Tyler was silent as well, waiting for her to say something as he sipped his coco. The more he watched her drink, the more he realized how beautiful she was. He had a few classes with her, but she hardly ever said anything and always sat in the back, so Tyler had never really had a chance to look at her. She also nearly always scored the highest on any test in any class she took. When she had finished the drink she just sat there, staring into the empty cup. Finally, when Tyler couldn't stand it any longer, he asked "Are you ok?"
Cordelia paused before answering with a simple "No."
"You want to talk about it?"
Cordelia paused, before asking, "Why are you doing this?"
"You looked like you needed it. You looked like you needed someone to talk to."
"I do." As she said this, tears welled up in her eyes once again. Tyler moved his chair over to her and put his arm around her shoulders. She instantly cuddled into him, crying on his shoulder for a long moment. "I'm sorry" she sobbed after a while.
"For what?"
"You're being so nice, and all I can do I cry."
"You can make it up to me by telling me what's wrong," Tyler said with an encouraging smile.
She cried on his shoulder for a while more, until Tyler asked, a little more forcefully, but with the same kind smile, "What's wrong?"
"You aren't going to give up are you?"
"Never."
She sighed and dragged an arm across her damp eyes. "Everything is fucked up. My parents kicked me out of the house and they won't even let me in to grab some stuff. I have nowhere to go. I'm lonely and scared, and I have no idea what I'm going to do." Just saying it seemed to lift a weight off of her, and her crying ebbed a little.
"What!? Why on earth would they do that? I want to know how the fuck can they justify this." Tyler was completely surprised that anyone would be so cruel to their own children.
Cordelia closed her eyes, as if to force back more tears. "It's because I told them I'm bisexual."
Tyler was silent for a while, just holing her as she leaned her head on his shoulder. There wasn't a thing in the world that he could think of to say to make the situation better. Finally he got an idea. "Come with me," Tyler said, and he stood up.
"Where?"
Without replying, Tyler called home from his cell. His mother answered on the second ring, causing Tyler to smile. He explained the situation to her, and she offered to drive the two home. Tyler went back to Cordelia. "My mom is coming to get us. You can stay in my older brother's old room. He has his own place in town now, so no one's using it. Let's go wait outside."
For the second time that night, Cordelia was stunned. "Why are you doing all this?", she asked.
"I'm doing this because I wouldn't be able to live with myself if I did nothing to help you."
"But why did you help out in the first place?"
"I already answered that. You looked like you needed a warm drink and a shoulder to cry on," Tyler answered with a smile.
Cordelia finally got up. She hugged him and said, "Thank you. I never knew that anyone could be so kind."
Tyler just smiled as they walked out to the curb to wait for their ride.
By the time they got to Tyler's house, Cordelia had stopped crying completely. She had not let go of Tyler the whole ride home, and he had been happy to sit next to her in the back seat of the minivan. He couldn't help feeling bad for her. She looked so pitiful, clinging to him, and he wanted with all his heart to make everything okay for her. To wave a magic wand and make her troubles disappear, just so he could see her smile.
As they walked up the steps and into his house, Tyler's mother asked them if they needed anything to eat, but was ignored. She left the two alone for a while. It was already nearly eleven, and she went upstairs to get ready for bed, first making sure that Tyler promised to make up the bed for Cordelia.
Tyler and Cordelia went up to bed soon after Tyler's mother. He showed her where she could take a shower and where things like towels and shampoo were located, and while she was in the bathroom, he put new sheets on Andrew's old bed. He then went upstairs to the attic, where his room was located. He had his own bathroom because he was the only person on that floor, so he did not need to disturb Cordelia while he got ready for bed. It was early for him to be going to sleep, only 11:30, so after he brushed his teeth and stripped down to his underwear, he turned on his TV and watched "Saturday Night Live" for a while. He always slept wearing only his underwear. As an Animal that evolved to be comfortable at very low temperatures, the New England climate was really much too warm for him. As a result, he tended to sleep in as little as possible, especially in the warmer parts of the year. He heard the shower turn off down stairs, so he got up and went to check on his houseguest.
"If you need anything, I'm right upstairs," he told Cordelia through her bedroom door. She didn't respond, so he listened at the door for a minute before going back up to his room. SNL wasn't very funny, so he turned the TV off, put on his glasses - which he was supposed to wear all the time but never did because he didn't particularly like the way he looked in them - and got out a book to read instead. He was currently reading King Lear, the famous play by William Shakespeare, but it wasn't holding his interest at the moment. His mind was too preoccupied with the girl staying in his brother's old room. After trying to force himself to read it for a few minutes, he finally gave up trying to read altogether. He turned out the light and lay in the dark thinking about the events of the night. He had almost fallen asleep when he heard a soft knocking on his door.
A soft voice in the hall whispered, "Can I come in? I don't want to sleep alone tonight."
Tyler got out of bed and threw on a shirt before opening the door. Cordelia ran into his arms. She was wearing pajama pants and an old shirt that Andrew had apparently left behind when he moved out. He escorted her over to his bed, where the two of them fell asleep, still cuddled together.
Tyler was the first to wake up. His mother never came into his room in the morning unless he was running late and would likely not be on time for school, and seeing as it was Sunday, Tyler was sure that his mother would not bother him at all. He looked at the sleeping form still wrapped in his arms. God she was cute. She stirred slowly from her sleep, and looked right into Tyler's eyes. He blushed and quickly looked away. He hated when he got embarrassed because the redness of his cheeks was always clearly visible through his white fur. "I know how awful this is going to sound," Tyler said, "but there is a part of me that's glad you needed help last night."
Cordelia scowled at him, but his smiling face prevented her from getting mad. "I'm just glad that it was you and not some creep who was there in the park."
Tyler smiled. "Come on. Let's go get some breakfast," he said, getting out of bed. He picked her up wedding style, and carried her down the stairs. Cordelia shrieked as he lifted her out of bed, but when he looked down at her, she was smiling for the first time since he had first seen her in the park the night before. When they got to the bottom of the stairs, Tyler set her down. "You should smile more often," he whispered in her ear, "you're much cuter that way."
They walked down to the kitchen, and she sat at the table. There was a note from Tyler's mother written on the dry-erase board: "Going to a yoga class at the YMCA, then doing some errands. I'll be back at about four. I'm glad you at least made her bed." Tyler ginned. Of course his mother had checked on him when she saw that Cordelia wasn't in her room. Tyler began opening cabinets to see what kind of food there was in the house.
He turned to Cordelia and asked, "What do you want for breakfast?"
"Whatever you're having. I don't want to be a burden."
Tyler smiled. "Pancakes then." He pulled a box of instant pancake mix off of a shelf, and started mixing ingredients together in a large bowl.
"I'm helping you," Cordelia said walking over to him. Tyler handed her the bowl to mix while he turned on a burner on the stove began melting butter in a frying pan.
When it was hot enough, Tyler poured the batter expertly into the pan forming perfect circles. He timed the pancakes exactly so that they came out as close to perfection as he deemed possible. He flipped them, and when they were completely cooked through he put them on a large plate and covered them with a sheet of tin foil to keep them warm. Cordelia opened cabinets to find plates, cups, utensils, etcetera, and she set the table. When Tyler had finished the batter, he brought the pate over to the table to his waiting houseguest. They dug in, and Cordelia was impressed with Tyler's cooking skills. Everything about him was so perfect, she thought. Tyler noticed the dreamy look on Cordelia's face. "I guess you like the pancakes," Tyler said, laughing.
When they had finished and done the dishes, Cordelia suddenly became morose once again. "What's wrong?", Tyler asked.
"I need to get stuff from my parent's house. I can't just keep wearing your brother's clothes, but I don't want to go back there."
"I'll go with you. I'll go for you, if you want me to. Just tell me what you need and I'll deal with your parents."
Cordelia looked up at him and into his eyes and smiled. "Thank you," she said meekly. Tyler got out a piece of paper and wrote down what she told him to get, and when she had finished the list, Tyler gave her a kiss.
"I'll be back soon. Are you going to be ok by yourself?"
"I'll be fine."
Tyler gave her a goodbye hug and ran out to his car. He drove to the address Cordelia had given him. He parked outside her house and walked to the door. He rang the doorbell, and nearly instantly the door opened to reveal a dark brown Rabbit who was only slightly shorter than Tyler. The man, who could only be Cordelia's father, smiled at him. "Can I help you?", he asked.
"My name is Tyler, I'm a friend of Cordelia's." At the sound of his daughter's name, the Rabbit's mood changed completely, and he moved to slam the door in Tyler's face. Tyler quickly put his foot in the way, preventing the door from closing. "That was rude," Tyler commented, glaring at the Rabbit. "I'm here for some of her things, and the faster you give them to me, the faster I leave you alone. I'll only have to come back later if you don't, and I can see you don't like the fact that I'm here even once."
The Rabbit grudgingly opened the door again, and invited Tyler inside. The Rabbit stalked upstairs and returned with for trash bags filled with cloths, as well as books and other things that clearly belonged to Cordelia. He dropped the bags in front of Tyler. "That's everything she owns. I never want to see any of it again. Now get out of my house." Tyler took the bags and walked out the door to his car. He placed them in his back seat and drove home.
Cordelia was waiting by the door when he walked inside carrying the bags. She hugged him tightly and thanked him close to a hundred times as he took her things up to her room. He set them on the bed, and the two of them spent about an hour putting clothes in drawers and on hangers in the closet, putting books on shelves, and setting up her laptop, which had been considerately packed between layers of soft clothing to protect it, on Andrew's desk. When they finished, the room had ceased to look barren and abandoned. Cordelia and Tyler lay on the bed and snuggled for a while.
"There's something that's been bugging me," Cordelia said as they held each other. "You said that the reason that you were so willing to help me last night was because you simply are a nice person, but it has to be more than that. What's the real reason that you are letting me stay here?"
Tyler sighed. "You really want to know?"
"Yes."
"Alright, this could take a while." Tyler paused, but Cordelia urged him on. Tyler sighed. "My parents died in a car crash when I was four. My brother and I were sent to an orphanage, and we weren't adopted until I was seven and he was six. Those were the worst years of my life. We were our only friends, really. We were never apart from one another, and as a result, we refused to go to a family that didn't want both of us. When Mr. and Mrs. Hawkins came, they were a godsend. They wanted two boys, and being that we had been in the orphanage so long, Garret and I were the best choice. Even when we moved into this house, we still shared a room for a few years, until we both got too big for our twin-sized beds and one of us had to move up to the attic to make room for a larger beds.
"Garret and I always shared everything with each other, and there were never secrets between us. Because we were so close, it was not all that surprising to me when he told me he was gay. I had pretty much figured it out. He made me promise to keep it a secret, and to let him tell our parents when he was ready.
"He never did get the chance to tell them in his own way. My father caught him and his boyfriend making out one night when he came home from work earlier than we had expected. My father exploded at him and kicked him out of the house, even though he was only 14. I stormed out of the house after my brother, and made sure that I knew where he was going. He spent the next few days at his boyfriend's house. I never spoke to my father again, and I never intend to.
"When my mother found out what had happened, she got in a huge fight with him. She kicked him out of the house, and began filing for divorce the next day. My brother came home, and everything returned to a pretty normal state, but for three days my brother did not have a permanent place to live. His boyfriend hadn't yet come out to his parents either, and so Garret was staying there under the cover story that my parents had flown to DC to visit some relatives, who had gotten in a car accident and were in the hospital. The lie was convincing and didn't invite a lot of questions, but it only allowed him to stay there for a few days. I'll never forget how awful it was to spend three days apart from my brother, and for a while there wasn't a single day that I didn't think about how it must have felt to be in his situation.
"That is the real reason that I offered to let you stay here. As soon as I heard that you had been kicked out of your house, I thought back to those few days, and I just had to do something to help. There was no way I would have been able to live with myself if I had allowed you to stay in the same situation."
Cordelia was silent for a long time, just cuddling into Tyler's chest. Tyler kissed her on the forehead before getting up and walking out of the room, leaving her to settle into her new home.
Tyler had been working out in his basement forty-five minutes when the telephone rang. It was his mother saying that her errands had taken less time than she had expected, and that she would be home in about fifteen minutes. Tyler checked the clock on the wall. It was three sixteen.
Tyler walked upstairs to check on Cordelia and see if she wanted anything to eat. He knocked on her door, and not hearing an answer, he slowly opened it. Cordelia was napping on her bed. There was an open book next to her, and it appeared as if she had fallen asleep while reading. Tyler smiled. All the fake smiles that he gave to popular kids in his grade masked the real feelings that he had towards his situation. Until the previous year, when his brother had opened the liquor store, he and his friends had never been members of the "in" crowd. It bothered him that the only reason that he was popular now was because he had easy access to alcohol. In truth he hated the whole social status system at his school for the way it segregated everyone. He knew plenty of people, such as his new housemate, who would never be invited to a party like the one the previous night that had more personality than many of the popular kids had combined. Those fucking smiles. They had become a crutch, something he relied on to make people believe that his world was perfect. It was becoming increasingly difficult to keep lying, both to other people and himself. It was odd, but with Cordelia, Tyler was actually happy. He had always assumed that if he convinced everyone that his world was perfect, that everything in his life was exactly as he wanted it, that it would somehow make it true. Somehow improve his mental state to a point where the smiles weren't false anymore. His delusion had become so complex that he had forgotten where reality ended and his lies began. Despite this, all it took to shatter everything was a single truthful smile.
Tyler staggered into the bathroom and looked at himself in the mirror. He mulled over his life. He realized that he had alienated old friends in order to hang out with people that he hated. He was shocked at himself. How many people had he thrown away as a consequence of his lies? He could think of ten, maybe fifteen situations where he had left a real friend behind in order to promote his social status. Tyler felt awful, and tears welled up in his eyes. "Oh god!", he whispered to himself. He couldn't stop the tears from coming and he sat down on the toilet and watched the drops fall slowly from his eyes.
He was torn from his thoughts by a sound at the front door. Tyler's mother was home. He wiped his eyes and walked into the hall just as Cordelia exited her room, and the two of them walked downstairs to greet her. Mrs. Hawkins was sitting on a stool in the kitchen when Cordelia and Tyler walked down the stairs. "Hey kids," she asked them as they entered the room, "do anything fun today?"
"Not really. I went and got Cordelia's stuff from her father and then helped her move in. That's about it," Tyler responded with a shrug.
"Good. You're such a mench. You know your brother's flight arrives in about an hour and a half. You are picking him up yourself, right? You should leave in about an hour if you want to be there when he gets through customs."
"I know," Tyler said, and then, turning to Cordelia, "You are welcome to come along if you want."
"I'd love to."
They arrived at Logan Airport at five, and since, through some miracle, the plane was supposed to land on time, Cordelia and Tyler only had to wait about ten minutes before a Polar Bear hand in hand with a handsome Husky walked towards them from customs. Each one were wearing a backpack and dragging a suitcase behind them. Garret looked pretty much the same as Tyler, though he didn't have the same drive to work out and thus weighed much more, even if he was shorter. They both even wore the same style clothes. The Husky's name was Duncan. He was muscular though he did not like to show it off. Most of the time Duncan was extremely modest, and he tended to blame himself for things that were clearly not his fault. The two had been together off and on since before the incident between Garret and his adoptive father. They tended to get in large fights and break up every once in a while, but they had always ended up back together again.
As Garret saw his brother waiting ahead of him, he grinned and ran ahead of his partner. Realizing all too late that his brother was not going to slow down, Tyler had no choice but to stand there as he was bowled over by his brother. Tyler was used to such rough attacks by his brother, and quickly flipped him over and pinned him to the floor. A few heads turned and stared at them, but Tyler didn't really care. "How was London?"
"Bloody fucking brilliant!" Garret shouted in a horrendous, fake British accent, eliciting more looks from passersby and a furtive eye roll from Duncan, who had by this point caught up with his partner.
Cordelia was staring at them from a few feet away, a look of extreme confusion on her face. Tyler smiled at her and was about to let his brother go, when a security guard jogged up to them. "Is there a problem here?", the guard shouted at them.
"Sorry sir," Tyler said, instantly standing up, "He's my brother. He just got home from a trip to London. He gets a little... over excited at times."
The guard eyed the brother's suspiciously for a moment before saying, "Just get out of the airport then."
The four teenagers hurried out to Tyler's car. As they walked, Tyler reprimanded his brother, who just laughed at the scolding. Tyler laughed. It was useless to argue with Garret. Reaching the car, the four got in and drove away. As he drove, Tyler looked at Cordelia next to him and said "The crazy one is my brother, if you didn't guess that already. His boyfriend there is Duncan." Then, looking back to see the two guys making out in his back seat. Noticing the sudden attention, the two teens in the back seat suddenly stopped and both of them blushed. Tyler laughed and went back to driving, while Garret and Duncan went back to their fun.
Tyler shook his head and grinned, and when he looked at Cordelia, she was grinning as well while she watched the couple in the back go at by way of the mirror on the back of the passenger side sun visor. Tyler put in a Chris Botti CD he had recently bought, partly because he liked it, and partly because the boys in the back seat would like the mood music. He skipped tracks till he got to "My Funny Valentine," and let the smooth music wash over him all the way back home.
After dropping Duncan off at his house to unpack, Tyler headed for home. He pulled the car into the garage and helped Garret get his luggage out of the car. All three of them walked into the house together, said a quick hello to Tyler's mother, who was busy in the kitchen making a tofu casserole for dinner, and went into Garret's room to help him unpack. Garret's room was pretty much the exact opposite of Tyler's room. Tyler kept his room clean, never leaving anything out when he wasn't using it. Garret, on the other hand, rarely put anything where it belonged when he wasn't using it, opting instead to leave his things in piles on his desk and floor. Garret never used a laundry hamper either, and instead left his laundry in a pile in one corner of his room. "Garret, this is Cordelia. I wanted to introduce you two earlier, but you were, shall we say, preoccupied."
Garret and Cordelia shook hands. "Nice to meat you," she said.
"Likewise."
With that, Cordelia left the room and went downstairs to see if Mrs. Hawkins needed help cooking dinner.
"So," Garret asked turning to Tyler, "you fucking her or what?"
Tyler smiled slyly. "No, I am no fucking her. She is just staying in Andrew's room for a while."
"Why?"
"She told her parents that she is Bi and got kicked out of the house. I don't think I have to tell you to be sensitive on that subject, do I?"
Garret grinned. "No, I mean why aren't you fucking her?"
"Ha ha, very funny. It isn't that I don't want to; I mean I would if she wanted to, but I don't think it will happen any time soon. She's not that kind of girl..." Tyler trailed off, not really finishing his thought as he thought about Cordelia.
"Holy fucking shit."
"What?"
"You. You're crazy for her, I can tell. Now I NEED to hear what happened while I was gone."
Tyler recounted the events of the past few days while Garret put his things away. When Tyler finished the story, Garret was grinning. "You are a hopeless romantic, you know that? I cannot believe I get more action than you."
"You have a boyfriend, so that isn't all that much of a surprise. Speaking of which, is he coming over for dinner or something? I know you couldn't have any 'fun' on the trip without getting in heaping amounts of trouble."
"Yeah he is. Go tell mom for me, kay?"
Tyler shrugged. He was going down to the kitchen anyways, so he figured he might as well. He said a quick goodbye to his brother and went downstairs. "Mom, Duncan is coming over for dinner. Garret asked me to tell you."
"I figured as much. How is he by the way? He leaves on a weeklong trip and when he comes back he barely sys hello to me. How on earth did you two end up so different?"
"He'll talk to you later. He wants to unpack so he can use his room for other things later tonight."
"Too much information," His mother said with a grimace. Tyler grinned, and walked over to Cordelia, who was chopping carrots.
"You're brother is... interesting," she said as he approached.
"That's one way to describe him. He can be a bit hyperactive at times, and he tends to run his mouth, but he doesn't mean any harm. He just lacks... self control."
"I noticed," Cordelia said, laughing.
"He can be a little blunt about things, so try to remember that he doesn't intend the damage he causes, if that's any consolation at all. He doesn't really think before he speaks. I explained things to him, and I think he gets it, but don't blame him if he isn't a complete gentleman."
"I'll try. What about Duncan?"
"Duncan is the exact opposite of Garret, or close to it. He never speaks without thinking, and gets embarrassed easily, though not by Garret any more. I think they have been able to stay together this long because they complement each other. You read 'Waiting for Godot' in Lit, right? They are kind of like Vladimir and Estragon. Each is one half of a whole human being, and neither can function without the other."
"I'm a little skeptical about that. But then, I never really have agreed with any of the bullshit they feed us in Lit. All English teachers are the same: they have one opinion about every book that they believe is the quote unquote 'correct' interpretation, and they see all opinions different from theirs as incorrect."
"I agree, for the most part, but you have to think that they know what they are talking about, since they have read the books they teach so many times."
"I suppose." There was a long silence, and Tyler got lost in his thoughts again. Cordelia was the best thing that had happened to him in a long time. His thoughts drifted to the decisions that he had made in the past year, and he frowned.
Interrupting Tyler's thoughts, Cordelia asked, "Is everything alright?"
Tyler shook his head and smiled. "What? Everything's fine."
"It doesn't look it," Cordelia said, raising an eyebrow.
"Listen, this isn't a very good place to talk," Tyler whispered, gesturing to his mother just across the room. Cordelia nodded, and they both walked up to Tyler's room and sat on his bed.
"Ok tell me what's wrong," Cordelia demanded.
"No, really, everything is actually better than before. Cordelia, you coming here is the best thing that has ever happened to me. You made me realize that everything I thought that I had accomplished in the past year has been for nothing and at the expense of a lot of good people."
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"After we unpacked your stuff, I saw you asleep on your bed and I realized that I was truly happy for the first time in over a year. I had constructed a fake life for myself. I thought that if people thought that I was perfect, that my life was perfect, that it would be perfect. I made myself believe that the most important thing in life was to be part of the popular crowd, and that that was the only way to find happiness, and I completely forgot how much I hate the popular kids. I got so wrapped up in my growing social status after my brother opened that fucking liquor store that I lost sight of who I am. Cordelia, you just destroyed all of that, and I am happier than I have ever been. I- I love you."
Cordelia just stared at him, mouth open, eyes wide. Tyler blushed. He had let his mouth run, not thinking about what he was saying. "I'm sorry," he said meekly. He started to get up, but Cordelia pulled him into a long, deep kiss. They fell back onto Tyler's bed and just lay there, snuggling, enjoying each other's embrace until Tyler's mother called them down for dinner.
School was always boring for Tyler, but now he simply couldn't concentrate. It was the next day, the period right before lunch. Lunch. What was he going to do? He couldn't sit with the "cool" kids, not now that he had come to his senses. What would his old friends say if he sat with them? He hadn't even talked to them in ages. God, had he fucked up.
"Mr. Hawkins!"
Tyler jumped. He had been spacing out, and had no idea what the teacher had asked him. "Sir?"
"I asked you to do the next problem on the board. Number 24 on the worksheet."
Tyler swore under his breath as he stood up, taking the class work with him. It was a pretty easy problem, just "find the derivative of f(x)=ln(x)." He wrote out his solution on the board, and as he was writing, the teacher, Mr. Caldwell, a plump Hippopotomus in his late thirties, whispered "see me after class" in his ear. Tyler's heart sank. This was the second time today he had been kept after a class for being so distracted. He walked slowly back to his seat after finishing the problem, and tried his best to pay attention for the rest of class.
As the period finally came to a close and Tyler's classmates filtered from the room, Tyler hung back and approached his teacher's desk. "Sir?"
"You realize that the AP exam is coming up, and what we are learning now will be on the test, right?"
"I'm sorry, Sir, I'm a little distracted right now."
"I can see that. It isn't really my place, but do you want to talk about it?"
Tyler sighed, and explained the basic situation to his math teacher, being careful to leave out any personal information or any incriminating testimony and just stick to the problem with his friends.
"I see. You've really gotten yourself into a bit of a mess, but I'm sure that if your friends really are friends, then you'll be fine."
Tyler thanked his teacher and slowly walked down the hall towards the cafeteria. As he reached the doors, he saw that he had two options. He could go to the left towards his new friends and continue to lie, or he could go to the right and sit with old, abandoned friends and feel alienated at best. He closed his eyes, sighed, and walked right. He saw the table almost immediately. It was the same table that they had always sat at. At the moment, all except for Kyle appeared to be in line to buy lunch and the Mouse was sitting alone. Tyler walked over and sat next to him. "Hey," he said awkwardly.
Kyle, looked over at him and raised an eyebrow. "What are you doing here?"
Tyler was sullen. "Not even a 'hello'? Man..." Tyler got up to find somewhere else to sit, but he was pulled back down by the arm.
"Look, I'm just surprised. What are you doing here? You never even talk to us anymore."
"I'm going through some-" Tyler started, but was cut off by Tori, a Red Panda with a big temper walked up to him and slapped him across the face.
"Fuck you," she whispered harshly at him.
"I deserved that," Tyler said, feeling his cheek.
Tori just sneered at him and sat down at the table as far away as she could. More people were filling up the seats at the table, each giving Tyler their own form of confused or nasty look. Tyler was depressed, and he could only hope that they would listen to him. He was left out of all conversation at the table, both because the people talking didn't really want him to be there and because he didn't relate to the topic being discussed. He ate in silence, until he was able to take advantage of a natural lull in conversation. "Listen," he said, surprising most of the people at the table, "I know I was a dick, but please just listen to me. I-"
Tori interrupted him again. "Why?"
Tyler just looked at her. "I don't know, actually. I guess you don't have to if you don't want to. If you don't want my apology, then what ever."
Kyle looked at him. "What happened to you? You were a dick before, but you were happy at least."
"No. That's just it. I wasn't happy. I thought I was, I thought that if I looked happy, the I would be. I made myself forget who I was just so that I could climb higher towards popularity." Tyler told them what had happened over the weekend. How he had realized that he hated himself, that he had become something he loathed. When he finished, the table was silent, and he stood up. "I hope you can forgive me."
Tyler grabbed his stuff and walked away, towards the exit. As he walked, he saw Cordelia sitting with friends near the door. He instantly smiled. She was the only thing going right for him. He walked over and said hello. Apparently she had told her friends about the weekend, because a few people at her lunch table giggled when he walked up. There was an empty seat next to her, so Tyler sat down for a minute. "How's it going?" she asked him.
"Not so well. Old friends are mad at me, and I'm not sitting over there," he said pointing towards his usual table on the left side of the cafeteria, a sullen expression back on his face.
Cordelia gave him a hug and his face brightened up again. "I've got to go. I'll meet you at my car after school." Tyler waved to her friends and walked out into the hall. There was only one more class until he could go home and be with her alone again. He walked to his next class, hardly able to wait for school to end.
Tyler sat in his car waiting for Cordelia to walk over. He considered putting in a CD, but before he could decide, Cordelia opened that passenger side door. As she as down next to him Tyler pulled her into a deep kiss that lasted for a minute at least. When he finally pulled away she asked "So, how was your day?"
"Awful." He told her about his experience at lunch, and she hugged him.
"They'll come around. It seems like some of them were ready right away to accept your apology."
Tyler sighed. "I guess so, but I'm still worried." She kept her arm around his shoulders as he drove away from the school. After a few minutes of silence, Tyler asked "How much work do you have tonight?"
"None. I got it all done in a study hall last block. Why?"
"How about we rent a movie? I never saw 'Ponyo'"
"You like Miyazaki films?"
"Hell yeah! Howl's Moving Castle was bad ass!"
Cordelia laughed "I never thought that you would be the type to watch kid's movies."
Tyler smiled "What movies did you think I like?"
"Oh, you know. Typical guy movies. Stupid comedies, action/adventure. That kind of thing."
Tyler laughed. "Only if I'm in the right mood. Right now, I want something simple and heartwarming. Miyazaki is perfect for that."
"Alright, 'Ponyo' it is."
Tyler took a u-turn and drove back towards the center of town. He pulled up at a Blockbuster and they both walked inside to get the movie. Tyler froze as he saw who was standing at the register. It was Jack. "Oh shit," he muttered under his breath.
"What?" Cordelia asked.
Tyler motioned with his head towards the register. "I forgot that he works here." He walked into the store hoping not to be noticed.
"Tyler! What happened?" Jack shouted across the store.
Tyler whispered "Fuck" under his breath. He told Cordelia to find the movie, and he went over to talk to Jack. "I went for a walk," and the motioning towards Cordelia in the "Family" section of the store, "and I got a little distracted."
Jack raised an eyebrow, and nodded. "Where were you at lunch?"
"I was sitting with Kyle and all them."
Jack was surprised. "Why would you do that to yourself? At the risk of sounding cliché, that's like social suicide."
"I decided that I don't really care about that. I'd rather be with people who like me for a better reason than the fact that I can get beer."
"Suit yourself, man."
Cordelia walked over with the DVD and they checked out. Walking back to the car, she asked "What happened in there? Who was that?"
Tyler explained more of his past as they drove back home, about how he had, through his access to alcohol, taken a few Jack and Bret up to the popular level with him.
"Ahh. So what are you going to do about them?"
"They have to decide for themselves. I hope they see things the same way that I do eventually, but I'm not going to force them." Tyler frowned. "I don't want to abandon them though. I'll have to find a way to hang out with them, without any of 'them' there to ruin it."
"That shouldn't be too hard. Just tell them how you feel. If they are real friends, they'll respect your opinions and try to accommodate you."
"But that's just it! I was given the same option by old friends and I didn't keep up with it. We drifted apart. I don't want to lose them the same way that my old friends lost me."
"Everything will work out in the end. And if not, then you tried your best."
"I guess so." Tyler slowly smiled again as he pulled into his driveway and parked in the garage. "See? This is why I love you. You and my brother are the only people who can really cheer me up." He kissed her on the cheek before exiting the car. They walked inside, his arm around her waist.
Later that night, sitting together on the couch with the movie playing, Cordelia's mind began to wander. She had fully expected Tyler to use the movie as an excuse to get close to her like most guys would, but Tyler didn't make any advances on her other than putting his arm around her waist. He genuinely wanted to watch the movie. Cordelia rested her head on his shoulder and smiled to herself. Tyler was the best thing that had happened to her in a very long time.
As the movie came to a close and the credits started, Tyler popped the DVD out put it in its case. He looked at the couch, and saw that Cordelia had fallen asleep. Suddenly he had a thought. He had completely forgotten about Prom. He had stressed about it for weeks, but all of a sudden it didn't seem so important to him. He would have to ask Cordelia the next chance he got. He picked her up and carried her upstairs
He was reading King Lear in his room a few minutes later when his cell phone rang. It was Kyle.
"Hey, man! What's up?" he asked Kyle.
"Not much. Listen, about lunch today, I'm sorry for the way everyone acted towards you. I just want y-"
"No, I deserve it. It's fine."
"Yeah, you do."
Tyler laughed. "Right, so I think I'm going to need your help."
"With?"
"Well, I may have seen the errors of my ways, but Bret and Jack have not. I know you are going to say 'well then screw them,' but if I abandon them, it will be exactly the same as what we did to you."
"You have a point, but it would serve them right."
"No. This is all my fault. I have to at least try to make it right."
"All right, whatever, man. I've gotta go. I'll see you at lunch tomorrow?"
"Yeah, and maybe Cordelia too."
"Who?"
"I'll explain tomorrow. See ya." Tyler closed his phone and went down to check on Cordelia. To his surprise she was up, getting ready for bed when he knocked on her door. "Did you like the movie?" he asked her.
"Yeah. It was a little childish, but good."
Tyler laughed. "And it put you right to sleep."
"Hey. I was tired."
"I noticed. Listen, would you like to go to prom with me?"
"Tyler, I would love to." He smiled and hugged her, and said goodnight. Walking back up to his room, Tyler thought that maybe, just maybe, everything would be alright.
EDIT: I forgot to out this here when I posted this story originally, so I'm adding it now:
Cordelia, which you might have guessed if you have read William Shakespeare's King Lear, is named for Lear's daughter who refuses to follow his orders and is subsequently thrown out the castle. I thought that that was a fitting reference, but I realized that King Lear is not as popular as Shakespeare's other works, and many people have probably not read it and thus do not understand. I know that this isn't all that important, but I put effort into choosing the names of my characters, and I didn't want this to go unnoticed.