52. (BoyxBoy)

52. Page 12.

When Aiden entered the kitchen, he was immediately aware of a tallish, slim woman with her back to him, blocking the kitchen entrance. He was about to cough, or runaway, or something, when Matt noticed him. "Er. . . Mum, this is Aiden," Matt nodded towards him. The woman turned and a broad smile appeared on her face.

"Ah, I'm so glad Matthew's made friends already!" she beamed. He tried his best to smile back. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Matt blush a dark shade of purple, and become engrossed in the floor. Her features were sharp and powerful, especially her eyes: they shadowed power and authority, but were masked with a strange feeling of warmth and integrity. "Oh, Matt's made you breakfast! Doesn't your mother feed you?" It should have been a joke, but she said it with a tone of brutal curiosity.

Aiden felt awkward. "Yeah," he lied, and forced a laugh, as he sat down to a plate of toast. The toast was just crunchy enough, and had a generous helping of butter and marmalade heaped on top. Aiden was too polite to say he actually hated marmalade (the strips of oranges scared him).  But it tasted heavenly, anyway. It took him to a place far away, on top of a cloud. If beauty could be described as a food: this was it. Matt had made a few spare pieces, so Aiden happily pinched a few more slices, and scraped them with butter. Deliciously, the butter melted into the soft toast, and made him dribble. He let out a low hum in appreciation. Matt shot a glance across the table at him and laughed.

He didn't really eat. He made meals for his mother, and there never seemed to be enough left for him. Every once in a while, he'd remember he hadn't eaten for a while, and raid the fridge for whatever he could find. He got school meals free (thanks to benefits), so the only food he really got was at school. But school meals couldn't be taken outside of the canteen, so that meant eating either alone (if he were lucky enough) or next to some jock-y losers (there weren't really that many seats and he always ended up sitting next to some bullying twats). Because he didn't have any source of income, he didn't have any money. Consequently, he couldn't buy his own food. He'd become used to not eating, and lived like that.

He ended his rush eating abrubtly, and dived for his tea that Matt had neatly placed out for him. He slurped it noisily, and held it close to him. It felt warm in his hands and tasted sickly sweet with sugar. Aiden's mouth felt slightly dry from the tea, so he picked up his empty mug and plate and left them by the sink and eventually found a glass, which he filled with water and drank slowly. He peeked over at Matt, who was steadily drinking a cup of tea and reading a music magazine.

This was so surreal - yet, so not. It was so normal. Natural.

Standing by the kitchen cupboards, Aiden watched for a few minutes as Matt turned page after page, and sipped and sipped. Eventually, Matt stood up. "School?" he asked.

Oh. Aiden had forgotten about that. "Yeah," he muttered, feeling slightly down.

"Let me get my bag," Matt said, running upstairs. Aiden nodded and patiently waited by the front door. A few moments later, as Matt ambled downstairs, he caught Aiden admiring a painting recently hung up, by the staircase. "My mum painted it," he said, as Aiden nodded at the picture.

"Really? It's good. Is she an artist?"

Matt shook his head. "It's more a hobby than a career. She's the boss at some cosmetic company, from what I can gather."

"Oh, right," Aiden answered, genuinely intrigued, as they left the house.

The walk to school was overwhelmingly weird. They talked about issues such as the weather, school and marmite. Exciting stuff.

 "You probably wouldn't want to walk in with me," murmured Aiden, as they neared the school.

Matt raised an eyebrow, confused, "why?"

"I'm, uh, not that popular."

Matt dismissed this remark. "I don't care."

"Seriously. . ." Aiden spluttered, a certain sense of fear in his eyes, almost pleading with the medium of vision.

Matt thought this over, he wanted to show him he didn't care, but he also wanted to do as he wanted. Aiden interrupted the thought process: "You go in now; I'll come in in two minutes." He said it decisively, and Matt knew he wasn't going to budge. Sighing, he stalked through the gate, not looking back at Aiden. He wasn't going to provoke any 'suspicion'.

Punctually, two minutes later, Aiden sauntered through the classroom door, and took a seat at his desk.

"AIDS!" a roar shouted across the classroom to Aiden's direction. He didn't turn. He already knew who it was. He sneaked a look at Mr. Dazzaroo (aka Darren Woodhouse), and was surprised to see him in conversation with Matt. Unfortunately, Daz caught this look (probably more of an open mouth and wide stare). "All right, [CENSORED]?" (Seriously, you do NOT want to hear the name Darren used). He listed a few more names, and a few were thrown in by his posse. There was a room full of sniggers. A few people in the room ignored it, and some just rolled their eyes, but everyone else had their gaze fixed on Darren and Aiden.

"Fuck off," Aiden muttered, staring straight down at his desk.

"What you say?"

Hadn't they been here before? "I'm pretty sure you can get free hearing tests, these days," Aiden's eyes pierced into Darren's, like razors.

"You trying to be funny?"

"I don't need to try," Aiden defensively stood up from his desk.

"Yeah?" Great come-back. Seriously.

"Yeah." This was seriously great banter.

"I don't like you," Darren glared. God, this was scary. He was so threatening.

"Feeling's mutual." Oh, how the insults were flying. Not.

Then Darren pushed Aiden. Hard. He tumbled to over a table, and blinked steadily. "You're such a faggot," Darren growled, and pushed him again. This time Aiden fell to the floor, head first. The pain jolted him, and a fast surge of hurt rushed through him. He felt slightly dizzy and preoccupied. He saw a blurred vision of his terroriser, boldly standing over him. Laughing.

He heard echoes of surplus laughter gather throughout the room. The room that was becoming distant, shady and faded. Now all he could see was Darren - and his fist. The fist that was coming more and more into his blurred vision, and closer and closer to his face.