what happens after school - creek

homophobic era?

"Dude...." Clyde starts

"Dude." Tolkien says

"D-dude"

"what did you do?" Clyde asks

I'm taken aback. All I did was go to the bathroom!

"What did I do?!" I ask "what do you mean?"

Tolkien sighs and rubs his eyes and Clyde starts explaining

"Tweek just got up and started talking about how he knew what you were up to? What the fuck are you up to? What's going on?!"

"Dude, what! I don't know! He didn't say up to what? I seriously don't know what you're talking about" I ask

"He said he wasn't mad at us because we were just playing along? I don't know what that means" Tolkien said

"It- it's all very confusing"  Jimmy says, he seems to be very unaffected by this

"I'll talk to him after school. I have to know what he's talking about."

"Oo! Gossip!" Clyde claps his hands

Now I'm starting to get mad. I didn't do anything! And for him to imply my friends did something wrong? That's what gets my goat.

This all explains why he was acting so weird.
It had something to do with whatever is going on. Probably.
I get angrier as the day goes on. How could he talk to my friends like that?
When they were nothing but kind to him

Suddenly school ends. I don't even bother going to the classroom. I know he's in the library.

My eyes go immediately to our usual table and sure enough

His face is buried in a book but that's definitely him

I go up to the table and make my presence known

I know he can see me so I just make a hand gesture like 'wtf dude?'

He buries his face even more in the comically large book

I still stand there

"Hey, dude. What the fuck?"

He looks up at me "leave me alone."

Ouch. That one hurt.

".... No"

The librarian shushes us

"Let's talk outside. Now." I say

He sits there for a minute before standing up.
I lead us to outside the building

When we both get outside the doors of the school he stands against a wall with his arms crossed.

"Do you mind telling me why my friends were asking me about my 'secret plan'?"

He just looks at me for a second. Making me sweat

"I know what you're up to. You aren't sneaky."

"Okay yeah, but what exactly does that fucking mean?"

"You know exactly what that means."

I throw my arms in the air in frustration

"no! I really don't!" I laugh a tad when I say, amused by the absurdity of the situation

"It means it's not going to work alright! I know what you're doing! I caught on the second you started being 'nice' to me."

I feel my heart pick up. Suddenly I feel like I actually am guilty. I don't know of what

"What?"

"You're a really bad actor, you know. You weren't even that good at pretending. Every time you were 'nice', every time you acted like you wanted to get to know me, I could see right through you.  You know I actually believed you wanted to be my friend for a second. I thought it was all in my head and I was being paranoid but I was clearly wrong."

He sounded so angry. I don't know what I did but it felt awful. Did he think..... he can't be..... no... there's no way...

He kept talking,

"And then you got your poor friends to play along! Or were they the ones who put you up to this?"

"How many times do I have to say this. I don't know what you're taking about." I say getting more annoyed and hurt,
"how can I explain my innocence if I don't even know what you think I did!"

He just stares at me

"You're not even sorry."

"Sorry?!" I lose my patience at this point "how can I be sorry when I don't even know what I fucking did wrong?!"

I inhale sharply as I prepare my next words carefully,

"You know what... i am sorry. Im sorry i was nice to you. I'm so sorry I tried to be your friend. I'm sorry I took a chance on the lonely kid and stepped out of my comfort zone. Which I will. Never. Do. Again!"

I start to walk away but then I decided I wanted to get one last word in. Because of course I did.

"You know I don't do that for many people. I don't just talk to strangers like how I was talking to you. I'm fine with people. Honestly! But I don't try to get to know them or do any sort of labor in conversations cause I usually don't care enough! But you seemed interesting. And now I'm getting kicked to the curb for something I didn't even do."

I didn't look at his face when I said any of that. It all feels like a blur.

I don't remember if my mom asked me why I was home so early. I don't remember anything after that conversation. I was that angry.

I was less angry with him being mad at me for no reason (although that was super fucking annoying) but I was more angry with the fact he wouldn't even tell me what I did wrong! That's what bothers me the most. I can't fucking stand not knowing things. No sort of closure at all

I was nothing but nice to that kid. But according to him, that's why he figured out my "plan"

I got into my warm snug bed but I didn't feel comfortable at all. I felt gross and weird and kind of sad. Night does strange things to a person.