blue neighbourhood ✧ tronnor (incomplete)

3. Connor

As soon as photography class was finished, I scurried out of the room without even looking up from the floor. Fortunately the corridors were still fairly quiet, meaning I could head off to the library without bothering anyone. I had a group of friends who I spent all of my free time with during the college day, and the library was our meeting point. We didn't necessarily spend all of our time there, but it was a nice enough place regardless. People never interfered with us there; we could just enjoy eachother's company despite our mutual dislike towards college. I enjoyed my courses nonetheless: photography, media, art and psychology.

Even when I was younger, I'd always been far more creative than academic, hence why the only remotely-academic subject I chose was psychology. The college itself, on the other hand, wasn't anywhere near as good. It was dingy and old, with peeling paint on the walls and floorboards that threatened to snap with every step you took across them. The teachers varied between being great and being terrible. At least half of them made it blatantly obvious that the last thing they wanted to be doing was teaching, which constantly made me question why they hadn't left if they despised their job that much. I know it's what I'd do if I was in a job I didn't like. There's no point wasting your life doing something you aren't passionate about because you'll only regret it.

As I headed to the library, my thoughts cast back to photography. The boy who'd sat next to me - Troye - was someone I'd never seen before. I'd probably passed him in the corridor on the way to class on the odd occasion, but he wasn't someone I'd ever looked twice at, nor ever had much awareness of their existence. Most likely because I spent most of my time in the library, away from the larger groups of people who were much louder and respected than I. It didn't bother me, though; popularity was never something I'd strived for in my life. I preferred having my smaller group of friends, where we all looked out for eachother and respected eachother without having to seek the approval of others first in case it wasn't 'cool'. People didn't treat us badly and we all had other friends, of course, but it was just a lot nicer to be a part of a smaller group. I felt secure.

"Hey! Thought you'd got lost or something." I was greeted by Ricky, who waved me over to our usual corner by the window between the shelves of ancient history and english literature textbooks. I'd known Ricky for most of my life; we'd gone through every stage of education together, from pre-school all the way to college. We weren't necessarily in all of the same classes, but nothing had ever come between us and I hoped nothing ever would.

I smiled as I dropped my bag to the floor and sat beside him. "Of course not. I just got held up in class."

"Do anything interesting?" Tyler asked, talking through a mouthful of apple.

"Um," I shrugged. "Not really. Just edited more photos, as you'd expect." I rummaged through my bag to find my pot of fruit. "Hey, have any of you guys met a guy called Troye?"

I received no response from any of the group. Tyler gave me a blank expression. Ricky, Kian and Joey all had similar expressions on their own faces.

"I can't remember his last name. But he was in my photography class and I let him use some of my pictures because he'd forgotten his own. It's just, I've never seen him before and I was wondering if any of you had. Like, is he new or whatever?"

Kian shrugged. "Maybe. Ask him when you're next in class."

"I can't just ask him about his life! We only know eachother's names." I was quick to retort.

"So? It's just a friendly gesture, it shows you wanna get to know him."

I chuckled. "Gee, you make it sound like I'm interested in him."

Kian shot me a smirk. "Well, you seem pretty intrigued by him. I can tell by the way you had that little half smile when you mentioned him. Yeah, I saw it."

I could feel my cheeks turning pink. "So what? He's cute, but that doesn't mean anything."

Kian didn't reply and instead shot Tyler a knowing smirk before tucking into a packet of crisps. I popped open my fruit pot and scooped a slice of orange onto my spoon before putting it into my mouth. We all fell silent while we ate, and I found myself gazing out of the window and watching as people milled around the basketball court.

The sky was a pale grey, as if it were indecisive of whether to snow or rain. I was definitely in the minority of people who preferred the colder weather to the warmer weather, partly because it gave me the excuse to layer up in cute jumpers and not receive strange looks for it. My thoughts were once again cast back to Troye. Thinking about it, he had a really pretty smile. And blue eyes that you could get lost in if you looked into them for long enough. Hell, he was definitely attractive.

"Connor," I winced as Ricky nudged my arm, catching right in the centre of a fresh bruise. "What class do you have next?"

I snapped myself out of my confused daze and pulled my timetable out of my pocket. It was creased and crumpled, but it was fortunately still readable. "Art for two hours."

Art was probably the subject I enjoyed most. I could easily get lost in the creative abyss of painting or drawing something for hours; it was something that truly captivated me. I loved being able to think of something in my head and watch it come to life on the page right in front of my eyes. I had a particular skill when it came to drawing portraits of other people. I hadn't quite mastered the art of doing self-portraits, but I thoroughly enjoyed drawing the physique of other people regardless of who it was. Drawing in general helped to take me away from everything in the real world and open the gates to a brightly coloured place, full of vibrant colours, tones and contrasting patterns. I loved it.

--

When I first walked into art class, it took me a moment to recognise who was sat in the seat opposite me. As soon as I saw them properly, however, it was hard not to notice the familiar mop of brown curls and blue eyes. Troye was sat with his phone on his lap, scrolling mindlessly through something and paying no attention to what was going on around him.

"I didn't see you as the artistic type." I smirked as I sat down, grabbing his immediate attention. His head snapped up and, when he saw me, a small smile crept onto his lips.

"Well I didn't see you as the sarcastic type, so I guess we're even," he teased.

Our assignment was scribbled across the whiteboard in blue marker. Our teacher wasn't in the classroom,cut had requested us to draw the person sat next to or opposite us. Since there was no one beside me, I had to settle for drawing Troye. Not that I minded, since, like I say, portraits of other people are most definitely my strongest point. I turned my attention to the piece of paper on the table in front of me and immediately began scribbling away, drawing lines that all connected with eachother until I'd perfected the structure of his face. Every now and then I'd look up at him to remind myself of where certain elements needed to go, and how to position them on his face. The main things I noticed were his bright smile, his strong jawline, and of course his eyes. When I wasn't looking at him, I could feel his eyes burning into me as he drew me on his own sheet of paper. I didn't look across at his paper, not wanting to distract myself from my own work as I found myself drifting into the world of vibrant colours and contrasting patterns. Yet, this time, I was surrounded by blue. So, so much blue.

A/N: I know it's shorter but I just wanted to include a filler chapter to introduce Connor's squad and also purely because I wanted to update this. I'm sorry if it's boring so far but it'll (hopefully) get better later on, just stick with me for now !!