Just Kidding, But Seriously...

But He Sure Can '(T)Werk It' In a Leotard

A/N- Long chapter?! I think so ;) This is my apology for taking 514651314 days to update. I could've made it a lot shorter but I decided not to. Forgive me? :)

OH YEAH AND MAJOR GRAMMATICAL ERRORS ARE GALORE I HAVEN'T EVEN LOOKED AT THIS OKAY GOODNIGHT LOVES YA GUYS

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"Dude," gasped Raymond as he basically smashed himself into the locker beside mine, his front half colliding with it with full force. It made a loud, metallic clang that left me questioning whether or not he had actually hurt himself.

I turned to him. By this time it was Tuesday, the day after the whole scene at lunch went down and Gwen had seemingly forgiven my idiotic act of locking her in a portable bathroom stall. I was looking forward to a normal school day now that the drama had been put behind us: failed exam papers, my constant jokes, questionably edible cafeteria food, and those brief thirty minutes where I ate lunch with Gwen and tried to keep my cool without making myself look like a fool.

That last one was completely impossible-I knew well enough by now that there was no such thing as a Derek who could talk to a girl he liked without screwing something up. Such was the natural way of things.

I didn't understand why Gwen was making me go through all of this pain and humiliation just to have her be my girlfriend. I mean, according to Raymond and Luke and Annemarie, she liked me. Why couldn't she just say she'd date me so that we could skip this whole courting process? I wasn't sure how much more embarrassment and stress I could take.

I think it was safe to say I was reaching my breaking point.

And it had only been two weeks.

And Raymond was about to lay another one on me.

"How much do you love me, man?" he questioned with wide, crazy eyes that made the blue in them ten times more pronounced.

I cocked my head, pulling out my math book from my locker. "Are you drunk?"

Raymond grimaced. "No."

"High?"

"No."

"Oh, so you're just in love with me," I concluded.

An angry line appeared between Raymond's dark, drawn brows. "God dammit Derek-no."

"Oh," I said, shouldering the door of my locker to slam it shut. "Well, in that case then... I suppose I tolerate you."

"You tolerate me," Raymond echoed flatly.

I shrugged. "Sure. What's this about, anyway?"

"Do you tolerate me enough to do me a huge, huge favor?" he queried pleadingly.

I sized him up suspiciously, caught off guard by the desperation in his tone. Raymond normally used this type of puppy-eyed attitude when he was dealing with one of Scarlett's tantrums.

"Just how big are we talking here?" I inquired cautiously. "Huge as in the size of Emily Orwell's ass huge?"

Raymond shook his head subtly. "Bigger."

My eyes widened in diameter. "Holy shit, dude."

"I know."

"What's up?"

"Okay, so-it's about Scarlett," he answered a bit breathlessly. We began to walk down the hallway to math class; it was the only class we had together besides biology.