Red String of Fate

Running in Circles

Don laughed at Henry's description. "Sorry, this cat's on a strict 'no canary diet' at the moment," he quipped. Henry rolled his eyes, but he couldn't help snickering a little. "So," Don drawled, lowering his voice a little bit, "I see you're pretty friendly with the new guy." Henry could feel his cheeks start to warm up, but he didn't say anything. "Do you know each other?" the senior queried. "You two already seem pretty close."

"Old friend of mine," Henry replied. He wasn't going to go into the longer version of the story quite yet. "Got separated about ten years ago. Finally saw each other again yesterday, so we hung out and caught up with each other." Don hummed and nodded to show that he understood. "Guess you could say we were really close when we were little." He smiled a little bit. "It was like nothing had changed since then. Like we picked up where we left off."

"That's really cool," Don said with a small smile of his own. "Nice to know you've got a good friend you can count on, even after all that time." Henry nodded, glancing over his shoulder as Pierre came up behind them. Pierre waved cheerfully at Henry as he passed, which the younger boy eagerly returned. Don watched the exchange with an amused smile. "Is he in your year?" he asked as Pierre jogged away. Henry nodded, his eyes fixed on Pierre as he rounded the next turn. Don watched a moment as well, then he nudged Henry's arm with his elbow. "Do you fancy him a bit?"

Henry nearly tripped over his own two feet. He almost had a heart attack before remembering that Don had been the first person other than Gil to know about his preference for guys. Don had come out to him about a year ago, and Henry had confided in him at around the same time. "Wh-what do you...?"

Don blushed a little and focused on a spot in front of him somewhere in the distance. "Ron says that I have a similar expression when I look at Doyle," he murmured softly. Doyle was another senior at the school, and Don's boyfriend of a year and a half. Don turned his attention back to Henry, his blush fading and his cheeky smile returning. "So, do you fancy him?" he prodded, his smile turning into more of a smirk. Henry looked away shyly, biting his lip to hide a smile. This was all Don needed to see "Awwww," Don chuckled. "Does he know?"

"We...kinda talked about that yesterday..." Henry admitted bashfully, rubbing the back of his neck. "So yeah, he knows. And he likes me too, so..." Don's grin could have lit up an entire city block. "I'll tell you the whole story later, if you want," he said as they both started jogging again. "It's kind of a long story, so it might take a while."

"Just tell me when and where we're gonna have story time, and I'll clear my calendar for a couple hours," Don teased. "How does that sound?" Henry rolled his eyes and put on a burst of speed, crossing into Don's lane on the track. His senior friend sped up, making the last leg of their final lap a friendly competition. Henry crossed first, and after sharing a triumphant high-five with the taller brunette, he immediately made for the spot of grass that Pierre was lounging on. He had evidently finished a while ago.

Henry flopped down next to him and lay down with a tired groan. Pierre began absentmindedly running his fingers through Henry's soft brown hair. Henry closed his eyes, a small smile playing on his lips at Pierre's gentle touch. "Nice job out there," the Frenchman told him with a proud smile. "Sounds like you got a good time." Henry's reply was a quiet hum as Pierre continued to stroke his hair. "Was the brunette another friend of yours?" he asked curiously.

"Yep," Henry replied. "That's Don. I'm not as close to him as I am to Ryan and Em, but he's still a good friend of mine." He opened his eyes and tilted his head back so he could kind of see Pierre's face. "Remind me later to introduce you two," he said. "I think you two would really get along with each other." Pierre smiled at him and tapped the tip of his nose, to which Henry responded by wrinkling his nose. The Frenchman chuckled and Henry closed his eyes again, relaxing onto the grass. He heard Pierre humming softly, and he found himself starting to drift off to sleep. A whole bunch of people are still running, he thought sleepily. A quick catnap wouldn't hurt. Pierre can wake me up...

Within seconds, he was out.

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Author's Note: Basically, when you do the mile run, you're just running around a track 4 times. You're running in circles. Or an oval, I guess. Hence the title.

So yeah, I'm finally back! Vacation was a whole lot of fun, but it kind of went a little longer than I'd previously guessed. My aunt and uncle drove me back home, and they hung out at our house for a bit before going to their vacation destination. And on top of that, I've been doing job searches and filling out applications and such. =_= Fun times.

Anyway, I hope the last few weeks have been good to all of you, and that you have lots of amazing things to look forward to in the future. Ta!