Pledged

Chapter 1

The first day of class and Al was already running late.

It was 9:17 am on a Tuesday morning and his 9:20 Roman History class was on the fifth floor while he was on the second. Despite the elevators of the Main building being down for repairs and leaving his dorm room five minutes after he had initially planned, he would have been on time had he not stopped for coffee at The Express-o on the first floor. Because there had been nothing express about that line.

Al being on time for this particular class was quite important because he had it with Professor Garth, the same professor who had failed him the previous semester for missing too many classes. Damn the attendance policy. 

Al began to run up the stairs, taking them two at a time while trying his hardest not to spill the coffee that had gotten him into this mess in the first place. He arrived in his class at 9:20 exactly, breathing heavily and noticing brown specks of coffee on the front of his white collared shirt. Groaning, he plopped down in a seat in the back next to a vaguely familiar young man with wavy, dirty blond hair.

"You could have saved your breath," the boy said, "Professor Garth isn't even here yet."

Al stared at the boy coolly, still breathing too hard to talk back.

The boy smiled apologetically and turned to his notebook in front of him, adding a few lines to a nearly complete drawing of a raven.

After Al finally caught his breath and gulped down a few swigs of coffee, he checked his watch carefully. At that moment, a short salt-and-pepper-haired man walked into the class.

"Sorry I'm late class, I had a meeting that ran a little over time."

You should be sorry, Al thought.

Professor Garth began calling names off the roll sheet almost at once. Al half listened as he rattled off names.

"Corvus McCoy," he said about halfway through.

"Here," the blond-haired boy next to Al responded. 

Al's heart skipped a beat. Oh no, not him.

"Your name is Corvus?" Al asked.

The boy nodded. "Hence the raven," he said, indicating his drawing. "It's Latin for -"

"Yeah, I know," Al cut him off.

"Alaric Miller," Garth called out in a tone that let Al know that he had repeated the same name more than once.

"Huh? Oh, yeah, here," Al said.

"Your name is Alaric?" Corvus asked, his blue eyes dancing with amusement.

"I go by Al."

Corvus smiled and extended his hand. "Nice to see you again, Alaric."

Al didn't take his hand. "We've met before?" he asked.

"Yeah," Corvus answered with a slight smile playing on his lips. "Last year. During freshman orientation."

"Oh," Al answered, pretending to be removing something from his coffee cup. "Sorry, I don't remember."

Al then put his AirPods in and faced forward, trying unsuccessfully to read Professor Garth's lips. The rest of the class passed with no exchange between the two boys, mostly because Al made sure not to even look in Corvus's direction. 

Finally, class ended and Al waited until most people had exited so he didn't have to push his way past anyone. Corvus packed his notebook, pen, and multiple highlighters into his backpack and he and Al stood up at nearly the same time. Turning quickly to exit, the tail of Al's shirt got caught on the back of his chair and he was snagged backward as he tried to take a step forward. Immediately, the remainder of his coffee spilled down the front of his already splattered shirt.

"Fuck!" Al practically yelled, earning a side eye from Professor Garth.

"That's not good," Corvus said, "Here, you can use my jacket to cover it up until you can change."

He passed Al his black denim jacket and Al took it with only slight hesitation.

"Thanks," he mumbled.

"I know how to get that out," Corvus continued.

"Yeah, me too," Al responded, "it's called bleach... sorry," he added quickly when he realized he was being rude without justification.

Corvus smiled again. "It's cool. I can tell you've had a rough morning."

He stepped around Al in the direction of the door. "You can just bring the jacket next class. Hope the rest of your day isn't such a bust." And with that, he exited the classroom, leaving Al the last one in the room besides Professor Garth. Al sighed and slid the jacket on, praying as well that the rest of his day wasn't a bust.