she slipped ; malum

hands

"I didn't mean to set your house on fire."

Calum snorted. "But you did. Nobody was even there!" he exclaimed, looking at him in exasperation.

"You were! You told me that it was fun playing with matches." The smaller boy whined.

The Maori's expression wore away, and he looked a little more uncomfortable. "I tell you a lot of things, Mikey. But you don't have to believe them."

Michael took a step closer. "You told me kissing was fun," he smirked, his forefinger and thumb grabbing Calum's chin, "do you think I could try that one out?"

Calum grabbed both sides of his face and kissed him. The smaller boy slipped his thumbs around the tanned boy's belt loops, smiling into the kiss. They both felt like they were on fire. All those dumb fireworks meant nothing compared to this – this was hot.

"Detention!"

Calum and Michael were a metre apart within a second, looking at the teacher, wide-eyed. She yelled at them like they had just killed a puppy. She told them that she was giving them detention for PDA, and Michael called bullshit.

"We were in a closed-off room with nobody around. That's not PDA; that's two boys kissing."

She didn't want to tell them that two boys kissing would be seen as so much worse to ninety-five percent of the people that went to Halsey High. So she didn't. She handed them a detention slip and they shoved it in their pockets.

Calum stepped off of the stage and walked out, feeling his blush return to his cheeks slightly. He wanted to slam his head against a locker. This was not what he did. He did not blush. He did not kiss boys. What the hell was going on?

Unluckily for him, the bell went, and that meant he had to spend one hour and forty minutes in a small room with Michael – the boy he just kissed. He tried not to look awkward about it, but he couldn't help himself.

In English, Michael rubbed his thumb on the inside of Calum's jeans, and the Maori squirmed, breaking the led in his pencil. He held Michael's hand for a second before dropping it and putting his on the table.

"Stop." Calum whispered.

The redhead rolled his eyes and continued writing his essay on the racism in 'To Kill A Mockingbird.' He looked at the clock, tapping his pencil impatiently, looking over at Ashton to see him doing a beat with his two pens. Michael was a little more than interested in how perfectly the tanned boy was drumming.

Curiously, he tapped a different beat with his fingertips. It went surprisingly well. Ashton looked over his shoulder, his dimples popping out as he grinned. Calum nodded along to the beat and made a popping sound with his lips.

They were all happy Luke had decided to skip that day.

Miss Illy looked up from grading her papers, and looked excited that her students were making cool sounds. She stood up and held a pile of tests in her hand, walking down the lines and handing out their grades.

Ashton Irwin, 83%

Michael Clifford, 88%

Calum Hood, 48%

"Fuck." Calum groaned, leaning back in his chair.

"I thought you were good at English . . ." Michael furrowed his eyebrows.

"I – I couldn't focus on the words on the page. I didn't get enough sleep. I . . ."

Calum seemed upset about the grade, and all the redhead wanted to do was hug him. But he didn't, 'cause Calum wouldn't like that, and neither would anyone else. They'd already been called faggots before, they didn't want to be called it again.

"I'll make it better." Calum continued to mumble to himself, and the pale boy only watched in sympathy.

"Do you want me to help?"

The Maori looked at him, and shook his head. He was better off doing things on his own. Always will be, always had been. He didn't accept help because he didn't need it. Michael would do it all for him, and he would learn nothing.

"I meant with the sleeping, and stuff." The pale boy whispered, afraid that if anyone else heard they'd think it sounded gay. "You always sleep when I'm around."

It was true. Calum did sleep a lot better when he was with Michael. It was like the boy's cologne was chloroform or something.

"I don't mind."

Michael shook his head slightly, sighing as he looked at the bags under Calum's dark eyes. They were so prominent. He couldn't help but feel it was his fault they were there. Michael had given him new things to worry about – his sexuality, mainly.

The poor guy must've thought he was straight until Michael came along.

Wrong.

Calum had kissed a boy before. But he figured it didn't count because they were both drunk, anyway. The both of them claimed they didn't remember it, but it hung over the two boys like a dark cloud wherever they went.

The class ended, and Calum had a free. Michael had drama, and secretly hoped that Calum would decide to be in the auditorium again. He sat down next to Ashton, and the two talked for a while. Mainly about Calum. Ashton tried to dismiss the topic, but Michael kept bringing it up.

"Why are you so interested, Michael?" Ashton huffed. "The past is the past. It should stay where it is."

"I just want to know what he used to be like."

The sun-kissed-skinned boy sighed, twisting himself into the position so he could look at the clueless firetruck head. "He was a really nice, polite guy towards Avery. Had a bit of a temper, but always tried to hide it. To me, he was always a little bitchy, but that's how we both were. He never went to Avery if he had a problem, because he was scared he'd get angry at her. So, he always went to me."

He shrunk back in his seat. "He got wound up over the stupidest things, though. But it was only when he started to have panic attacks did I realise he wasn't telling me as much as he was supposed to."

Michael didn't push him anymore. Ashton got back to his work.

Michael wanted to give him something in return. Wanted to tell him something to say thank you, because he was now aware of how uncomfortable he really was with talking about Calum. He wanted Ashton to know that Calum was still the same Calum he left, just with a little more problems.

"He still has them, you know?"

He's still the same, you know?

"I can tell."

Iknow.

shameless self-promo: i have a lashton story called educator. It's about how liz tutors ashton and luke has a crush on him and how ashton sleeps over sometimes and luke doesn't know why. pls check it out.

I also have fic called pink champagne. Its about michael living in a hotel and wanting to fuck a tourist - luke, but gets rejected.