If there's a fire

16.

"Nanny needs to go." James told Thomas with a frown.

It'd been three days- James still had a cold, but he was fine.

Nanny didn't believe that.

"Oh James! Why are you out of bed?" She snapped, grabbing James by the arm and pulling him to bed.

"Nanny, I'm fine, I have school work-"

"Thomas will take care of it." She said, sitting beside James and placing a cold rag over his head. James just sighed, letting it happen.

Thomas felt bad for James, but couldn't help but laugh. This was the exact way Nanny treated Thomas as a child.

What James didn't like was that he couldn't even kiss Thomas. It was like Nanny had put a stop on their relationship.

She was always there, she always knew.

James was sitting between Thomas's legs one day, and just for a second he turned his head up-

The phone rang.

"No kissing, you two! I reminded you before I left but I got this feeling... none! Thomas, you hear me? A Nanny knows! No kissing!" She snapped. She hung up before James could even respond.

All in all- Nanny sucked.

"Nanny, are you sure you don't have anything at home would should be doing now?" James asked, trying to wipe the cold rag off his forehead.

"Nope. All I care about is your health-"

"Nanny, I'm fine!" James whined. Nanny rolled her eyes.

"Well, get that fever down and I'll be on my way!" She snapped. Thomas chuckled from his desk, and nanny turned to glare- Thomas looked down quickly.

It only took another week for James to get better, and nanny finally left. James returned to school, still a mess, holding Thomas's hand.

"Hah!" Some kid yelled, running down the hallway. "Fags!"

Thomas went to charge after him, but James held him back.

"Stop it- its all right, who cares." James whispered. Thomas sighed, kissing James' forehead, and James smiled.

"James! Oh god, you're finally back- we need you in the bass section, Lenora got expelled for something stupid so now we have no one to-"

"Sir, please calm down- I will gladly take over a piece in the bass section. May I see the music?" James asked. Thomas smiled, dropping James' hand and walking to the back of the classroom to hang out.

The day ended quite quickly- Thomas found himself stretching and yawning, and finally fourth period was over and it was four o'clock.

--

While James and Thomas dealt with their issues... John had an entirely new issue of his own.

Alexander.

Okay, so Alexander had always been an issue- but never like this. John always thought the lingering thoughts of his best friend were normal- but possibly not. He watched Alexander slowly sip one of the multiple mugs of cold coffee around him that John had made, still madly typing away. The computers glow made him look beautiful- but the bags under his eyes and his sagging face made him look exhausted.

"Alexander..." John whispered, walking up behind Alexander. Alexander just shook his head, continuing to type.

John's hands rested on Alexanders shoulders- he slowly worked his thumbs into Alex's tense arms, and within seconds Alexander had stopped typing.

His shoulders dropped and he sighed, content.

"Thank you." He whispered, not wanting it to stop but needing John to go away.

"When is this paper due?"

"Friday."

"How many pages?"

"Around four or six."

John stared at the screen, finding the page count- eleven and counting.

"You're fine. Come on- let's go to sleep. It's three am, and I can't sleep with all your tapping. If you're not going to sleep for yourself, do it for me."

"My beds uncomfortable. Especially when I could be doing so much more and actually getting things done-"

"Who said you were sleeping in your bed?" John asked with a smirk. Alexanders eyes widened and he blushed.

"Well... that's a different story. I'll... I'll be there in a minute."

"Good. I'll be waiting." John smirked, before finally stalking off to his room.

Let's just say it didn't take Alexander too long to wrap up the wrap up the rest of that paper of his before he was rushing back to John's room.