Benjamin has freckles. Thijmen has a knife. Their one thing in common? Having to live under the same roof. Every year, as part of a school program, a "troubled teen" is taken by a wealthy family in hopes to help him reform. This is what brought Thij...
A man and the principal came into the classroom and asked the teacher if they could disturb for a second. Many boys in the room anxiously glanced at the two people at the door. If the principal came to get someone, they were in deep shit.
However, when she turned her gaze to Thijmen, everyone visibly relaxed. It was just the new guy.
But Benjamin immediately sat up straight and threw Thijmen a look. The Dutch boy only sent him a smile and got up from his seat to follow the principal and the man out of the room.
The rest of the period, Benjamin had no attention for the teacher whatsoever. The only thing he could think of was that Thijmen was pulled out of class by the principal. His eyes were constantly on the door and the empty seat beside him.
Had Thijmen done something wrong? Had he messed up and returned to his old habits? Surely, he didn't mean to. He hadn't shown any sign of actually ever doing bad stuff, apart from killing his lungs. Or had he done it all behind Benjamin's back?
Had he just put up a nice front for him?
When the bell rung, he was out of his seat like a lion spotting a baby antelope after not eating for weeks. He was hungry for information. He needed to know what had happened. Once again, Benjamin ignored his friends and instantly went in search of Thijmen. If the PE teacher saw him now, he'd think he'd drunk thirty cans of Redbull. He never ran this fast.
Arriving at the principal's office, Benjamin saw Thijmen emerging from the room with a wide smile, and he stopped running so suddenly he tripped over his own feet and fell over. Thijmen was immediately beside him, lifting him up by his arms.
"What are you doing?"
"I-I-I w-was... I'm just... Nothing."
Thijmen wiped the dust off Benjamin's shoulder and shook his head in amusement. "Why are you running in school?"
For the millionth time in his life (and most definitely not the last) Ben's face heated up. It seemed like he was turning into a broken traffic light. The only color he showed was red. Green, if shown lentil soup.
"I wasn't running."
"Make the cat believe that."
"What?"
"It's a Dutch saying. I saw you running."
"Okay, I was running."
"Why?" asked Thijmen patiently.
"B-because I was—"
"Don't lie."
"I wasn't going to," Benjamin huffed, shuffling his feet in embarrassed. "I was running because I was worried that you got into trouble."
"Oh." Thijmen's lips quirked up in a smile. "Were you? That's cute."
Current location of Benjamin's blood: back to the face.
"I wasn't in trouble. It would be unwise of me to get into trouble, now wouldn't it? I wouldn't be able to ask you on another date."
Current situation: even more blood to the face. How much of his blood was even going there? It had to stop eventually, right? What if his head exploded? He'd read about something similar on the internet, but then again, the head they'd been referring to was different, and the events leading to him reading such article weren't something he would like to remember.
"They were just asking about how I was doing and all that," concluded Thijmen. "Just a check up. You can calm down, Bennie." He reached out to ruffle Benjamin's hair. "Besides, you haven't seen me do anything bad, have you?"
"No, I guess not, but... No, I haven't."
"But what?"
"But, well, uh..." He hesitated to say it, but he couldn't really come up with anything else to say, other than random nonsense. Not much good had come from that. "Criminals do stuff in secrecy, so it would be kind of weird if you told me about it."
Thijmen sighed and looked off in the distance with a sad smile. He looked like... like he needed a hug. However, Ben was too scared to give one. What if he didn't like it if he did that right now?
Before Benjamin could make his decision, Thijmen was already turning his attention back to Ben and he replied, "I swear to you, I don't do stuff in secrecy—I mean, I don't do stuff at all. I came here to... Well..."
Benjamin nodded. He understood.
He didn't know what Thijmen had done to get here in this situation, but it was obvious that he regretted it. The look on his face looked so genuine Ben just had to believe him. He imagined the results of that would bite him in his ass later if Thijmen was lying after all, but he couldn't really find a reason for that.
He didn't know what to say.
So he did what he was too afraid to do earlier. He hugged him.
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