bad decisions - bastille
" here we are, trapped in the amber of the moment. there is no why. "
- kurt vonnegut
"Welcome to Hell," Dion said to Achilles as he walked into the room that served the multipurpose of chemistry and detention. Achilles looked down at Dion, who had constructed multiple tiny origami cats out of ripped out notebook paper.
"Why are you in here?" Achilles asked, his hand touching one of the paper cats.
Dion snatched it away from Achilles, "I spiked the punch and turns out snitches exist at this school."
Achilles nodded as if he thought Dion was completely innocent, making his way over to where Patroclus was sat, textbook open and pages of homework around the desk. He sat next to his boyfriend, making Pat look up and smile.
"Oh hey, welcome to Hell."
"So I've been told," Achilles motioned to the boy at the front of the classroom, "I'm sorry we ended up here."
"Not ideal but at least Hector isn't — Jesus Christ," Pat stopped his sentence short as a familiar face walked into the room behind Coach Ares, who was holding a grocery bag full of protein bars and a phone charger. Hector locked eyes with Achilles as he strode in, cocky smirk on his face, sitting down next to Dion in the front. Achilles rolled his eyes while looking at Pat.
"He's in here because he busted us and got caught with a vape pen, he's not badass," Achilles whispered, making Ares look up from the desk.
"Hey hot shot! This is detention, not study hall, be quiet," the coach barked, sitting down behind the desk and plugging in the charger. He really thought he had power in this position, even though it really came down to getting paid a minuscule amount more for doing the job no other teacher wanted and the fact that his affair partner had agreed to "help with tutoring" today while her husband went home. He looked intimidating with his overly worked out body and the slight tattoo poking out from his shirt sleeve, but ultimately his only power was making kids run extra laps in P.E.
Achilles rolled his eyes again and slumped down in his chair, looking over at Pat, who had gone back to doing homework. He felt shitty about making Pat go through detention, which wasn't ever something the brunette had been in. In addition, Pat's parents doubled down after the homecoming incident, not allowing him to go over to Achilles' house until further notice, which resulted in very quiet Skype calls over the weekend and secret phone calls. Achilles had really missed him over the weekend, which seemed silly at first, until he realized how much time the other boy took up of his company. Good taken up time.
A few other kids walked into the room before Ares closed the door off, and the countdown from an hour and a half kicked off, with two kids falling asleep and being awoken multiple times with Ares and a ruler, Hector furiously typing up an essay, Dion making more origami, and Patroclus getting though multiple subjects of homework. Meanwhile Achilles sat the entire time, arms crossed, staring between the ceiling and white board.
He knew the whole deal with Paris and Helen was a stupid high school drama scheme, but the amount of bitterness that had accumulated because of it was alarming. Hector was becoming more erratic for the hell of it, bumping into Achilles in the hallways and bathroom when he could, staring him down. His friends followed suit, mainly trying to mess with Patroclus, because Hector had seemed to back off of him once Achilles threatened him in front of everybody. But between the lingering kids in the parking lot after track practice that revved their engines when Achilles loaded his car and the slowly increasing divide between the school's "sides", Achilles wasn't sure if it was still for show or for real.
"Hey," Achilles felt something bump his arm, "we can go now."
Patroclus zipped up his backpack as Achilles shook himself out of the state he was in and stretched out his arms. "Already?"
"You wanna stay here longer?"
"God no, let's go," Achilles said, grabbing his own backpack and walking out of the room with Patroclus, leaving Ares behind to throw away his protein bar wrappers. "Where'd Hector go?"
Pat looked around the hall before pushing the door to the parking lot open, "I don't know, he left out when Coach dismissed us. Why?"
Achilles looked around the parking lot, his eyes landing on the few cars that remained in their spots. "Uh, no reason, just wondering. He's been pissing me off."
Pat let out a small scoffing noise, "what a surprise. Is that his car?"
"Fuck."
Hector's car was an old model of a Corvette that had been insanely fixed up to the nines, and it was just as overly flashy as he was. And he wasn't shy about showing it off. Or revving his engine as Pat and Achilles walked out to their cars.
"What do you want, dickwad?" Achilles yelled over the engine, raising his hands in the air. Pat punched his boyfriend's side.
"Are you kidding me? You're gonna get us killed, just go home, I'll call you -"
The sound of the engine cut him off before Hector stepped out of his car, making Achilles and Pat stop in their steps. Hector left the car running, with several of his friends in their own cars around his, leaving the door opened as the walked towards the two boys.
"You called?" Hector said, now in front of the two others, looking specifically at Achilles.
"Do you need something?" Achilles shot back, furrowing his eyebrows.
"You need to back down from all of this cool guy shit about my brother and Helen, acting like you're the go-to man for everything."
"You're the one who asked for my help, asshole! I'm sorry I don't want you trying to beat my boyfriend up and screwing yourself over with trying to help your dumbass brother and his mistakes, but you literally make everything more complicated than it needs to be. You're eighteen, grow the fuck up," Achilles huffed, watching as Hector frowned at him. He could feel Pat tense up beside him.
"Well maybe if you two didn't make it so difficult to navigate the fucking school without having every other person cuss me out, things would be easier!"
"Oh I'm sorry, who beat my boyfriend up? Don't start that shit with me -"
"Achilles -" Pat tried butting in as Achilles inched closer to Hector, his voice getting louder, one of Hector's friends kicking up his engine behind him.
"Am I wrong?" Achilles cut Pat off, "what are you, jealous?"
Hector hesitated to answer, his eyes flickering from Achilles to Patroclus then back to Achilles, "you wish."
"Uh huh, I don't think I'm wrong," Achilles got closer. Pat grabbed his arm and tried to pull him back.
"C'mon, we should just go," he mumbled, Achilles' arm slightly giving way.
Hector looked at Pat, "you always try to act as his back up, you don't ever really fight for yourself though, huh?"
Patroclus let go of Achilles' arm and looked straight at Hector. This time Achilles had taken a step back, his eyes making their way to Patroclus, who had clenched his jaw. "Fuck you."
"What'd you say to me?"
"I said fuck you, you asshole."
Then Patroclus swung his arm at Hector's face, making contact with the other boy's right side jaw, knocking him back. Pat pulled his arm back, going in for another swing, but Achilles grabbed him from the back, pulling him back as Hector looked up and wiped his lip. Then Hector began to stumble towards the two, Achilles pushing his way in front of Pat, now his fist hitting Hector's oncoming one.
By this point, Hector's friends had left their cars, making their way towards the three man fight, most of them stopping before they reached it, just wanting to see how it played out, and not wanting to get black eyes. But one of the boys kept walking, his stride becoming larger as he approached them, and as Achilles was busy trying to shield Patroclus, Patroclus was met with a fist in his own face.
"You? Jesus Chri - " Patroclus was cut off as he ducked Sarpedon's fist again and lunged towards his torso. Sarpedon fell back onto the ground, his head hitting the concrete beneath him. He grunted, raising a hand to feel behind his head. Patroclus stopped for a second, his eyes widening before Sarpedon started to make his way back up onto his feet. Patroclus cursed in his head - he really didn't want to fight the principal's son, but it was that or be knocked out by the principal's son. So he took a deep breath before going in for another swing, his arm extending before Sarpedon could reach out his own, and in one fail swoop, Patroclus was standing in front of an unconscious boy.
"What did you do?" Hector's voice cut through to Patroclus, his hands lowering from Achilles and the latter turning around to face his boyfriend. "Did you just knock him out?"
"I - uh - " Patroclus wasn't sure what to say. In one way, it was self defense. In another, he had also swung at Hector first. And on another level, Sarpedon had kind of always been a dick.
"That's kinda hot," Achilles said, blood running down onto his lip, his eyebrow raised as he looked at the brunette.
Hector rolled his eyes. "And how much detention do you think that'll get you?" He pointed to the boy on the ground. Achilles turned back around to face Hector. He got close again, his time his reflexes faster than Hector's as he grabbed his throat.
"If you tell anyone that Pat did that, or that somehow this wasn't slightly your fault, I'll fucking rip your heart out and eat it. You are not gonna screw us over anymore, leave us the fuck alone, okay? I'm sick of this and I'm sick of fighting and if you or one of your little buddies try this shit again I will - so help me God - beat you up so bad you won't know who your parents are anymore," each word dripped off of Achilles' tongue with such venom that Hector didn't try to get away from the other boy's grasp. He eyes flickered to Patroclus from over Achilles' shoulder, then back into Achilles' eyes. Achilles let go slowly, his fingerprints slightly red against Hector's throat. "Do you understand me?"
Hector hesitated on his words again.
"I said do you UNDERSTAND ME!" Achilles yelled, his hand raising again.
"YES," Hector replied, equally as loud, his hand slapping Achilles' away. Hector motioned for his groupies to grab Sarpedon to put into someone's backseat. He began walking backwards then turned around to get back into his car.
Achilles walked over to Patroclus, who had started crying. "Hey, no, no don't do that - hey look at me."
"Do you know how much shit I'll be in if this gets out?" Pat said as Achilles rubbed a thumb over his cheek, the tears mixing with the blood coming from his upper cheek.
"It won't get out, baby."
"Okay, but if it does."
"It's not going to, okay? I'll kill Hector before that happens. I'm sick of the shit he's been giving everyone. Paris can deal with his own mess. Ag can find someone else to get involved in this, okay? For now you need to get home and tell your parents you fell down the bleachers while watching me run. Okay? You're gonna drive home and take a shower and call me and I'm gonna talk to your while you fall asleep," Achilles rubbed more of the blood and tears away. Pat's eyes moved to watch Hector's car leave the parking lot, three others trailing behind.
"But what if he hurt you?"
"Are you serious right now?" Achilles laughed. Pat laughed a bit.
"Yeah, I'm serious!" he said, now rubbing his own thumb under Achilles' bleeding nose. "Look at you."
"You have a growing black eye, babe."
"C'mon, your eyebrow is, like, split open, dumbass," Pat laughed as Achilles rolled his eyes.
"You're the dumbass, dumbass," he said, leaning into Pat's lips, mumbling the last 'dumbass' against Pat.
It wasn't necessarily pleasant, with blood and salt on both of the boys' lips, but it was the most intimate kiss the two had shared. In the middle of the high school parking lot, the sun still halfway up in the sky, both of their bodies aching from forming bruises. Achilles' hand found his way into Pat's hair as he slowly pulled away from the kiss. He rested his forehead against his boyfriend's.
"You're gonna go home and text me when you get there. And then you're gonna tell your parents you fell down the bleachers."
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a/n: i know, it's been more than a minute. life gets crazy. college is crazy, ya know? i still very much love this story and love my boys, and i wanna get more updates out, i'm so sorry for the slowness of it all. i tried to make this long for ya'll. i'm so thankful for votes and comments and messages. please don't be afraid to reach out and talk to me!!!! i'm always here to talk about life or cats or star wars, idk. i hope you liked this chapter!!!! love u!!!!
- ash