Short Stories - Chapter 6: Chapter 6

It started in the summer after eighth grade.
A new family—the Mendozas—moved into town. Karla and Emilio Mendoza had been close friends with my parents, Mary and Bert Busch, in college, and the two couples reconciled quickly.
So when Karla and Emilio began searching for work, causing them to be away from home more often than not, my mom and dad were quick to offer my help in watching their kids—free of charge and, of course, without asking whether or not I was okay with that.
Which I found as ridiculous as it was annoying, because the Mendozas had a son my age, Aiden, who seemed perfectly capable of doing that on his own. But after spending an hour with his six younger siblings—most of whom were under ten years old—I understood why Aiden would need an extra pair of helping hands. Those kids were bat-shit crazy.
It was supposed to be a one-, maybe two-time thing. I found, though, that I actually didn't mind doing it too much. As awful as the kids could be, they were also cute and sweet and fun to play with. Not to mention, babysitting them allowed me to get to know Aiden, since there was a certain type of bonding that came with taking care of little devils together.
Watching the kids became a summer-long event—I would would go to the Mendozas' house nearly every day, and during those rare moments when all of the kids were asleep and not posing any threat of burning the house down, Aiden and I would sit in his room playing video games and watching old movies. We grew pretty close pretty quickly.
As a matter of fact, I grew close with everyone. Abigail, Antonio, Allyana, Allison, Ace—even Ariana, who was yet to reach a year of age. Mister and Misses Mendoza, too, who often invited me to stay for dinner when they came home.
They even offered to pay me at one point, once they found work, but I was enjoying myself too much to consider the babysitting a real job. And I was pretty sure they needed the money more than I did.
Though they hid it well, I could tell that the family was struggling. Packing up and starting over was hard for any family, let alone a family with seven kids. They were all such nice people, it seemed only right to help them out. Besides, doing so just gave me an excuse to hang out with Aiden all summer, which was perfect for me since I, a week into knowing him, developed a Big Bad Crush.
Fast forward two years, and we're starting the eleventh grade. Except we're not starting it together.
Ever since Aiden first stepped foot into Bay Lake High School at the beginning of freshman year, it was as if the entire school just gravitated towards him. He was lucky, having come at the beginning of high school, when everyone was a new kid. He was never the weird transfer guy. He never spent a single day sitting at the lunch table alone.
He got in with a group of popular kids, most of whom were upperclassmen. I never really understood why; maybe it was his outgoing personality, or the fact that he'd gone through puberty faster than most fifteen year-old boys, or his presence on half of the school's sports teams.
Me? I stayed where I'd always been.
The group of smart, privileged kids that stayed below the radar. We weren't your cinematically portrayed pimply, awkward losers that got shoved into lockers and made fun of in the courtyard. We weren't unknown or isolated or invisible, as the stereotype goes. We were just sort of there, friends with whoever we happened to sit near and approached every now and then for tutoring. We were your average teens with above-average IQs.
As it turned out, our two groups didn't really mesh.
It wasn't like we were the characters in some cheesy high school drama, where we stayed separate because it was some kind of social taboo for us to hang out. But Aiden's friends had their own style and their own lunch table and their own after-school plans, and my friends and I had our own—different—style and lunch table and after-school plans.
Aiden and I didn't have any classes together. We didn't hide our friendship, and there was no reason for him to fear "losing his rep" by talking to me—not that he would care if there was, because Aiden just wasn't that kind of guy. We talked whenever we did see each other around school, and I babysat with him during the weekends. Yeah, hiding wasn't the problem.
We were just from two different sectors of the high school social stratum, and those sectors didn't come into contact often. I didn't know his friends and he didn't know mine, and that worked to keep us separate. That was usually okay, though, because when summer came, I was at his house daily again, and we fit like puzzle pieces.
I was used to our system by junior year. It had never really bothered me before. Unfortunately for me, though, my stupid feelings for Aiden had only grown and grown since that first summer. After more than two years of being around him, it was almost embarrassing how much I wanted to spend more time with him. For the first time ever, the new school year brought along a case of Aiden Withdrawal. And it sucked.
•••
"I mean, why is she being so clingy?" Aiden groaned. We were in his bedroom on the Saturday after the first week of school; I was spinning aimlessly in his desk chair while he sprawled on the bed with his face in a pillow that seriously muffled his voice.
I rolled my eyes. As much as I loved Aiden—like, really loved him—I wouldn't hesitate to admit that he was absolutely awful with girls. He wasn't the most empathetic guy, and he had a tendency to hurt just about every girl he dated, though he never tried to.
"She's not," I said dryly. "You strung her along for half of the summer then went all radio-silence. You hurt her feelings."
"How?" He exclaimed dramatically, rolling onto his back to glare at his ceiling fan. "Seriously, Noah, what did I do? It's not my fault she can't handle it when I don't respond to her texts after two minutes."
"More like two weeks," I grumbled.
"You know what?" He turned on his side and met my eyes. "I'm done with girls. I just don't get them. From now on, Aiden Mendoza is a full-time bachelor."
I scoffed. "As if. You can't go a week without sticking your dick somewhere."
"I've got a left hand for that," he said with a smirk. "Besides, I just mean no more dating, you know. None of that wannabe-love shit. Hookups don't count."
"Whatever makes you happy, Casanova."
Aiden grinned. "I should change my last name to that," he mused. "Aiden Casanova. How's that sound?"
"Perfect for your future."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"It means I picture you on a pole in two years," I told him. "I can see it now: middle-aged women shoving fifties into your gold-sequined man-panties while you dance to Bad Romance."
"Shut up," Aiden chuckled, flipping me off.
"Oh Casanova, you're so much hotter than my husband!"
He laughed and got up from his bed so he could flick me in the temple—which hurt like a bitch, by the way. "You know what?" He said, grabbing the back of the chair and pushing me into a dizzying whirl. "Doesn't sound so bad. I like dancing, I like money, and I like MILFs. Might be the perfect job for me, actually."
"I'm so glad I could help you find your calling," I said dryly. "Your future is just so, so bright."
Though, if I was honest, Aiden would fare well at some sleazy strip-joint. He was suited like your typical jock—tall and muscular and obnoxiously attractive—and he blatantly displayed the benefits of having parents of different ethnicities. From his dad, he got the tanned skin and wavy dark hair possessed by many Colombians, while also snatching his mom's hazel eyes.
I would definitely go to whatever club hired him. Just saying.
"Did you hear a word I just said?"
I blinked and shook my head, forcing myself to rid my nasty little gay-ass brain of images of Aiden "Casanova" Mendoza in gold-sequined undies. "Absolutely not," I admitted shamelessly. "Be free to not repeat yourself."
Aiden chuckled. "Noah Busch, has anyone ever told you that you're a little bi—"
His bedroom door creaked open, and Ace's small face peeked through.
"—iiiieautiful person," Aiden finished with a cough, and I snickered at his not-so-smooth recovery.
"Why thank you, Aiden," I teased. "You're such a sweetheart."
Aiden made a face at me before turning to his younger brother. "What's up, bud?"
"I'm hungry," he said, patting his tummy for emphasis with one hand and sucking his thumb like a toddler with the other—which made it considerably harder to understand him. "Can we make something to eat?"
"You bet we can," I said, flashing him a grin. "We cooking or baking?"
Ace, despite only being five years old, was already positive that he wanted to work in the kitchen when he grew up. We couldn't make anything, even just simple sandwiches, without including him, or he'd throw a little fit.
He thought for a long moment. "Baking," he decided.
As we passed him to get into the hall, Aiden gently smacked his arm. "Get that finger out of your mouth unless you want braces."
In all reality, the Mendozas didn't need me to watch their kids anymore. The next oldests, Abigail and Antonio, were fifteen and thirteen respectively, and them and Aiden together were more than enough. I never stopped coming, though, and I didn't plan to. His parents worked weekends to make ends meet, and I'd be damned if I didn't come "babysit" every weekend that I could.
"Alright," Aiden said when the three of us were in the kitchen, holding the baking recipe book we always used. "Today, us culinary connoisseurs will be exerting our efforts towards making . . ." He shut his eyes, and Ace nodded excitedly in anticipation as if he'd understood a single word Aiden had just said. Aiden flipped to a random page of the book and opened his eyes, "Double chocolate chip muffins!"
Ace clapped excitedly, and I knew we'd sold him at chocolate.
I took the recipe book. "Ace, you're on ingredient duty," I told him, and he nodded dutifully. "Except for the eggs. And remember the rules—"
"No going near the oven by myself or without oven mitts," he recited, and Aiden high-fived him.
"Atta boy," I praised. "Okay, we need brown sugar, coconut oil, chocolate powder, eggs, vanilla extract . . ."
It was weird; before I met the Mendozas, I'd never stepped foot into the kitchen to do anything but get food or do the dishes. Now, though, I felt like a seasoned pro—at least at the process of it all. Aiden was still way better at actually making things taste good, and without him, Ace and I would probably open the oven to find lumps of coal where there were supposed to be chocolatey cupcakes.
It was a methodical process, fun and smooth, and the three of us worked like a well-oiled machine. Ace was one of those sweet kids who was just happy to be participating as long as he got to lick the bowls after. He asked questions about how everything worked, and loved to sit by the oven and watch as the cupcakes grew in their pans; it fascinated him every time without fail. It was impossible to bake with him and not smile the whole time. He was just a cute damn kid.
Until his devious side came out, as it often did. I turned around after placing the dirty bowls in the sink to be met with a face full of flour.
"Oh you did not, little man," I growled, wiping my eyes and spitting flour from my mouth. Ace giggled and tried to scurry away, but I grabbed the nearest spoon and shoved it into the Greek yogurt, and with aim that I was mildly impressed with, launched it at the tiny demon, hitting him square in the back of the head.
Ace yelped and, with an excited laugh, turned to make his counterattack when Aiden came up behind him and lifted his brother up onto his shoulders with a loud roar.
Then he charged forward, grabbing the bag of baking soda on the way, and pretty soon, all I saw was white.
I reached blindly for something, laughing triumphantly when my hand grasped the chocolate syrup.
Clearly, this was war.
The main goal of battle: keep the other party away from the eggs. Because once eggs are brought into the occasion, all is over for the victim. Sugar, flower, chocolate powder, yogurt, and chocolate chips went everywhere, and got in every place you wouldn't want them to get. In our hair, in our eyes, and, worst of all, something always managed to get under the good old pantalones.
I made a fatal mistake. I let myself get distracted for a moment by chocolate syrup that had dripped into my mouth, and Aiden raced around the kitchen island before I could even respond. He grabbed an egg from the carton with a triumphant yell and handed it up to Ace. I tried to get away, but it was hopeless. The egg came down on top of my head, and I felt the disgusting sensation of it dripping down my forehead. War was over.
"Alright," I said, nodding in defeat and wiping egg from my forehead. "Well played, my friends. Though I must say, two-on-one was hardly fair."
"Cry me a river," Aiden mocked, letting Ace off of his shoulders and giving his brother another loud high-five.
"What the hell happened in here?"
All heads turned at the voice of Abigail, who stood at the kitchen entrance with a hand on her hip.
"Sorry, sis," Aiden shrugged. "You missed the big fight."
Abby rolled her eyes. "This place better get cleaned up."
"I totally agree," I said. "And since the three of us would just make the mess worse walking around here, I guess you've gotta do it, huh?"
"Don't you dare."
"C'mon," Aiden said. "Look at your poor wittle bwother. He's filthy. It's my responsibility to clean him up."
"And I'm technically a guest," I added. "So it should be a priority to make sure I'm comfortable."
She huffed, but I knew she didn't actually mind. Abby was one of those freaky people who actually loved cleaning, and if we tried to help her, she'd just end up yelling at us over how we were doing it wrong. "Get out of here," she said.
"Love ya," Aiden said, and leaned over to kiss her cheek, but she put her hand up and leaned away from him.
"You are covered in syrup," she said, disgust obvious in her voice. "Don't touch me."
Aiden grabbed my hand and Ace's and hurried out of the kitchen, calling out, "Take the muffins out when they're ready for me!" behind him and earning some colorful language from his sister in return.
"Good lord," I breathed. "There are little ears in the vicinity."
Aiden laughed. "He's heard worse, especially from you," he said, giving me a knowing look. "You take my bathroom, I'm gonna try get the yogurt out of this kiddo's hair."
Which was how it pretty much always went whenever kitchen wars took place. I would shower in Aiden and Antonio's shared bathroom while he took his parents' bathroom and helped clean up whichever of his siblings had been involved. Afterward, I would borrow some of his clothes and throw ours into the washing machine—because he hated doing the laundry himself. Clearly, we'd done this before. Many times.
"I wanna watch a movie," Allison, in all of her eight-year-old glory, announced at nine that night. The parents had gotten back home hours ago, but they seemed exhausted, so Aiden and I had insisted they go to bed and let us hold down the fort for a while.
"Stellar idea," I said, because I was starting to feel pretty exhausted, too, and watching a movie was always the best way to get the young ones under control. I was bouncing two year-old Ariana in my arms, having just gotten her to calm down from a tantrum. "What movie?"
"I've got this," Aiden said, walking over to the DVD case and pulling out The Shining. "Perfect."
"Yes!" Cheered Allyanna, who'd just turned eleven and was rocking a new pixie cut. "Yes, yes, yes!"
"No, no, no," I said, snatching the DVD from Aiden's hand and placing it back in the case, swapping it for a classic instead. "We are going to watch The Sound of Music."
"Yes!" Allison enthused, right as Allynna said, "No!"
"We've gotta keep it appropriate," I insisted pointedly. "Besides, it's one of the few movies Ari can watch without crying, and I'm not ready to deal with that again."
"You're such a buzzkill," Aiden teased, playfully nudging my shoulder.
The corners of my lips quirked upward. "Please," I said. "You need someone to keep you in check. Where would you be without me?"
He slung an arm around my shoulders and sighed dramatically. "Sad, lonely, and wondering when someone would show up to fill the void in my life."
Even though I knew he was joking, I felt my face heat up, so I quickly gave him the DVD, set Ari on the couch, and disappeared into the kitchen on "popcorn duty". Crushes seriously sucked ass sometimes.
Five minutes later, we were all squeezed onto the couch. Allyana sat on one end, braiding Allison's hair, as Allison herself devoted all of their attention to the movie, her fingers clutching the little blanket that she'd been carrying around since before I knew her. Ace was curled up against my side, eating nearly all of the popcorn we shared, while Aiden sat on my other side with his head leaning casually on my shoulder. Little Ariana was sat in his lap, and she fell asleep thirty minutes into the movie.
Ace didn't last much longer. Even Allison, who loved The Sound of Music almost as much as she loved her blankie, dozed off eventually. Allyana left after some time to go watch YouTube videos up in her room, leaving Aiden and I as the only ones there still awake. We bent our heads close together, forgot about the movie, and spoke to each other in hushed voices as to not wake anyone up; it wasn't until the final scene had ended that we got everyone to their respective rooms and settled down for the night.
I texted my parents that I'd be spending the night, but they'd probably figured that much already, given that that was how things usually ended up. Aiden passed out on his bed the moment we stepped into his room—he was the only one of the Mendoza siblings to have a bedroom to himself—but I went to the bathroom first, using the spare toothbrush he kept for me and giving myself my usual, don't do anything weird, don't do anything gay, and definitely don't do anything weirdly gay, mental pep-talk before I went back into his room.
Aiden was one of those guys who didn't care about sharing the bed with another boy. He wasn't the fragile masculinity type. So it had never been an issue. Not for him, at least.
But I always felt guilty climbing in next to him. I never tried anything, and I did my best to never think anything, but still, it was weird. Not weird enough to make me not do it, though, because at the same time, I really loved sharing a bed with him. Even though we were on opposite sides of the mattress, I could always feel his warmth, and it was comforting.
Which was terribly gay, but I digress.
•••
I'd like to get one thing straight: I loved my friends.
Joey, Lizzie, Becca, and Peter were awesome. Just like me—academically inclined, ambitious, sarcastic. They understood me on a level that no one else did, because we had similar views and goals and plans and ideas. And they were funny and kind and loud when they wanted to be. From them, I got all of the benefits of having friends, plus all of the benefits of having a group in which I fit in. We dressed the same and acted the same and were, by our peers, often perceived as the same.
But god, they were driving me crazy.
I'd spent the entirety of sophomore year and the summer after as a fifth wheel while Joey dated Becca and Peter dated Lizzie. Then, in the final week before school began again, two massive storms hit—Hurricane Jecca and Hurricane Pizzie. Two break-ups, back-to-back. Which meant our time together tended to go something like this:
"Is that a new shirt?" Lizzie asked me at lunch on Monday.
"I've had this shirt for a solid year now," I said dryly, and Lizzie grinned sheepishly.
"Sorry," she said. "Guess I'm just noticing stuff more now."
"What, now that you and I aren't together?" Peter said bitterly. "Because its just so freeing, isn't it?"
"I literally never said that," Lizzie snapped, turning on him and whipping her blonde hair in my face in the process.
"Woah guys," Joey said; Joey was my best friend since forever, and was always the guy to try and lighten the mood. "Let's put the claws away, okay?" He said, and it seemed like he would keep the peace, until . . .
"That's rich, coming from you," Becca muttered under her breath, and Joey rolled his eyes.
"If you have something to say," he said slowly, not looking at her, "say it to my goddamn face instead of whispering it to yourself like a petty little—"
"Don't talk to her like that!" Lizzie demanded.
"How about you stay out of their business?" Peter said to her.
"I'm sorry, was I talking to you?"
"Finish what you were about to say," Becca sneered at Joey. "I dare you."
"Won't waste my breath," Joey grumbled.
And so it went for the next . . . Well, I didn't really know how long, because I tuned them out after about thirty seconds and let my brain wander. What I didn't realize was that my eyes would wander, too, and when they landed on Aiden over at his own lunch table, crowded with at least twelve people, they stopped moving altogether.
He was laughing at something someone said, wearing the varsity football jacket he always wore, blending in perfectly yet standing out at the same time. Three tables away.
Three tables. Yet two nights before, we'd been sitting on his couch so close I could feel his body move with every breath, then sleeping in the same bed.
The distance had never gotten to me before. But now, I'd give anything to take away those three tables.
"What're you staring at?"
I turned at Becca's voice. Everyone was looking at me instead of glaring at each other, so apparently the fighting spree was over.
"Just spacing out," I said, which wasn't entirely true or untrue.
"Well you should space out in a different direction," she said. "Stare over there too long and you might catch Hunter's chlamydia."
"How would that even be possible?"
Peter scoffed. "Anything's possible with those guys."
"What's that supposed to mean?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.
"It means," Becca said, "they're such a hot mess, their downward spiral will see no end and might even rub off on you. Those kids peaked in freshman year."
I glanced again in Aiden's direction and, feeling defensive for my friend, said, "That's pretty mean."
Becca shrugged. "Just being honest. I don't think there's an ounce of ambition between them."
"How would you know? You don't know them."
"We don't have to," Lizzie joined in. "I mean, just look at them. Half of them are stoners, one of them is preggo, and if you added up all of their GPAs, you'd probably get, like, 3.2 total."
"Okay," I said, rolling my eyes. "You guys have seriously got to get down from your high horses. Just because you're all rich and smart and know exactly what you're doing with your lives doesn't mean you're better than them."
"You're rich and smart and know exactly what you're doing, too." Lizzie pointed out.
"Yes, and I'm humble about it."
Joey and I exchanged a glance, and then he turned to the others and said, "Really, guys. Stuff like this is the reason those guys are at the top of the high school food chain while we're stuck in the middle. I'm sure they're probably pretty cool. Noah is friends with Aiden, so we all assume he's a good guy. Why can't we assume his friends are, too?"
Lizzie pursed her lips. "Yeah, you're right," she admitted. "I think all this sudden pretentiousness is coming from a secret part of me that's just bitter that they're all so likable and popular and gorgeous and shit."
"So damn gorgeous," Becca agreed with a sigh.
In my head, I agreed, too. Absolutely gorgeous.
Joey linked arms with me as we walked down the hall to our sixth period together after lunch. Now that we were away from my other friends, I said, "Thanks for backing me up, man."
He grinned. "No problem. Can't have anyone hating on your mans."
"For the last time, he's not—"
"Yet," he cut me off pointedly. "But if you'd just talk to him about it . . ."
"I'd rather lay down on the street and get run over by a slow-moving semi, or cover myself in bread bits and let the crows peck me to death."
"I totally get a gay vibe from him, though."
"And what about all those girls?"
"Beards, maybe. Or he could be bi. The possibilities are endless."
Joey was the only person outside of my family that knew I was gay. And I was happy to keep it like that, because he, despite being straight himself, had no problem talking about boys with me. I didn't need the entire school to know. Just someone to confide in. And since I couldn't do that with my parents—not that they minded, but that just sounded awkward as all fuck—he was my only outlet.
It was the following Saturday when I got to actually talk to Aiden instead of staring from a distance—and being caught by Joey while doing so.
"You know, I kind of miss you at school," Aiden said out of absolutely nowhere. I was helping him with his Physics homework, and he was supposed to be doing a set of ten practice problems, but from what I could see from glancing at his paper, he'd stopped halfway through the first one.
"Aiden," I said, "You need to do the problems."
"Damn, ouch," he said. "Glad you miss me too."
It was only then that I fully processed what he'd said in the first place. I was so used to him getting distracted mid-work, I tended to tune out his random comments.
If I remembered correctly, though, and hadn't just been gaydreaming—daydreaming—then Aiden had just told me he misses me during school.
I shook my head to clear it and save myself from doing something incredibly gay. "Sorry," I said. "I do miss you. It sucks that we don't talk more."
Aiden nodded, fiddling with his pencil between his fingers. "I wish we could hang out more. Like at lunch, or after school or something. Not just when I need you to help me watch my siblings or not flunk out of every class. You're, like, my best friend, and I never see you."
Some people might've chosen that moment to dismay at the blatant friend-zone. I, however, never wasted my time getting my hopes up with Aiden, since I knew he was straight, so the sting had gone away long ago. Now, I just felt happy that he'd just called me his best friend, meaning he felt closer to me than all of those popular groupies of his.
I nodded in agreement, but I didn't say anything else, again for the fear that what came out of my mouth would be incredibly gay.
"How're your friends?" Aiden changed the subject. "Still the smartest kids at Bay Lake?"
I snorted. "School-wise, maybe. But I don't think they know anything about, you know, being a teenager. And they can't go five minutes without arguing after all the breakups. Sometimes I wish I could hang out with you instead," I admitted. "I love them, but they have got so much stupid drama going on right now, and I feel like I'm always in the middle of it. It would be cool to escape."
Aiden raised his eyebrows. "Why don't you?"
"Please," I huffed. "We both know it doesn't work like that."
"Dude, this isn't Mean Girls," he said. "Or the caste system. The world won't end if you come sit with me at lunch."
"Isn't that, like, weird, though?" I asked.
"Why?"
I shrugged. "I don't know your friends. And mine might get mad if I ditch them."
"So get to know them," he said, as if it was that simple. And maybe it was for him, because he was so open and social. But I wasn't him. "And you said it yourself, your friends are being annoying right now. It's not like you have to drop them, or go through some Cady Heron transformation. It's just lunch."
He had a point. It would be nice to connect with some new people. And my friends were pissing me off. And I wasn't about to become a new person from a few lunches here and there.
Or at least, those were the excuses I used to tell myself that my real motivation wasn't the opportunity to spend more time with my Big Bad crush.
"Okay," I nodded. "Sure. Lunch. Now, back to physics."