Summary: Gavin has had a crush on the schools star quarterback Ryan ever since his freshman year. What happens when the two suddenly become lab partners for chemistry class?
Warnings: None PG (It’s really just fluff out the ears.)
WordCount: 1,627
Being one of a handful of foreign students in a high school in the middle of Texas was never easy. It was made slightly easier for Gavin given the fact he was white, but it still was no walk in the park. You constantly felt like the new kid, like you never really fit it. Luckily for him, he had managed to make a few good friends his Freshman year.
Michael, the hot headed boy from homeroom who he quickly learned was the aggressively affectionate type. The two quickly became best friends, slowly adding onto their group as the year went on. First came Lindsay, Michael’s girlfriend, who was the group's wild card and resident cat lover. Last, but definitely not least, was Jeremy, the rising star offensive lineman for the school's football team who always seemed to have a different hair color every game.
In all it was a pretty good little group of friends. Sure he still missed his friends back in England, but these guys made it easier. It had been two years now, and the four of them were just about to start their Junior year. Gavin was excited, what with being one year closer to graduating. He was not prepared however, for the surprise that would meet him in chemistry class.
Chemistry class was one of the few classes with assigned seating, mostly because who ever you shared a table with would be your lab partner for the rest of the year. The last person Gavin expected to be sat down on the stool next to his was Ryan Haywood, the football teams starting quarterback. To say Gavin was panicking a bit would be an understatement.
It was fairly common knowledge that Ryan was pretty smart, when you were athletically inclined and had impressive grades it’s generally taken notice of. So it wasn’t that Gavin was worried he’d end up having to do all the work. No, the real problem is that Gavin had the biggest crush on Ryan, and Ryan was leaps and bounds out of his league.
The crush started shortly after the first school game Gavin had gone too in Freshman year. Being from England, Gavin wasn’t all that interested in American football. But in the interest of supporting their new friend Michael, Lindsay, and himself decided to start going to the home games. After that first game they all went to, there was a party, nothing to big or existing, just a bunch of the players and their friends taking over a local pizza place. Jeremy had invited the three of them along.
Something about the way Ryan interacted with everyone at the party drew Gavin to him. He was so kind and laid back, not to mention he had an adorable laugh. Gavin often kicked himself for not going up to talk to him that night before the crush really took hold. He never had gotten the courage up to talk to him since, but now here he was. Sitting at Gavins assigned desk, looking handsome as ever in his letterman jacket, reading some paperback Gavin couldn’t see the title of.
Gavin was nearly frozen in place, but when several of the still filtering in students nearly ran him over, he was forced to move towards his seat. He took his seat gingerly, and slowly started to pull out the book he would need for class. He glanced over at the other, taking in his features, his kind of shaggy blond hair and his steely blue eyes.
Ryan glanced over at him, putting his book away now, and smiled. Gavins heart nearly lept out of his chest at the sight. Ryan raised his hand and offered it to the other. “It’s Gavin right? I’ve seen you hanging around with Jeremy. I’m Ryan, it’s nice to meet you.”
Gavin raised his own hand to shake the others, cursing internally the way it shook slightly. “H-Hi,” He managed to squeak out, blushing and clearing his throat before going on, “Hi, yeah it’s great to meet you too.”
Ryan chuckles, a litting sounds that make Gavin irrationally happy a light feeling. “I’m surprised we haven’t met sooner, Jeremy talks about you all the time,” He comments idly.
Gavin feels the slightest bit of panic trickle up his spine. Jeremy knew about his crush on Ryan, had been pushing him since he found out to talk to Ryan. Did he tell him? Jeremy was his friend, he wouldn't do that….would he?
Seeming to see the distress Ryan chuckled again, “Don’t worry it’s nothing bad. Mostly about how you’re into filmography. Sucks there's not a film club in this school, hu?”
Gavin could feel his face grow warm as he silently apologised to Jeremy for thinking he’d betray him like that, and thanking him for talking him up to Ryan. He nodded shallowly struggling to get words out, “Y-yeah. It would be great to have a film club. But I guess I’ll just be content with making dumb videos on my phone.”
“You should show me those videos some time, if they’re half as great as Jeremy makes them out to be they’ve got to be pretty epic. I’d love to see them,” Ryan responds without missing a beat, practically grinning at the other.
It’s then that the bell rings and the teacher stands and begins class. Gavin struggles to pay attention for the rest of the class, to focused on trying to act normal. His heart rate feels like it’s through the roof and he can feel the warmth of Ryan sitting next to him. It’s very distracting. When class is over all the students start to pack up there books and head to the various places they’re expected next.
Ryan is finished gathering his things first and before he leaves he hands Gavin a torn piece of paper. “I’d love to stick around and talk some more but I’ve got practice. Here’s my number, text me later,” he tells him with crooked smile that Gavin thinks might be the cutest thing he’s ever seen. He gingerly takes the piece of paper from Ryan's hand, almost as if afraid if he is too rough with the strip of paper that contains the most important string of numbers in Gavin's young life, it’ll disintegrate.
He stands there with what has to be the dopiest grin of his life for a good minuet before frantically digging out his phone to enter the others number. He wasn’t going to text him just yet, yet, but heaven forbid he lose the precious number. Having to ask for the number again would be positively mortifying. With that done, Gavin left to meat up with his friends.
Later that evening Gavin lay in bed, writing and rewriting what was gonna be his first text to Ryan. Nothing sounded right, either too cringy, desperate, casually, or a combination of the three. He lay with his phone resting on his chest, glaring up at the ceiling, as if the textured plaster was keeping the answer to his dilemma from him.
He sat up eventually and picked up his phone, trying once again to compose an aproperiet text.
‘Hey Ryan, it’s Gavin.’
So far so good Gavin thought to himself as he continued on.
‘So this is my number….’
Ok no, backward progress there. How about….
‘How as practice?’
Good, good, showing an interest without being creepy. It just needed one last touch.
‘Looking forward to having you as a lab partner.’
Before he could psych himself out of it again Gavin quickly hit send and tossed his phone aside, face planting into his pillows. His face felt hot, and he had only sent a short text, three sentences for Christ sake, what was wrong with him. When his text tone went off he sat bolt upright, scrambling for his phone. The message was from ryan.
‘Hey, I was wondering when you’d text. Practice was good, thanks for asking. I’d ask you your something was but I don’t know what sort of stuff you do after school.’
Gavins was shaking, the amount of adrenaline coursing through him from a stupid text conversation was ridiculous. But Ryan was interested in what kind of stuff he did after school. As he was trying to steady his fingers enough to type out a reply, his phone went off again.
‘I’m looking forward to being partners with you too.’
And with that, all the progress Gavin had made to calm himself was gone. He flopped onto his bed face first and let out a string of high pitched bird like noises. It was stupid to be this giddy over a stupid text, but he was. Ryan was just as nice as Jeremy and his daydreams made him out to be. Even as he thought it, Gavin cringed a little inwardly, thinking he sounded like some love sick girl from a teen romance movie. He did finally manage to get a reply out to the other thought.
‘I dragged my friends Michael and Lindsay to the park to film this stupid idea I had. Do you know them?’
It wasn’t long before a reply came.
‘Not personally. Jeremy talks about them too thought. What was the idea? Can I see the video?’
Gavin debited for a few minutes if he should send the video to him. It was pretty dumb and immature. He finally decided against it, at least for now.
‘Just teenagers being dumb and immature. Maybe I’ll show it to you later.’
‘I’d like that.’
There conversation lasted for a little while longer, and when Gavin finally turned out the lights to go to sleep, he had a huge smile on his face. I had a pretty good feeling about this year.
Author's Note: So this is way shorter than I wanted it to be, and ended way sooner than I wanted it to. But your in luck, because I plan on continuing it with another chapter or two (maybe more, depends on how long it takes to get to the ending I wanted). Once all the gifts are posted I’ll be uploading this on my AO3 under the same title (username is TaraInNotRed). I hope you’ll check out the rest of the story!
