Do I Ever Get a Break?

Greg was annoyed again. He knew that he was being moody, he just had no energy to change it. No sleep, a bad mark on a test, his roommate's annoying friends, and Autumn cancelling their plans had all contributed to his current state of emotion. He didn't want to be happy right now. And if people had a problem with that, oh well. The noisy hallway was the perfect place to feel alone. So he sat on a stone bench in the fourth floor hallway. He hoped his body language screamed, "leave me alone." That's all he wanted. A moment of personal peace.

But being alone had never worked out for Gregory, especially this year, and this time was no exception. "Hi," he mumbled, hoping that the person would just go away.

Things weren't going so smoothly for the thirteen year old. Letters were getting misplaced back and forth between David and himself and he didn't have a phone to call his friend with. David knew that he went to a boarding school somewhere that wasn't close to where he lived at all. How were their letters getting lost? Riley tried to switch the owls he used so that maybe David would get his letters. But he wouldn't get a reply until days or weeks later. It sucked not being able to see his friend everyday like they had over the summer. Riley had learned more things about David in those days and he was incredibly close to his friend. In his hands he held a letter from David. He hadn't opened it yet and he was on his way to his dorm to open his letter. But he couldn't help himself, he took a seat on the stone bench that was in the hall. He hardly noticed the boy beside him as he ripped open the letter.

Dear Riley,

I lied. I had gotten your letters but I just didn't know how to reply to them. It wasn't what you said, I just didn't know what words to use. You had said nothing to get me to lose my voice but yet you said all of the right things. I'm sorry I lied about not getting your letters and the truth is they're under my bed in a shoe box. I should probably explain why I lied and what's going on.

Things are getting difficult. Way too difficult. Feelings are getting too deep and it's hard to escape the crashing waves of emotion. Can you tell I want to be a writer? I want to tell you something I wanted to say since I started talking to you. I truly like you, you have me questioning myself. I want to brush my hair and wear nice clothes just to impress you when we see each other. It's difficult to admit any of this since I'm taking a huge leap from my comfort zone. I do not want things to change for the worst but I just had to get my feelings across. I might not even send this letter, I might just write a new letter lying about getting your last letter.

If you do not feel the same way, ignore everything I just said. My imaginary dog ate your last letter. My mom thought it was junk mail and threw it away. I have loads of homework and I just haven't gotten to it yet. I'm a bad liar. In other news, I got my eyebrow pierced along with that lip piercing I was talking about. It hurts like hell but I'll pull through.

Yours Truly,
David

Riley's heart flopped around and pounded hard against his chest. This is what he wanted. He wanted this to happen and now he was so happy. He blinked and looked over at the boy who had suddenly talked. "Oh," he blinked then grinned. "Hi." He couldn't lose his smile no matter how hard he tried, it was there to stay.

It was a cheerful person. Gregory's least favorite type of person at the moment. Even after Gregory said hi, the boy kept smiling. The other boy had received a message of some and appeared to be having some sort of smiling conniption. Gregory was tempted to stand up and back away slowly.

Greg felt bad. This other boy didn't sit down because he wanted to have a conversation. And now Gregory would have to make awkward conversation.

"Um... Are you okay?" Greg asked. Obviously the older boy was okay. But even mental people could be happy. The fleeing option was looking like the safest. "Do you want to be alone, too?"

He hadn't meant to ignore the person next to him but he had and felt a bit bad. But he was just so happy with the letter he had gotten. He couldn't help but smile brightly, he was just so happy and he couldn't control the muscles in his face. His face was beginning to hurt a bit but he still smiled like an idiot. "Oh, I'm fine." Riley stuffed thebletter into the bag that he never went anywhere without.

This wasn't the proper way to meet someone and Riley knew it. So he turned his attentiom to the younger boy and held out his hand. "My name is Riley," he grinned. He looked like a first year and since he hadn't seen him before hebassumed he was one. He was probably the age of the brother he had never met but hoped he'd meet someday.

Greg still wasn't convinced that this other boy was a normal member of society. But the older boy seemed to be able to hold a conversation, and that was a good sign. Gregory was still braced to be ready to leave, if absolutely necessary.

When the boy introduced himself as Riley, Greg paused for a moment, hopefully not enough for anyone to notice. "Hi. I'm Greg," he greeted. "It's nice to meet you."

No need to get all worked up over meeting someone with the same name as your estranged brother, Gregory thought. it's surely a coincidence.

But he couldn't shake the thought from his mind.

"Did you get a good message from home or something?" Greg asked, wondering why Riley was so happy.

He suddenly felt like he was being Autumn. She never kept to herself and was all up in everyone's business."You don't have to answer that. It was a stupid question."

His heart pounded when the boy introduced himself as Greg. That was his brother's name. It couldn't have been him though, right? There were tons of guys names Gregory, it was a common name. There was no use getting worked up about it but yet he felt the need to say something about his brother and how that the boy shared the same name. He let out a small, forced, chuckle and said, "Weird, that's my brother's name. I've never met him though so his name could be different now." He didn't have a clue what his brother was doing or if he had magical abilities like him.

"Actually, it's from my friend," he grinned. He wanted to say boyfriend but he wanted to reply to David first. "It wasn't stupid, I probably look crazy for smiling so much. You just wanted to make sure I was okay."

Gregory didn't know if he wanted to even say anything about his own brother. It was an even bigger coincidence. It had to be. "Why don't you know him?" he asked.

"Uh... You don't have to answer that either," Greg backtracked. He had made a full transition into a clone of Autumn. Acting like his cousin was not a smart move. She had no shame or common decency ever. "Sorry. I've somehow contracted my cousin's bad manners and no longer know how to talk to people I've known for just a few moments. I don't even know how that happened," he half-joked.

Riley let out a small laugh at the boy telling him that he didn't have to answer his questions. It was only natural for humans to ask questions when they didn't know or understand something. It was a long story and he didn't want to share it with a complete stranger. "People question things they don't know, so I'm okay with the questions." What should he tell him? Just say it was a long story and leave it at that? That answer would get more questions am if hetold him the full story then he'd get even more questions.

"It's a long story, sort of like a fairy tale. But with more tragedies than happy endings and mother god mothers." His mother died, that was one of the main details in just about every fairy tale."Once we're friemds then I can tell you all about it."

Greg didn't know what to say. At least Riley didn't think he was stupid.

But it was still a weird situation. It didn't feel like a coincidence and it was starting to scare him a little bit.

But the little bit of information Riley told him about whatever happened didn't exactly line up. It was vague enough that it was plausible, but still equally unlikely. Greg didn't know much about his birth family. He'd lived with his adoptive family for as long as he could remember. He knew that he had a brother that lived in the UK as well.

"Okay," Greg agreed. "Once we're friends."