“Thanks, man. I guess I’ll have to get the rest somewhere else,” his older brother explained.
Timothy smiled, “Oh, I love that book. We read it in ninth grade. I’m shocked they are having your girlfriend read it on a college level.”
Noah grunted, “Yeah, well, there were too many students offended by it. It was mostly the tone-deaf interpretation being presented. Plus, they wouldn’t even let people read the entire book. Just the parts that they felt were important for test questions.” Noah still remembered that town hall meeting. This town was doomed.
The new boy dropped the smile that he always seemed to have on his face and just nodded, “How interesting…” If Noah were reading between the lines, he could tell that it disgusted him just as much.
Brick coughed, “I’ll see you at home, Bro. Or well, maybe I won’t. I’m working a double tonight. Later!” He winked and ran out.
“Your brother seems nice. You look like a slightly more muscular version of him,” Timothy said, kind of flirty, but it felt like a weird thing to be flirty about. At least Noah thought so.
“Yeah. He used to be more muscular than I was, but over the last few months, he has been stressed out with the baby on the way,” Noah explained. He wished that Brick had just gone to school as he had intended. Noah looked outside and noticed a bike. “Did you ride your bike here?”
Timothy nodded, “Yeah. My car didn’t make the drive over from the East Coast. It was a clunker. I’ll get a new one soon.”
Did Noah dare ask him this…? He was going to take the shot, “Do you want a ride to school tomorrow morning?” There he made the next gesture into hanging out more with this guy, this really hot guy.
“Oh, I don’t want to be a burden,” Timothy explained.
Damn it. Thought Noah, “No! It’s no issue at all. I can get you. I have to take my sister to school is the only issue.”
Timothy pondered for a moment; it seemed, “Ok, yeah. Um, here,” he wrote something down on a flier that was on the front desk. “This is my number. Just text me later on, and I’ll text my address and when I should be up to meet you. Thanks, man!”
Noah was trying to avoid having the world’s biggest smile on his face, but he couldn’t help it. He knew that they would be spending the day at school tomorrow to some degree, but the extra few minutes in the morning just felt epic. That was the word he was using in his mind. Epic.
CHAPTER FOUR
TIMOTHY
The more that Noah described Kansas, the less he was sure about this place. Yet the more he talked with Noah, the more he liked spending time with him. He was adorable in the most farm boy way possible. Timothy wasn’t entirely sure if that was considered offensive or not, but he felt like it was suitable.
He walked his bike into his new garage and parked it along the side. He then went in from the garage door into the house. Timothy walked into the kitchen, where his mother was making dinner. “Hey,” he said.
“Where did you run off to?” Ana asked. Ana was a typical Jewish mother. Overly protective, but at the same time, she gave Timothy a lot of space, or at least that is what she claimed. He supposed that in comparison to a lot of his Jewish friends back home, she did.
“I just went exploring a little on my bike. You realize you have sent me to a school that doesn’t give homework, right?” he pointed out.
Ana put her arms on her hips, “Well when I go and talk with your teachers, they will have homework for you.” This was typical of his mother. She wasn’t going to let him get away without studying, which is something she always did.
Timothy looked around the room. It was slightly larger than their old house. It wasn’t a terrible house, definitely on the nicer side of town. Yet, it was still pretty meh. “When is dad supposed to be home?” Timothy asked.
“Oh, I’m sure on the later side. He still is adjusting to working and what have you. We just have to give it a few weeks, and things will be back to normal,” Ana explained to her son.
Would things ever be back to normal? Connecticut was so different from Kansas. Noah had essentially made Kansas seem like hell on earth in a day. “I suppose we will adjust.”
Ana smiled, “So, then did you make any friends at school today?”
It felt weird to hear her ask that. That sounded like something that a parent would ask a child in a bad sitcom or something. “I mean, there are some nice kids in a few of my classes. There is this one guy who will be picking me up tomorrow morning,” Timothy explained.
His mother continued to smile, “See, you thought that it would take you forever to make a friend!” Ana explained.
Was Noah a friend? I mean yeah, he guessed. There was just something about Noah that seemed very weird but in a good way. “I’m going to go Facetime with the guys back home,” Timothy explained before he pondered the subject of Noah anymore.
* * *
Timothy’s new room was slightly smaller than the one he had back home. The closet was much larger, so that was a plus considering how much clothes he acquired over the years. He never really thought about how many outfits he had until he had to not only pack everything up but then unpack it.
The curly-haired boy sat down at his desk and opened his laptop. It only took a minute for the video call to start up with his two best friends from back home, Collin and Philip. They were all on the same basketball teams from the time they were five years old. Timothy still intended to go to college with them. The world could separate the three friends apart, but it wouldn’t stop their friendship.
“What up, man!” Collin screamed into his microphone.
“A whole lot of nothing,” Timothy explained to the redhead. “There is like nothing to do around here.”
Philip put on his very familiar, told you so smile, “Yeah, my aunt lives in Kansas. We kind of force her to come to visit us instead of the other way around. It’s just so boring down there. Good golf game though, I guess, but it is pretty flat.”
Timothy shrugged, “I haven’t gotten to explore very much as of yet. Possibly this weekend. I don’t know. Not a whole lot of people to go exploring with,” Timothy explained as he once again thought about Noah. He needed to stop thinking about Noah.
“So, any potential new girlfriends out there?” Phillip obnoxiously asked.
“Eh, not that I can see… It seems like everyone is paired up rather well down here already,” Timothy explained.
“Tara is still taking it pretty hard,” Collin frowned.
Tara Milton. Timothy and Tara had been together since fifth grade off and on, but more times on. He loved her, but he loved the concept more than the execution of her. In many ways, she was the fourth member of the group of friends. She wasn’t really a traditional girlfriend. Yet, she was. “Yeah, I’ve texted a little bit with her. I don’t know….”