Chapter Text
if boys were like essential oils, all rose water and hibiscus and melaleuca, karl jacobs thought he would be lime.
sharp and tangy, inedible alone but when mixed with the right things, everyone’s favourite.
karl was a writer, a poet, a rambler, or whatever fancy word suited him on whatever given day.
he kept a little notebook on him, tucked in his pant pocket, the bottom of his sweater pulled low over it. catholic school wasn’t very kind to dreamers.
karl liked to write about people. people, in his eyes, were poetry. contradictory, inexplicable, and so beautiful.
to him, boys were curved around the edges. all tinted in rose colour and looking at them was like existing in those moments when the sun peeks through the blinds of a dark room and casts golden light over the floating specks of dust.
and girls were poisoned honey, learning too young how to hide their venom under sugar and sweets. they were high kicks on the edge of a soccer field, and those moments in songs right after the beat drops when there’s just pure silence. they were simmering and beautiful.
some people were just more poetic than others, because karl’s journal contained stories about mainly two people.
quackity, who was all yellow starbursts and hot summer nights, a sky full of stars waiting to fall.
and sapnap, who was the smell of wood burning, evergreens and winter and getting drenched in water because you forgot your umbrella.
today was the first day of junior year, and karl’s tummy had been replaced with a washing machine. he was ready to vomit. he’d been going to this school since freshmen year, he should be used to first day jitters, but karl could swear his anxiety got worse every year.
he pulled into a parking spot in the junior lot, and took the keys out of the ignition. pulling off his multicoloured hoodie, he folded it up and shoved it into his backpack with a long suffering sigh. his hoodie was all sorts of colours, almost enough to be an eyesore. the yellow, purple, pink and orange hoodie with the green swirl on the front was a source of comfort to karl. something his parents had bought him a couple years back after a particularly long trip. he’d worn it religiously since, only ever taking it off to comply to the school dress code. most of the time he slept in it too.
over the years, the cuffs of his sleeves had become frayed, from anxious clutching of them with his hands. so at one point, karl took up learning to sew, using his parent’s money to buy himself a sewing machine. he liked the noise it made, the low rumbling echoing through his large empty house, making it seem less sterile than it usually was. making it seemed lived in, just like his hoodie was.
he liked worn in things, broken in jeans and t-shirts with holes in them. being an only child of an extremely well off couple, he never got to experience the joy of getting hand me downs, but he imagined it was probably the best feeling in the world, to get a box of preworn clothes and to get all dressed up in them and put on a little fashion show in the middle of your living room, just to showcase what you’d gotten.
everything karl got was brand new. stiff as a board, the colours not yet faded, empty of personality.
like this car, for example. he’d gotten it for his sixteenth birthday. or gotten it delivered at least, his parents hadn’t been able to make it, so they just sent a car instead. it was an expensive band aid.
he grabbed the strap of his backpack, and pushed open his door, getting out and slamming it shut behind him.
karl didn’t stop to check his parking job, knowing it would be over the line and once he saw it he’d have to fix it and it would take all morning and make him late to his class, and then when he walked in, the teacher would be forced to hand him a tardy slip, and everyone in class would stare at him and he would shrink under the pressure of so many eyes watching him and...yeah no, it wasn’t a good idea.
skipping up to the front door, karl’s brown shoes skidded on the pavement. the school issued dress shoes had absolutely no traction. they were just as impractical and bland as the rest of his uniform, a pair of grey slacks, and a blue sweater over a white collared shirt. even though it was august, and the leftover heat from july still hung in the air, heavy and humid, making strands of hair stick to foreheads with sweat, the uniform was the exact same as it would be in the winter. seasonal uniforms? we don’t know her.
he stepped into the threshold of Saint Calvin’s Catholic School for Boys, and immediately found some comfort in its familiarity. sure, he hated the place, but there was something to be said for how it never changed, no matter how many years passed.
the main hall was dark, a big chandelier hanging from the ceiling that cast yellow light onto the walls covered in original wooden panelling. his feet rested on an oak floor, this school was both old and rich enough to have been made with wood flooring, and not the bathroom tiling of your average public school.
he reached into his pocket with clammy hands, and pulled out the schedule he’d gotten in the mail a few weeks back. locating his locker was easier than he’d expected, it was right next to the one karl had had last year, which was nice.
after depositing his things into the locker in the most unorganised way he could possibly find, karl gathered his binders and books into his arms, and set off to find his first period class: religious studies. this was not going to be a fun way to start every day for the rest of the year.
pushing open the heavy doors - because doors that weigh a thousand pounds will definitely keep out the school shooters, sapnap thought to himself with a roll of his eyes - sapnap entered Saint Calvin’s, a grin pinned on his face. this morning, he’d practiced it in the mirror, imagining his mouth was an awning on a bulletin board, and he was taking two little pins and sticking them in the corners of his lips to keep them up. didn’t want the smile to slip, so he pushed them in as deep as they would go.
sapnap was what you’d call a “charity case”. his mother was a drunk and his dad worked practically 24/7, only coming home to sleep and argue with his wife. compared to the rest of the kids at this school, sapnap’s family wasn’t well off. compared to a regular middle class family, sapnap’s family still wasn’t well off. with barely enough money to put three meals on the table, sapnap worked odd jobs here and there, and did his best to keep his weekend job at old navy. if it weren’t for the scholarship, sapnap wouldn’t be going to this school.
yep, that’s right. he was a scholarship kid. but not a smart one. no, sapnap couldn’t string a math equation together to save his life. he wasn’t one for pretty words and fancy poetry. he was a footballer, a linebacker, not a poet or mathematician or fucking einstein.
so he had to work hard to keep afloat in school ( bad grades equalled no scholarship ) while performing in football and working multiple jobs. oh and of course, church every sunday, prayers every night, the usual religious shit. it was an understatement to say that this junior was under a lot of pressure.
he gripped the threadbare strap of his four year old backpack tight with one hand. it was slung over one shoulder, which probably wasn’t helping the fraying - he needed this backpack to last at least two more years, because damn, were they a fucking lot more expensive than they should be - but it looked cooler, and all the other jocks wore theirs the same way.
it was hard to look tough, and athletic in these uniforms that were designed to make every student look the same. but sapnap figured out a way to convey it, in his stance and the way he placed his hands, the feigned confidence with which he walked through the main hall, heading to his first class.
sapnap didn’t fit in with the rest of the students here at Saint Calvin’s, that was for sure. but if there was one thing he was good at aside from football, it was pretending. yeah, sure, his clothes were all hand me downs, but thrifted was the new style, hadn’t you heard? and sure, maybe he didn’t have lunch a couple days of the week, but that was because he was on this new diet, guaranteed to build up muscle. and maybe he never went to the parties the seniors on the team threw, but that was because his parents always had a gala or charity ball they wanted him to attend, not because he had to go in for his shift at old navy. trust fund kids didn’t work at old navy.
and so, sapnap was a pauper disguised as a prince. no one knew he wasn’t a rich kid like the rest of them, and it worked. it wasn’t like his parents would ever give him away, his mother didn’t care enough to attend things like open house, and his father was always at work on the night of his games. as well as every other night.
he strolled down the hall languidly, taking his time to wave at all his friends whom he hadn’t seen since the last day of school.
“hey dream, man, what’s up?” he asked, passing the tall senior in the hallway, and greeting him with an energetic high five.
“bro, it’s been forever! how was italy?” oh, that’s right, he’d told the team that he’d be in italy for the entire summer, to explain why he’d be absent for the entirety of it. in reality, he’d just found a summer job at dairy queen. lucky for him, the rich and stuck up didn’t really frequent crappy fast food chains all that often, so he never had to worry about his cover being blown.
“it was alright, dude. missed you and the gang though. they don’t really play much football in frickin’ rome.”
dream nodded understandingly. sapnap was willing to bet that he’d actually been to italy multiple times over the course of his lifetime. sapnap, personally, had never even left ohio. they were going to go to florida for his uncle’s funeral once, but his mother had gotten too drunk to drive them, and instead of driving them in her place, his father had gotten into an argument with sapnap’s mother, and in the end, no one ended up going anywhere.
“well, as much as i hate this fucking school, it’s good to see you again, sap.” dream said with a grin. “what’s your schedule? i hope we’ve got at least a couple classes together.”
“dunno. haven’t looked at it yet, to be honest.” that was a lie, sapnap had memorised it the moment he got it in the mail. “aw, shit,” he groaned, tilting his head back in annoyance as he saw what he had for first period. “i’ve got religious studies first thing. this year is going to suck ass man.”
“oooh, i wouldn’t want to be you. but, hey man, don’t feel too bad,” dream placed a casual hand on sapnap’s shoulder, “at least we’ve got lunch period together.”
“yeah, i guess so.” sapnap pressed his lips together, clearly still displeased. dream opened his mouth to say something, but was interrupted by the warning bell.
“oh, well, i guess i better get to class.” he said, “bye man, see you at lunch!” dream clapped sapnap on the shoulder one last time before heading off to whatever class he had first. sapnap watched him walk away, seeing him grab another senior - george was his name, he wasn’t on the football team, but he was a friend of dream, and always attended the games - and envied the ease at which he was able to wrap his hand around the shorter boy’s arm. dream was a naturally affectionate person, he never seemed to think too hard about touching people, not in the way sapnap did, wondering if people would judge him or take it the wrong way or think that his affections towards another boy might be anything other than platonic.
not that they would be.
but right now, sapnap mainly envied dream because he had religious studies first period, and dream did not, lucky bastard.
speaking of religious studies, he had to get going, unless he wanted to be late.
quackity was late. so, so, so fucking late. oh fucking heck, he was so fucking late. he pressed the buzzer beside the entrance, and waited, foot bouncing up and down, why was it taking them so long to unlock the fucking door? he needed to get to fucking class before they marked him absent and his abuela absolutely freaked about it.
quackity began to place bets in his head. would it be a “do you think your mamá would be proud of you if she found out her son had missed a class on the first day of school? thank the lord she is dead, may she rest in peace.” or a “oh lord have mercy, you take after your father, that good for nothing hijo de puta” kind of day?
there was a small click, and quackity was barrelling through the front doors, skidding down the hallway, ignoring the loud office secretary who yelled “no running in the halls” after his fleeing figure. this was a catholic school, quackity was pretty sure it was a worse sin to miss religious studies than it was to run in the fucking halls.
not that quackity cared about sinning. in fact, he thought of them as more of a checklist than anything.
quackity was a problem child, the kind of kid every teacher feared. he was loud, obnoxious, and knew how to work a crowd. his humour was abrasive and rude, but he took great pride in the fact that it was only ever self deprecating. he never mocked anybody else or put someone in the spotlight to bring out a few laughs. teachers hated him so much, and with the stunts he pulled, he should’ve been expelled long ago.
lucky him, his abuela had a special way with words. curse words. quackity took after her in that way. she’d cussed his principal out until he agreed to let quackity stay. the man had said quackity only had once last chance to prove himself, but quackity was certain it was a bluff. the old guy wouldn’t risk his abuela’s wrath again.
so basically, quackity had infinite chances, and he intended to spend every fucking one.
religious studies, religious studies, which classroom was it in last year? oh shit, they’d moved it again, he realised as he stopped in front of a familiar door with an unfamiliar sign beside it. ‘chemistry’. that was not religious studies. fucking school always switching the fucking classrooms on them. quackity cursed under his breath, he hadn’t bothered to bring his schedule. quackity hadn’t thought he’d need it, since he had all the same classes as last year. he didn’t expect them to change the fucking classrooms.
it took him another five minutes of sprinting down hallways, but lucky for him, private schools ran on the smaller side, and he eventually found the right classroom.