I Want to Face...

Wyn wondered what it was like to live in a house with a full family. He never had that experience and it seemed really nice. He watched a bit too much Brady Bunch and Modern Family to really understand what it was like to live in a house. Wyn fantasized a loving atmosphere that wasn't always get-up-and-go. A house was a safe place that provided stability and reassurance...at least that's what Wyn imagined. He lived in a trailer most of his life along with Megyn and Hunter. The three of them lived in different trailers that camped right outside of the circus tent. While the other two probably still did that, the world was changing. More and more circuses were closing down and replacing animal acts with something else. Less circuses were migrating and more were putting down roots. While many still preferred hiring circus families, the business was changing.

Wyn walked alongside Oliver. He kept his eyes straight and his attention anywhere but on himself or Oliver. When he was addressed, Wyn didn't bother turning. "Sudoku. They're logic puzzles. Passes time," Wyn replied bluntly. He wondered if Oliver did sudokus or even knew what they were. From his experience most people who did sudokus regularly were older individuals who bought daily papers or math nerds or something along those lines. For Wyn it was something to pass the time that required just enough concentration to keep his mind from wandering to darker places.

Another moment of awkward silence passed when Wyn decided that he didn't like the awkwardness either and continued, "Do you like to draw?" That was a dumb question since most people didn't do things like draw because they hated it. Small talk was hard when you didn't know anything about the person. Wyn hated this part of meeting people...the part where you had to actually put in effort to learn about the person through awkward conversation.
 
Sudoku puzzles. Oliver had never heard of anyone his age solving those just for fun. It was one of those things his mom liked to do whenever she came across one in a magazine or a paper but that was about it. He had to say that even if it sounded boring as fuck it was actually quite interesting to hear of someone just enjoying doing sudokus on their free time, it was certainly more interesting that walking around playing some random game on your phone to pass time as most people did. He wondered for a moment if it was tied to how much Wyn seemed t have wont to make this project was done properly. Maybe he was some nerdy math-wiz on top on secretly being an athlete,

Oliver let out a snorting laugh att Wyn's question, "No I fucking hate drawing," he said loudly, as if he was very passionate about it, "art, in general, is a disgrace to humanity and should be stopped at all costs," despite the overexaggerated nature of his joking comment he would probably be a good actor. He kind of liked expressing himself, at least when it was about things he wanted to express, and he wasn't afraid to goof around and look dumb, which meant he could take on roles like that. It came in handy when you read poetry out loud too. But he didn't do that as much anymore, it was another one of those things that felt pointless now. What was the point of reading The Raven in the most involved and passionate way possible if it didn't put a smile to his lips. It didn't matter if he had read it like that to friends before him, because he had been the one who mattered.

"But yeah, I've been known to like drawing from time to time," he said in a more pleasant and convorsational tone, "Sometimes I do hate it though, when you're not doing progress you know, but I think it's like that with most artsy things," at this he looked at Wyn and tried to catch his eye so that it would be clear that he was alluding to what he had witnessed yesterday, even if it was something athletic it was still something artistic as well so he figured Wyn would maybe be able to relate. But Wyn seemed hell-bent on not looking at him when they spoke.
 
Wyn was caught off guard by Oliver's sarcasm. By the time Oliver finished speaking, Wyn wasn't sure what was real or not. "Right. Yeah," Wyn replied as he tried to comprehend the conversation. He wasn't used to this type of conversation. Most people were more straight forward with him, but then again most people didn't follow him and break into an establishment. "When you don't see progress things get frustrating."

Wyn wondered what he could bring up next. He didn't want to talk about his aerial work because that would bring up more questions that he didn't want to answer. Instead, Wyn asked, "So what's your family like?" It was a simple enough question, but Wyn was secretly gathering more information. He knew that most parents would inquire about new guests and Wyn was already formulating his story. He needed to keep the general lie that he's been telling around the school straight. Lying was hard when it had to be drawn out for a long time. That and Wyn's lie was rather intricate that was based on information from movies, TV, and the internet. In reality, Wyn wasn't sure how accurate his story was to typical life.

Oliver's house was a lot further than Wyn initially thought. By the time they turned onto Oliver's street, Wyn lost track of where they were in the neighborhood. Wyn wondered which was his house was and how he was going to get home. He couldn't ask Lauren to pick him up, so he'd have to walk back before it got too dark. Wyn decided that he'd ask which way the nearest supermarket was so he could shop for the next few dinners. Wyn knew his way home from all of the major supermarkets.
 
"I dunno, not all that different than any other family I guess," Oliver shrugged, it both was and wasn't the truth. Technically they were a very ordinary family, the standard mom, dad, two kids, one girl, one boy, was what appeared to be the most typical family, or maybe not the typical but to many the ideal family. But then there were the additional facts of himself acting up to the point where arguing was a near constant lately, and there was the pressure of parents with prestigious jobs who wanted their kids to succeed at the same level as them.

They approached Oliver's house. It was nice. Big, with a well kept, although dying because of the cold, garden, a bit of a front yard and an even bigger one in the back. Placed in between two other big houses with well-kept gardens and big yards, filled with more ideal families. Only those where ideal families without a mentally unstable kid who didn't listen to any type of authority unless he wanted to.

"I don't think anyone will be home until later though, dad's working some big case and I think mom has a late lecture today," he said as he went to punch in the code to the front door, they had replaced the regular lock with keys ages ago. He felt like he had kind of revealed his parent's jobs without being too obvious about it. It was absolutely stupid but sometimes he felt kind of weird about being from such a well-off family. It wasn't for completely shallow reasons though, it was more that he knew he was privileged to come from such a home, yet he still had turned out kind of fucked up, at least according to most people.

They entered the hallway, it too on the bigger side, and very organized and clean. Though a lived in kind of clean, with Octavia's gym shoes lazily thrown close to but not quite on the shoe rack, and the shoes in the shoe rack having their pairs mismatched as someone had just quickly placed them there when cleaning. Oliver kicked off his sneakers and made sure they ended up piling up with Octavia's shoes just to annoy her when she needed them. He shrugged off his jacket and hung it up amongst the other ones as his mom would get pissed if he just threw it aside, shoes and jackets had different standards, apparently. He waited until Wyn too had gotten his outdoor clothes off and then steered the steps into the house, that he did not intend on giving the other a tour of.

"My room is upstairs," he said, the staircase was just past the hallway so there was no need to go through the rest of the house, even so, there was no avoiding the family pictures on the walls that made things a little more homely. They entered Oliver's room which was probably the room that looked the most lived in in the entire house. Which essentially just meant it was a huge mess. Clothes were strewn out all over the floor and chairs, the dark painted walls were covered in band posters, and drawings and sketches he had once been proud of but now couldn't be bothered to tear down. Books with little annotation post it's reaching about halfway through most copies were placed in various places in the room, as the bookshelf full of books was getting full. His desk was a disaster all on its own. One half of it had a desktop computer, but the space in front of it was currently occupied by a set of watercolours, a closed sketchbook and a myriad of strewn about paintbrushes and dip pens for the inks that weren't even all collected in one spot, but placed on different spots on the desk. The other half of the desk, which originally was intended as a space for art and homework had turned into a dumping station for half-filled sketchbooks, more literary books as well as school books.

"Sorry it's such a mess, I didn't actually plan for anyone to come over," he actually felt a little embarrassed, having a messy room was one thing but this disaster clearly indicated that it had been months since he properly cleaned it. He headed over to the desk and cleared the chair for the second half of the table of from any laundry, which he just threw on the floor and then pulled it up to the one by the computer so they both had somewhere to sit while they did research.
 
Wyn followed Oliver up to the large house. He started at the building for a moment or two as he took in the sight. It looked more like a mansion, but then again Wyn didn't have a great concept of what a mansion should look like. The open lawns reminded him of where the circus would set up the tent. Wyn wasn't used to seeing such a large open space in front of a house. To be honest, Wyn thought movies and TV shows made up the yard thing. Oliver walked into the house and Wyn followed. In Lauren's house he normally wore shoes, since she did. In his trailer, everyone left their shoes on unless they were on the furniture. Wyn took off his shoes and placed them carefully in line with the others. He then hung up his coat next to Oliver's. Everything was a bit mechanic as he followed Oliver's lead. Wyn kept his backpack close since it had his valuables in it.

Wyn followed Oliver up the stairs, but couldn't help but take a peek around the stairs. The house was so open and bit. He estimated that the kitchen and attached room was about the size of Laruen's house. As they walked up to Oliver's room, Wyn took note of the pictures strewn across the walls. They covered the wall as he walked up the stairs. Wyn wondered if everyone took this many pictures. Every frame told a different story. Some were obviously vacation pictures while others were at different events. Wyn tried to remember the last time he took a picture like that with his parents. For the most part, the majority of Wyn's pictures with his parents were promotional photos for the circus. Other pictures were selfies or action shots. Nothing really formal and they rarely had pictures made. Of course, they had posters, but again they weren't really family pictures. Wyn had to turn away for a moment as memories came back. This was the exact reason he kept his mind busy with puzzles, exercise, and homework.

Oliver opened the door to his room and Wyn nearly dropped his jaw. The room was a mess. It was covered with stuff both on the floor and on the walls. While many would be awed by the mess Wyn was awed by the amount of stuff. Despite living with Lauren for almost 2 years, Wyn was basically living out of a large suitcase. If you gathered the stuff on Oliver's floor it would probably double if not triple the amount of clothes Wyn owned. As Wyn thought about the amount of stuff Oliver had, he realized that he wouldn't want that much stuff; too much clutter. Seeing Oliver's room just made Wyn realize how much he liked his own life.

When Oliver cleared a spot for them to work, Wyn took a seat. He didn't have his laptop with him, so he was going to do most of the research on his phone, which he didn't mind. Wyn pulled out his notebook and began to pull up articles about WWI German soldiers. As Wyn researched he stated, "I really want to bring the Flying Circus into the story and the Fokker Scourge. So 1915-1916?"
 
As Wyn set down Oliver proceeded to clean up the desk a little so it was actually usable. Though cleaning up basically just meant moving all of the things occupying the area in front of the computer screen to the ever-growing pile of things on the other half of the desk. Before sitting down he started the desktop computer and headed over to go get his laptop, that way it would be easier to take notes and do research at the same time, though he realised a little too late that it probably was a bit excessive. At least his laptop clearly wasn't new, what with it being an older model and the back of it being covered with stickers from the same bands as on his walls that were starting to peel off a little on the edges.

"I have like no what the fuck you mean but sure," Oliver said, he vaguely recognized the names, but since he was a little embarrassed about not knowing what possibly was something basic, as he tended to mostly just know things he was specifically interested in, he googled before Wyn could get a chance to tell him, finding out through pictures rather than to look up the articles that popped up.

"Oh okay aircrafts, got it. So we're making him a German fighter pilot then?" he asked, assuming they were sticking with the idea of making him part of the central forces just to contrast what most of the other people in class probably would be making,
 
"Either a German fighter pilot or a soldier watching from below. I'm not exactly sure what you need research wise since you wanted to write the diary entry, but I'll give you some ideas and resources," Wyn stated as he scrolled through some more articles. He was extremely skilled at doing things on his phone since he normally did research on his phone at the circus. Everything had to be easily accessible and carrying around a laptop was impossible when preparing for a show. Also, Wyn needed to be proficient to prove Hunter wrong when they got into an argument over facts and information.

Wyn and Oliver continued to do research and make notes about different individuals and historic events. They settled on a German soldier in the trenches during the Fokker Scourge, a major event that occurred from 1915-1916. This was the first instance that fighter planes were used to attack the trenches and wipe out the enemy lines. Overall it was a gruesome event, especially with the introduction of machine guns and interruption gear. Wyn had his nose buried in his phone when he heard someone come into the house. He checked the clock and noticed that it was 6:30 already. "Hey man, sorry, but I have to get home. We can pick this up next time," Wyn stated as he started to gather his stuff. Wyn had his phone out already as he checked his GPS for directions. Lauren would be home around 7:15ish so Wyn needed to get moving if he wanted to make it back in time.

Wyn called up Lauren as he walked down the stairs, "Hey, I'm working on a project and I'm running a little late." Wyn, along with his inability to make eye contact with anyone, passed whoever walked into the house. "No, it's nothing crazy, just got caught up in research." Just as Wyn was about to hang up, he felt a hand grab his shoulder.
 
He was glad they had ended up settling for an onlooker in the trenches because that meant he could take inspirations from the poems by Rosenberg more and visualise things based on those as he wrote. He started to map out some key points they wanted in it, a lot of focus would be on the aircraft, but Oliver was making sure there would be plenty of emotion behind it as well. He wanted to portray the soldier realistically, a man who didn't know much about the planes, though he would probably have someone else explain the situation just so they could add some more of the research Wyn was finding. But Oliver's focus was less on the research and more on making the character intricate. He imagined a family at home, his journal entries letters he would never send but that he hoped would find their way back to his family when he didn't.

Oliver actually felt a little creative, able to forget the things that were weighing him down for once. So much so that he didn't even really hear when people started to drop in, but he realised people were probably home now that Wyn mentioned he had to leave. It was weird but suddenly Oliver almost wanted to continue working. This was the second time he had lost track of everything horrible when just hanging out with Wyn and as guilty as it made him feel it was nice to forget sometimes. He figured it probably had to do with Wyn just not knowing. He didn't know what had happened and he never even met Alexander, and had arrived at their school after summer break when he had been forgotten by anyone who hadn't been his friend. It was weirdly liberating.

But if he had to go he had to and Oliver just followed him downstairs only to see that his family very much were coming home at that moment. Wyn was almost promptly ignoring them, and to most, him talking on the phone would be enough of an excuse for that, and reason not to bother him. But not in Oliver's family. It seemed like the people who had just come in through the door was his father and Octavia.

His sister, with her long golden curls draping over her shoulders, and in part falling in front of her face that shared a ridiculous similar structure to Oliver's, but had a light dust of freckles and a tan remaining from the summer. Her eyes had the same grey colour as Olivers, and overall they looked very similar, just like any twins, the main difference was their natural hair colours. She was looking down into her phone while attempting to untie her shoelaces at the same time, so wrapped up in her world of fitting in and gaining popularity in her group of friends that she didn't even notice the guest.

Oliver's dad on the other hand, a man on the shorter side who had put on a couple of pounds throughout the years but still far from unhealthy, with the same head of curls as his children but kept shorter and more manageable, with the same colour as Oliver's natural colour, which was dark brown as opposed to the silver it was dyed. He wore glasses, a button up and overall looked very proper, while also wearing the warmest of smiles as he placed a hand on Wyn's shoulder.

"Leaving before we get a chance to say hello huh?" He said, his friendly demeanour didn't really suit his job in Oliver's opinion, but he was much different in court, "Who do we have here?" he asked, more Oliver than Wyn since Wyn was on the phone. though Oliver did not get a chance to reply as Octavia finally had looked up.
"Wyn?" she said as if she knew him, even though Oliver knew she didn't, but he supposed everyone knew who the new kid was, "He's new at school, what is he doing here,"
"History project," Oliver said, voice bordering on irritated but mostly emotionless, he hated how everyone acted as if yesterday hadn't happened.
Suddenly his mother peeked her head out of the kitchen, she shared Octavia's golden hair but lacked the curls, she was tall, slim with a pale complexion. Oliver had no idea when she arrived but suddenly the entire family was surrounding him and Wyn, which he had a feeling Wyn wouldn't enjoy.
"I didn't realise we had guests,"Oliver's mother spoke, a little quieter out of respect for the phone call. Her voice had a bit of an accent but the confidence of someone who not only was fluent in the language but knew all rules surrounding it better than a native speaker.
"It doesn't matter he's leaving," Oliver said shortly. Becuase his mother wasn't getting the kind of responses she wanted she turned to Wyn.
"Are you talking to your parents? If you're afraid you'll miss dinner you are more than welcome to join us,"
 
Wyn was frozen solid when Oliver's father addressed him. The hand on his shoulder reminded him of how his own father would get his attention or reassure him. There was something about the way Oliver's father addressed Wyn that made him think of his father. For the first time in a while, Wyn looked directly into the other man's eyes. They connected for a moment before Wyn tore his attention away. The conversation seemed to happen around him as multiple voices called out and chimed in. This didn't happen much recently since it was normally just him and Lauren, but in the trailer everyone was always talking over and around each other. Wyn was silent as he watched the conversation unfold, until he heard Lauren's voice on the other side.

Are you at someone's house? Did you get invited to dinner! Don't worry about me. I have a lot of work anyways because of tax season. Stay out. Just be back before midnight. Have fun!
​
Before Wyn could object Lauren hung up. He knew she was probably really excited to hear that Wyn was hanging out with someone from school. Wyn stared at his phone in mild disbelief as he tried to figure out what to do next. Looking around at the other members of the family, Wyn took note of Octavia, who he'd seen a bit around school. She was overly affectionate to certain people and a bit of the barbie type (hair and makeup always and dressed in nice, tighter-fitting clothes). Wyn wasn't sure about her and did his best to avoid her along with the group she hung around with. Now he was trapped. Next he glanced back at Oliver's mother who was in the kitchen. Her voice was pleasant to listen to and very welcoming.

After getting over the initial shock, Wyn gathered himself and started to analyze the situation. He was stuck in the house with this family and there was no escape. Wyn smiled to the family before looking back to Oliver for help. "Thank you," he replied with a hesitant smile as he put his phone back into his pocket. Wyn was gripping his backpack strap so tightly that his knuckles were turning white. This was his first time in a 'family' setting and not just with his aunt. To say the least, Wyn was nervous as fuck.
 
Oliver's mother shone up at the idea of Wyn staying over and she happily said, "If I had known someone would come over I would have prepared something proper, we've got leftovers we need to finish though," she said with a kind laugh, "Don't worry, they're just from yesterday though."

"You should introduce us to your friend," Antony said with a smile as the family moved into the kitchen.
"We're doing a project," Oliver corrected his father. He couldn't claim Wyn was his friend, he wasn't sure if he even wanted that to be the case and he was honestly almost certain Wyn did not want it either.
"Oliver, bete dig,¹ " his mother switched over to her native language to scold him without Wyn knowing what she said, clearly she thought he was acting rudely. Oliver didn't reply properly, instead, he sighed as if this was the worst chore in the world.

He gestured first towards his dad who was the closest, "My dad, Antony," then towards his mother who was getting a big pot of yesterday's pasta sauce out of the fridge, "mom, Malin," then nodded towards Octavia, who now seemed to have completely forgotten about her phone and curiously was looking over at Wyn. He might not have gained much in terms of popularity from being the new kid, Oliver honestly couldn't even say he had ever seen him hang out with anyone, but that didn't mean someone like Octavia wouldn't want to know more about him, "You know Octavia from school, she's my sister."
"Twin sister," Octavia filled in. At school, they often didn't know each other, amongst family and new people she always made sure to point out the bond that in her opinion seemed to make them stand out.
"Yeah, whatever," Oliver said, sounding slightly annoyed, but his tone changed to something more pleasant as he finished with, "This is Wyn,"

"Well it's very nice to meet you, Wyn," Antony reached out for Wyn's hand with a smile. As soon as the introduction was done they all got seated, Antony helped set the table while Malin heated up the food. The family, or at least three-fourths of the family talked pleasantly about mundane everyday things until the food was placed in front of them. Octavia right away went in to grab a serving, claiming she was starving after cheer practice. But Oliver's parent's attention was now back on Wyn, who Oliver had made sure was seated next to him. He could tell he was nervous, it was so easy for him to pick up on things like that after Alexander, and as much as he had been trying to force eye contact throughout the day he wasn' a complete dick, and knew it would be easier to sit next to someone he had at least talked to before.

"So you're new, huh? Antony asked, which intrigued Malin, they were clearly incredibly like-minded, their marriage was a happy one that fit the perfect house and the idea of perfect children, that they only had one of.
"Yes, please tell us, did you move here recently?"

Translation:
1. Oliver, behave.
 
Wyn felt a cold sweat start as he was introduced to the family. Trying to take note of everyone's names was a bid difficult despite the small size. Names weren't Wyn's strong point and he knew it. Putting his backpack down near the stairs and out of the way, but still in view, Wyn followed Oliver to the kitchen to fill a plate. He examined the food before putting it on his plate. Wyn wasn't a picky eater, but he liked to know what he was eating. After making a careful selection, Wyn took a seat next to Oliver. The rest of the family followed suit and took a seat. Wyn did his best to stare at everyone's nose for a good half second before looking down at his plate. Wyn collected himself for a moment before answering.

"This past summer. We moved in just before school started," Wyn decided the best option was to embrace the character he used in school...his cheerful, polite, and essentially TV persona self. Wyn was good at acting. It was a must for performing. This was a character he used rather often, especially in situations he wasn't fully comfortable with. "My father's on a business trip so I moved in with Mom. The school's nice and so's the neighborhood. So what do you guys do?" Wyn was going to manipulate the conversation and pull the attention away from himself.

Wyn wondered what language they were speaking. He didn't exactly like not knowing what people were saying around him, but at the same time he didn't really care. As Wyn kept the parents busy, he glanced towards Octavia who was staring at him rather uncomfortably. He gave her a small smile and hoped this would be enough to satisfy her. Wyn looked at Oliver and noticed how the air around him to cool eerily. Wyn wondered what Oliver was upset about. Oliver had what seemed to be everything yet he was obviously upset with his family.
 
It wasn't hard to tell Wyn moved the conversation on from himself fairly quickly. In a family full of people who would love to talk about themselves for ages, whether it was about the parents' careers, the daughter's cheerleading or the son's poetry, it was a little odd to have someone divert attention from themselves so quickly. But no one really complained either.

"Well I'm a lawyer, nothing too exciting," Antony said with a pleasant laugh, despite the entire family enjoying bragging a little at least the parents knew how to downplay things and stay humble.
"A really great one though, he gets to take on all the big cases," Octavia bragged for him, she certainly didn't mind the money that came with her father's job. Not that Oliver did either, but at least he had the decency not to want to purposefully shove it in people's faces.
"Aw, thank you sweetie," Antony said with a smile, and turned the conversation over to his wife, "the one with the interesting job here though is my dear wife,"
Malin smiled and swatted her hand a little as if to tell him to stop with the compliment, "It's nothing special either, I'm a college professor, and linguist,"
"So don't mess up your grammar around her, or she'll actually murder you," Octavia laughed.
Malin shook her head and addressed Wyn again, "So you're working on a school project, would you mind telling us, I always love to hear what assignments teachers come up with, and we don't get much out of this one," she teasingly nodded in Olver's direction. Oliver glared and put down the pitcher of water he had been using to fill up his glass a little extra hard, without any water spilling out, to tell her he didn't find that funny at all.

It wasn't like he kept his acting up in school and his clearly off behaviour a secret. But he didn't like how she pointed out how he hadn't been willing to talk much about what was going on in his life as if it was just a random funny thing. He had a reason for it and she knew that, but was pleasantly ignoring it because she wanted him to move on. And he didn't want to do that.
 
Wyn noticed the interaction within the family and it was painfully obvious that Octavia was bragging. Wyn decided to ignore it and listen as the rest of the conversation continued. A lawyer and a college professor...Wyn knew those two jobs paid big bucks, which made sense based on the house they had. Wyn wondered what it was like to have parents like these. He often heard that parents would go off to work all day and return home to see their kids at night, that their interactions were mostly at night and in the early morning. For Wyn that sounded horrible. Growing up he was always with his parents if not other elder circus members and performers. Wyn was always around a parental figure and was always looked after by someone in 'the family'. Being so close to everyone in the circus, Wyn couldn't imagine only seeing parents at night.

Wyn smiled as he took a sip of water. Looking through Malin, Wyn replied, "We're covering WWI and we have to create a diary of a fictional soldier based on real events and our own research. We decided to base our character on a German soldier in the trenches from 1915-1916." Wyn wondered if there was more information he should add. Glancing at the time, he knew he had to waste a little more time before he could make a daring escape.

As Wyn watched the family dynamic he was reminded of past dinners. Wyn remembered sitting at a pop-up table with several performers and a buffet style dinner. Everyone sat at long tables and moved around as they pleased. Alice and Michael often talked with the other adult performers while Wyn stayed with the younger group. Nevertheless, everyone shared dinner and the atmosphere was light and fun. Wyn missed having so many people around for dinner. It was lonely with just him and Lauren. His eyes softened a bit as he reminisced.

Keeping the conversation going, Wyn continued, "I'm doing the majority of the research and Oliver's writing. It makes sense that his mother is a professor given his aptitude for writing." Wyn did his best to keep the conversation on the project and Oliver's family rather than himself. It was better this way. The only thing that could go wrong is if Oliver brought something up, but it seemed that Oliver was in a bit of a mood, which reassured Wyn that he wouldn't say anything.
 
Malin smiled at Wyn's comment, because she liked hearing good things about her children. And with Oliver that was clearly a rarity. The most they got nowadays were calls from the school about him skipping, and calls from his therapist saying he wasn't showing up, and neighbours being annoying and telling them they think they saw him smoking on his way home. Always negatives. But wyn had managed to both praise Oliver's writing, without even really seeing all that much of it, and her for teaching him.

"I can't take credit for that though, I might have thrown a book or two on him when he was younger, but the writing he took up himself," She said, though she really had helped him a lot with his writing throughout the years. Whether it was proofreading or letting her meet her literature professor colleagues, it wasn't all him, but that was still the one thing she had said so far that didn't make Oliver feel like shit so he didn't object to it. His creativity was the one thing he felt like his parents were actually proud of him for, especially the writing. Sure he wasn't the best at putting together an academic essay but when it came to the creative writing he was actually decently talented. His mother, of course, had to continue, "I'll proofread it for you when you're don't if you let me," she was only trying to be nice, that'd be clear to anyone. But to Oliver it just felt like her encouraging studying because she knew Oliver would be failing a lot of classes if the rest of school the year played out like it had started.
"It's for history, not English, the spelling doesn't have to be perfect," Oliver said cooly.
"It will still make it look more professional, it won't hurt to let me look, it might even raise you a grade," Oliver stared at her for a couple of seconds, she stared back unwavering.
"whatever," Oliver muttered, because he knew she was right.

Then the conversation continued pretty normally. Octavia hijacked it and talked about cheer practice for a good chunk of the meal while Oliver grumpily picked at his food. At least his parents weren't pushing Wyn for more information now, because it had definitely made him nervous. When the food was all eaten the conversation died down into a, to most of the people at the table, comfortable lull. Oliver had no idea what would happen next, the fact that Wyn had stayd over for dinner was obviously weird enough to begin with, it was kind of clear that they barely knew anything about each other as they didn't ever really talk to each other, and most of Oliver's energy was spent being annoyed at his family.

"Did your mother say a time you need to be home?" Antony asked, despite the clear lack of friendship Oliver assumed they'd let Wyn stay the night if he so wanted, if that meant Oliver did something else than just mope, "We'll give you a ride if you want to stay longer,"
 
Wyn felt welcomed in the household, but still a bit uncomfortable. He wondered if it was just the fact that it was a new space and new people or if it had something to do with the fact that he wasn't used to this style of family. He watched as Malin commented on their project and how she'd love to review it before the boys handed it in. The scene reminded him of how his father would do the same whenever Wyn was working on a new routine. While the specifics were a bit different, the goal was the same. Parents always wanted to watch their children grow and improve as well as help them through things. At that moment, Wyn would give anything to have his father pester him about the new routine and give advice and opinions.

The conversation died down after the food was finished and Oliver's parents started asking questions again. "No thank you. I should be heading out anyways. Thank you so much for the meal and the company," Wyn stated as he began to gather his stuff. He felt like he already stayed his welcome since he ate with them. While he knew Lauren would be over the moon if Wyn stayed over night, he didn't want to. Wyn didn't need his nightmares or dreams becoming a problem...that and he didn't want to put the effort into lying early in the morning as they got ready for school.

By now the sun had gone down and the street lights illuminated the ground. The main roads were well lit, but the smaller streets turned dark a long time ago. Wyn pulled out his phone and checked to see if Lauren sent him anything. She told him to ask for a ride because she didn't want him walking home at night, but Wyn ignored it. "Thank you again for everything," Wyn stated as he picked up his backpack and headed for the door, "I hope to see you all again some time. Oliver, I'll see you tomorrow at school." Wyn said his goodbyes and shook the appropriate hands before heading out the door. He knew that Oliver's parents would be watching him from the door so he walked away like he knew where he was going. Once he turned the corner, he pulled out his phone and checked the GPS. It would be another 20 minutes to walk home. Since it was too dark to do a sudoku, Wyn put a single earbud into his left ear and put on some music to walk to.

Wyn waited in the front of his house for a car to pass by. When one did, he stood up and waved to it. This way Wyn could tell Lauren that he was dropped off so she wouldn't worry. Then he walked up to the house and unlocked the door. When Lauren heard the door open she was quick to jump on Wyn. She wanted to know who's house he was at, what he was doing there, who they were...the whole nine yards. Wyn gave her the information she wanted, but didn't go into detail. He promised her that he would tell her more tomorrow because he was tired and wanted to go to sleep.

Wyn got ready for bed and the minute his head hit the pillow he was out.
"Hey Wyn, did you anchor the fly-aways?" Alice asked from the 18ft platform.
Wyn looked up to his mom and replied, "Yeah, everything's secure. Dad you got the pulleys?"
"Yep. Honey, grab number 4. I'll lower you down," Michael called up. Alice grabbed the rope and Michael lowered her down. Once everyone was on the ground, Wyn went around with his father and checked everything one last time before their first show for the location.

The first show was always the most nerve racking. The crowd was starting to form and everyone was filling in the seats, while the performers were putting on costumes and makeup. Wyn was in the wings when he got called to perform. His mother would come down on a triple trapeze. She'd be in the middle trapeze while two ropes hung down on either side of her. There Wyn and Michael would climb up and join Alice on the trapeze. Wyn ran out to center ring and began to climb the rope. The cheers from the crowd were gone and the lights shone on him alone. Wyn looked around expecting to see Michael, but all he could see was darkness. Wyn kept climbing until he reached the trapeze. There he found his mother who was crying as she moved away from him.

"Why did you abandon your family?" She asked before falling backwards into the darkness below. Wyn reached out, but couldn't catch her. As he reached out darkness surrounded him. All he could see was darkness and he was alone.
​
Wyn shot up out of bed. He was covered in a cold sweat and breathing heavily. He was shaking a bit as he tried to calm himself. There was no way Wyn was sleeping any more that night. He checked the time. It was only 1:34am. Wyn exhaled deeply. He hated restless nights, but every time he tried to go back to sleep, he'd return to that lonely rope in the darkness.

Wyn moved through school pretty normally, but he was exhausted. Unlike most days, Wyn's hair was a bit of a mess and there were circles under his eyes. Halfway through the day he started to doze off in class. He got to world history and was out cold for the majority of the class. Mrs. Sheridan didn't say anything...she normally didn't say anything when students fell asleep in her class. Wyn slept quietly in class until the bell rang. Unfortunately, the bell didn't wake him.
 
The moment Wyn left Oliver's parents were on him. At first, it just seemed like pleasant conversation, parents wanting t know what was going on in his life. But they had encouraging tones when they asked him if he thought he'd invite Wyn again. Meaning they didn't like how he didn't have friends over anymore and wanted him to stop avoiding people as much as he did. Oliver hated it and answeres with an irritated tone which later just caused his parents to be mad at him, which led to another fight, though a shorter one than the day before.

The rest of the evening Oliver spent doing nothing, he just laid in bed until it was an acceptable time to go to sleep.

The next day school started off normal, but normal still wasn't normal and something always felt off. He wondered how long it would feel like that. He wanted it to stop. But he also didn't want it to stop, because if it stopped it meant he would have forgotten his old routines, his own locker first, then Alex's, the waling Alex to his first class and so on. He knew there was one sure way to stop it without forgetting though, which would stop the feeling like shit and the arguing too. There was always the option to follow suit with Alexander. Maybe when his parents couldn't stand him anymore, that way no one would miss him like he missed Alex now. For now, he just didn't look both ways when crossing roads, at least it wouldn't be an active decision if he got run over.

Something he noticed in world history was that Wyn was asleep. He realised it because he had the same position as he had, the crossed arms on the table and buried face. He had figured he was more tired than miserable, that just made more sense, then after a while, he realised that he definitely was tired. Because he was sleeping. Oliver spent the rest of class throwing glances his way, wondering if he'd wake up. Once again, Wyn proved to be a nice distraction.

One thing that Oliver found very amusing was that Wyn wasn't awake by the end of the class. Normally, Oliver would hurry to avoid Tess and Davíd but today he headed ver to Wyn. He crouched down and propped his arms and chin on the table, looked at Wyn for a couple of minutes, thinking he'd wake up by himself. He didn't. So he moved an arm and gave him a poke between the ribs, "hey New Kid," he said, "there are much better spots around school to have a nap,"
 
Wyn jolted awake and fell out of his seat, but not before whacking his knee against the leg of the desk. "W-what...what, I'm awake," he stated with his eyes still glazed over. Wyn looked around and found Oliver staring at him with a smirk. "Damn," Wyn said as he looked down at the floor and pushed his hair out of his face. Taking a deep breath, Wyn collected himself and stood. "I guess we're late for next period. Gah," Wyn yawned as he leaned against the desk he just knocked. He was too tired to say anything snarky to Oliver so instead he just gathered his stuff and began towards class. As he moved through the classroom with half open eyes, Wyn knocked a few chairs and desks.

Wyn knew that he needed to sleep, but he wasn't one to skip classes. If he skipped classes, Wyn would be singled out by teachers and students would take notice. The last thing he wanted was someone paying too much attention to him. The stress from a bad night and the lack of sleep put a toll on Wyn. He couldn't help but feel guilty about leaving the circus and his family. Wyn wondered if his dreams were a result of the stress from his therapist's urging to go to group therapy. The first meeting that he was scheduled to go to was tomorrow and Wyn wasn't looking forward to it. In the few minutes he took to collect himself, Wyn started thinking again. This was the worst thing he could do.

Standing with his back to Oliver, Wyn began to think back to the night that his parents died. He blinked quickly to avoid crying, but a rush of emotion flooded him. Wyn quickly wiped at his eyes as he started to cry. Using the sleeves of his sweater, Wyn dried his tears, but couldn't stop them. Realizing that Oliver was still there, Wyn ran out of the classroom and around the corner. He knew that a few of the exits were unguarded during the day so he rushed out of one and down the street. By the time he stopped, Wyn was in a small park that had been forgotten by the public long ago. Wyn stood in the park as he continued to cry. His shoulders were hunched over and Wyn held his head. All he wanted was to disappear.
 
Amused Oliver followed the sleepy Wyn as he stumbled out of the classroom. But the moment it was apparent that Wyn wasn't just rubbing the sleep out of his eyes but crying Oliver froze up. He had no idea why Wyn was crying but it was entirely possible that he had helped push him over the edge. He felt kind of terrible. Terrible enough to want to make sure Wyn was actually okay, so when the other just kind of started to hurry away, presumably to hide the tears, Oliver followed. It didn't really hit him that if this had been partially his fault, as he believed it to be, that probably wasn't the best idea.

Wyn seemed to have no intention of just finding a remote location of the school though, as he actually exited it. Oliver couldn't care less about definitely missing his next class by leaving school. He was just there to avoid his parents bitching about it anyway. Wyn, and thus also Oliver didn't stop until they were in a park, one that wasn't really central enough for people to be bothered to visit that if it was summer probably would have looked more overgrown but now in the cold fall weather just looked kind of dead and boring.

Rather than to say anything, knowing that it probably would come out as something snarky as normal he carefully placed ha hand on Wyn's hunched over back and slowly lead him over to one of the wooden park benches. It was clearly old, still a little wet from the rain that seemed to have fallen during the night and covered in graffiti. He sat Wyn down, and sat next to him though at a bit of a distance. He crossed his foot aver his knee and leaned back, quietly looking up at the sky for a moment, waiting for Wyn to hopefully calm down a little. The sky was gry, overcast with a layer of thin mist clouds, with no distinct shapes, just a constant grey. The weather finally matched his mood now that it was fall.

"you okay?" He finally asked, "I know I'm a little scary but I didn't mean to spook you that much," he added as a joke, trying to at least lighten up the mood just a little.
 
Wyn took a seat and felt like a small child being led around by a parent. Wyn didn't say anything, he couldn't. There was nothing for him to say to Oliver. Sitting in silence as he wiped his eyes and nose, Wyn began to calm down. He wondered what he could say to Oliver. There wasn't anything he wanted to say exactly, but he knew that he couldn't just leave it. The facade of a normal kid was harder than he imagined. "I'm fine." Wyn replied keeping his face from Oliver's view. He didn't want Oliver to see his face which was probably bright red and puffy. Wyn thought he had control of his emotions, but obviously not. Despite this, Wyn felt better after crying. He sat in silence before his brain was able to function properly again.

"I need to get my backpack out of my locker," Wyn stated absentmindedly. A lot of what he needed was in his backpack including his circus straps and rigging. Wyn didn't know what to do since he left school. Usually when people left school they didn't plan on coming back. Wyn didn't plan on leaving school, instead he left in a spur of emotion. As he thought about his options he wondered if there was a way to get back into school and get his backpack without anyone noticing.

Wyn turned to Oliver, "I need to get my backpack from my locker. If you help me, I'll let you come to the gym." Wyn thought this was a fair trade since he planned on going straight to the gym if he got his backpack. He needed an escape and the only thing he thought would help would be a good training session...maybe two. Feeling like a sad child, Wyn added, "Please." He was embarrassed, but knew that he needed help to get his backpack without getting Lauren involved. Sneaking out of school was one thing, but sneaking back in would be a whole new ball game.
 
Oliver was glad to see that Wyn seemed done with crying. Oliver didn't like the crying. He didn't like the idea that something maybe was wrong and he didn't know what or how bad it was, even when it was with someone he barely knew. He figured it was nothing though, the guy was clearly tired, everyone was prone to crying when they were tired.

He was a little surprised by the sudden talk about his backpack. Normally when skipping you would think of bringing your things with you, and if you didn't you could just get them the next day, it was no big deal. Oliver was about to say that when Wyn suddenly proposed he'd get something in exchange for helping him out. And he was clearly pretty desperate since what he was offering was what he had made Oliver promise to swear off. Which meant Wyn really needed his backpack. And since Oliver still was incredibly curious about Wyn's hobby he wasn't going to miss out on this opportunity.

And honestly, it sounded kind of fun to sneak back into school and then out again.

"Sure, sounds doable," Oliver said with a shrug, stood and motioned for Wyn to come with. They weren't that far from school but Oliver made sure to stop before they were too close, just so no one would spot them. Wyn could probably be seen as just someone walking down the street, but Oliver did not only stand out but most teachers knew he skipped on the regular. Even so, he felt like he had more of an idea of what they were doing that Wyn, who clearly wasn't the kind of kid who skipped school on the regular, "You know it'd be easier for me to just go in and get it," Oliver decided, "Just give me the combination to your locker and I'll be back out in like ten minutes,"

While it wasn't a big deal to Oliver, he assumed it wasn't a small deal for Wyn. He seemed kind of secretive, so someone he barely knew knowing his locker combination probably wasn't ideal and Oliver was essentially asking him to trust him with it.
 
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