Hiding in plain sight

[redblood]

(One x one between Redblood and @Nim)

"Don't worry. No one will notice." Erica reassured herself. Her stomach clearly didn't agree as it protested over and over again. It was too late to turn around though. Everything had already been planned out. Willow Creek's private high school would be her new school and home for the next three years, just as it had been her father's and grandfather's once. There was only one problem. It was a boys only school.

Her family had a tradition of sending their firstborn son to Willow Creek high school, but since her mother and father split up before a second child had been born, and her father still hadn't thought about remarrying, her grandfather selfishly decided to send the only child of the family to that school to make sure the tradition continued. Erica didn't get much of a say in the matter, and her father blindly listened to his father. If someone found out about her gender, she wouldn't just be thrown out of the school, her family would probably see her as a failure.

From now on, Erica would be known as Eric, and that wouldn't change for three long years. Her mother didn't know about it of course. If she ever got to hear that her daughter was forced to become a man when she had tried so hard to make Erica into the perfect lady, she would flip out completely. She guessed her father would lie and say that she was studying in an all girls school instead. Because lies never backfired.

Nervously she brushed a hand through her newly cut blonde hair. It was an odd feeling. She had never had short hair before. It felt nice, as if a weight had been lifted from her head, but at the same time, she did miss to be able to play around with her long locks. Oh well, in three years she would be able to let it grow back out again. Only three more years. A deep sigh left her lips. It would probably be the three longest most anxious years of her life. Erica put a hand on the door handle to the room she would live in from now on and slowly pushed it open. The test began now. Could she fool her roommate to believe she was one of the dudes? She certainly looked a bit too feminine, but with her chest tied up and her hair cut short, people should be perplexed enough to not assume she was one or another before her personality established which one was correct. Luckily she was in an all boys school, so it wasn't even up to her personality. Most people would most likely just think that no girl would come into the school, thus no matter how girly she seemed, they would just assume she must be a boy. But better not take any chances. She had to refrain from feminine behaviors as much as possible from now on.

"Excuse me for intruding. I'm your new roommate, Eric Brooks." She said, before even having opened the door completely. At that point she couldn't even be certain if her roommate was in there or not.

 

[Nim]

Looking up at the open sky, He felt relief. Finally he was here, at the high school he wanted to go to since he heard of it. Away from his annoying parents and younger siblings. Giving the sun a smile, Chase still didn't get how lucky he was. He turned to look behind him, seeing that his parents had left after he made it clear to them that he can handle himself. Picking up his bags, he begun making his way towards the school.

First thing on the list, find out what room he was at! The fact Willow Creek had its own dorms was brilliant. That was probably the feature he enjoyed the most about it. After arriving at the entrance of the dorms, he took a deep breathe. The smell wasn't the best there was, but at the same time, he didn't quite expect it to be the best smell. All boys school, after all. Finding the head of the dorm wasn't too difficult due to him being in the entrance hallway of the dorms, waiting for all the new arrivals to assign them rooms. Getting his room number and a key to it, Chase felt like one of his dreams already came true.

Having a light jog with the bags throughout the dorm, Chase got lost twice before he found his room. It appeared as if no one else had arrived there yet, but the head of the dorm made it clear all rooms are being shared by at least 2 students. Wondering how many people will be with him in the room, he placed the key in the lock and opened the door. The first thing that he noticed was the fact the room had only two beds. So only one roommate. That would make things much easier.

After going inside, Chase closed the door with his leg and then went to toss his bags on the bed to the left of the door. The room was very well organized. Each side had a desk, a spinning chair, bed, a simple wardrobe, one of the smaller ones, and one window which was in between the two beds. Upon checking the bed out, he found out that each bed had more space within the bed, and that in order to reach it, he needed to pull a piece of sturdy cloth to reveal it. Smiling at the fact there was a lot more space than what he thought there would be, Chase begun to put his clothes and other stuff around the room.

About 20 minutes later, after he arranged most of the stuff and put the bigger bags within the bed, Chase was in the middle of setting up his laptop when he heard the door open. It was his roommate! Jumping to his feet, Chase went to the door and completely opened it with a big smile "Hey there roomie! I'm Chase Atkins. Come in! I already claimed the bed on the left, so you can go ahead and take the one on the right." He said before taking a step to the side, to allow Eric to come in and then gave him a pat on the back "I hope you don't plan on being so polite all the time. Some of the guys here will most likely make you a target of their pranks if you do, no doubt about it. At least, I heard the seniors tend to make pranks on the juniors." He said as he then went to sit in front of the desk once more.

After closing his laptop and taking out a couple of Baseball trophies, Chase placed them next to the laptop with a prideful look. He then turned to look at Eric "So, spill the details. How'd you managed to get in here?" He asked.

 

[redblood]

The first test seemed to have flied by without her even noticing. He didn't mention her feminine face, and much less seemed suspicious of her. Though she wasn't safe yet. The longer they stayed together, the more chances he would have to find out. The first week would be the most nerve wrecking, after that if nothing happened she could probably relax. Though she would never be able to let her guard down. If she became too comfortable she would definitely start making mistakes.

"Pranks?" Erica mumbled. Wasn't that a private school for the best of the best? Were there really people acting like kids even in the higher classes? At least in her old school she had been able to stay with her girl friends when the guys became too immature, but now she didn't even have that escape. Sure some girls acted immature too, but not in the same way often time. Maybe she would be able to find a stereotypical invisible group and become friends with them, thus turning herself into an invisible person. If she was so boring no one payed attention to her, no one would even care investigate her.

"I guess I'll just have to stay away from the older students then." Erica laughed nervously. She did not want to become the target for some petty and childish pranks.

She rolled in her bags and started to unpack on her side of the room. Of course she had to be careful when Chase was there. She needed to find a good hiding place for things he shouldn't see, like her tampons. That would definitely be the hardest time of the month. As she unpacked her clothes, she heard a question coming from behind. It wasn't a big surprise that the question would come up. It wasn't easy to get into that school. There were only a few scholarships, and you needed to be extremely smart or athletic to get those. "Connections. My great grandfather was this school's first chairman, and ever since he stepped down, my family has continued to help funding this school. So history and money has given all the firstborn sons in our family a place here once we've gotten to the right age." It felt slightly embarrassing telling him that she pretty much bought her way into that school, but if she lied it would definitely show on her test scores eventually.

"What about you? Sport scholarship?" She asked. She mainly guessed on it because of the trophies. Not because she thought he was too poor for the school. Even rich kids took help from scholarships at times. If they weren't certain that their grades would reach up to the schools expectations, it was normal for them to also go for a scholarship if they were good at a sport or art. Well, scholarship or bribery, but the latter depended on the parents. Considering he had won prizes, he would definitely have been one of the stronger candidates for a scholarship.

 

[Nim]

"You guessed it. Got it thanks to being the top Baseball player in my school. I didn't think I'd make it, but when I was informed that they wanted me to have the scholarship, I was just so happy. Of course I focused on the regular studies so I could get here and still be at a good level. Only top students for a school such as this, after all." Chase said and leaned back a bit.

He then took a moment to more properly examine his roommate "Well, seeing your physical build, I assume you aren't in your top shape. But I'm sure this school will change that eventually." He said and turned to look at the celling for a bit "So, do you like any sports? Or should I just skip that and go directly to what do you like doing in your free time?" He said, turning his back on Eric and moving to rummage a bit through his backpack. After a couple of moments he took out a baseball and begin tossing it up and catching it.

While he didn't mind too much, he was a bit worried about being in the same room with a nerd. He didn't have any intentions of just tossing any attempts of being friends with Eric aside, but he figured that it was like most high schools. Sports team on one side, Smart guys on the other. And then it would often occur that the sports team would prank the smart guys, as odd as it was to him. But if that was indeed the case in this school as well, then it meant that being in the same room as a nerd would mean that making friends with others who got here through Sport Scholarships would be harder, unless they were in the same situation.

After a few moments of tossing the baseball up and catching it, Chase looked at Eric's back and smiled "Hey Eric, think fast." He said, gave him a moment to turn around and then tossed the ball at his direction. He didn't put any effort into the toss, so it would rather easy to catch.

 

[redblood]

Well that was good news. Having a sportsman as a roommate would probably make some people think twice before they picked on the girly student. At least as long as they were on good terms with each other, otherwise he might just be the one encouraging his mates to attack her. Of course it wouldn't make any difference among the older students. Few seniors listened to what a freshman had to say.

"I've actually never played any sport." Erica confessed. It wasn't that shameful for a girl to say, but as a guy she knew it would be a questionable behavior. Getting a nerd stamp would probably be a curse and a blessing. Most people wouldn't talk to her, so there wouldn't be many chances for people to find out about her secret, but some people would definitely tease or bully her, which wouldn't be too pleasant to go through. "My mom was a bit overprotective, and thought I would get hurt if I so much stepped out of the door, so I haven't been very active. Quite honestly, I'm more interested in art and music subjects." Of course she were. That was what she had been trained in since she were a child.

She was quite lucky that she had a name that could be so easily bent into a boy name, otherwise she would probably not have reacted when he called her by a different name. She turned around, but instead of catching the ball with her hands, she just protected her face and upper body with her arms while giving off a pathetic squeaking sound. The ball bounced on her upper arm and then fell down to the floor. "Sorry. I can't really handle... stuff, flying towards my face... Or any body part in general." Erica apologized, though even she realized there wasn't anything to apologize for, but for some reason it came out anyway.

 

[Nim]

So Eric was one of those 'rarely outside' types. That was a shame, but at least he had a good excuse. Lots of people have over protective parents, so Chase assumed that he could get away with it. The fact he was more into art and music subjects, however, was a bit odd "I didn't know the school even gave the option to learn music or art. Well, that only shows that the first day of school didn't even start, and I'm already learning new things." He said and let out a small laugh.

Getting up from the chair, Chase went and picked up the baseball "Well, Don't worry about it. Though you'll probably need to remind me that a few times, because I might not remember." He said and then threw the baseball to the bed. Afterwards, he approached Eric and placed his right hand on Eric's left shoulder "Even if you currently squeak like a girl and rather run than catch a ball, by the end of the year, that will change. Trust me, I'll make sure of that. Also, that was a very convincing girly squeak. You should probably try to avoid doing that in gym class or, well, in general. The other guys will be sure to give you a bad nick if you do it in front of them." He said and gave Eric a smile before moving away.

Opening the room door, He looked back at Eric "I'm gonna fetch myself something to drink. Want something?" Chase asked. In the meanwhile, he couldn't help but think about what kind of nicknames Eric would get if he was caught squeaking like that. Something that would be easy for them to remember, but still would be an insult, but not one the teachers could do something about. Squeaky Ericky was the only one that he could think of. Chase was never a bully and didn't want to be one, but he had heard enough bad names to know that even simple stuff can be offending if done in a negative context.

 

[redblood]

"It's far from the main focus, but there are some extra classes that can be taken for artists." Erica pointed out. Of course few would know about the art classes. It was just like a side project the school had. Most people would miss that part of the school's classes if they didn't specifically looked for it. Willow creek was mainly known for its great athletes after all.

She would probably remind him about her horrible sport ability enough times within the first week for him to get it. Even though she would get some art classes added onto her schedule, she wouldn't be able to escape the mandatory gym classes. Not without getting thrown out of school. She could just imagine how bad she would look during her first gym class. This time her mother wouldn't be able to butt in with a paper saying her daughter wouldn't attend class and then give them a check to make sure she passed the class anyways. Now she just wished her mother had let her attend those classes a bit now and then instead of being too paranoid to even let her raise a finger.

"Please don't set unrealistic goals for me." Erica told him after his little reminder of her screaming voice. It couldn't be helped really. She was a girl after all. Though she couldn't tell him that. "It will change by itself eventually. Puberty is just a bit late for me." She then added. It was kind of true. Her voice was still changing, but it would probably not become manlier. At least she hoped it wouldn't.

"No thank you, I'm good. I'll just continue unpacking." She replied to his question. Lucky, that would give her the chance to hide everything that needed hiding. Like her tampons and the bindings for her breasts. It would certainly be three long years. Hopefully she would be able to go through them without any incidents. Hopefully her roommate was the type to not invade someone's personal space, or drawers. There really weren't that many places she could hide them in.

 

[Nim]

Nodding after hearing Eric's response, Chase closed the door behind him and begun heading down the hallway. The dorms were filled with new people who were looking for their rooms, meeting new friends and just trying to get out into the fresh air, struggling to do so in the somewhat crowded hallways. He didn't have any problem navigating between all the people, and managed to find one of the few drink vendors in the dorm building. It was next to the entrance to the building, and after getting himself a bottle of water, he decided to go out for a few minutes.

Stepping into the fresh air was always a major change from the closed rooms. If he could do it, he would probably spend the rest of his life living in the outdoors, in a big enough tent, enjoy every day to the fullest. Suddenly noticing a football headed his way, Chase let the water bottle go and instead grabbed the ball before it hit him in the chest. Another guy approached him and Chase handed him the football. Afterwards he kneeled and grabbed the water bottle from the ground, and cleaned the bottle from a bit of dust that came onto it. If people here were mostly active like this, then he wasn't going to have any problem blending in.

After enjoying a few more minutes of just strolling outside, Chase went back inside and begun making his way towards his room "Chase? Chase Atkins? Oh man, I couldn't remember if you got in here or not!" A voice suddenly shouted to him. Turning around, he saw a smiling person, who was slightly shorter than him with ginger hair and bright green eyes, making him appear like the average ginger figure. Chase didn't know who he was, so he wondered where he knew him from "I'm sorry, but you are?" He asked plain and simple. He hoped he didn't sound rude, but from how the other guy approached him, it sounded like he might've not known who he was, but that guy knew who Chase was.

"The name's Alvin Furius, but just call me Al. And of course you wouldn't know me, seeing I was never anyone big in our school. But you! everyone in school knew you. One of the best baseball players our school had ever known! Oh man, when my parents managed to get me in here, I wouldn't think it would be alongside you!" Alvin said, make Chase feel a bit embarressed. People that were at his school thought about him that highly? It made him feel really weird. "Well, thanks for saying that, but I don't think I really was that much of a big shot. I just did what I love, and when you do that, you do it the best, you know?" Chase said before turning around and giving Alvin a wave "Catch you on the flip side Alvin." He said as he resumed walking to his room

After a couple more minutes he arrived at his room. He didn't bother knocking, simply opening the door, getting inside and closing it behind him "And I'm back! Hope you didn't miss me." He said without looking around the room to see if Eric was even in it or not.

 

[redblood]

Erica unpacked everything that needed hiding as fast as she could to make sure that was done once Chase came back. The last thing she needed was for him to walk in on her just as she put away her pads. Maybe she should have some kind of explanation for them just in case someone happened to notice them. With other words, if someone happened to be poking around in her drawers. The best alternative she could come up with, without revealing her true gender, was to say that she had a fetish. It would be extremely embarrassing, but not as awful as being thrown out of the school and be forced to meet her grandfather's and father's disappointment.

After she had put away everything that shouldn't be seen by others, she started to slowly pack up everything else. Clothes, laptop, books. She had left most of her things at home, like diplomas and trophies. She felt it was a bit braggy to have them on display in the dorm, though for some reason she hadn't even thought of that when she had seen Chase's trophies. There was a difference between cool sports trophies and geeky classical music trophies though. He would probably be admired for his, she might just be laughed at for being so girly.

Once Erica was done unpacking, Chase was still not back. "Seems like I didn't have to stress myself out after all." She sighed. Was he buying every bottle in that machine? Maybe he met some old friend on the way. That wasn't completely impossible. She opened up her laptop and logged in on the school's wifi. "Please have a descent speed." She mumbled as it connected. It was a rich man's school, so they should have top quality, but considering her former school had been rather high class, and it had taken ten minutes just to connect to their wifi, she wasn't very trusting towards any school's internet connection.

Surprisingly, it worked rather well. Some sites took a while to load, but most of it seemed to go smoothly. At the very least it wouldn't be any problems doing school work with it. The door opened and Chase came back in. "Oh yeah. I was completely terrified when you didn't come back. Almost called the police to report you missing." She joked.

 

[Nim]

Chase let out a laugh upon hearing what Eric said and then moved to sit next to his desk. He placed his bottle on the table and then opened up his laptop. After connection to the school wifi, which was apparently running really good for a school, he turned to look at Eric.

"So, I feel like if we're going to be staying here together we might as well get to know each other better. So that we won't be like some roommates who only greet each other and never interact with each other. I wanna know as much interesting deets about you as possible." Chase said and tried to estimate for a moment how much things a guy like Eric could have to share. He wasn't entirely sure, but he figured there had to be something. He grabbed his baseball and started to toss it up and down while smiling to his roommate.

"Alright, I'll ask a few questions and then you can ask me." Chase said and tossed the ball up "Do you have a girlfriend, what things you like doing in your spare time, what's your ideal girl, and most important for me..." He asked all the questions in a very fast speaking manner and caught the ball while looking at Eric with a somewhat big smile "Did you ever want to try any kind of sport? This includes any kind. Even the more girly ones." He said and then winked at Eric, trying to give him an indicating that he will accept any answer except for no. He had no idea if it had worked or not, but he figured that Eric will get something from it.

Afterwards he leaned backwards in his chair and tossed the baseball up, catching it each time and apparently listening to every word Eric had to say in response. He knew there were a lot of other questions he could've asked, but he figured that he could always ask more later on.

 

[redblood]

Erica wasn't too fond of Chase's idea about getting to know each other better. What was wrong with just being roommates that never interacted with each other? It would definitely make it easier for her to hide. Though trying to get out of it would probably be more suspicious than if she just played along with his little question game. She should probably keep to the truth for as many questions as she could, otherwise she would have too many lies to remember, and eventually make a mistake.

"Alright, but I won't promise to answer anything embarrassing or private." She told him just before he started asking his questions. There were a lot of questions to remember. Chase really went at it when he got the chance. "No girlfriend. I'm not particularly interested in dating. That can wait until I'm done with high school. Plus, there's quite a shortage of girls here. Might be hard to find one around here." So far no lies. She wasn't interested in getting a girlfriend, and she preferred it if dating waited until after graduation so that it wouldn't affect her grades.

"Ideal girl. Hmm... I haven't really thought about that." Now she couldn't do anything other than to lie, since she didn't have an ideal girl. She didn't have an ideal guy in mind either, but it would probably have been easier for her to imagine one if someone had asked her about that. "Smart, somewhat independent but still relies on me, shorter than me, cute. Oh, and I'm a sucker for red heads." That last one was true. She adored natural red haired people. Their hair color was just so beautiful.

"And then it was spare time interests, right? I like to draw and paint, though I do prefer watercolors, I write music scores and I read a lot. Especially horror stories." Erica did wonder if that would bring her further into geek territory, or if horror was a passable genre. Though it was books and not movies, so maybe no genre would pass.

"And lastly, no, I don't want to try any sport. At least not in a competitive manner. If it's just for fun without any pressure on getting better or winning, then I could think about trying out swimming, or badminton, maybe soccer, but I think the team pressure would kill me." Finally the questions ended. Now what would she ask him? She hadn't thought about that.

"Okay, my turn. Uhm... How many years have you played baseball?" She asked, as that was the first thing she could think of when seeing his trophies. "Do you play any other sports? Have any interests outside of sports? And hmm... Do you have a girlfriend?" There wasn't much else she could think about asking. She only knew that he was sport interested, so it was good to start there. Plus, he had asked her about having a girlfriend, so maybe that meant he had dated a few.

 

[Nim]

"Hmm.. Those are all very simple questions for me to answer." Chase said as he leaned back in his chair once more "I have been playing baseball since I was seven. So that makes it.. eight years so far. If you wonder how I got into playing baseball, it was thanks to my dad. He taught me the basics." He said and then smiled as he remembered the small games he had with his dad.

"I don't do too many other sports. A bit of basketball, I know how to swim well, and I also know a bit of tennis, but thats it. As for anything outside of sports, well..." Chase stood up, moved to his closet and opened it, reaching into behind his clothes and then took out a small portable console "When my friends aren't around, or if I'm sick or injured and cannot participate in actual sports, then I play the sports on this. I can also link a web cam to it and then watch others from the comfort of my bed. Someone from my old school taught me how to do it." He said before putting the small device back into the closet and closing it.

Sitting down on his bed, he thought about the last question for a moment "Truth be told, I never had a girlfriend. I did get a few offers and confessions throughout middle school, but I never felt the same way back. I guess you could say my love is baseball." Chase laughed for a second on what he said.

"So, you read horror books? Thats pretty sweet. My young sister reads those too. She says those are scarier than horror movies, because her imagination is what makes it so much more... how did she say it? realistic? She gave me some kind of a wiseass answer." Chase shrugged before moving to lay back on his bed "As for the swimming, I could help you out with that. I never tried competitive swimming, even though I was told that if I put more effort into it, then I would make one heck of a swimmer. One competitve sport is enough for me. But yeah, I could help you learn how to swim if you'd like." He said before closing his eyes.

 

[redblood]

Well, she hadn't planned to come up with any difficult questions either way, so it was fine if they were simple for him to answer. Erica listened to his answers and nothing was really surprising, at least not before he came to the girlfriend part. Someone like him should be rather popular, and still he hadn't dated a single girl? That was quite odd.

While she didn't have any experience with such things herself, as far as she had understood it, a lot of people dated even if they weren't very interested in the person simply so that they might see if they will become interested later on. His disinterest was probably better than sharing rooms with a womanizer though. It would definitely have been annoying if she had gotten the same room as someone who tried to bring in his girlfriends into the dorms all the time.

"Yeah, horror movies are pretty restricted. With books it's the readers own imagination that decides how scary it will be, with a bit of help from the author too of course." Erica said in agreement with Chase's sister. There were a lot of horror books that failed completely in their attempts of being scary, but they were extremely few compared to all the bad horror movies that were out there.

She cursed herself silently in her mind as he brought up swimming. It was definitely not something she could do no matter what. At least not while going to that school. Everyone would realize she was a girl for two reasons if she even attempted to get close to a pool. "D..Don't get me wrong. I know how to swim. I was taught as a child. We even had a pool in the backyard. I just don't swim very often, so it goes rather slowly once I get the chance." Erica paused for a moment before continuing. "I think I'd rather try out something on dry land if I take on any sport. I've heard that too much showering can dry out your skin and too much bathing in chlorine isn't good for you either. I get rashes way too easily." The last part was a lie, but it would be a good reason not to go into a chlorine filled pool.