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adorethedistance · 4 years ago

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Chapter 4: Under Pressure - JJ Maybank x Reader

Photo credit: Me again. This time I made more of a Y/n x JJ lifestyle aesthetic with two of the pictures directly correlating with the chapter.

Warnings: swearing, mentions of murder, mentions of noncon touches

Words: 2262

Previously in part 3: Your detention slip and now permanent record may both read ‘abuser of hate speech’; on top of that JJ ditched the detention that you were meant to spend together. With mom working late, it’s easy to buckle down and finish homework, until that neglected plant on the fire escape distracts you from the task at hand. In hopes of revitalising the creature, you took a trip to your apartment’s rooftop only to find Spiderman had been watching your every move. Just like JJ, he ducked out of the scene without a trace.

MESSAGES:

Y/n/n: I’m already outside of Osborn’s. I don’t wanna go in alone the door is closed

Y/n/n: Hello??

Read 12:18 AM

Still no response. I can’t remember the last time JJ has read a text and not contacted at least one of the pogues. Mrs. Kasmos’s advice on male puberty re enters my head and I can’t help feeling relieved but also disappointed. Is this how things are going to be now? I can’t imagine losing JJ, especially over something as simple as the bulk of puberty.

The various possible explanations run through my mind as I walk to school. When I get there, JJ will just explain everything and then we’ll all understand and things will go back to the way they were. I have no reason to be anxious so why should I be anxious?… because that’s how anxiety works. I guess.

__________________________

“Who decided our meeting spot would be outside during the winter?” I ask approaching the group as they greet me with tired, closed-mouth smiles.

“Y/n, you have to try this,” Pope says, handing me a thick rectangle wrapped in Hubba Bubba paper.

“The fuck is this?”

“It’s Dr. Pepper gum.”

“Where did you find this?”

“I found it in the gas station where I got my breakfast burrito,” John B chimes in with his mouth half full.

“But I just brushed my teeth!”

“Just eat it!”

“Okay, okay. This is peer pressure, I’m gonna put you guys in the bullying box,” I say unwrapping the brick of gum. I hesitate to eat it as the entire group is watching me in anticipation. I place it on my tongue for a moment before deciding to chew the whole piece.

“Yo, what the fuck?” I say in awe of the confectionary. “How did they do that?” The group laughs at my obvious bewilderment, causing me to laugh. I unnecessarily chew harder into the gum to figure out the experience I’m having.

“That’s amazing. Has JJ tried it yet?” I ask before realizing he’s nowhere in sight. “Wait where is JJ?”

“You tell me, he’d reach out to you before any of us,” Kie says looking amongst the group.

“No way. You’ve been best friends since 3rd grade, I’m sure he’d contact you, John B,” I say unaware of my own denial.

“Yeah, but he likes you more.”

“JJ doesn’t like me more that’s...” I trail off in realization. Does JJ like me more? I mean we’ve always sort of been on a different rhythm from everyone else but that doesn’t necessarily mean we’re closer, right? “I mean he read my texts from yesterday at like 12 AM, but he didn’t respond. What do y’all think happened?”

The group expresses uniform confusion and discomfort.

“It might’ve just been another run in with his dad. A really bad one,” Pope points out before blowing a bubble from his Dr. Pepper gum. The bubble pulls John B and Sarah from the moment and they begin to talk about the gum as they had been before I arrived.

“Hey,” Kie rests a hand on my bicep. “I’m sure everything is fine. JJ’s a tough kid, he can take care of himself,” she says softly so as to not draw attention to our sidebar.

“Yeah. It’s JJ...” I shrug. He’s fine, I’m sure of it.

__________________________

The monotony of ordinary is deafening here at Queens High. We have a new project in English for narrative writing and I can’t be bothered to start any time soon. As we learned today in APUSH, Abraham Lincoln is still racist and still dead. I’m really not sure what’s happening in Precalc because it stopped making sense once we entered the second unit that was no longer review. I wonder how physics will undoubtedly add to the workload. On top of that, JJ isn’t even here for me to write notes to.

I remember this one day, when we were learning about projectiles, JJ drew Mr. Osborn as a goat and we had to stay quiet but we were laughing way too hard. He blacklisted us from that day forward, the only difference between me and JJ being I have good grades. JJ is a permanent member of the shitlist since his homework doesn’t make up for the goofing off.

I take a deep breath before walking into Osborn’s classroom. Everyone in the room is looking at me as I come in, alone. Usually I don’t notice any staring because all I see is JJ. We’ll come in laughing at whatever stupid joke he’s made and take our seats louder than Osborn would prefer. The room is silent today and looking to the front I see why.

Osborn is nowhere to be seen.

Instead it’s Ms. Tolpher, a well known substitute on campus who has a shorter than normal attention span. It’s an odd thing to notice, but very noticeable nonetheless. She smiles as she catches my gaze and I offer the fakest, politest smile I can muster as I think about JJ.

“Hi everyone, I’m Ms. Tolpher. Your teacher’s only instructions were to ‘finish last night's homework because I know more than half of you didn’t do it’” she reads off of a piece of white printer paper. Wonderful. I can use this time to work on all the assignments I have for my other classes. I’m gonna grind now and be absolutely scott-free after school.

__________________________

Running a fork over the full container of salad I brought for lunch today, I realize just how not hungry I am. I see a deformed piece of lettuce and I can’t help but think of this one day where I had brought in a salad for lunch, and JJ made fun of me for eating healthy. I pretended I was offended but we both were able to laugh. Upon opening the container I saw that all the leaves were wilted and the hard boiled egg had gone green. JJ then said it was instant karma for trying to deny my tastebuds any sort of enjoyment, and with his signature grin, he split his sandwich with me and gave me his vending machine bag of Cheez-It’s.

“Hey.” My head snaps up as I’m pulled from the memory, and I see Pope waving a hand in front of my face. “You good?”

I nod immediately on instinct before realizing I didn’t want to have a break down in front of the entire cafeteria.

“Yeah, I just need some air,” I say, standing from the plastic bench and leaving the mess hall. The cool metal of the pushbar causes me to shiver and my desire to be alone grows infinitely larger.

It’s all becoming too much: the homework, the projects, college applications, JJ is missing, I don’t want to stress out my friends, I haven't seen my mom for more than 10 minutes this week, and-

“Y/n!”

I turn back to see Pope followed me out of the cafeteria, and is now jogging to catch up with me. Once he’s standing in front of me, panting, he notices the tears welling up in my eyes. I blink them back down with a sniffle but Pope isn’t fooled.

“Hey, what’s wrong?”

“I-” my voice threatens to break underneath me and I pause to take a deep breath to stabilize my emotional state. “I’m just really stressed out right now.” He nods in complete understanding. If anyone knows the stress of family issues, school, and friends--it’s Pope.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“It’s a lot, I mean school work and my mom and… JJ,” as I finish my sentence Pope tenses up, and his eyes widen slightly. After a moment he responds,

“Uh. Well, that’s only 3 things,” he offers positively. I breathe out a laugh before he continues. “I mean JJ is probably fine. He’s tough and street smart and he knows New York.”

“What?”

“What do you mean he knows New York?”

“Just in general, so if he’s not at home he’s gonna be okay.” Brushing a stray strand of hair out of my face, I let out a frustrated sigh.

“Pope, what the hell are you talking about?”

“I don’t know! I’m just saying if JJ were out in the city he’d be fine, but I’m sure he’s probably just at home because he’s tired or something,” Pope finishes, flustered.

JJ wouldn’t miss school just because he’s tired. He wouldn’t.

“You’re probably right. I’m just anxious- thanks for all the reassurance Pope.”

__________________________

“I’m not gonna waste time shotlisting if I’m just using found footage!” I whisper to myself as I read through the project requirements. Behind me I hear my friend, An, laugh. “Sorry, I’m just thinking out loud for no reason.”

“It’s cool,” he says before putting his headphones back on only one ear.

Turning my attention back to my project, I realize I need my external hard drive to import some footage I downloaded when I was working on the film at home. I run my hand along the warm metal of the back of the computer to feel for the USB port, and plug in the drive.

The footage of Spiderman is all embedded in full length youtube videos from social media news outlets, so I’ll be spending a lot of time cropping. I’ll be spending even more time downloading all of these ten minute videos to the dinosaur that our school calls a computer.

I realize importing all of the videos will take the entire class period, so I lean back into my chair, getting comfortable.

In the meantime, I turn towards An and look at his screen.

“What are you working on?” He offers me his headphones before scrolling back to the beginning of the video and pressing play. It’s a break from his usual noir films and instead, a spaghetti western complete with Nerf guns. He’s a self described ‘Vietnamese Sergio Leone’.

“Very cool. I like your westerns, your editing style works well with the genre,” I say, handing back the headphones. An thanks me and follows my gaze back to my own computer. The footage is still downloading.

Entering the drive on my desktop, I see a folder titled ‘portrait of JJ’. I forgot about this.

“Who’s that? Is it the guy you’re always with?” I hear An ask from over my shoulder. His observation makes me blush.

“That’s my best friend JJ. This past summer I decided I wanted to make a documentary about him and I’ve been compiling footage of him ever since,” I explain quickly as An surveys the video playing on my desktop. It’s one of JJ and I at the pier with our friends. He’s eating ice cream and trying to wipe his messy hand on my t-shirt. The audio in my headphones is a mixture of our laughter as he tries to catch me but he doesn’t want to drop his ice cream.

“We’re pretty much inseparable… except, he’s not at school today… and he hasn’t been answering any of my texts.”

“You guys seem close.”

“We are,” I smile, quite fond of my relationship with JJ.

“When I met Davey, we were inseparable ever since, too,” he explains with a little less fondness in his eyes. “But we met back in 7th grade math. When did you and JJ meet?”

“About a year ago? It was at a back to school party for our friend, you know Sarah Cameron?” An nods yes, allowing me to continue. “She was hosting this back to school party, and we were friends so I was invited, and she invited John B. Routledge because they both had a crush on each other but didn’t think the other did. So by extension, John B. invited JJ to sort of be his hypeman for the night.” An laughs at my exposition.

“So John B. and Sarah are flirting within a few minutes and JJ’s work is done, so he kinda floats around trying to find someone he can flirt with… and he finds me on the couch on my phone because I’m not really huge into parties--but I love Sarah so of course I came.” Quickly, I glance back at my computer screen to check on the downloads. 26 minutes left.

“And JJ finds me on my phone and he literally jumps on the couch next to me and scares me so he’s off to a great start. He then asks who I am and all the small talk formalities, and I thought ‘oh gosh he’s gonna start physically flirting with me like touching my shoulder or my face and I really don’t want that’, so I’m mentally preparing for the flirting to start, but then…” I laugh at the memory.

“Then he asks me: ‘what conspiracy theories do you believe in?’ and I was just so surprised I really thought he was gonna try and kiss me eventually, but he just wanted to talk about conspiracies the whole night,” I finish, breathlessly looking between An and the downloading videos on my computer.

“That’s pretty funny. What did you say?”

“Hm?”

“Which conspiracy theory?”

“Oh I told him my thoughts on the JonBenét Ramsey situation. I think the brother is the one who killed her, and all the letters and whatnot were written by the parents to help cover up the murder and keep him innocent.” An seems thoroughly surprised by my answer before inputting his own conspirator beliefs,

“I would’ve said that the government definitely has aliens in Area 51.”

__________________________

Read the next part here.

A/n: Okay I know I promised I was done with the 2 am writing and minimal proof reading... but I really wanted to post another chapter so... sorry?

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