Chapter 18

Now all the two had to do was to wait for her reply.

⭑･ﾟﾟ･*:༅｡.｡༅:*ﾟ:*:✼✿ ♫♪ ∞༺♥༻✧ ☆⁺˚*♡⁺˚*☆ ♫♪ ✿✼:*ﾟ:༅｡.｡༅:*･ﾟﾟ･⭑

Jayden sighed as he sat down in his uncomfortable chair and looked up at the board. His teacher was talking about how to add two-digit numbers, but he didn't want to listen. He was making himself busy by fidgeting with his hands while the teacher talked about how you carry the one to the tens' place... ugh. None of this even made sense to him. He used his arms as a pillow and rested his head on them so he could sleep during this boring lecture.

...

"Jayden Edmenson!"

Jayden jumped at his name being called in a sharp tone. He hadn't even slept five seconds and this teacher was already calling his name!

"Are you sleeping in my class?" She asked, obviously knowing the answer.

Jayden shook his head groggily. He rubbed his eyes with his hands and later hid his face in them.

"Then act like it. I don't want you to be asking questions later because you were sleeping when I was giving you the answers."

Yulia, that annoying girl snickered at the sound of Jayden getting in trouble. Ugh. She was the teacher's pet and always asked questions, therefore, answering the teacher's questions correct. Yulia smirked at Jayden because she knew he hated whenever she smirked at him. Well, everybody hated when Yulia smirked at them, which is why she loved to do it.

The teacher clapped her hands. "Alright, there will be a graded assessment on this, so I expect everyone's full attention."

"You'll always have my full attention, Ms. Wraker!"

"You should probably raise your hand next time." Ms. Wraker suggested.

Jayden turned away from the board to look at Jalil. Jalil was not in a good mood at all. He looked horrible. His eyes were as red as if he had overdosed on Opioids. They were also swollen because of all the crying Jalil had done. His mother was in jail and it was all Mr. Edmenson's fault. Why did he have to attract his mother so much? Couldn't he had been at least a little ugly and weird so that his mother wouldn't try to poison him out of love? Jalil wished that the outcome of Jayden visiting his house had been different.

As said earlier, Jalil was not in a good mood at all, which is why Jayden hadn't tried to talk to him. Jalil likes to be alone when he's not in his right mind, so Jayden didn't interact with him. Usually when Jayden was this bored in class, he would turn to Jalil to start talking about whatever those boys liked to talk about. But Jalil was not in the mood to talk to anyone, so Jayden was left bored during class, waking himself every few minutes.

The teacher walked around and started passing around one sheet of paper to each student.

"On this paper, there are some two-digit equations. You will add the numbers together and when you're done, pass the paper to that pink bin right there. If you need help, look on the board."

Jayden took his paper slowly and looked at it. 43+58? No way he could possibly figure out the answer to 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 question. Maybe the answer was Jesus. Jesus was the answer to every problem, right? Mommy had told that to Jayden, and Mommy was always right. Jayden wrote the answer "Jesus" to every question on the sheet of paper. If the teacher marked him wrong, that mean she was denying that Jesus was the answer to her problems! She can't possibly say that any answer that Jayden had wrote was incorrect.

"Easy!" Jayden smiled as he put his paper in the pink bin. He was the first one to finish his paper, even faster that Yulia!

"Wow Jayden, you finished that fast?" Ms. Wraker asked, again knowing the answer. She grinned at Jayden and thanked him for finishing his work. Jayden gave Yulia a smirk as he walked back to his desk and in return, she rolled her eyes and continued to madly scribble on her paper.

When Jayden sat down on his chair, he stole a worried glance at Jalil and noticed that he was crying silently. Jayden wanted to be there to comfort him, but he thought that Jalil would shake him off like all the other times he tried to cheer him up when he was down. He didn't know what he could do so that Jalil would stop crying. Wait, Jalil likes chocolate! Maybe Jayden still had that candy bar in his backpack that he was saving for lunch. Jayden dug inside his backpack and his fingers touched something soft and flexible wrapped in plastic. Perfect, just what Jayden was looking for! He grabbed the item and placed it on his lap. He zipped his backpack back up, took the candy bar from his lap, and slid the object to Jalil. It touched Jalil's arm just slightly, so Jalil turned his face to see what had touched him. The candy bar was sitting there, waiting for Jalil to notice it, and he did. He took the bar and put it in his backpack. Jalil then hid his face in his arms and more tears started to form.

Jayden was being so kind to him, like he always was. Jalil never appreciated Jayden's sympathy because he didn't find it man-like for other boys to comfort their male friends. He thought that only gross girls like Lakayla and Toya helped their friends out whenever they needed help. But now he understood why Jayden wanted to help him whenever he wasn't feeling himself. It was because Jayden really cared. Jayden never wanted to see anyone cry, so he did what he could to make them happy again. Now Jalil understood why Jayden was always trying to make you cheery and laugh until your stomach hurts. He wanted to see you satisfied with things. He wanted to see you overjoyed with how things were going. That's why Jalil loved his best friend so much.

Jalil felt terrible for always pushing Jayden away when he was trying to help him. How could he be so horribly rude to him, when he wanted you to smile? What type of person is that cruel? Jalil took out a piece of paper from his backpack and quickly scribbled something on it. He then passed the note to Jayden.

Jayden took the note and read it carefully.

𝘛𝘩𝘢𝘯𝘬 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘤𝘢𝘯𝘥𝘺 𝘣𝘢𝘳! 𝘐 𝘥𝘰𝘯'𝘵 𝘸𝘢𝘯𝘵 𝘵𝘰 𝘮𝘢𝘳𝘳𝘺 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘰𝘳 𝘢𝘯𝘺𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨, 𝘣𝘶𝘵 𝘐 𝘭𝘰𝘷𝘦 𝘺𝘰𝘶. 𝘐 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘺 𝘥𝘰, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘺𝘰𝘶'𝘭𝘭 𝘢𝘭𝘸𝘢𝘺𝘴 𝘣𝘦 𝘮𝘺 𝘣𝘦𝘴𝘵 𝘧𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘥! It said. Jayden made a wide grin with teeth. Nothing could ruin his mood right now. Jalil had just said that he loved Jayden? That was so sweet! No one could ever IMAGINE someone like Jalil saying that he loved anyone, but Jalil had wrote it to the person who deserved his love the most. Nothing, absolutely nothing could make Jayden's smile fade, except one thing.

"Jayden, what is this?"

Ms. Wraker's high pitched voice made Jayden jump in fear, probably for the second time today. Ms. Wraker's sharp voice was very scary, so if she yelled your name angrily, you better have fear.

"Do you think this is a joke? I take time out of my schedule to teach you, and you decide to take it as one of your games?"

Jayden looked up at Ms. Wraker's furious face. "What'd I do?"

"What did you do? What did you do?! Come here and see for yourself!"

Jayden lifted up from his chair and walked slowly to Ms. Wraker's desk. Yulia gave him a small smirk as he walked up to Ms. Wraker, but he just ignored that bothersome girl. Once Jayden arrived in Ms. Wraker's presence, she pointed at his work, which had every question marked as wrong. Jayden gave Ms. Wraker a confused face. Why was she acting as if Jayden was in the wrong? She was in the wrong for marking his paper wrong. Why was she sharply yelling his name as if he had broken her window, when she was the one who should have her name sharply yelled?

Jayden turned to face Ms. Wraker. "What'd I do?" He asked once again.

Ms. Wraker absolutely hated how Jayden acted as if he hadn't known what he had done. "What do you mean 'What did I do'? You wrote 'Jesus' for each of your answers!"

Jayden didn't think anything was wrong with writing 'Jesus' for his answers, but when he heard snickers and laughs behind him, his ears turned red with embarrassment. Yulia had the loudest laugh, but did she really have to pound her fist on the desk as if Jayden's failure to correctly answer the questions was that funny? No, she just did it so that Jayden's ears could burn with humiliation even more. Ugh, this was why Jayden always hated Ms. Wraker with a burning passion.

"Explain yourself! How does 63+75 equal Jesus?"

Jayden looked at Ms. Wraker, trying to think of an answer for her question. The whole class went silent and looked at Jayden, waiting for his answer as if this was some type of spelling bee.

"Um," Jayden muttered. "I wrote Jesus because he's the answer to all the questions you have in life."

Ms. Wraker was surprised at Jayden's answer. Her right eyebrow was raised while her mouth fell slightly open. She looked at Jayden straight in his pupil.

"See me after school." She got out a yellow sticky note from her desk drawer and wrote something on it. She passed the note to Jayden. "Keep it safe."

Jayden held the note in his hand while wanting to just die of embarrassment. He just wanted to pass away at this moment and resurrect twelve years later, when he wasn't forced to go to school and go through all this uselessness.