Chapter 34

Art was woken in the middle of the night, and saw a fleeting figure dashing out of the room. Not quite managing to see who it was, he glanced around to see who was missing. Mara, Marcus and...Ash! He guessed Marcus was screwing Mara, he hadn't known the bloke very long, but to him that seemed like a Marcuslike thing to do. It must have been Ash. Pulling on a pair of trousers, he followed Ash, going out of the dorm. He glanced around, where had he gone? Listening for a second, he heard faint sobbing coming from the bathroom. Practically running to the bathroom, he found Ash sat on the floor by the toilet, tears running down his face, his bright pink hair looking very bedraggled. Art knelt down beside the boy, putting an arm around his shouldesr.

Ash looked up at Art, all blury through the tears in his eyes, "I, I," he sniffed, "I was sick."

Gently, and prooving he could be a good teacher, Art mopped the poor boy up, "Come on," he said, "Let's get you back to bed." He half carried Ash back to the dorm, lying him down on his bed, "Don't go to sleep just yet, I need to check your temperature." He smiled, gently brushing a lock of hair out of Ash's eyes, "Won't be two seconds."

He was slightly more than two seconds, although, fair enough to Art not alot more, before he returned with the thermometer. Shoving it in Ash'smouth, he proceeded to ask Ash fairly important questions - teachers always do this when you have something in your mouth (*snigger*) and so do dentists.

"Do you want a drink?"

Ash nodded, being unable to speak

"Try and keep still. Otherwise it doesn't work properly."

"Mmm mmmmmm" said Ash infuriatedly, "Mmm mmm mmm mmm"

Grinning Art took the thermometer out of the boy's mouth, "Yes, a little high. You ought to stay in bed tomorrow."

Ash stuck his bottom lip out, but was cheered by Raven appearing form no-where with a glass of water, "Here you go." she whispered.

Art, astonished, turned to look at her, "Thanks," he smiled, "Did we wake you up."

Smiling Raven shook her head.

"Do you ever sleep?"

Raven grinned, and nodded. Before turning and climbing back up the ladder into Alex's bed.

Art watched her go, astounded, before turning back to Ash, "You'll be ok now?"

Again Ash nodded.

"And if you need me? Just wake me up. I don't mind."

Ash smiled, and nodded.

Most people were woken up by Marcus sauntering back into the dorm.

Tor sat up, oblivious to Fergie lying beside him, "Where's Mara?" he asked sleepily.

Marcus laughed, "Downstairs, getting dressed I think."

Tor frowned, not quite understanding, and not quite beleiving what Marcus was hinting at, "Why's she getting dressed there?"

Marcus shrugged nochalantly, "I guess she wanted to." he said mischeviously, his eyes sparkling daringly at Fergie. "Or maybe she just didn't fancy walking naked around the school."

Tor's eyes narrowed slightly, but he was soothed by Fergie's arms around him, his twin gently whispering in his ear, "Leave it. She's just a girl."

Marcus laughed as he started to make his bed, "I like that phrase, 'Just a girl' makes so much sense."

"My god!" Nienna snapped, actually speaking to Marcus for the first time since he had arrived, "You are such a..."

"Machiavellian arrogant bastard?" Marcus suggested, laughing, "Yes, I know, I have heard it all before."

Nienna scowled at him, "I was just going to say tosser actually."

Again Marcus laughed, "Yep, heard that one too, lots of times."

Blushing slightly, Mara came back into the dorm, fully dressed and sat down on her bed, trying to calmly do her hair.

Marcus grinned, grabbed his wash stuff, and, whistling, wandered off to the bathroom.

"Don't you just hate him?" Nienna squealed.

"No," Ash muttered sleepily, "I think he's sexy."

"Don't we all." Dee laughed

"I don't" Tor muttered, but no-one apart from Fergie heard him

"Right guys!" Art wandered back into the dorm, no-one knew where he had been, but it was generally assumed that if Art didn't atleast pretend to sleep in his own bed he'd get in mega trouble. "Today there is a little change of plan."

Everyone now looked up, half interested, apart from Seiji, who knew what was happening, his plan was falling into place.

"Today, we're actually going to be having an art lesson all day, to do with your term project, so can you go straight to the art room after breakfast."

"Oh," Ash sighed, "That sounds fun."

Art reached out a hand to Ash's cheek, "You stay in bed little one, you need sleep." He turned to Eagle, "You're stuck with this lot all day too, ok?"

Eagle shrugged, grinning, that meant less time with the bullies in his year, and more time with Matt.

"But for now," Art smiled cheerfully, "It's breakfast time. I'll go wake the other's up."

Matt frowned slightly, turning to Seiji, "He seems cheerful, somethings up."

Seiji laughed, "I guess it must be the prospect of spending a whole nother day with me." he grinned at Matt, waggling his eyebrows.

Matt sighed and rolled his eyes, "Something's certainly up."

As they all left the dorm to go eat breakfast, Seiji grabbed Eagle by the hand, holding him back. "Eagle," he smiled, "Do you remember our promise?"

Eagle frowned, unsure of what Seiji was talking about.

"You promised me that if I got Matt to go out with you, then you'd let me have my Art back."

Eagle smiled wistfully, "Yeah, but it's never going to happen."

"I wouldn't be so sure." Seiji grinned, "Come on, breakfast."

Breakfast was mostly conducted in silence, as all of the upper sixth were tremedously hung over, oh sorry, they were 'just a little tired' *cough*mixing drinks*cough cough*

After breakfast, all the lower sixth, and Eagle wandered, rather timidly, and very afraid over to the art studio. When they pushed open the door, they saw not the art room as they were used to it, with tables and desks, but a few desks in one corner and the rest of the room divided up with canvas screens into little cubical like rooms.

Art grinned, "Welcome to the weirdest art lesson you'll ever have."

"Uh oh" Ally whispered to Mikey, "The freaks on his freak role."

"Right, first of all I want the twins and the new people to go sit over there," Art pointed to the desks that were still looking vaugly normal in the corner, "And Eagle has to go sit at my desk."

Timidly the kids did as they were told, leaving the rest of them still standing in the middle of the room.

"Now, get into your normal art pairs."

There was a few shufflings of feet, and everyone got into their pairs, leaving Ally and Mikey standing in a space in the middle.

"Who are you normally with?"

"Uh Satu, only he's gone." Ally grinned, "Guess I'll just have to spend all day relaxing instead."

"Ash, but he's ill." Mikey answered.

"Good," Art grinned, that made it even more fun, an unexpected pairing, but one he was sure would be funny, "You two can go together then."

Ally and Mikey sighed and went to stand with the rest of their year.

"Now children," Art grabbed a stool and perched on it, "Cast your minds back to the start of this term, I know it was a long time ago. I drew two pictures, and the one I did of Sei, was much better than whoever else I drew, I think it was Mara, wasn't it?" he didn't wait for an answer, "Now, can anyone remember why I said I could draw Seiji better?"

"Cause you know him better?" Nienna suggested

"Correct." Art beamed at her, "Now, after today we shall start working on our actual peices of art" he sniggered slightly, "And before today we spent a whole six weeks working on getting to know your partner's personality." He grinned wickedly, "So there's only one thing left to do today."

"Oh no." Ally shook his head, already making the leap, "That's, that's....that's sick!"

Art laughed, "But necessary. Now, for those of you who haven't made the connection, I am talking about getting to know your partner," he gave in to his natural artness and sniggered, "physically."

"What!" Alex glanced first at Art, and at Raven, and then back to Art.

"Now," Art ignored him, "There will be a few rules. One - no sex. Sorry, I know it makes it less fun, but there will have to be no sex, that's in your own time if you want to. Two - be nice to whoever you're working with, respect them, and if they ask you not to do something, then don't do it. Three - everyone has to do it, unless I say so, if you're nervous or uncomfortable just start with easy things like hands, or faces, that should work fine." He directed the stunned students to the little cubicles, pushing one pair into each, before turning to where the twins were sat with the new people. "I thought you might not want to do it," he grinned at Fergie, "On account of that could be fairly painful, and you two know each other fairly well anyway. So you two, can explain to the newbies what we've been doing about portraits, and you can draw pictures of people you think you know well."

Marcus grinned and took Fergie's hand in his own, "You can explain to me."

Fergie laughed, "Oh can I? I think I should explain to the other two actually."

Scowling slighly Marcus squeezed his hand tighter, "No, I like you the most." He grinned and stuck his toungue out at Fergie.

"You have your toungue peirced? And people think you're straight?"

Marcus grinned and nodded, "You ever kiss a guy with a peirced toungue?"

Fergie thoguht for a second, and then shook his head. He flet Marcus grab him, pulling him closer, he expected the kiss to be rough, joking, but Marcus caught him totally off balance with a sweet, gentle kiss, his toungue flickering inside Fergie's mouth.

Marcus laughed as he pulled away, "You have now."

"So what am I doing here?" Eagle asked

Art grinned and pulled out a chair to sit beside the boy. Reaching into his desk drawer he found Eagle's A-level sketch book, "You have some essays to write."

Eagle groaned, it wasn't that he didn't like writing essays, he just couldn't.

"Hey," Art reached out a hand, gently stroking the back of Eagle's neck, "it's ok. I've spoken to the exam board, and all you have to do is tell me what you want to say, and I'm allowed to do the writing bit."

Eagle looked up at him, and smiled, "Thanks."

"My God," Matt muttered as Seiji pulled him further inside the cubicle. He glanced around there was a table, and two chairs, nothing else. "Why did I have to get stuck with you?"

Seiji grinned, "It's ok, I'm not going to touch you. Well, not like that anyway." He laughed, "You're not my type."

Matt frowned, still uncertain, but secretly he was rather glad it was Seiji, he figured most of the other guys ion the year would have tried to kill him now, cause of what he'd done to Eagle earlier that term. Sure, Seiji could kill him, but he didn't think he would.

"Now," Seiji grinned, taking charge, "How about you let me go first, cause I know what I'm doing, ok?"

Unsurely, Matt nodded.

"I'm gonna ask you to do something, you don't have to, but it would really help." Seiji grinned.

"What?" Matt asked, really scared now.

"Take off your shirt?"

"What!?" Matt hissed, hugging his arms protectivly around him,

"Shh," Seiji held a finger to his lips, "I want to see how your muscle structure works, it's nothing more." He smiled as he stepped forward, unbuttoning Matt's shirt, "Trust me, I'm so mad about Art I couldn't even look at another guy right now."

Matt grinned, "What about Amber?"

Seiji winced at that one, but used the question as a distraction to slip Matt's shirt of his back, "She's not another guy is she?" He grinned.

For a while, Matt stood patiently frozen, while Seiji ran his hands over his well muscled body. While Seiji ran his hands up and down Matt's arms, over his shoulders, gently working out the tension that was there while he did he felt Matt standing, perfectly relaxed, almost too relaxed. For one breif second Seiji thought his plan wouldn't work, and that he would have wasted everyone's time, but he decided to go a little further anyway. He calmly walked around behind Matt, starting to slide his hands over Matt's back. He let his middle finger trace down Matt's spine, and almost instantaneously felt the boy tense completely. Seiji grinned to himself, now sure of what he was doing, and sure he was right. For a little longer he lit his hand's roam over Matt's body, feeling Matt growing tenser and tenser, trying not to grin to much, Seiji knew exactly what was happening. Then, slowley and gentley he slipped his arms around Matt's naked waist, around to his middle, his finger's barely brushing the by now very noticable bulge in Matt's jeans. "You're gay aren't you?" He whispered in the boy's ear.

Instantly Matt pulled away, blushing bright red he turned to face Seiji, "You can't tell anyone you.."

"Shh," Seiji held a finger to Matt's lips, "You fancy him, don't you. Eagle."

Matt turned an even darker shade of crimson, and sadly, nodded. "It's awful," he muttered, "He'll never like me, it's hopeless."

Seiji smiled and wrapped his arms around Matt, a more innocent gesture this time, "Poor Matty," he whispered softly, "Do you want to talk?"

Matt nodded, and felt Seiji sitting down, pulling him onto his lap. "It's, it's" he stuttered, "I love him so much, I always have done. And all he ever does is tease me."

Seiji frowned, "You think Eagle doesn't fancy you?"

Matt sighed and put his head in his hands, "I know he doesn't fancy me, he's always joking about it, asking me out, telling me he loves me, but I know he's joking. And the other night," Even though Seiji didn't think it was possible, Matt turned an even deeper shade of red.

"I know about the other night."

"And it felt so real, so good, but." Matt looked at Seiji, tears in his eyes, "He said it was nothing. I had to joke, I had to pretend I didn't love him." he sobbed softly, "but I do."

Seiji gently pushed Matt off him, "Hold that thought," he grinned, and danced out of the cubicle. Rushing up to Art's desk, where Art and Eagle were working on some essays, he grinned at Art, "Sorry," he said, "Need to borrow that," *yoink* he grabbed Eagle's sketch book and ran back to Matt with it.

"No!" Eagle cried, knowing Seiji would show it to Matt, but he was held back by Art grabbing him.

"It's alright," Art whispered in his ear, "Trust Sei, he know's what he's doing."

Seiji smiled as he got back to Matt only seconds later. He sat back down on the chair again, pulling Matt once again onto his lap. He wrapped his arms around the boy. "This is Eagle's art sketch book." he said before he opened the book, "They've been doing portraits as well."

Silently Matt flicked through the pages, pictures, lots of different media, charcoal, pencils, paints, oils, acrylics, even wax crayons at one point, but only ever one subject - him. "They're" he turned to Seiji, astonished, "They're all of me."

"Look in the back." Seiji whispered.

Matt flicked to the back of the sketch book, and when he saw the back page, he felt his heart stop beating. It was covered in sketches, all of him, some of him with Eagle, one of him and Eagle kissing with "I wish" written beside it. All over the page was scribbled, Eagle 4 Matt, Eagle loves Matt.

"He, he," Matt stammered, totally shocked, totally delighted, "He loves me?"

Seiji grinned, he loved playing matchmaker, "He loves you more than you can imagine. He doesn't shut up about you." He looked at Matt, who's eyes were shining with the delight of love. "I'm going to go and get him, and you're going to tell him what you just told me, that you love him. Yes?"

Matt nodded his consent, still staring dumbfoundedly at the sketchbook.

Seiji slipped out and walked over to the teachers desk, "Sorry about that," he said to Eagle, holding out his hand, "Come with me, Matt has something to say to you."

Bright red, Eagle furiously shook his head, "No," he whispered, "He's seen my pictures, he knows."

Seiji smiled, putting an arm around the older boys shoulders, leading him towards where Matt was, "He knows, and he has something to tell you." He looked pointedly at Matt, "What were you going to tell Eagle?"

"I, I," Matt stammered, and then for the first time, his eyes met Eagle's and he felt all the love he had ever felt for Eagle over all the years welling up inside him, "I love you." he whispered.

Eagle froze, "You?" he turned to Seiji, "He?"

Seiji nodded.

Eagle grinned and stepped forward, wrapping his arms around Matt, "I love you too Matty," he muttered into Matt's hair, "More than you can possible imagine, so much love it should kill me."

"No," Matt grinned up at him, "I can imagine. It's almost as much as I love you."

Eagle laughed, and, delighted, kissed the love of his life, who kissed him back.

"huhumm," Seiji coughed, "Sorry to interrupt this touching scene, but.." he turned to Eagle, "We had a deal. Do you promise?"

"What?" Matt looked at Seiji, horrified.

Seiji grinned, "I might be nice, but I'm not that nice, and I generally only do things for my own gain. Do you promise Eagle?"

"What's he promising?"

Seiji smiled faintly, "We had a deal, if I could get you to tell him you loved him, which I knew you did, then he'd give up Art."

Eagle nodded, "Here," he said, digging in his pocket and pulling out a key, "For you." he dropped it in Seiji's hand.

Matt frowned, "The key to Art?"

"No," Seiji laughed, "The key to his room, I didn't actually know you had it." He sighed softly, and walked out, leaving Matt and Eagle on their own.

"So it was just a bet ey?" Matt asked, burying his face in Eagle's neck so the older boy couldn't tell he was grinning.

"I'm sorry, it was just he said it, I didn't think he would and, and I do love you."

Matt grinned and kissed Eagle, "I love you too."

Seiji walked over to Art and dropped the keys on his desk. "I didn't know Eagle had the spare key's to your room." he scowled slightly, "You said you'd lost them."

"Sorry?" Art ventured.

Seiji grinned and shrugged, "S'ok." he muttered, sitting on Art's lap, "I'm good at picking locks."

Art grinned and buryed a kiss in Seiji's hair, "The happy couple finally a couple then?"

Seiji nodded, "And you are mine and mine alone."

"It's not a problem, right?" Ally said, shrugging nocholantly, "I mean, we're both blokes."

"More to the point, we're both straight blokes." Mikey grinned, "So, we're fine with this, right?"

"Yeah, we're great." Ally said, with only a slight stutter as Mikey stepped forward. For a few minutes the two boy's stood absolutely still, apart from their hands sliding over each other's body, each noticing himself getting hotter and hotter, but each also noticing the other boy too.

"I guess this is..." Ally said, uncertain of what he was going to say.

"Alright," Mikey muttered in his ear.

Ally shivered slightly, feeling Mikey's warm breath on his neck, "Yeah," he squeaked

Alex winced slightly as he felt Raven running her hands over his stomach. She was so perfect, so gorgeous. He lay there on the table, letting her slip her hands underneath his shirt, wanting her to do more, but knowing he mustent, he so wanted her, but she was just too innocent. She stopped and he half smiled to himself as he saw her turn and make some little not or drawing in her sketch book, she really was taking this seriously.

"Right," she grinned, grabbing him by the hand and pulling him to sitting, "Your turn."

"Ray," he said softly, "I don't think I should."

"I know," she whispered softly, slipping her arms around his waist, "I know we're not there yet, but," she grinned letting his hand drift across to her lips, kissing his fingertips, "I want you to, and if, if I think you're going to far, I'll make you stop, ok?"

Alex smiled, he hadn't expected her to understand, Raven obviously wasn't as innocent as everyone thought she was.