Chapter Text
Max wakes up to a kick to the ribcage.
Well, it’s less of a kick and more of a shove. A shove from someone stretching out their legs that sandwiches him against the bed’s footboard and squeezes the sleep out of him. He half-consciously notices his legs dangle over the edge at the same time he realizes this isn’t his own bed. The footboard he’s just been acquainted with is definitely metal, not wood, which he knows on account of it being very cold and on his face. Good start to consciousness.
He reaches up to rub his eyes as the foot unplants itself from his ribs and the sigh of someone else waking up breaks the silence.
Relative silence. On the small TV across the room, at a low volume, an old song plays on a loop in the soundtrack menu of Burnout. He imagines it’s been like that all night. That fills in the rest of his memory, and he specifically remembers that he definitely didn’t try to sleep over here.
Here being…
Ready for this one?
“Hey, geekshow,” Johnny grumbles, cracking his knuckles. He is unsurprised by Max’s presence.
Johnny Jhonny’s house. Yup.
Max slowly props himself up on his elbows and looks around. He’s wearing jeans. The lights are still on from whenever it was the two of them passed out, and the blackout curtains are pulled over the window. That, coupled with the game they never technically stopped playing, gives this all the effect of a lost sense of time.
“Hey. I’m uh, still here. Whoops,” he says, scratching his head. He yawns and swats an empty soda can off Johnny’s bed. “Guess we both dozed off. Man, I’ve had accidental sleepovers before, but never on a—”
He pinches the bridge of his nose as it hits him. It’s what they get, staying up so late. “On a school night. Oh, this is disorienting.”
Johnny sits up with his eyes still shut and fumbles blindly for his phone, right past the point into humorousness. He could open his eyes, but he doesn’t, and so this lasts a good twenty seconds before his hand finds it on his nightstand. Max’s own phone is on the floor somewhere. Many things are on this floor.
“What time is it, anyway?” Max mutters. He untangles himself from a stray sheet. What are they even supposed to do right now? School must be hours off, but this completely throws off the rhythm…
“I’unno,” comes the reply as Johnny clicks his phone on and creaks open his eyes. He blinks a few times, adjusting to the jarring light of his phone screen. Max touches his feet to the floor. He feels… very well rested. Like, suspiciously well.
But either way, he remarks, “Probably something real awkward like 2 AM or 4 AM or something. I hope you like your sleep schedule on the ruined side, because…”
Johnny’s eyebrows shoot up just slightly like he’s seen something of mild interest. He hums, clicks the phone off, and drops it back on his nightstand.
“What?”
He glances over at Max as if he’d forgotten he was there. Then he stretches his arms, yawning. “It’s uh… 10:15.”
“… Weren’t we still awake at 10:15?” Max says as he looks over, puzzled. Johnny blinks back at him.
Now we pause.
And pause…
“WHAT?!” Max squawks.
He springs from the bed in an instant and stumble-runs across the floor, to the window. He throws the blackout curtains open, letting in blinding morning light on top of the light already on, much to Johnny’s chagrin. 10:15. Not PM. AM.
“What the flipping flip!” Max cries, running his hands through his short hair. “How did—how did we sleep so long??”
Johnny, with a blanket over his head and having hardly moved an inch other than to put it there, shrugs. “Mmm. I needa wake up with an alarm but I put my phone on silent earlier.”
Max flops his hands against his sides in a helpless shrug. “Why…?”
“‘Cause it was bein’ so…” He waves his hand vaguely, searching for a word. “Audible.”
“Man, I hate you a lot.” Max darts to where his hat lies on the floor, quickly donning it. He shakes his head and continues scurrying around as Johnny continues not moving.
“Don’t freak out, Mux,” he says.
“I will absolutely freak out, Jhonny!” Max declares, pointing accusingly at the amorphous blob on Johnny’s bed. “This is gonna be a whole big thing now.” He stops and spins around in the center of the sty of a room, looking for his backpack. “I have a routine. I mean it’s like… a rut, actually, but I have it, and—okay, where is my backpack.”
“Prob’ly yer house, genius,” Johnny laughs. He pushes the blanket off and sits up, planting his feet on the carpet.
“Nnngh…” Yeah. Probably his house. Probably on the floor in the center of his room. He’s probably going to go home, having completely stricken this exchange from his mind, and trip over it in his ironic and no doubt frantic hunt for the thing. … So he should probably get a head start on that.
“Alright, well,” he says, glaring down at his shoes on the floor. “I guess I’m. Going there, then.” He looks to Johnny for his impressions and finds the dude just… studying him. “… What?”
His brows are furrowed at the fidgeting boy across from him, and after a few seconds he glances around his room. At the TV, at his phone, and then finally back to Max. He speaks up.
“Why don’t we just not go?”
Max squints. “Huh?”
Johnny’s base energy is starting to show, now he’s actually awake. He reaches for his phone. “Well, we already missed…” And checks the time again, “All of first and second period. An’ most of third.” He puts his phone back and goes about trying to fix the extreme bedhead-plus-gel disaster of his hair. “By the time we get ready, get your crap, and get all the way up the hill t’ school, we’re gonna prob’ly miss all of third and most of fourth.”
“Yeah, but…”
“Plus, it’s Friday,” he interrupts, smirking. “Plus, it’s First Friday. Let’s just not go!”
Max, who’d been aloofly hearing out Johnny’s reasoning, lets his shoulders drop and rolls his eyes to avert his gaze, asking what must be asked. He’s obviously tempted.
“What’s First Friday?”
Johnny simply stares back with his hands folded in front of his mouth for a long time. Max shifts awkwardly.
“Okay.” Johnny abruptly stands, clapping his hands together. Just like that, he is as full of energy as he always is during the day. “We are definitely not goin’ to school!” Max opens his mouth to protest, but Johnny doesn’t let him. “Brush your hair or teeth or food or whatever.”
“Right now?” Max asks, turning to watch Johnny as he moves about the room, grabbing a questionably clean towel from the clutter on the floor and his classic hair gel from atop his dresser. He flashes his hands quizzically. “Can you wait? What are we doing?”
Johnny stops on a dime on his way to the open door and drops everything he’d just gathered, instead pacing across the room to Max and grabbing his face, smushing it. There’s that big ol’ hyena grin.
“Maxwell Gangsta Puckett,” he firmly begins. “Pay attention.”
“Okay…?”
“What we are doing is you an’ me are taking the day off.” He jabs himself in the chest with his thumb, grin getting impossibly wider. “Johnny style.”
Max winces. He’s familiar with Johnny style, just like everyone who is familiar with Johnny is. The brute does everything in his life with a level of energy behind it that usually affords chaos or destruction or both. Every path is a warpath, and logically, Max probably shouldn’t be following him down this particular path on this particular day. But to be completely fair, he kind of signed up for it.
Especially considering this guy is his boyfriend.
“Okay. Great. That makes me nervous,” he replies. Johnny whirls, grabs his things, and fires out of his bedroom. Welp. Hopefully Max doesn’t miss anything important at school today.
Or, y’know.
Lose any limbs.