Our Island of Trees, Part 1

"I never wanted any of this to happen."

-

Two school boys sat on their secondary school playing fields, enjoying the warm, if not rare, British summer. Both around fifteen years old, they have known each other longer than either of them cared to remember, neither one had really changed all that much since they'd met all those years ago in primary school, both remained immature, unsure and relatively uncaring of the future and most of all concerned only with their own enjoyment. The first, Aaron, was the smarter of the two, although brilliant, he rarely used it, only in times that he could get a laugh from his student audience would he be bothered to tap into his mind. He was tall and well built, he'd been asked many a time to play on sports teams throughout his school years, and declining them all under the simple notion that it would require time and effort, only the former would he have in abundance. He was most noted by his other classmates as being a comic and clown, but one that would never amount to much in the 'real world.' The other half of the duo, Dominic, was much the same, in that he wouldn't give effort to anything outside of football and video games. Unlike Aaron, Dominic had worked hard to get into the football team during his first years at secondary school and thoroughly enjoyed it, he was now captain and constantly trying to convince his counterpart to join, to no avail.

Their laziness was in full view as they skipped class and headed down to the sports fields, shielded from view by the windowless sports hall. Skipping class was not something uncommon, in fact it was more uncommon for them to actually turn up to the first class after lunch on a Wednesday.
"You know we might actually have to go to one of Mrs Bainbridge's maths classes at some point before the end of the year." Dominic smirked, eyes closed enjoying the warm rays.
"No." Aaron replied simply, also basking in the sunlight.
"Just no?" Laughed Dom.
"Absolutely. Just no. In fact if it wasn't such an arse I'd kill you just for suggesting it."
"We still have to pass our exams at the end of next year though." Dominic protested, half-heartedly.
"It's May. We've a whole year to catch up. Besides I didn't know you were so eager to learn." Aaron grinned. "I'm not, don't get me wrong, it's just…"
"You want a bit of Bainbridge?" Aaron laughed. "I knew you were a little desperate but come on man, seek help!" Dominic replied to this, with a strong variation of 'no.' "I knew it," Aaron started, but stopped. "Who are they?" He pointed towards a couple of girls heading towards the bottom end of the field. "I don't know, but they're not very good at skiving." Dominic said, sitting up, "They're heading to the bottom of the field, Ms Tucker can see you from her office there."
"Hey!" Aaron shouted to the girls, who stopped. "Don't go down there." There was a brief pause, before the blonde girl shouted back, "Why?"
"Because they can see you from there." Aaron replied.
"What?" The girl replied.
"Is she deaf or something?" Aaron scoffed, before turning to shout again, "If you go down there," he spoke as if to a child, "you will be seen, they will then come and get all four of us." The two girls then began discussion between each other and then headed towards Aaron and Dominic. "Crap they're coming over." Aaron whispered.
"Why is that bad? They look pretty fit to me."
"Because, I just wanted to sit back and enjoy a free period, now I've got to make conversation with them."
"You guys seem to know a lot about this." The blonde girl smirked.
"About what?" Dominic asked, pedantically.
"Skiving. If you hadn't have told us, we'd probably be marching back as we speak."
"You live and learn." Aaron smiled, before lying back down and closing his eyes.
"Amelia by the way." The blonde pointed to herself. "Chloe." She pointed to her mate who smiled, clearly shy. "Aaron," Dominic replied pointing to Aaron. "I'm Dominic."
"Nice to meet you both. Do you mind if we hang around with you, I mean the pitch isn't that big."
Aaron gave something which was slightly friendlier than a grunt but a noise that didn't exactly show he wanted to make friends. The girls then threw their bags down and sat down near the two boys. The two of them chatted a little to each other quietly. The conversation eventually moved to what both of them had seen on the news that morning, it was at this point Aaron knew that Dominic would say something. It wasn't as if Aaron could read minds, nothing so simple, but the simple word Dominic had used to describe the girls before; 'fit,' told Aaron, Dominic would use almost anything to generate conversation. Aaron began begging in his head "Don't do it Dominic. Please Don't. I know you're going to… but please, just don't…"
"Hey," Dominic started.
"Crap." Aaron thought.
"Are you two on about that big meeting in Zurich?"
"Yeah," Amelia replied, she looked a little taken a back that he'd butted in. "Do you know much about this?" She asked.
"Nope he doesn't." Aaron thought.
"Yeah, I'm really into that kind of thing." Dominic lied.
"What do you think about the new American naval base in Taiwan?"
"I think it's disgusting that America thinks it can invade any country it chooses." Dominic replied. It was at this point Aaron couldn't help but burst into laughter. "What?" Dominic spat.
"Oh nothing," Aaron chuckled, "Continue."
"Yeah, I don't think America should invade small countries like Taiwan." Dominic reissued his previous statement. "Oh," Amelia looked confused and paused before finally saying, "You know," She struggled, "America hasn't invaded Taiwan, they're just putting military installations on the northern and western parts of the Island."
"Oh." Dominic turned red.
"That is what the conference in Zurich is about, China are angry about this." Amelia finished. There was a moments silence, the odd breeze the only recompense to an awkward moment. The girls finally began chatting again and Dominic lay down again, whispering only, "Worth a shot."

The rest of the period the four of them sat and lay there enjoying the sun, until finally the faint sound of the school bell could be heard which signalled time for the next class. Dominic got to his feet. "What class you got?" He asked Aaron.
"Nothing. Got a free." He smiled.
"I do too!" Amelia smiled.
"Why'd you skip then?" Dominic asked.
"Couldn't be bothered." Both Aaron and Amelia replied in unison.
"Well that was weird…" Dominic gave Aaron a suggestive eye, picked up his bag shouted "Goodbye." and walked away. "I'd better go too." Chloe said quietly.
"Oh okay," Amelia waved, "Text me when you're done." Chloe waved, attempting to stay a good bit behind Dominic and walked away. "Looks like it's just me and you." Amelia gave a wry smile.
"You and I." Aaron replied, eyes still closed.
"What?"
"You and I, not me and you."
"Are you like one of those, beautiful mind crazy people?"
"Yeah. Except without the beautiful mind."
"You're weird." She stated, her face was one of interest about this boy.
"Trust me, you don't know the half of it." He nestled into the grass a little. There was a momentary pause. The hedges and trees surrounding the field could be heard moving in the wind, the odd bird tweeting and then, "Tell me."
"Sorry?" He asked.
"Tell me about you, I want to know." Another moments silence, Aaron covered his eyes from the sun and looked at her. "Why?" he asked, simply.
"Because, I want to know." Her eyes full of intrigue. Aaron looked at her for a moment, attempting to see if she was serious or merely trying to make him look foolish, but then again, he thought, there was no-one to make him look foolish in front of, but still the question remained, why would she want to know this much about a guy who only an hour ago she'd known only as 'that guy I once sat next to in geography.' "Well?" She asked again.
"You're serious?"
"Yeah. I mean, I don't just want a name and a mask, I want to know the man behind the mask."
"What mask?"
"That stupid thing you do in class. You make jokes, pretend you don't care about the work, laze around and generally cause a bit of havoc and yet, I've never seen you hand in homework late, be full on rude to a teacher." She stopped, coming to her conclusion, "You care about your work."
"Do you just sit and watch me in lessons or something?" He sat up.
"It's difficult not to when you're the centre of attention for most of the classes you're in. Except history of course, you're always so quiet in history."
"It's so boring, I fall asleep." Aaron laughed.
"Then explain why I see you taking extremely detailed notes."
"Seriously, what is wrong with you?" Aaron blurted out.
"I'm just curious. I mean history is so boring I have to find other things to entertain me, right?" She paused again, watching the look of confusion of Aaron's face. "I want to know."
"Want to know what?"  
"Everything."

To begin with he began to explain his situation only to humour her, leaving out large amounts of personal details, just in case she turned round and said it had all been a joke, some dare her friends had put her up to, but eventually she stopped him and asked for more and more detail. Then more thoughts of why jumped into his head, why did she want to know so much? Why did he have to tell her all this stuff and not know a single thing about her? Until finally. "When do I get to know about you?" He smiled, stopping short in one of his stories.
"Next week. If you're still interested then of course, and if you are still interested, just come here at the same time next week and I'll tell you everything you want to know, just like how I'm questioning you now."
"And if I don't want to know?"
"Don't show up." Simply put. "Now continue, I'm interested." He stopped for a moment, weighing up why he should wait a week for information she could give right now, but for some reason, he continued. He told her that he'd grown up in the North West of England and moved South when his mother and father separated at the age of eleven, he then said about how he'd met Dominic, that he wanted to one day fly a plane and that he was so interested in history because he thought he could use it to predict future political events. He spilled almost his entire life story in little under an hour. "… ever since I've just preferred to walk home." He finished. She smiled at him, he smiled at her. Their eyes locked together just for a brief second, it was in that second, something just moved in his chest, a rush a blood. However this moment was cut brutally short when her phone began to vibrate loudly in her bag. "Sorry." She said, grabbing her bag and rummaging through it. "It's Chloe, her class is done, which means, going home time." She threw her phone in her bag, zipped it up and got to her feet. "Is that it?" Aaron asked, looking confused.
"For now," she began to walk away. "The offer for next week still stands." She waved as she continued to walk, not looking back. Aaron watched her all the way, until she disappeared behind the sports hall building. "What the hell was that?" He muttered to himself. His phone also went off, a text from Dominic. 'Those girls wer phit, did u get anywer with tht blonde?' Aaron laughed and locked the phone, stuffing it back into his pocket. "To be honest," He muttered again, "I've absolutely no idea."