Chapter: How It Began

Author: Axel Otto

My name is Axel, but if you ask anyone besides Tuck, they'll tell you my name is Otto. American high school boys have a very hard time calling each other by their first names, so my own was quickly forgotten and readily replaced by my surname, kinda like some cult initiation.

To get the formalities over with, I moved to The U.S. at 17. One day my father took a job for the embassy and the next I was no longer a German citizen. In a matter of a week, I was officially an American teenager, and trust me, it's just like all the movies say it is. The place is a fucking war zone.

One thing is for sure, and that is without Tuck, I never would have made it out alive. So I guess this is where our story begins--an underfunded, over crowded, dirty and dingy public high school smack in the middle of suburbia, Pennsylvania.

"Watch it, punk!"

And yes, someone did actually say that to me. (Which may or may not have had something to do with the faded leather jacket I was wearing.) I ignored the prick and pushed my way through a group of decent looking senior girls whose hungry-for-fresh-meat eyes followed my every muscle twitch as I moved by them, smiling to myself secretly.

Maybe American high school wouldn't be as shitty as Degrassi described it after all. I was just praying I wasn't about to get shot, stabbed, shanked, or worse. However, if it weren't for the public high school system (cue cringe), I never would have met Tuck, and after that, the risk of getting shot was worth it. Which, conveniently, leads me to my next point.

I made it to my first class of the day, holding in a groan of annoyance as I shuffled to the back of the classroom past the usual back-to-school conversations between over excited girls in mini skirts and the boys who didn't have enough balls to talk to them and just tried to look up into their coochies instead.

My effort to distance myself from the overtly dramatic scene of the American high school classroom was to no avail. Once the bell rang, all 17 students were crammed shoulder-to-shoulder in the front of the tiny classroom so Mrs. What's-her-name could put us all in damn alphabetical order, claiming she'll get to know our names easier that way. I would never understand why teachers did that shit. Why on earth would it help you to memorize my first name by seating me alphabetically by my last name? It still boggles my mind to this day.

Anyway, I was placed in the far right hand corner with the rest of the unfortunate students whose last names belonged to the tail half of the alphabet. I was stuck behind some guy with a full head of deep brown hair and directly in front of whichever beach-blonde bottled dyed bimbo he was dating. The two were in an obvious argument with me seated directly in-between them, which, let me tell you, is not a comfortable position to be in as a normal, everyday person. But as a German boy in an American classroom, speaking all English at school for the first time ever, I was genuinely afraid I was about to be involved in some lover's spat turned shoot-out/medieval duel. Hell, this was AMERICA. The only shit I knew about this place was from what I watched on Teen Nick.

"Baaaby, come on, you know they're lies!" The Bimbo whined, leaning over her desk, placing her hands on the back of my chair in order to make sure "baby" heard her. I slunk deeper into my seat. The Brunette in front of me ignored Blondie's pleas, which of course only caused her to push it further.

By some act of God she had maneuvered herself so she could grab baby's shoulder to make sure he heard her. Her breasts were now spilling out onto the back of my neck and upper body, simultaneously turning me on and creeping me the fuck out.

I'm no lady, but pressing my jugs into some stranger seems like it should go against the code of etiquette. I mean come on, how hard is it to get out of your fucking seat and walk the .3 meters it takes to ask your boyfriend why he's pissed at you?

"TuuuuckERRRR! Listen to meeee!"

Yes, she was that much of a whiny bitch.

A commanding male voice coming from baby told Blondie 'to be quiet' and that he would 'see her after class.' She didn't plead in my ear after that, and I was damn thankful. Class started soon after the fiasco, and I was still thinking about Blondie's tits pressed against my neck.

My thoughts of breasts were quickly scattered when our teacher told us all to turn around and discuss our favorite piece of literature with the people around us. I gathered that this was an English class.

I panicked instantly. I would have to speak to these apes?! No way was I about to speak to Blondie about literature, and Mr. Brunette struck me as one of those rebellious types to blatantly ignore instructions. I immediately didn't want to talk to him.

For once, however, my instincts were wrong. And to this day, I have never been more thankful about something in my life.

He spun around to face me so quickly that the shock of seeing his face so close to my own had me jumping backwards, and consequently falling out of my seat. Mr. Brunette burst out laughing as my ass landed painfully on that nasty school tile that has probably been streaked with feces and prepubescent ejaculation. I winced, rubbing the forming bruise on my ass.

Mr. Brunette's hysterics had ceased enough for him to stick a hand out to help me up. I stared at it for a second too long, contemplating if this was the part where he said "psych, I have a gun."

"Oh come on Blondie, a hand won't kill you."

I snorted at the nickname he gave me. At least he didn't call me a bimbo, and at least he didn't have a gun.

I took his hand, getting to my feet. I was just glad that no one seemed to notice our little scene; the class had erupted into a deafening chatter as soon as Mrs. Marshall allowed the students to speak, each and every one of them using the discussion of literature as an excuse to catch up on what had happened in the last 12 hours since they had last seen one another.

Once I was all situated in my seat, my precious leather jacket had been dusted off, and my pencil had been correctly adjusted back to it's position in the center of my desk, I finally looked up at Mr. Brunette.

I didn't think there was much to say about him more than I had already gathered within the first few minutes of class. He had a girlfriend, hence the blonde big-titted bimbo. He was tall. He was brunette. He was handsome, I could tell you that too. He had these blueish gray eyes that were surrounded by thick, dark lashes. His hair framed his pale skin in thick black curls and looked soft to the touch. (Quick disclaimer ladies--it's softer than a newborn baby's ass. And I'm the only one he lets touch it.)

He smirked at me.

"Are you new?" he asked me after a few seconds of me blinking at him. I nodded a bit reluctantly. I didn't like to be smirked at. "What's your name?"

"Axel Otto," I responded, hoping he could understand my accent. I guess it wasn't as thick as I thought it was, because he understood.

"Welcome to Fair Lawn, Axel Otto. I'm Tucker Oaks, but for reasons which I have regretfully yet to comprehend, high school boys can't physically bring themselves to call each other by their first names. So, everyone calls me Oaks. And now, you're Otto."

I laughed. The intelligent manner in which he spoke made me wonder what he was doing with Blondie. (Quick shout out to Tuck, right here. Yes, I did use your first real sentence to me as the opening line for our book. And no, you're not getting anything in return.)

*Insert heavy Germanic accent here* "I sink I will be alright with zhat."

(Okay, so maybe my accent wasn't that heavy, but Tuck is making me type it like that because apparently that's what he recalls I sounded like.)

Tuck's eyes widened as I spoke, having actually heard me speak for the first time. "So, where did you live in Germany?"

I chuckled a little bit, impressed that he could tell my nationality. The few select people I had already spoken to today (the secretary and a few teachers) thought I was Russian. One asked if I was from the UK.

"Uh, zomewhere you 'ave never heard of," I told him honestly.

"Try me," he said, arching one of his eyebrows. I had never seen someone do that so well.

"Bavaria. Place called Pullach, right near Munich."

Tucker nodded. "So you were sort of next to Grünwald, right?"

To say I was astonished was an understatement. He not only knew what I was talking about, but he also knew what municipality was right next to the place I grew up. AND he was an American.

"Yes," I said, eyebrows furrowing. "How did you know?"

He shrugged. "I just know stuff."

I gave him an awkward chuckle in response, which--thankfully--he didn't get to react to. Mrs. Marshall was asking for our attention at the front, wondering if any of us shared the same literature interests. Not one person raised their hand. Shocker.

And then Tuck did. I felt my stomach tighten. Annnd here's where he announces that he has a gun.

"Otto and I shared a common interest," he announced loudly.

I noticed that every single person in the classroom had diverted their attention to him, eagerly awaiting his next few words. A few of the girls looked like they want to pounce on him, and the rest of the guys looked like they want to suck his dick, be on his dick, or have his dick. I had now realized that I was speaking to one of the ~popular~ boys. I braced myself for what came next.

"Big tits."

Everyone in the room absolutely lost it, including myself. I felt myself slapping him in the back like I've known him forever. He leaned back in his chair, tipping himself backwards so he could crane his neck to look at me. We exchanged grins and high-fives as the class's laughter quieted down.

This is the moment when I know he is going to be my best friend.

(To this day, Tucker still doesn't know how the phrase 'big tits' escaped his lips. He claims he was going to say Shakespeare just to make Marshall feel better, but apparently his subconscious had other ideas. Quite frankly, I'm glad it did.)