So... it's been a while :)

I have written a few bonus chapters to 'Heart and Soul', which I will be publishing throughout the next few weeks for anyone who might want to read. Hopefully, when I'm done with that, I will have a new story ready to publish!

Hopefully.

The first bonus chapter is Joey's POV of Carter's cafeteria very early 2000s drama. I noticed through your comments that he was a well-liked character, so I hope you like it!

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Unlike Every Other Day — Joey POV

*this chapter contains multimedia relevant to the plot*

Joey put down his phone. He had no idea what to think.

From his perspective, what had happened in the locker room earlier that day had escalated way too fast and completely out of nowhere.

He had been the one to tell the others about Carter and Seth's escapade to the Everglades with the Santoros and Coach's family. At the time, the others reacted exactly the way he expected that piece of useless information deserved.

The mean little smile on Bobby's face when he brought it up in the locker room hinted at something else, though. The look Carter shot Joey too.

Joey had heard Scott call Coach's son 'Nancy Mason' before, but he thought it was just a dumb joke that no one took too seriously or found too funny. That was the only kind of jokes Scott usually had.

Carter's reaction showed he did take it seriously, though. And Seth's, above all.

Of course, Scott did use... that word. Which was taking it more than a little too far. Especially if he was going for simple locker room banter. 

No, yeah, that word was definitely too far.

And then Chaz came in. And he looked worried. Like he was taking it seriously too. And, after that word was thrown in, Joey supposed that was acceptable.

But Bobby had to puff out his chest and be the big, though guy in the room. Which was beyond stupid. Sure, Bobby was big and tough. But Seth was... well, Seth. Joey had seen him clock a guy for making a joke about his dad's second family once. A teammate. Obviously, if the one on the line was Carter, of all people, Seth wouldn't reign himself in.

So they fought, and Carter just stood there.

Joey'd had no idea what was happening. He had the impression he was missing a lot of information. He always had that impression, especially in class, but he'd been having it a lot around his friends lately. Which was really annoying.

When he and Chaz broke Seth and Scott apart, Carter still did nothing. When Joey asked, Carter said nothing. And that was even more annoying, so Joey left.

And now Seth was off the team. Carter, who stood and watched as his teammates fought in the damn locker room, was the sole captain. And Joey still had no idea what had happened.

His phone buzzed next to him and he picked it up to read a text from Jenna.

That made him want to sink his head into his pillow and scream. Because, no, he did not.

He knew Chaz knew. Chaz knew, Scott knew and Bobby knew too. Carter and Seth definitely knew. Everyone, except him. Because nobody told him anything anymore.

He didn't know what was going on in his friends' lives, he didn't know why his girlfriends were always so different after they started dating, and he had never known squat about whatever he was supposed to know for class. So, lately, Joey knew practically nothing.

He might as well ditch school and go be a potato or something.

Except his parents would never let him drop out. So, the next morning, he kissed his mom goodbye and went to school like every other day. When he sat at the cafeteria for lunch, however, it was more than clear that day wasn't like every other.

Carter sat in front of him, looking down and keeping quiet. Because why would he start sharing now, after spending a whole-ass year being as cagey and secretive as Seth?

Joey focused on the conversation the girls were having to his side. Jenna and Melanie were telling Sienna, Chaz's ex girlfriend, about a new show and Joey knew they were trying to distract her from the girl currently sitting on Chaz's lap. Because the one think Joey did understand was messy, shallow relationships and breakups.

"Do you have a problem?" He heard Carter snap eventually. Joey looked up to see his usually passive friend glaring heatedly at Bobby Gonzalez and Scott Meyers. He couldn't even hide his shock when he heard Carter add venomously, "Besides your face."

And that was mean as fuck, because Scott's face really didn't look its best, all bruised and swollen. And it was so un-Carter-like to point it out.

Scott smirked. "Not at the moment. Do you?"

"At the moment, I have two," Carter said and even Joey, clueless as ever, could tell he meant Bobby and Scott. Or at least he thought that's what Carter meant.

He heard Jenna put her phone down, which was a testament to just how unlike every other day that day actually was.

"Maybe you should get Nancy Mason to suck you off. Get that chip off your shoulder."

Even Joey's lips parted. Because Scott was an asshole, that much was well-known. Even by Joey. But that was too much of an asshole's thing to say. It was just wrong. And the way he kept going back to that sort of comment was even more wrong. Wronger...?

"Did somebody told you homophobia was a personality trait? Or is your skull too thick to even grasp the concept of a personality?"

Joey heard Jenna whistle over the chorus of 'ooh's and 'damn's. There was a delighted shine in her dark eyes too. That was exactly the kind of comment that got her blood flowing. It just wasn't that kind of thing that usually came from Carter.

A lot of people around them were starting to look.

"Calm the fuck down, Parrish," Bobby spat. "People might start thinking Coach's son really did turn you into a sissy."

"He didn't turn me into anything," Carter shot back.

Oh.

Scott snorted loudly. "So you were a faggot all along?" He asked, laughing.

Oh...

Carter stood from the table. "Better than being a brainless bigot who overcompensates with the size of his ego."

Oh!

Joey was frozen for a second as Carter turned and left. Much like everyone around him. That outburst was shocking enough, but a bigger question pulsed inside Joey's brain.

Was Carter...?

Joey would have known, though.

Except of course he wouldn't. He never knew anything.

He watched Seth follow Carter, because Seth always followed Carter.

There was ruffling and shuffling as people went back to their business. Joey saw Carter's stepsister and her friends, the nerdy one and the hot girl, move to the table near the dumpster where his friends' had sat down.

He saw Melanie and Jenna stand up and, true to himself, took a second to catch up.

"Where are you going?" He asked.

"Wherever the drama leads," Jenna replied, way too pleased.

Right.

Joey grabbed his tray and walked after them to the dumpster table. He tended to follow the girls as much as Seth did Carter. Either one of the two had more brain capacity individually than two of him.

He had to pull a chair from a nearby table to squeeze in at the head, with Jenna to his left and the big-headed nerdy kid to his right. Jenna took out her phone again.

"Babe, can I have your carrot sticks? I'm not enjoying these fries as much as I though I would," the nerdy kid—Mel had said before that his name was Roy O'Brien—piped up.

The hot blonde girl huffed. "You know I'm trying to cut down carbs."

"It's useless buying carrot sticks at lunch if you're just going to hit the taco truck after school with Bella."

That was so the wrong thing to say. Joey might not know much, but he did know how to annoy a girl. Even if he didn't necessarily comprehend the mechanism, he had memorized a few triggers. And that was definitely on the money.

"I'll trade your fries for my apple," he said.

Roy looked at him, eyeing the golden apple in his hand. He grinned. "Deal."

Joey watched Seth give him a Seth-like look. Seth looks were quiet and broody and hard to crack, but mostly judgmental, even if with a dash of fondness from time to time.

"What?" Joey asked. "Season's over and I'm coming back from a breakup. I need the carbs."

Seth rolled his eyes. Joey traded his apple for Roy' fries and ignored Jenna's disgusted look. She looked at him like that a lot, but they hung out all the time so clearly she couldn't be that disgusted by him. He suspected that was actually how she showed love.

"I have a question," he eventually said. Jenna rolled her eyes when he raised his hands like he was in class.

"Yes?" It was the blonde that spoke.

Joey smiled. "Is this, like, our new crowd, or is it just a temporary arrangement?" He looked at Carter as he asked that.

"Hope it's temporary," Jenna muttered. "Or we'll need a bigger table."

"Preferably some other table. One refugee is fine, but eight is pushing it," a dark-haired, all-black dressed girl Joey didn't know spoke from the opposite end of the table.

"Yeah, the dumpster table was kind of our thing," Frankie Santoro said. "It repels shallow idiots. Or, really, all sorts of idiots."

"How'd you end up here then?" Bella Santoro asked without wasting a beat.

Her brother scoffed. "We took you in. This is your token of appreciation?"

"Shut up, little Santoro," the blonde next to Bella Santoro joined in.

As they spat out jabs back and forth between the three, Joey took a moment to look at his friends. Jenna was looking at something on her phone, holding the image with her manicured thumb on the screen. Next to her, Melanie seemed to be watching Carter, so Joey looked at him too.

Carter usually had a kind of off look on his face during lunch. Like he was sitting with them, but he wasn't really there. He never joined in on the conversation unless someone blatantly pulled him into it, or unless someone in his closer circle addressed him more privately.

In that moment, though, he had a stunned look on his face. Like he was sitting with them, but he couldn't quite believe what was happening. He almost looked confused too. Which made Joey feel a little better than it probably should. Because why the heck should he be the only one confused all the time?

Joey snapped into the conversation when he heard Jenna say something about the way he ate to Bella. It sounded mean too, because Jenna had used her mean voice. This sort of superficially sweet tone that was actually meant to be condescending.

Carter's stepsister was too quick to quip back to have time to be offended, and Joey's eyebrows rose at her jab about Jenna's weak lunch of rabbit food.

Jenna winced at the mention of cafeteria Sloppy Joes. "I'm vegetarian."

Bella flaunted her chips in front of Jenna, as an offering.

Joey was sure that scrunched-up nose and tightly pressed lips would turn into a menacing look and a snide remark. Instead, Jenna took it with a shrug.

Joey cheered, watching Jen dump Bella's chips on her salad. "'Atta girl."

And Jenna didn't even told him to bite her or flipped him off, because she was too busy eating carbs. The kind that came in a plastic bag. At lunch.

No one really expected Scott and Bobby to come over to their table. But the bitter, overly aggressive speech didn't come as a surprise. Not as much as Jenna throwing his varsity jacket into the dumpster, that's for sure.

Joey reacted mechanically when he saw Scott charge in her direction. Chaz Wheeler was on him before he could touch Jenna, but Joey still said, "Move a finger in her direction, I dare you."

"You feeling lucky, shorty?" Scott taunted him, and Joey realized then he never really liked him. Because off the field, without his gear on and his mouth shut, Scott was just a frustrated dude with a lot of anger and not enough in his head to make up a personality outside of that. And for a horrible second, Joey saw in himself the potential to become Scott if he let the same kind of anger take over.

Seth spared him the need to reply to Scott's taunt, steering an even angrier reaction out of their teammate. Chaz made a sorry attempt to pull Scott away, which backfired and made him leave. In the end, it was Bobby that dragged Scott away, red and raging.

"Very early 2000s teen drama, indeed," Roy said, making them all laugh.

Even Joey laughed. Even though he still felt like he was missing something. That feeling wasn't new, though. The discreet kiss he saw Carter give Coach's son in the parking lot after school, on the other hand, definitely was.