Thursday morning, Auggie woke up early. He wasn’t sure why he’d woken up early—it certainly hadn’t been the plan—but he couldn’t fall back asleep either. He lay in bed, watching the digital clock advance towards 7:00am, and checked his social media accounts. He didn’t post or reply because it was too early and he had a certain kind of image to maintain, but he scrolled through the feeds.
One platform that he’d never really managed to get traction on was Vine. It featured short, looping video clips that were no longer than six or seven seconds. Auggie had been noodling some ideas for the platform, but his best videos—until now—had been significantly longer than six seconds. In general, his most successful work relied on clear characterization that was established quickly, escalation, and a twist at the end. Six seconds just wasn’t enough time to do that. He lay in bed, thinking about that for a while, trying to figure out how he could condense his usual format. Then he tried scrapping his usual format and brainstorming something new. Then he thought about a guy with a bro flow of strawberry-blond hair and a phenomenal beard who was definitely, certainly, positively not Theo.
The thing about this guy who absolutely, completely, totally was not Theo, was that you needed like a million snapshots of him to really understand him. You needed a picture of that instant right when he was teetering on the edge between laughing and getting angry. You needed a picture of how his eyebrows drew together when he was reading Shakespeare—or something equally boring. You needed a picture of how he hooked one heel around his other calf to scratch his leg. You needed a whole series of pictures of him blushing. You could fill a museum with them. The very first hint of color beneath the beard, the crisp pattern of red as the blush solidified, the way he scratched his cheek or shook his head or pushed his hair behind his ears when he got flustered. The end of the blush, when he’d forgotten about being flustered, and his eyes were like watercolors.
Auggie pulled a pillow over his face, told himself no, and then proceeded to jerk off.
When he’d finished, he went to the bathroom, showered, and began getting ready for the day. He was staring in the mirror, toothbrush hanging out of his mouth, trying to get the right amount of gel to get the right amount of texture to get the right amount of lift in his crew cut, when the idea hit him.
“Oh shit,” he said to the mirror.
Brock Spafford, who was squeezing zits at the sink next to Auggie, glanced over.
“Oh shit,” Auggie told him and then sprinted back to his room.
He grabbed his phone and opened up an app he’d been trying to figure out how to use. Snapchat was still relatively new, but Auggie’s gut told him it had a lot of promise. The idea of messages, videos, and images that self-destructed had a degree of intrinsic appeal, but more importantly, there was something about the built-in scarcity, the get-it-while-you-can nature of the app, that he thought was going to make it huge. And, of course, it never hurt to have people hanging on your next video because they knew it would be gone soon.
He messed up his hair so that it looked like bedhead, and then he set up his lights and climbed back in bed. He pulled the sheet to his waist, so that his abs and a hint of dark hair below his navel was visible. Nips out. Until now, he’d been safe, sweet, boy-next-door Auggie—no nips. But that had also been straight-boy, ultracloseted Auggie. And fuck that Auggie.
The first snap in his story was of himself in bed. The next was him just after the shower—water gleaming on his chest, wet hair hanging over his forehead. The next was brushing his teeth, making a ridiculous face. The next was trying to get his hair right. The next was picking out an outfit. The next was nominally picking out shoes, but he angled the camera to get his bare leg and a hint of underwear. The next was his backpack. The next was the front of the Sigma Sigma house. The next was Wroxall’s gothic silhouette behind him—he slapped on the geofilter for this last one, because he was still trying things, and the geofilter was new. Most of the guys in the frat didn’t pay any attention; they knew who he was, and they knew what he did. Auggie did see a couple of them check their phones, and one guy—a junior named Tripp—did some pretty vigorous adjustments while staring at the screen.
Then Auggie saw the time and, swearing under his breath, sprinted to class.
He got to Tether-Marfitt two minutes after nine. He got to the fourth-floor classroom three minutes later. When he slipped into the classroom, Dr. Wagner was already droning on about something—it sounded like the publication history of Romeo and Juliet—and Auggie tried to sneak to the back of the class.
“Mr. Lopez,” Dr. Wagner said in his dry, nasally voice. “I’m so glad you could come to class.”
“Sorry,” Auggie said, creeping toward the aisle that would take him to the back of the room. “I’m sorry I’m late.”
“Please sit down, Mr. Lopez.”
“Right. Yes, sir.”
“Now, Mr. Lopez.”
Auggie threw a frantic look at the front row, which was totally empty except, of course, for Theo. Auggie shot across the room and dropped into the seat next to him. Dr. Wagner watched the whole thing, waiting in silence while Auggie unpacked his laptop, a piece of chalk suspended in one hand. Auggie’s face was hot as he opened the laptop and woke it up. He stared at the screen.
“If you’re ready, Mr. Lopez?”
“I’m really sorry.”
“I suppose you’ve decided you don’t need to bother bringing your textbook to class.”
Auggie stared at his backpack. “I forgot it. I’m sorry. It won’t happen again.”
“There’s no point in you staying if you don’t have your textbook, Mr. Lopez. Kindly remove yourself from the room.”
“He can share with me,” Theo said, sliding his copy of the Riverside Shakespeare to a spot between him and Auggie. When Dr. Wagner opened his mouth, Theo said, “Just for today.”
Wagner chewed on this for a minute. Then he said, “You’re very lucky you have such a good friend, Mr. Lopez.”
Auggie tried to melt into his seat.
“Not everyone gets that kind of special treatment,” Wagner said before turning back to the board, where he began scribbling dates again.
“Oh my God,” Auggie whispered, his eyes screwed shut.
“Forget that old fuck,” Theo whispered, “and open your eyes and take some notes.”
After that, Auggie assumed class couldn’t get any worse. But Wagner had clearly marked Auggie for punishment, and his retribution took the form of questions.
“When was the first, unauthorized quarto version published? Anyone? Mr. Lopez?”
Auggie’s mind went blank. “I don’t know. I’m sorry.”
A few minutes later: “And, of course, the authorized quarto was published, yes, anyone? Mr. Lopez?”
“I’m—I’m sorry.”
“I thought maybe you were late because you were doing the reading,” Wagner said with a kind of ghoulish glee. “I see that I was wrong.”
Auggie sank down in his seat.
“1609,” Theo whispered.
“What?”
“The third quarto was printed in 1609, and it’s the version the editors of the First Folio used in 1623.”
Auggie shook his head.
“He’s going to ask you,” Theo said; Wagner was still droning on about the authorized quarto.
“I did the reading. I did it, Theo. I swear to God.”
“I know.”
It was the way he said it, so matter of fact, that helped more than the words themselves.
“And of course,” Wagner said, “the third quarto emerged in, yes, Mr. Lopez, I’m sure you can help us with this one.”
“1609.”
Wagner stared at him for a long, silent moment. Then his gaze slid to Theo. “Well, we can’t all have the TA sitting next to us, can we?” Then he began to talk about the textual variations of the third quarto.
Auggie started to pack up his laptop.
Theo’s hand was warm when it closed around his wrist. The calluses were always a surprise; somehow Auggie forgot, again and again, how rough Theo’s hands could be.
“Don’t give him the satisfaction,” Theo said.
“I’m getting you in trouble,” Auggie said.
Theo rolled his eyes. “Wagner couldn’t get me in trouble even if he wanted to. He’s a thug and a drunk, and he’s taking out his complete failure at life on you.”
Auggie grabbed his backpack.
“Don’t you dare put the laptop away,” Theo said, squeezing Auggie’s wrist. “Your ass is staying in that seat, and you’re going to take notes and get an A in this class.”
“What the hell kind of teaching assistant are you?”
“The kind that specializes in bullying smart but annoying undergraduates into reaching their full potential. Laptop open, Auggie. You’re missing stuff that will be on the test.”
The class got better after that. Not much, but better. Theo didn’t stick around to talk; he was out the door before Auggie had finished packing up his stuff. Auggie thought he might find him downstairs, where they could talk without Wagner listening to them, but Theo was gone.
Auggie dug out his phone and checked Snapchat. He was surprised to see he’d gained over a thousand followers in the last hour. And he was even more surprised to see a snap from dylan_j199. It was clearly an answer to Auggie’s first snap: it showed Dylan in bed, his blond curls tousled, his eyes sleepily half open, a tiny smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.
He’d scrawled across the bottom of the snap, nice way to wake up.
Auggie hesitated. Then he took a snap of himself grinning and giving a goofy thumbs up and scribbled very nice and sent it back.