A few days after his birthday, Sylvian was still preoccupied with the presentation. Akiel was scheduled to come over to his house with all of their project material, and he did fulfill that promise. Since they were only going to be touching everything up and looking through their project work, it felt less frantic than the last time. While Sylvian told Akiel to make himself at home before he went to change in bathroom, Akiel had no intention of making himself comfortable, he was intrigued and lost in his whole self by Sylvian and instead started rummaging around in Sylvian's bookshelves.
He found himself fascinated by an old journal, thoroughly neglected and left in a largely untouched space for who knew how long. Akiel thumbed through the pages of the journal and stumbled across something interesting. When Sylvian was sixteen, he had a boy best friend, an actual best friend, and Sylvian had secretly fallen in love with him. Sylvian's boy best friend's name was a little strange but--Eliot Lee. As Akiel read, he realized Sylvian had been crushing on Eliot for what seemed like forever! The journal detailed some very raw moments in which Sylvian described the rollercoaster of emotions he felt when Eliot pretended to like him, and how they had dated for two months. But then the truth, as it often does, began to reveal itself--Eliot had been using Sylvian for two months to figure out what a relationship felt like, while he secretly had a crush on a girl named Amelia. Sylvian felt betrayed and embarrassed, he felt stupid in some respects, and it warranted him not trusting people in future relationships moving forward. He had never told anyone any of this and when I read it, the enormous piece of why he isolated just made sense.
Akiel closed the journal, put it back on the shelf, and acted as if he was waiting for Sylvian to come back from the bathroom. When Sylvian came back, Akiel was sweet and innocent again. Soon after they were in the chemistry lab at school presenting their project and received first place in the subsection contest for their project. Once that was done, all the closeness from working together on the project wore off, and they were back to poking fun at each other and teasing like they had never even worked together on the project.
Apparently out of nowhere, they had fought – about yet another bowel movement. Neither of them had managed to understand it. After school, Sylvian had gotten a text from Akiel. Sylvian chose not to open it right away but when he got home and opened it, he was frozen in place.
The text was cold as ice.
"I know your little secret. It's disgusting. If you even think about telling a teacher, or anyone, I will do everything I can to ruin your academic reputation. This is your first and final warning. The secret - and about Eliot, your so-called best-friend-boyfriend, and your betrayal - hilarious to me. Let's see how you handle this, then maybe I'll consider whether to keep this between us."
Sylvian was in shock, the threats were real, and the humiliation was brutal. Sylvian quickly sent a message asking Akiel to stop, and to please not tell anyone the secret.
The whole problem was triggered by a misunderstanding during gym class when Sylvian spotted a mark on Akiel's left arm. There was a big buzz about a wound on Akiel; and a couple girls came up to help Akiel. However, it was Sylvian's simple presence and misguided intentions that sent Akiel into a frenzy, and his first instinct was to blame Sylvian in what can only be described as a fit of madness. A mere miscommunication set in motion a cascade of ill feelings turning misunderstandings into a much darker place...