•Does it offend you, yeah?• [one/one]

Damien silently finished the slice he'd taken from Kohen's pizza, nodding at the other's comment - yea, it was true they bought the food in order to share it, but the boy still wanted to be polite about it, it simply was in his nature to do so.

"The juice it's what's ruining it, it pretty much always is" Franco agreed, sipping from his soda after two spicy slices. "My grandma used to make it like that, and it was always kinda unpleasant. But then one day my dad tried it and his came out way better. Thank god grandma agreed and started draining the juice before putting it in the oven."

"Yea, he's right" Samantha joined in, pointing at the boy next to her. "i used to drop by his place a while ago and his grandma would do the cooking. She was pretty skilled and all, but the pineapple pizza just never hit"

In the meantime, Damien had picked up another slice and was silently enjoying the food when he noticed Kohen staring at him with his hand reaching towards his side of the food. He gave an approving nod as he lightly gestured towards him to pick up the slice and then watched for the other's reaction, waiting.

"How is it?" he asked, tilting his head with curiosity when the other seemed to freeze for a second then suddenly relax.

Kohen listened to the others as he savored his newly found favorite thing- Damien's wacky fish pizza. Kohen wondered why he hadn't tried it before, but then again, he didn't visit places like this often, with or without friends. He was constantly broke and his deadbeat of a father never gave him any money to buy stuff with.
Probably thinks Imma save up and leave. Ha. Stupid old man. I'm way ahead of that. He thought. And it was true, Kohen was already working. His father didn't know of it though. He always thought he was out with Jake's gang. One thing was for sure- Kohen always made sure to sneak out when his father was passed out from the booze, then come back before school started and clean up- his father was usually still pretty wasted after that.
After finishing the two slices of fish pizza, Kohen went back to his own side- not wanting to see greedy in grabbing more. It was Damien's afterall.

Kohen turned to Damien once again when he asked his thoughts on the pizza. He laughed.
"You know I thought you were pretty crazy for suggest fish on a pizza- I mean, I hadn't even heard of such a thing till now, but uh,," He looked around nervously, wondering if they were going to judge him on this.
"I kinda like it- I never thought I'd be saying this, but it's really fucking good." He said, another nervous laugh escaping him as his face turned a little red. Maybe Kohen did have a thing for weird flavors and food. He just never really explored that side of himself.
All in all, he felt pretty relaxed. It was past midnight and he was getting tired. Kohen hadn't noticed the time fly by but he was sure aware of it when the alarm on his phone went off. This was around the time he snuck out to go to his job, but today, he had called in to ask for the night off.
He took a quick glance at his phone to turn it off and saw a bunch of unread messages- and all from the person he dreaded the most, Jake.
The small fact unsettled him, but he tried to shove it to the back of his mind and focus back on the discussion at hand.

He liked it. He actually liked it. That made Damien's shy smile freeze for a second, before his eyes started to sparkle with excitement and his smile just extended to his ears. He was really happy that there was someone else out there whom he could agree on on something. It wasn't much, but for Damien it meant the world. Sure, there were things he and his friends had in common, but it didnt hit as close to home as this one did; it warmed his heart and the feeling was wonderful. After years spent isolated from the world, bonding with someone over something as small as what they liked on their pizza was like a dream come true. Perhaps, if they spent more time together they could uncover more of what they had in common?

Damien still had one slice left by the time the others were done with theirs; he reached his hand to grab it but hesitated for a few seconds, then offered it to Kohen. Why not give him one more slice if he'd grown fond of the taste? Damien was a skinny kid after all, he could live without one more pizza slice.

"So, guys, do you still have things in mind or do you wanna head out?" Samantha asked, finishing her soda. "It's kinda late and you know how our parents get when we dont show up after a long time."

Kohen arched an eyebrow at Damien when he saw the huge smile on his face. What was he smiling at? Was there something on his face? Perhaps some pizza sauce? Slowly, the heat made it's way up to Kohen's face, he wasn't used to being smiled at like that- it seemed like it was almost in…admiration? Did he get that right? He wasn't sure, he usually read the mood wrong.
When the last slice was offered to him, Kohen didn't think twice about it, he took it and started eating. It's like the poor kid was starved despite having eaten a lot. "Thanks-" he managed through a full mouth.
Once he was done, he nodded at the request to leave. He doubted that his father would find out about him being out with friends this late, so it didn't matter to him, but the others seemed to be worried about what their parents thought, so why now dip now?
"Sure, I'm done, we can go" he said, gathering some of the trash from the table and throwing it away.
As soon as he did that, be went on ahead and walked out the door. Kohen had a smile on his face as he took in a deep breath of the night air.
"Hey, shitface."
Kohen froze at the words spoken. He knew exactly who's voice that belonged to.
Jake.
And suddenly, Kohen had an uneasy feeling in his stomach- enough for him to want to throw up.

Damien waved his hand in a "No problem" motion when Kohen thanked him for the slice and slowly started to gather the trash on the table, stacking it all on top of one of the plates so they could throw it away easier; on the other side of the table Samantha did the same with Franco, gathering some of the crumbs with a napkin. The boy emptied his soda bottle while Kohen ate and placed it on top of the trash, getting up to go at the counter in order to pay up the costs. His family was moderately wealthy, but even so Damien rarely went on big spending sprees so most times he only carried a small amount of cash with him, but every now and then he'd ask his mother for some extra in order to go out with his friends. His family knew how glad he was to have friends so most of the time they agreed to let him have some fun in their company.

After paying up, he asked for one more small soda bottle which he slid in his bag so he could enjoy later. He also quickly texted his mother that he'd be on his way soon enough, before picking up his bag and heading towards the door where he'd seen Kohen exit through. Before opening it, he waved his friends over.
"Do we still have a bus home, guys?" he asked, looking at the clock on the wall.
"I think so, but we might wanna hurry if we want to catch it." Samantha said, picking up her things as well. "If we miss it, my brother said he might drop by here in a couple minutes to pick us up."

With that, Damien gave a short nod and pushed the door open, nearly running into Kohen that had stopped just a few feet away in front of the door.

It wasn't moments after that Damien had stopped behind him.
Jake's glossy grey eyes scanned over Kohen, flickering over to Damien when he came out. Soon, there was a crooked smile on his face. "Ah, a date." He said. "I'm sorry to-"
"IT'S NOT." Kohen nearly yelled. Even if it had been, Kohen knew that Jake would spread the rumor around school to get back at him. He didn't want that.
With that, Jake looked amused and satisfied, knowing that he could get under Kohen's skin.
"Okay, a night out, a date, whatever you freaks call it." Jake went on, casually digging into his pocket and pulling out his phone. "But why didn't you answer? We must have called you about eleven times tonight. What if it had been an emergency?" He asked.
"It's never an emergency with you guys." Kohen replied. He nervously glanced back at Damien. "Uhm, Day, why don't you go ahead? I have to talk with my friends here-"
"Friends?" Came a voice from behind Jake. "No, we're not friends. Unless you can prove it to us." Marcus stepped forward. He was as pissy as ever. Very on brand for a pyromaniac.
"And your friend isn't going anywhere." Aaron stepped out from the shadows. He had his back leaned against the wall, watching the whole time.
"Rae. Grab him for me." Jake ordered and Rae too stepped forward.
The whole thing seemed to planned out for it to be a coincidence. Kohen figured they must have been stalking him the whole time.
Kohen gave a laugh, trying to sound unfazed, but it came out with hints of nervousness. "Ah? So you've been following me." He stated. "Am I that important? Do I mean that much to you?" He asked.
Jake's playful face turned serious, as if Kohen had hit the nail on the head. "We'll see how long that pretty mouth of yours is talking after I'm done with you."
Rae walked forward to get Damien, but Kohen did the unexpected. He brought his arm out and blocked Rae from passing, while shielding Damien.
"Look. Your problem is with me. Don't bring others into this. It's not their fault."
"They? Oh. Then it looks like we better work quickly before they come."
With that Jake stood in front of Kohen, and Kohen, too afraid to move, froze. Jake smiled again and lifted Kohen's chin with his hand, his grip firm. "You're coming with us. Period. As for your friend- or is it boyfriend? Doesn't matter. We'll make a mess out of him too."
Before Kohen could react, Jake knocked him out. Rae seemed to mumble an apology as she tightly grabbed Damien's wrists and brought them behind his back, shoving him forward.
"Make a sound and I'll kill you. Do as much as sneeze and I'll end you right here." Jake warned, proping Kohen over his shoulder, his peaceful sleeping face unknown to the horrors they were about to witness.

(If it gets too intense, mind having Samantha's bro drop by in time to save their asses at the last second, but after that Kohen would know about Damien being bi or smth? idk qvq)

Still inside, Samantha and Franco froze when they heard the voices outside and saw the bullies gathered around the door. Samantha whipped out her phone and quickly dialed a number, impatiently whispering "pick up, pick up" while pacing around nervously next to the other boy who had just frozen. As a nerdy type, he was scared shitless those guys would mess him up really bad, and as much as he would have wanted to help Damien, he was just frozen in place, unable to move. Besides, these guys were very bad news, under no circumstance was it indicated to confront them, unless you were a jock or something like that.

Damien had not expected this ambush like meet-up with Kohen's friends, so he just stood where he was, trying to keep his poor heart from jumping out of his chest. He was scared, yes, but honestly there was nothing he could do, except the one thing he knew he could - very carefully, he slid his hand into one of his pants pockets, looking around for the small device his aunt had given him. Once he found the small disk, he long pressed the big button in the middle, until he felt it vibrate for a second, then slid his hand out, hoping he'd been unnoticed.

As a kid with many medical problems, his family always wanted to make sure they could keep an eye out for him, wherever he was. That small buzzer was for times when he felt like passing out or was just in overall danger. Hopefully his aunt could get here in time before these guys did anything too bad to him and Kohen.

He was unnerved to be there, surrounded by these notorius bullies. A small gasp escaped his throat when the other guy knocked Kohen sensless, but there wasnt much he could do, as the girl was already restraining his arms. Damien nodded slightly at the warning, trying to keep himself calm, but his heart was still thumping away in his ears.