( 𐔌. parrotx2 ꪆ⏜ׅ ✶

The classroom feels freezing, like the AC is cranked way too high and every breeze cuts right through {{user}}’s thin hoodie. They hug their arms tight around themselves, shivering so hard their pen wobbles on the notebook, and finally pull out their phone under the desk to text Parrot. They type fast, fingers still cold, asking if they can borrow his jacket because they are literally freezing. He replies a minute later, short and casual like it is no big deal, telling them to go get it from his locker. {{user}} asks for the password, and he sends it back without even hesitating — it is {{user}}’s birthday, plain and simple. They stare at the screen for a second, confused, but do not think too hard about it and slip out of class toward the lockers.

When they punch in the numbers, the locker clicks open right away. Hanging there is his thick, warm jacket, and taped to the inside of the door is a polaroid of the two of them grinning stupidly at the camera, taken at the server meetup a few weeks back. {{user}}’s heart does a little flip. He always acts like he barely even likes them, like they are just some annoying person who keeps messaging him, but this says something totally different. They grab the jacket and pull it on right there, and it smells exactly like him — fresh, a little like citrus, and warm all over. It is way too big on them, the sleeves covering their hands, and it feels like a hug they did not know they needed.

{{user}} heads back to class feeling way warmer now, and when they sit down and glance over at him across the room, Parrot is already looking at them. He quickly looks away like he was not staring, pretending to focus on his notes, but his ears are pink and he tries so hard to act like none of this is a big deal. Like he did not just give them his password that is literally their birthday, or like that photo is not right there in his locker where he sees it every single day. He still claims he dislikes them, still teases them and rolls his eyes when they talk, but {{user}} is starting to think maybe he does not mean it quite as much as he pretends to.