Disclaimer: The following story contains activity that would be considered of homosexual nature between consenting college students. While none of it crosses into a gratuitous nature, if such material is offensive to you or you are not of the legal age to read such material in your area, please do not. Other than that, please enjoy the story!
The Living Years 28
Chapter 28 "The Great Unraveling"
It was hard for Shawn to do something like this. It was no secret that he wasn't exactly the son his father wanted him to be but there was a time where he tried to live up to everything his father wanted from him.
He'd been captain of his school's baseball team. He dated the school class president, daughter to the wealthiest family in town. He was a sport playing, drinking, swearing all American good old boy that for whatever reason, his father still hadn't approved of.
And now here he was about to finally admit to his father out loud the very reason he had probably never been proud of him.
He always suspected that maybe his father knew about him. And now he was about to prove his father right.
"Come again? Did you say you were-"
"Gay? A fag? A fucking flaming homo? All of the above dad! Feel better knowing you were right about me all along?"
Shawn's father said nothing. His mother said nothing. There was complete silence. He almost thought they just hadn't heard them. He figured he should repeat himself but didn't quite get the chance.
"You know, I had a feeling but I had to stop myself because no son of mine could turn out gay. Not my kid," Shawn's father responded.
"Too bad you don't have another son to be proud of instead, right dad?" Shawn spoke.
He didn't care anymore. The guy he loved was never going to love him back so the way he figured it, he was destined for unhappiness. Why not have his family hate him? He was already halfway there with his father.
"Yeah, that's....that's too bad," his father spoke, almost inaudibly.
He'd turned around so that his back was to Shawn. Shawn looked briefly over at his mother before looking back in his dad's direction.
"You know, you're right I don't have another son to be proud of," his father started. "But no one says I have to keep the one I already have."
Shawn hadn't even seen the gun. He hadn't even felt the death. It was one quick moment. His father shot him in the head and he was dead.
Or at least, he was dead in his dreams.
Now, in reality he was awake. And so apparently were Ben and his roommate Spencer.
"Dude, who's gay?" Spence asked, almost like he was still half asleep.
Shawn looked down at himself. He was sleeping on a blow up bed next to Ben's bed on the floor. He was shirtless and completely drenched in sweat. He was also panting heavily as if he'd just run some kind of marathon.
"Spence, go back to sleep," Ben spoke.
"Two egg McGriddles please," Spence mumbled before rolling over in bed, pulling the covers over his head.
Ben leaned over his bed looking down at Shawn.
"What happened?" he asked.
Shawn took a moment to think about it. He dreamed that he told his parents he was gay and his father had reacted the way Shawn figured he would react in his worst nightmares. And he'd just had that nightmare.
There was absolutely no way in the world that he could ever actually tell his father he was gay. He wasn't brave enough for that. Besides that he didn't even have a boyfriend or any guy in his life, for that matter, to prove that he actually he was. He knew that he was, but for now he liked to think that he wasn't anything.
And telling his parents he was gay was something. It was a big thing.
Shawn looked over at Ben to answer his previous question.
"I think I just saw my future," he replied. *****************************************************************************************
"All I'm saying is that maybe you could have handled the entire situation a little more diplomatically instead of just completely rushing your mom away like you did," Zoey spoke.
She, Grace, Noah and Trey were all on their way to the respective classes. They usually met up at the same place whenever one let out just to walk as far as they could before having to split up for the next one.
And the incident in question was one of semi epic proportions. Grace's mother had completely sprung having a new man in her life on her. She hadn't told him about him on the phone. Hadn't mentioned him in text or email. Nothing. But when it came time for her to spend 72 hours with her mother, sharing what had become her own life with her mother, she decides to spring this big surprise on her.
And it was a big surprise. He was a big surprise. A really big snoring, snorting, 7 meal eating, walked three miles behind everyone, heavy mouth breathing surprise. And Grace didn't like him. She always saw her mother as being better than that. And heavy Heavy D wasn't something she was trying to be down with.
So she vented to her friends and quietly stewed to herself, holding her tongue and keeping it all in until the moment she decided to spring upon her the announcement she feared the most: they were engaged.
Unfortunately for them both it had been in the middle of a parent vs child talent show competition that was taking place in the coliseum. Grace hadn't known at the time what had gotten into her. All she knew was that she snapped and completely went off on her mother and HIM, completely embarrassing everyone involved.
Expecting her mother to argue back, Grace was completely shocked and aghast when her mother simply walked out of the room silently. Expecting her to be waiting in her room for her when she finally calmed down, she was further shocked to learn that she had completely packed up and went home.
At the time it seemed like the best thing for everyone involved. Now she just felt like a jackass who had some explaining and apologizing to do.
Not that she would ever choose to admit that particular weakness to her friends.
"She ran away, not me," Grace replied, crossing her arms. "She a grown ass woman. She know better than to be trying to bring some big ass pervert up here to me."
"Pervert. Grace, come on," Zoey spoke.
"I don't wanna talk about it anymore," Grace replied. "Besides, you wanna talk about folks being out of character around they parents let's talk about those two over there."
Zoey looked at Noah and Trey who were otherwise completely silent and had been, she noticed, since they had met up.
"Well?" Grace asked. "Ya'll got anything to say about turning into MC Hammer when the feds were up his ass?"
"What does that even mean?" Trey asked, a little confused.
"Ya'll was over here acting straight paranoid people was gonna find out and then...well ya'll know what happened next," Grace replied, crossing her arms.
Trey looked down, feeling embarrassed. Truth be told, it had been mainly him that was going around acting like the sky was falling and that the world was at an end. He'd pretty much made up his mind that Noah's brother knew about them and as such was doing whatever he could to torment him with the knowledge. It was almost like Bryce wanted people to know what he knew but that he found more pleasure in not directly telling anyone.
"After all that ya'll still didn't tell nobody about you," Grace replied. "Everybody here can know but not yo mama's huh?"
"I think we already established that none of us have trophy families to write home about," Zoey interjected. "You should cut them some slack."
"Yeah well I'm just glad I got somebody that knows exactly what I'm going through," Grace spoke.
"Please tell me you aren't talking about Josh," Trey spoke.
He wasn't the biggest fan of Grace's boyfriend. For all intents and purposes, he seemed like a nice enough guy. Grace seemed to really like him and he seemed to treat her right. But there was just something about him that Trey couldn't quite put his finger on.
But he had to keep telling himself that as long as she was happy. Besides, Grace's boyfriend needed to be the farthest thing from his mind when he was still having problems with his own.
"Well alright then," Grace spoke. "I guess we can talk about it some more at lunch. Zoey, walk with me."
"Bye boys," Zoey spoke, interweaving her arm in between Grace's as they turned to the left. "Stay out of trouble please."
"How's jumping off a cliff to end my troubles sounding to you?" Noah called after Zoey who just held up a finger in the air behind her.
Noah chuckled while Trey wallowed in his own thoughts before the two of them started walking. Ordinarily Trey held closely to Noah to try to get a little warmer in the cold as they walked but he was so wrapped up in his thoughts that he couldn't even feel how cold it was outside.
All he could think was how it was him that was constantly sabotaging his relationship with Noah. Shawn had been the biggest deterrent to their relationship, and even though he wasn't sure that the feelings he seemed to have for Shawn would ever truly go away, the fact of the matter was, Noah was his boyfriend, not Shawn, and he needed to remember that.
Of course, their latest problem in a long string of problems they seemed to keep having was Trey's lack of wanting to tell his mom or Noah's parents about them. No one could quite seem to understand his logic when the truth of the matter was, he wasn't really sure he understood it either.
He had become more and more comfortable with being with Noah in public, to the point where he no longer thought twice about holding his hand or hugging him. He still felt a little uncomfortable kissing him in public, but that was mainly the kissing thing, not the kissing a guy part.
But there was just something that was keeping him from telling the most important person in his life. He feared rejection. He feared being outcast and shunned. But most of all he felt afraid that his mother would accept it and hate him for not telling him sooner.
It was almost like putting it off avoided all horrible possible outcomes. And he was okay with avoiding the horrible. He'd grown comfortable with avoiding the horrible. Only, this weekend had sought to prove that maybe he wasn't as comfortable with it as he thought. There were, after all, two people in his relationship and he was just now starting to think about how Noah was feeling.
The only problem was he couldn't quite read him.
Noah for his part, knew that Trey had to be dealing with a lot being on his mind and was completely okay with giving him his space. That was why he hadn't said anything to him when Trey hadn't grabbed his hand or wrapped his arms around the inside of his coat as they walked along. He figured the best way to avoid a fight would be to let Trey tell him whatever was on his mind on his own.
Besides, he had enough to deal with himself regarding his own issues. His brother had behaved strangely the entire weekend, to the point where he'd actually had to assume that Bryce knew he was gay and was teasing him with the information all weekend long.
It was the only thing that made the most sense to him and even though his brother was no one to be proud of as of late, he knew his brother was just as smart if not smarter than he was. Why wouldn't he be able to figure it out for himself?
The last thing he cared about was his brother knowing his business. The way he saw it, he needed to care about the person for him to care what they thought about him and Bryce had lost that privilege a long time ago. He was, however a bit concerned with the inane idea that his brother would piece together his being gay and then figure he could toy with him regarding that information. He wasn't sure what Bryce was really capable of anymore and the last thing he needed was his brother turning his already terrible parents against him.
At the end of a normal day under normal circumstances he didn't give two shits what is parents thought about him as well, but these apparently weren't normal circumstances and he was beginning to think about all the ways his parents finding out he was gay could go wrong for him regarding the rest of his life and his future.
But he figured that as long as nothing was happening regarding that, he could at least try as best as possible not to think about it.
He looked over at Trey, who looked as though he was miles away, before smiling happily to himself. With all the terrible thoughts he had looming in the back of his mind, he knew that he could at least take solace in the fact that he had the most wonderful, compassionate and trusting boyfriend in the world. He couldn't be happier with Trey.
"Hey, you been tested?" was the question that had been posed to Noah as, seemingly out of nowhere, a girl with glasses, a nose piercing and bright red streaks in her dark hair, jumped into his face with a flyer.
"What the hell!" Noah spoke, annoyed.
Trey's intense thinking session was broken when he noticed what was going on. Someone was in Noah's face with some kind of flyer. But that was probably the most normal thing going on in that area at the moment.
A few feet away from them was a large group of students, shouting and screaming at students that were passing by. Many of them had signs, all of which seemed to be talking about STD's.
Noah took the flyer from the girl and looked it over, Trey peeking over his shoulder to get a look.
"There's an epidemic of STD's going around campus," the girl spoke. "We're trying to get the school to order mandatory STD testing of all the students so we can stop this stuff before we all die of AID's."
"AID's?" Noah asked. "Don't you think you're going just a little overboard?"
"You think syphilis, gonorrhea and herpes are something to joke about, pretty boy?" the girl asked. "They're not by the way. And just in case you had any doubt, the on campus clinic and local hospital have both seen a 56% increase in STD testing and treatment in the past two weeks alone."
"And you think forcing everyone to get tested for something they might not even have is gonna prevent people from getting an STD in the first place?" Noah asked.
"We're trying to wake people up! Forcing students to get tested will force them to think about what an STD can do to screw up their lives."
"And what happens if they get tested and have an STD?"
"They get the help they need."
Noah looked between the girl and over to the protestors, one of which had just gotten a face full of soda in his face from a passer-by.
"You people are crazy," he said. "No one is going to force people to get an STD check. You wanna help people? Here's a free piece of advice: if you don't want an STD, stay a goddamn virgin all your life!"
Noah was so upset he needed to just walk away, balling up the flyer and throwing it and all. He'd never, under any circumstance his a girl but this girl in particular seemed to be asking for it.
Trey looked back over at the protestors before looking back over at the girl who handed him a flyer.
"Sounds like your boyfriend there has a reason he doesn't want to get tested," she said.
"How-"
"I can read people as well as I can read this school. We're on the fast track to the bottom of the barrel and if we don't something about it, we won't have enough people at this school to call it one anymore."
Trey stood as the girl patted his shoulder gently before walking away to hand out more flyers to passer bys. Trey looked over to Noah, who'd stopped and was looking down at the ground, waiting for him. Even from where he stood, he could tell that his boyfriend was far from in a great mood.
He started over to him slowly, a bit afraid to approach him.
"I mean, can you believe that bullshit nonsense?" Noah asked, as soon as Trey was within earshot.
He didn't respond. Noah was a bit too furious to look at Trey.
"Look, I don't wanna yell at you over something stupid like this when it's not our problem so I'm just gonna go to class," Noah said. "I'll see you later."
Trey watched Noah go for a while before his thoughts quickly got darker. He started letting himself think about what the girl had said.
He and Noah hadn't really talked about any kind of testing between them but maybe if this sort of thing was forced on everyone, he'd get to see exactly what it was between them that they may have gotten from each other or someone else.
Maybe mandatory drug testing wasn't such a bad idea. *****************************************************************************************
His head hurt like fuck. That was his first thought. His second was how he'd ended up fully clothed minus a sock and shoe on his left foot, on top of his bed with a bra hanging over his lampshade next to his bed and the blinds in his room drawn back.
He absolutely couldn't remember what had happened to him the previous night but he did know that it was nearly 2 in the afternoon and he had missed the entirety of his days classes.
That and his head hurt like fuck. Letting out a groan, he lazily reached into the drawer next to his bed, knocking the lamp atop it over, and pulled out an empty bottle of aspirin.
"Christ," he mumbled, sitting up.
Sitting up hadn't hurt as much as he thought it would have but looking around at the spinning room certainly did. He knew for sure that he hadn't gotten drunk at all, as after his brother's pregnancy fiasco and the millions that had to be paid to get the girl to agree to aborting the baby, alcohol was off limits for him.
He had absolutely no idea why he felt like he was in fact, shit faced drunk but he felt so bad that he couldn't figure out any other reason why he felt so bad.
First thing he decided to do was get completely out of bed. He looked around. His room was trashed, as if he'd had some kind of party in his room that he couldn't remember. Either that or someone ransacked the place just for the hell of it. Either way it was a complete mess.
Deciding his room was a bit too messy and stuffy, he walked out and into the kitchen with the intention of grabbing a bottle of water. However he quickly realized that his fridge was near empty, not having gotten groceries at all.
His memory was actually starting to come back to him. While he didn't quite know why he felt the way he did or why his place was trashed, he did seem to remember going out to celebrate his parents deciding to leave once they realized there was no way they could stay in the same place with each other for too long.
So he celebrated, without liquor that much he knew, and then came back to celebrate some more with a some random female he'd met on campus and....well, she was gone and now his place was a mess.
While he didn't see anything missing he'd made up his mind that it was the last time he brought random hooker wannabe's back to his place for a good time.
It baffled him once he realized that he had no food at all in his entire kitchen, or at least nothing that didn't require at least one other thing he didn't happen to have in order to prepare.
And his lounge area was also a mess. He was almost afraid to use the bathroom for fear of what it might looked like.
He had a housekeeper. Elsa. Yet she was nowhere to be found and his place was a mess. He felt like he'd just had several bottles of a cheap, expired 40 ounces, yet knew for a fact he hadn't touched a drop of liquor. Something was going on and he had no idea what.
He could feel his breathing getting shallower. If he were a betting man, he'd say he was having a panic attack. He needed some aspirin. That always seemed to make everything better, straight away.
Not thinking entirely clear, Jesse set out for the nearest drug store, leaving his keys behind and door to his apartment partially open. *****************************************************************************************
It was too quiet for Shawn's taste. Spencer, Ben's roommate, was gone. Ben was silently typing away at something on his computer. And it seemed like absolutely no one from their floor was around to make any kind of noise.
He didn't want to be left alone with his thoughts. His thoughts were a little bit too much to handle at the moment. He always preferred thinking aloud anyway.
"You think I should tell them," he blurted out.
Ben, surprised to hear Shawn even speaking, turned around to face Shawn.
"Tell who what?" he asked.
"I've been thinking," Shawn spoke, lifting himself up from the edge of Spencer's bed. "The best way to keep my father from killing me is to tell him about me being gay now before I fall in love with some guy and have to tell him about the wedding later."
Ben shifted uncomfortably in his chair.
"Uh, don't you think you're being just a little overdramatic?" he asked. "Besides, I thought we said maybe you weren't actually gay after all."
"No Ben, I'm not being dramatic. I'm being a forward thinker," Shawn replied.
"Whatever that means," Ben mumbled.
"Besides, what straight guy do you know that's in love with his male roommate?"
Ben didn't respond. Truthfully he didn't want to talk about it. While he'd been working towards getting over his issues regarding Shawn's sexuality, the fact of the matter was that he still wasn't 100% comfortable with accepting it. Lately, it had seemed easier for him to accept others being gay more readily than his own best friend.
He was supposed to have known Shawn and to have him admit to him something like he had was taking a lot of getting used to. He just liked holding onto the idea that maybe Shawn didn't quite know what he was talking about. Now he was having to accept the idea that maybe he did.
"I'm trying to get over it," Shawn spoke. "But for some reason it's hard. I mean, I stop spending all my time with him, I'm not even his roommate anymore, and yet all that only makes me think about him even more."
"Really?" Ben asked, too uncomfortable to look over at his friend.
Shawn started pacing back and forward, feeling like he was getting worked up just thinking about the idea of telling his parents.
"I've been thinking about that dream," he started.
Ben groaned.
"Shawn, I told you-"
"Yeah I know my dad's not gonna shoot me. He's not that crazy. I know that he cares about me but I never hear him say it. I don't know how much he cares you know?"
"Even if you're dad isn't cool with you, and that's a big if since he's your dad bro, you know you can always hang with me and moms."
"What about your stepfather?"
"He doesn't get a say. I'm still getting used to it myself, but I'm adapting. I try. Give your dad some credit. Who says he can't do the same?"
Shawn wasn't too sure about his father. Even if what Ben was suggesting was true, he still hadn't forgotten about how Ben had first reacted to finding out he was gay. It took weeks of constant badgering of Ben on his part to get him to even talk to him. And he knew Ben still wasn't completely comfortable with him being gay.
And that was just the reaction from his best friend. Granted he'd known Ben his entire life but he was still only his best friend. His parents were the two people that had brought him into this world and had worked every day of their lives to provide him all the things he wanted and needed. They probably had their own dreams and hopes for him.
It was a completely different situation for them and he knew it.
Which was probably why he wasn't going to be able to calm down when it came to this. And Ben overemphasizing that he do just that was not helping anything.
He needed to get out and away. Go somewhere filled with people who he didn't have to listen to talk to him about any of his problems. And somewhere he could go to try to take his mind off of what he had going on.
"I'm going out," he said simply, grabbing his backpack and rushing out of the door before he could hear anything further from Ben. *****************************************************************************************
Zoey and Grace exchanged glances, looking over their two best friends who were simply eating their food while looking down at their trays.
"Fight?" Grace asked, turning towards Zoey.
"No, if they fought, Noah would look like a brooding Alice Cooper right about now," Zoey replied.
"Hey, I might be offended by that," Noah spoke up.
"See," Zoey spoke. "It's something else."
Grace just nodded as she looked over at Trey, who looked a bit too sullen for her tastes.
"Boy stop acting like somebody just took your favorite piece of candy out yo mouth and talk to me," she spoke.
Trey looked up at her, not really sure where to start. There was always something major going on with him. He had hoped that not talking about it meant he didn't have to deal with it. At least that way, he could feel normal for more than three seconds.
Before he could even respond, Noah had taken it upon himself to finally say what was on his mind.
"This place is a fucking circus," he mumbled.
"Sure, yeah, it's called college," Zoey replied. "That's the fancy way to put it."
"And why not, you know?" Noah continued. "You have people getting away with attempted murder. Dorm halls burning down. People getting jumped in broad daylight. Oh and let's not forget the latest waste of free speech, mandatory STD testing being shoved down our throats by some psycho, crazy hippie assholes."
Zoey and Grace exchanged glances while Trey just looked in no particular direction.
"Okay, well no more skipping breakfast for yo crazy white ass," Grace spoke.
"Please tell me you saw those dumbasses in the courtyard going on about how STD's were spreading around this school like some kind of zombie virus that's gonna kill all of us," Noah spoke.
"Yeah, I saw em. I thought it was funny," Grace replied.
"Funny? Grace, how could you think something like that is funny?" Noah asked.
"Noah, boy you gotta stop and think about where these people is getting they information from. Like the school is actually gonna tell it's students about an increase in STD testing," Grace replied. "That's like telling somebody the car you bout to sell em been in an accident."
"But, they said-"
"Yeah I know what they said. Which is why it's so funny," Grace spoke.
Trey didn't really think about it the same way that Grace apparently did. Her common sense reasoning seemed to hold more in line with that of an elaborate conspiracy themed school cover up. Why wouldn't the school inform it's students about an increase in STD testing? Forcing them all to wake up would be the best thing to get the testing rates to decrease.
"Well, no one's getting tested, that's for sure," Noah spoke matter-of-factly.
"Why not?" Trey found himself un wittingly blurting out.
For all that was going on around them in the cafeteria; the banging of trays against solid oak table or the shouts across one hall into the next, it seemed like all of the outside was muffled in that moment and all that remained was the silence coming from the four people at their table.
Noah, surprised to have been the question from the person that had asked it, turned to face Trey.
"What?"
"We haven't exactly talked about...that, you know? I just figure us having to get tested like everyone else takes the awkwardness away."
Noah did his best to hold his frustration in.
"Why would we need to talk about it, Trey?"
Trey didn't respond, instead choosing to just swallow hard, feeling sorry that he'd even opened his mouth.
"Why would we need to talk about it, Trey!?" Noah repeated, this time more firmly.
"Guys-"
"I'm sorry, are we confusing the past here," Noah started, cutting Grace off. "Was I the one that slept with Shawn when we were supposedly on a break or was it you?"
"Noah-"
"I don't go around sleeping with people for the hell of it, okay Trey. I liked to have faith in you that you didn't do the same thing but I'm not the one that's slept with someone else since we've been together so if I need to be tested for anything it's because I got it from you!"
Trey knew that he didn't have a right to argue anything that had just left Noah's mouth because he knew that everything he'd just said had been 100 % true. He'd tried forgetting that he'd ever slept with Shawn but apparently that had been something that Noah hadn't forgotten and wasn't going to let him forget either.
Noah was upset with Trey but he wasn't going to say anything else because despite everything that was going on with him at the moment, Trey was the one good thing in his life that he didn't want to screw up.
The last thing he wanted to do was push Trey into Shawn's more than willing and waiting arms.
At that point, no one really knew what to say so no one said anything, letting the silence firmly continue to surround them and only them. *****************************************************************************************
If she was tied to a chair with her legs wrapped and hands behind her back, suspended in mid air above a tank full of sharks in a room full of trained ninja assassins, Sierra would come clean that somewhere really deep down she actually was concerned for Jesse's well being.
He was probably one of the most annoying, cocky, self absorbed, antagonistic jackasses she'd ever met but there was something about him that she just couldn't let herself get to. Something that made it nearly impossible to completely hate Jesse.
And for that reason, she'd decided to take it upon herself to personally yell at him for missing class yet again and to rub in his face the information of the test he'd missed because of it.
She hadn't, however expected Jesse to apparently be waiting for her to show up. As she reached his door, the only one on the top floor of the 7 floor apartment style dorm hall he stayed in, she noticed that it was more than partially opened.
She stopped, eyeing the door a little suspiciously before looking inside her purse for the pepper spray she always carried around with her for any just-in-case moments. She didn't really feel like she had any reason to be afraid, but doors partially open the way Jesse's was had never been a good thing for anyone involved in such a situation, she figured.
Slowly she started towards the door before realizing she was acting a bit ridiculous and just walked normally to the door, pushing it open and walking inside.
"Jesse...it's Sierra...I came," she started, surveying her surroundings. "I came to yell at you..."
Something was a bit...off about Jesse's apartment, she noticed. The fact that the door was even open at all should have told her something. But now things were worse. Not only did it smell a little but it was out of order. She'd been to Jesse's apartment enough times to know that he favored neat above anything. She knew him to be a neat person and regardless of whether or not that was even true, what she was dealing with at the moment was not neat.
She stopped in her place, just looking around suspiciously before noticing what sounded like shuffling coming from the back where his bedroom was.
Deciding against calling out for Jesse in case there was more wrong with the situation than she knew, she slowly started towards his door, her hand firmly clutching the pepper spray in her purse as she walked.
She felt the beat of her heart speeding up. She was less nervous and more anxious than anything. She was ready to spray someone to pieces and then kick them in the nuts. Or at the very least, try to save Jesse's stuff from being stolen right from under him.
"Aha!" she shouted kicking his door open before letting out a hearty scream, which Amber returned.
The two girls screamed, screaming at each other before Sierra stopped. Amber screamed for a few seconds more before stopping herself.
"Sorry, I like to scream sometimes," she spoke.
"WHAT are you doing here?" Sierra asked.
"The Real World finale is tonight and the cable went out in my room," Amber replied.
"What so you thought you'd rob the guy blind while you waited?" Sierra asked, crossing her arms.
"The place was like this when I got here and Jesse wasn't. I was trying to figure out if he was moving or something. I mean...look at it. It's...ew."
Sierra looked around before walking a few feet and sitting on the edge of Jesse's unmade bed. Besides being a mess, there were several empty bottles of what looked to be aspirin laying around all over the place.
"Was somebody drugged?" Amber asked, an empty bottle in her hand before being promptly ignored by Sierra.
"So the door was open, place was a mess and Jesse was missing and you....go through his stuff so when the police question you your finger prints are all over everything?"
"Ah, hello bitch, why would the police question me? I didn't even call them."
"Jesse's missing you freak!" Sierra shouted.
"I said I like to scream not shout!" Amber retorted, clutching her left ear.
"We have to find him. I mean, does any of this look right to you?" Sierra asked.
Amber looked around. Truthfully the idea that Jesse was missing or in harms way hadn't actually crossed her mind. She wanted to tell herself that she wouldn't even care if that were the case but the truth of the matter was that she probably would always care what Jesse was up to, kidnapped and all.
"So what do we do?" Amber asked.
"We look for him," Sierra replied. "And if we can't find him, well. You're probably going to jail."
Sierra started out of Jesse's room, Amber following behind her.
"Me? You're the one in all of his classes," Amber replied.
"Minus my fingerprints all over-"
Sierra was promptly cut off when Amber grabbed her hand, holding her index finger and tapping it all over every wall nearby for a full few seconds before she even had a chance to pull away.
"That way we can make each other our bitch in prison instead of Bertha the 200 pound he-she," Amber spoke almost cheerfully before heading out of Jesse's apartment. "Let's go find him so we can yell at him."
Sierra stood almost aghast at the human being that Amber was. Of all the people to help on a search for Jesse, she was the last person that she wanted alongside her. But in a pool full of people who probably actually cared for Jesse, she was exactly the right person for the job. *****************************************************************************************
Shawn had purposely waited for the table in the back corner of the library before doing anything. He wanted to try to get some work done but at the same time he knew he'd be prone to walking back and forward. It was what he did when he was worried about something and had a lot on his mind.
And he had plenty on his mind. He felt like there was some kind of timer on his life. Not that he had minutes, days, weeks or months to live. More like he had precious time to tell his parents about him being gay before they somehow found out on their own.
How would they even find out was something that he kept asking himself. Ben knew but if he was going to tell anyone that mattered, he would have done it by now. And Grace and Zoey didn't even know his parents for them to tell anyone. Noah didn't care enough most likely and Trey....he didn't know what to think about Trey.
The truth was, Trey was central to all his problems.
Trey was this. Trey was that. He was always involved somehow in something and he was starting to find it a bit sickening that he was so dependent on one person in particular.
Previously he'd been worrying about all this as he attempted his Psychology homework but as he was now realizing he was walking back and forward subconsciously and had apparently people staring at him now because of it.
He stopped mid walk and stared back at everyone for a moment before noticing someone familiar walking into the library with a pair of large textbooks in hand.
Dropping everything, he headed over to the check-out counter.
"You're a shrink right?" Shawn asked.
Collin turned around both surprised and a little annoyed to see Shawn of all people. Shawn was the only underclassmen that bothered him because he was the only one that kept making it a habit to do so.
Collin looked away from Shawn as he fished around in his back pocket for his wallet to retrieve his student i.d.
"Can I help with something freshman?" he asked, not even bothering to look at Collin.
"Yeah, you can actually," Shawn started, not even bothering to care how crazy he probably seemed to Collin right then. "With a lot of things."
"If you need that much help then I'm probably not the right person to give it to you," Collin replied, handing his student i.d. to the lady behind the counter who smiled before offering a `be right back' and disappearing behind a large stack of books.
Collin sighed once he realized that he now had nothing better to do than to acknowledge Shawn until the girl came back with his new books. He turned around, putting both arms behind him on the counter and looked out over everyone in the library.
"You're supposed to be like some really insightful psych major who's good at figuring everything and everyone out right? So figure me out already."
Collin looked over at Shawn, slightly insulted.
"I thought we'd done that already," he replied.
"Yeah well you didn't do a good enough job," Shawn replied, leaning on the counter just the same as Collin. "Which doesn't surprise me. You generally can't figure people out in the five seconds before even talking to them."
"What do you want from me, freshman?" Collin asked. "I told you what I thought, you didn't have to like or accept it but here we are, running into each other again."
Shawn stared at Collin for a moment.
"You say that like it's a bad thing," he spoke.
Collin looked over at Shawn briefly before returning his gaze to the students around him.
"Maybe it is," he replied. "I can't seem to get rid of you."
Shawn looked down.
"Do I bother you that much?"
Collin's gut reaction was to tell Shawn that yes, he did in fact bother him. But as he was starting to realize with each passing encounter with the guy, it probably wasn't for any of the reasons he'd be thinking.
He was actually starting to grow fond of Shawn.
"What's the problem?" he sighed, hoping that he didn't sound as annoyed as he had been before.
Shawn looked up, a little surprised that Collin was actually willing to oblige him.
"I'm dealing with identity issues I think," he started. "I'm starting to realize that I'm not the person I thought I was. I don't even know my parents well enough to know if they'd take me being gay the wrong way or not."
"So, you're gay then," Collin spoke. "Interesting."
"Like...in a bad way?" Shawn asked.
"Nothing bad about being gay," Collin replied.
He was going to respond further before the girl who'd gone off to retrieve his books returned, handing him his i.d. and the two books. He offered her a generous `thank you' before placing the books in his bag and placing it over his shoulders.
He turned to leave and had even gone a few paces before stopping and turning around.
"College is exactly the place you figure yourself out, trust me. So don't worry about that," he replied. "And about the other thing. It's not gonna be easy when you tell them but at least make sure you're ready and you take it seriously. It keeps you from having to deal with stress later like in my case."
That was all Collin offered before deciding it would be just enough for Shawn to salivate over as he turned to leave, leaving a stunned and now aroused Shawn behind. *****************************************************************************************
"Hey baby," Josh smiled before kissing Grace passionately.
After a few moments he stepped aside, taking her coat and letting her inside.
Grace rubbed her hands together and looked around Josh's room.
"Aww, baby, you cleaned up for me," she spoke.
Josh was exactly the kind of guy she should have had in her life all along. He was always the perfect gentlemen, opening doors for her, pulling out her chair for her to sit down. All of the things that guys should have been doing for ladies but didn't.
Besides being a perfect gentlemen there was the added benefit of having so many things in common. They both liked all the same movies and had read most of the same books. It was like Josh the female version of him but built and sexy enough to be her man.
"I thought we could watch a movie since Erik's gone," Josh spoke, pulling out a large black bean bag chair from under the bunk bed against the wall in the middle of the room.
"Oh what movie?" Grace asked, looking around Josh's room.
"Crash," Josh replied, fishing around under the bed for the other bean bag chair. "I haven't seen it yet and figured you'd like it."
Grace did like it. As a matter of fact it was one of her favorite movies and one of the movies that Josh had told her he'd seen and was one his favorite movies.
Feeling there was a possibility that she could be mistaken and not really wanting to get into an argument about something so silly, she just decided to not say anything.
"Oh you reading Fahrenheit 451 again?" Grace asked, picking the book up off the computer desk facing the opposite end of the room.
"Ugh, I have to read that for English," Josh replied, still looking under the bed. "Personally, I hate it."
Again, Grace found that weird as it was one of her favorite books. One they'd talked about both liking as well.
Now she was starting to feel like someone's fool and she didn't like it.
Josh finally surfaced with the other chair and stood up with a smile on his face before noticing his girlfriends crossed armed, pissed off look.
"What's wrong babe?" he asked.
Grace didn't bother looking at him for a few moments in an effort to keep what would otherwise be an uncontrollable anger in.
She sighed inwardly before tossing her hair out of her face and looking up at her 6'2 boyfriend.
"What's my favorite movie of all time, Josh?" she asked.
Josh's smile faded slightly as he looked down nervously.
"Grace, come on-"
"Boy answer the question," Grace replied.
There was a silence in the room that told Grace all that she needed to know in that moment. If Josh was on the up and up like he was supposed to have been, then he'd know her favorite movie because it was apparently supposed to have been his too, just like they talked about.
Instead, what she got was lies on top of more lies.
Josh may have been the perfect boyfriend but she'd take being alone before she ever went back to dating someone that lied to her.
She wasn't about to be anyone's fool.
"You know what Josh, I think I'ma go," she started, reaching on the bed for her coat.
"What? Grace, what-"
"I'ma let you think long and hard about what's bothering me," she said. "And you better figure it out too."
Josh stood dumbfounded as Grace exited his room. *****************************************************************************************
As Grace and everyone had recently come to the conclusion of, the Pink Panther's was more or less escapism for them. While they were fully committed to the idea of helping the victims of Hurricane Katrina, the fact of the matter was that the caring only came when they had too many problems in their lives that they didn't want to care about.
As it was Grace and the others had more or less become the CEO's of the Pink Panthers. The people who were the face of the club and not much else while all the so called `freaks' Grace had wanted to help in the first place were the ones spending the majority of their time doing all the house building.
And as Grace sat up all night thinking about how it was she could have possibly allowed herself to believe that there was a guy in the world that could actually be perfect, she realized that she had problems she wanted to work through. Then she realized she wasn't the only one.
Thus the reason why they were all currently slaving away at the home building site with The Pink Panthers.
"Okay here we are, fresh glasses of pink lemonade," Dylan spoke, walking over to Grace with a tray full of glasses. He was walking carefully so as not to spill anything but seemed to be doing that anyway.
"Boy, it's damn near freezing out here," Grace spoke, jumping back slightly as the contents of one of the glasses spilled to the ground once Dylan placed the tray down. "Do we look like we wanna be out here sipping on something colder than it is outside?"
"Aha! No ice!" Dylan responded.
"Uh, no," Grace retorted, shutting him down.
"Well still," Dylan started, straightening himself up. "Working this hard takes a lot out of a brotha. I gotsa get my drink on, ya know?"
"Boy go get the coffee I asked you to get in the first place and don't come back until you have," Grace spoke.
Dylan had been teasing her before, like he usually did and she usually did right back. But today she obviously had a lot on her mind, as she'd actually been quite harsh with him, he noticed.
Without saying another word he turned around and started back towards the quad, first being stopped and handed some money by Zoey who made her way over to Grace.
"Damn boy is wasting the Pink Panther funds on some cold ass lemonade, which by the way he spills all over himself," Grace mumbled, hammering a nail into a piece of wood that had already been finished earlier.
"Something wrong?" Zoey asked, crossing her arms, feeling just a little put off with Grace's attitude.
"Your man is never around but at least he doesn't tell you he likes everything this side of China right to your face," Grace replied.
"What?" Zoey asked.
Grace stopped for a moment and then pulled Zoey aside so that they were relatively alone.
"I'm starting to think that maybe Josh isn't ever gonna be the right guy for me as much as I want him to be," Grace replied.
"Grace..."
"I mean I felt bad for thinking he was some kind of peeping tom asshole but it's like we moved straight past one messed up problem and onto another."
Zoey stood as Grace didn't say anything further.
"He lied to me, Zoey," Grace replied sullenly. "How am I supposed to trust a word that comes out that damn boys mouth now?"
Zoey sighed, placing her hands in her back pockets.
"Relationships are hard, believe me I know," she started. "But you can't really expect me to believe that you actually thought he was perfect."
The fact of the matter was that Grace knew she thought he was perfect which was the reason why she felt so crushed now.
"So he lied to you. Just find out why and call it the last mistake he gets to make with you," Zoey replied.
That felt like the most sensible thing in the world to do to Grace. Hearing that from Zoey put her in a little better of mood. Now she felt nervous with having to confront Josh and the possibility of getting into their first official fight as a couple. That wasn't something that she relished in the least.
Elsewhere, meanwhile an interesting situation had more or less popped up that no one was going to comment about.
On the left side of the house, Noah and Trey were busy helping with setting up what would be the framing for the windows of the kitchen. Directly across from them about twenty feet away, Shawn and Ben were each doing the same thing, setting up the framing for what would be the windows of the family room.
Trey knew that Shawn was across from him. Noah knew it. Shawn knew it. Even Ben knew it. Yet Trey was pretending not to notice him as best he could. The only two people actually paying attention to each other were Noah and Trey.
Noah was still quite upset with Trey regarding Shawn. He thought he'd fully accepted the fact that they'd slept together but after getting not much more than an hour of sleep thanks in large part to thinking about how intimate his boyfriend had been with Shawn, he'd come to the conclusion that he wasn't as comfortable with it as he thought.
He mostly felt angry. Mostly angry towards Shawn. He was thinking about the STD thing and about how maybe there was some truth to it. He was thinking about all the gross diseases Shawn possibly could have had and passed down to him through Trey. He felt sick to his stomach with the idea that Shawn could have given Trey something that could hurt or kill him.
All he wanted to do was punch Shawn's smug face in and had a feeling that if Shawn came anywhere near them, that would be exactly what happened.
"Is it just me or is he purposely not looking at me?" Shawn asked, looking over at Trey hammering away at a support plank.
Ben, reached down to the ground and picked up a box of nails, placing one between his lips for a moment as he adjusted a piece of wood before removing it to speak.
"I don't know," he replied. "But his boyfriend sure doesn't have a problem staring you down."
Shawn looked over at Noah blatantly and obviously glaring at him before looking away with an annoyed sigh.
"Yeah well I'm not even gonna bother trying to guess what's crawled up his ass today. He's always doing that it seems like," he replied.
Ben looked over at Noah.
"Yeah what is that anyway? Is it like some kind of gay thing? He's not into you is he?" Ben asked, getting on his back to hammer a nail onto the underside of plank.
Shawn chuckled lightly.
"Which one of those questions do you want me to answer first?" he said before looking over at Trey who quickly looked away from Shawn and down at the work he'd stopped doing.
Noticing this, Noah looked over at Trey.
"Is he bothering you with that?" Noah asked.
"Just don't pay him any attention, Noah," Trey spoke, almost inaudibly.
Noah chuckled, almost insanely. It was the best he could do to keep his anger at bay.
"Kinda hard not to Trey when all I can think about is his lips all over you and hands all over you doing things to you that...."
"Noah, that was a long time ago," Trey replied. "I told you, I'm done with all that indecisive bullshit. I'm with you, end of story."
Noah stopped working entirely and turned to face Trey.
"Why say it like that?" he asked.
Trey turned to face Noah.
"What?" he asked.
"Like we're some married couple and you're the half that wants out of the relationship."
Trey wasn't actually looking to start anything with Noah with that last comment. As a matter of fact, he'd thought it would provide Noah the comfort he was seeking regarding their relationship.
He'd meant what he said. He owed it to himself and to Noah to stop being so wishy-washy with his thoughts and intentions. He picked Noah for a reason and he was starting to realize that maybe Noah was actually starting to figure out exactly what that reason was.
"Noah..."
"Dylan's back with the coffee," Noah spoke. "I'll go get us some."
Trey watched as his boyfriend headed away from him and over towards Dylan before he heard what sounded like thunder.
He looked up. It had been cloudy all day but no one had really discussed the weather. If there was thunder, lightning wasn't far behind and rain wasn't far behind that.
And while that was vaguely on his mind, the truth was it was now moving towards the very back of his mind as he realized he had plenty of other problems to deal with as he looked briefly back over at Shawn.
"That's definitely a gay thing right?" Ben asked Shawn, noticing Trey's brief look over at him.
Outside Shawn was trying to remain calm and collected but inside he was thrilled. There was hope after all as far as he was concerned. And as long as there was hope that he could be in happy, successful relationship with a guy, he knew there was no way he was going to be ready to tell his parents anything regarding that aspect of his life.
"Yeah," Shawn replied, smiling. "That's definitely a gay thing."
"Have you seen this man!?" someone asked, shoving a flyer so close to Shawn's face that he couldn't even see the man in question.
"Amber!" Sierra called out.
She and Amber had spent the entirety of the previous day looking for Jesse themselves. When they hadn't found him they'd skipped class to make flyers to pass out around school. While they had yet to actually call the police, partially out of fear of being implicated in Jesse's possibly murder and partially because they didn't want to accept that he may have been dead, they had been conducting their own search all day.
So far no one had seen him. And now that it was getting later and darker outside they were starting to worry more.
"I knew I should've bought a leash," Sierra spoke once she caught up to Amber. "Sorry about letting this out of my sight. She's worried, you know."
"Back off Sierra, we're not playing good cop bad cop here," Amber spoke. "Now, look at the picture. Have you seen him or not?"
"Jesse? He wasn't in class when-"
"Duh! Of course not! He's MISSING moron!" Amber shouted.
Ben stood up, dusting dirt from his hands and onto his pants.
"What are you two even doing here?" Shawn asked. "I mean you really think Jesse would choose here of all places to disappear to?"
"Well when someone disappears and you have NO idea where he'd go, you check everywhere he might be," Sierra replied. "God, this place looks it could be done next week if you all just stayed here."
"Focus, retarded one, focus!" Amber exclaimed.
Shawn chuckled at the notion of Amber being the one to call anyone retarded while Sierra just stared at her aghast.
"Hey sexy ladies, where have ya'll been all day?" Dylan asked, joining everyone along with Grace and Zoey.
"You seen Jesse, little elf boy?" Amber asked, handing Dylan a flyer.
"I told you, my family grows into our ears," Dylan replied, pulling his ski cap over his ears.
Amber sighed and tossed her hands in the air before crossing them.
"I don't have time for this. We're wasting time here when we should be out on the streets checking all the alleys and dungeons," she spoke.
"Yeah, okay, because those two places have rich billionaire written all over them," Zoey spoke.
"They do when the billionaire is DEAD!" Amber exclaimed.
"Hey," Noah spoke, joining the group with Trey at his side. "What's going on?"
"They looking for Jesse," Grace replied. "He's missing or something."
"What?" Noah asked.
"Yeah, we went by his place, his door was open, no food, stuff was a mess and no one's seen him all day," Sierra replied. "It's weird, but I'm actually worried."
"Well did ya'll call the police or anything?" Grace asked.
Amber and Sierra exchanged glances before Amber looked down.
"Somebody told us they already did that," Sierra lied.
Everyone looked around, no one really sure what to say at that moment before Dylan spoke up.
"Who says he's missing?" he asked.
Amber looked over at him.
"What?" she asked.
"Well I mean, we all know the guy's got money," Dylan continued.
Everyone agreed on that.
"And he's not exactly the friendliest guy in the world," Shawn added.
Once again everyone agreed.
"Most people do generally avoid him," Zoey spoke up.
More heads nodded in agreement.
"Yeah and he does have a habit of pissing people off the instant he opens his mouth," Noah added.
This time there was more agreement from everyone.
"Yeah, he does do that doesn't he?" Sierra asked, thinking about it for herself.
Everyone agreed, many of them starting to exchange Jesse Yorkshire horror stories with each other before Dylan spoke over the growing commotion.
"The point is," he started. "Who says he can't just get away for a little while without telling anyone? If I had as much money as him I'd be somewhere new every week."
"And the girls would call you little elf boy there too," Amber spoke.
Dylan decided to snap back.
"You know I'm with her now," he said, confidently. "You are the fat one."
Sierra turned away to hide the laugh she knew was coming as Amber looked around at everyone chuckling at Dylan's comment.
"What the hell is wrong with you people?" Amber asked. "Our friend-"
"Friend?" Noah interrupted.
"Is missing," Amber continued. "And none of you seem to care!"
No one said anything.
"Oh so I guess I can expect the same kind of treatment from you all when I turn up missing then huh?" Amber asked.
It had been a rhetorical question but there probably wasn't a single person that wasn't thinking about the obvious answer to that question.
"Fine," Amber replied. "I'll find him myself then. And when I do I'm gonna tell him all about how much you didn't care he was missing."
Amber started away from everyone.
"Ugh," Grace moaned before starting after Amber. "Amber girl, wait!"
Sierra and Zoey followed as Amber continued to walk away from them, shouting stuff at them as she did.
There was another clash of thunder before another shortly thereafter.
Dylan looked up at the sky.
"It's gonna rain," he spoke.
"No it's gonna fuckin storm which means we better get the hell out of here before it does," Ben spoke, placing his hands in his pockets.
Trey wanted to move but all he could do was think about how his boyfriend was now just inches away from the very guy he despised at the moment and how worried he was that something was going to happen.
When he looked up at Noah he could just see the sheer anger running through his face and coming across from his eyes.
"Noah..."
"You think you're fucking slick don't you?" Noah growled
"Excuse me?" Shawn asked.
"Trey is MY boyfriend. And just because you got to sleep with him when he was stupid enough to let it happen doesn't mean he still wants you so you can stop staring at him like you wanna fuck him with your eyes!"
"Whoa, bro, I think you need to calm down man," Ben started.
"No it's okay, Ben," Shawn replied, a confident grin on his face. "I can handle this."
Noah chuckled.
"Of course you can because you're some kind of fucking smooth operator right?" Noah asked.
"Noah.." Trey started, even going so far as to try to walk him away from Shawn.
But of course Noah was a lot stronger than he was and his tug on Noah's arm had done little to actually move him anywhere.
"You're really gonna fight me? Right here in front of Trey?"
"Hey asshole, don't fucking say his name!" Noah spoke, this close to snapping.
"Guys," Dylan interjected. "Come on..."
There had been further warning other than one final boom of thunder before it started pouring. It hadn't started gently and worked to a rough downpour. The rough downpour was now here. And while the other members of the Pink Panthers were scrambling to pack away all the tools and supplies and Amber's flyers had left her hands and were now flying all around them.
The trees nearby were swaying violently back and forward. The scene looked almost like there was a tornado on its way, both metaphorically and literally.
"Enough of this, okay!" Trey shouted over the wind and rain. "We have to go! Now, Noah!"
Noah glared at Shawn as Trey worked to pull him away while Shawn glared right back, Ben working to pull him back as well.
Neither of them budged until they noticed Amber running past them all calling out Jesse's name.
Trey looked past Shawn to realize that Amber wasn't being some crazy psycho. Jesse was in fact here, in the torrential downpour of a disaster.
Amber threw her arms around Jesee.
"Well if this is the kind of greeting a bloke is going to receive whenever he has a spa retreat I might have to give up spa's entirely," Jesse spoke. "I've been looking for everyone for ages by the way. I saw flyers of my missing face plastered all over campus. I found it a bit odd, figured I should probably investigate."
"So you mean to tell me that you've been at a spa the entire time me and Sierra have been worried sick about you?" Amber asked, incredulously.
"Well I'd have told someone if I cared enough," Jesse replied. "Sadly none of you all inspire that bid of confidence. And can we get out of the rain please? Do you know what kind of absolute shit is ruining my clothes right now?"
Jesse's smooth talking was promptly ended when Amber slapped Jesse hard across the face.
"I hate you, Jesse Yorkshire!" Amber shouted.
Jesse clenched his face before realizing that something was going on back over by the others.
"What's that then?" he asked.
Amber turned around to noticed everyone gathered around something. Jesse had already started in their direction, Amber following.
"What's your name?" Grace shouted, bending over his body.
"Hel....you have to help me...please," the man mumbled before passing out entirely and nearly falling to the ground, Ben catching him before he fell.
"Somebody want to tell me what the hell is going on?" Jesse shouted.
"You tell us," Grace replied, looking at the fully unconscious passed out stranger that had just wandered into their lives.
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Copyright 2008