Warning: This story doesn't contain any sex. It's the story of gay teens. None of the characters are based on real people, nor are they meant to resemble any living or dead people.
Let me know what you think of the story by emailing me at Hnstskr4@aol.com
I want to thank everyone who has emailed. I also want to thank those who have read the story. It means a lot hearing from you. Please continue reading! There is a lot more to come. I own all rights to this story. Chuck B.
I've got such a great response to the story and would love to hear from everyone who reads it.
I'm using a different technique for writing this story, so if you don't like it, let me know, or if you really like it, let me know that, too.
Copyright © 2010, 2011
Characters Mentioned In This Chapter Seth - Seth is the main character. He is 17 at the start of this story. Charlie Thompson -- Seth's Dad Dawn Thompson -- Seth's Mom Paul Thompson -- Seth's 15 year old brother Paige Taylor - 17 friend of Seth's Scottie Westbrook -- Seth's best friend
Chapter 8
Scottie!
I can't do this anymore. My life would be so much easier if I were not gay. I know that I would have a girlfriend by now. This conflict inside of me wouldn't be going on and I would be at peace, if there is such a thing as being at peace. More importantly, Scottie wouldn't be causing these feelings within me. This mixture of emotions wouldn't be tearing me up inside. Not telling people is getting in the way of my life. I want to be free. People don't just assume that I'm gay. It's easy to go under their radar. Maybe it's been too easy. I should have told Scottie earlier.
Scottie needs to know and today is the day to tell him. These past few weeks have been killer. I've put more energy into hiding from him than in telling Scottie or in preparing to tell him. I wonder if he's noticed my odd behavior. Don't want to lose him, but I can't control the consequences that happen after I tell him. Simply need to just tell him! I'll just do it now.
I'll invite him over to play a video game. There is nothing abnormal about it. We always play video games together. Hopefully my nerves will calm down. I'm sitting here stressing about his reaction. I can put less stress on myself by having him over when everyone else is home. Don't want to take chances with him; even though we are both about the same size, a hit from him would really hurt. I know that I can count on my mom and dad to cushion the fall. This is one time that I'm doing the right thing. He's going to be upset. There is no getting around it. Hopefully though, he won't stay upset. He's too good of a friend to lose. Come to think about it, everyone is home now.
Might as well get this mess over with! I grab my phone and call his house. With each ring, I'm getting more and more nervous. It's so bad my arms are shaking. Maybe, I should just hang up. I should just forget about all of this.
"Hey Seth, what's up?"
Guess it's too late to forget about it.
"I just thought that maybe you might want to play some video games."
Wonder if he can hear how badly, my nerves are shaking me.
"Cool beans, I'm up for a rematch."
Well, I can't back out now.
"See in a few then Scottie!"
"Will do man!"
After he hung up with me, I grabbed my phone and called Paige.
"Hey, how is my favorite Mormon stud?"
"I'm extremely nervous."
"Why?" Paige asked.
"Today is the day; I'm going to tell Scottie."
"Are you serious?"
"Paige, I am deadly serious."
I could never be any more serious about anything in my life. Wish things didn't have to be this way, but I have to get this over with.
"Are you scared?"
"I'm not really scared of him hitting me, but honestly, I am afraid of losing him as a friend. Yeah, now I've been friends with him for a very, very long time. It hurts to think that I might lose him."
She was quiet for a couple seconds and then she spoke up.
"I hope..."
Out of nowhere there is a knock on the door.
"Paige, I'm sorry, but I think Scottie is at the door. I need to get going."
"Seth, be careful!"
"I will, and I'll call you after he leaves."
My mom answers the door. I can't hear her voice or his, but I know it's Scottie down there.
I can hear him coming up the stairs. Right now, I feel like running to my wastebasket and puking my guts out. I turn on the television and my game console. My right hand pulls the game that I want off the shelf. Just as I'm about to insert the game, Scottie enters my room.
"Ready to get beat?"
I turn around and do my best to laugh.
"Yeah... you haven't beaten me yet at this game, but there's always a first time for everything."
I'm way too nervous to really focus on the game.
"You going to put the disc in or are we going to sit here all night?"
"Yeah, I'm on it right now."
I slipped the disc in and sat there while it loaded up. Once the game was loaded up, we started playing and I was doing pretty good, but not as good as I usually do. It's all about my nerves. Wonder if he notices how bad my game is tonight. As we play, he cracks jokes and I do my best to crack some myself. Suddenly, my phone rings.
"Dude, who's calling you?" Scottie asked, knowing this will delay our game. I look at my Caller ID and announce who is on the phone.
"Paige!"
He gave me some hand gestures telling me to hurry up.
"Hey Paige, what's up?"
"Have you told him yet?"
"Umm... no, no I haven't told him yet."
Scottie was getting impatient. I was hoping she wouldn't be mad if I said that I needed to go.
"Paige, I need to get back to the game. Can you call me later?"
"Will do! Good luck!"
With that we hung up, and Scottie and I went back to our game.
We are now half way through the game. My nerves are killing me. It's literally causing me to die. This is bad, and I do mean bad. I just want to run to the hills. He's actually starting to tell that my game is off.
Scottie beat me! He beat me at a game that I've beat him at, at least a thousand times already.
"Man, that was one for the record books."
I tried to laugh it off, but Scottie wasn't buying it.
"What's up with you, man? You never lose to me at this game. You've been acting funny all night. Spill it, now!"
Wow... didn't expect him to want me to spill it.
"Nothing, it's..."
I'm just going to tell him.
"Okay so it's a lot more than nothing."
He looked confused.
"Scottie, I'm gay."
"What?"
He looked upset and confused.
"And you expect me to be okay with this?"
"No I don't!"
He was quiet for a second and then he sort of smiled.
"Is this a joke?"
"Scottie, have you ever known me to joke about something like this?"
I know this isn't going to end well. He didn't even say anything else to me. He got up and walked out of my room. I don't want to lose his friendship, but I can't force him to like this announcement. I also can't hold back the tears anymore. They wait to fall; I got to my bed before I started to cry.
Guess the sobbing drowned out the noise of my mom coming into the room. I was aware of her sitting beside me. She patted my back and rubbed my shoulders.
"Seth, he'll come around some day. You just have to be patient. In the meantime, you have your family and we still love you."
I didn't stop crying, but it did make me feel better to know that my family loved me. She picked up the controller that Scottie was using and looked at me.
"Want to play?"
Now, my mom has never played any of these games before. In fact, she has never once even asked to play any of them before. Even though my mind really isn't ready to play a game, I decide to play the game anyway. We start playing and I give her a short introduction to the game. Making sure to stress to her, how important it was for her to know the controls. Once she was able to manage the controls okay, she really wasn't half bad at it. I still ended up beating her, but I have to admit that she wasn't half bad. Besides, playing the game really helped to ease my mind.
"Thanks, Mom!"
She smiled at me and gave me a hug.
"You're welcome!"
My phone rings and I glanced down at the caller id. Mom looked at it.
"Are you going to answer it?"
"It's Paige."
"Okay, so are you going to answer it?"
By now it was on the third ring out of five, and it would soon go into voice mail.
"Would you please answer that phone?" Paul's voice rang out from his room.
I reached down to answer it, but by this time the phone had stopped ringing. I picked up the phone to call her back, when my mom made this weird face.
"I think your dad just got home."
She got up and left the room. Now, my Dad didn't just get home, it was her way of letting me know that she knew I needed, no, wanted some privacy. I love my parents.
I dialed Paige's number and waited for her to pick up the phone.
"Hey boyfriend!"
"What's up?"
There was no doubt in my mind why she had called, but that is sort of our routine whenever one of us calls the other.
"I just called to see how things went with Scottie."
All of the sudden, I could feel my emotions coming back online. I could feel myself getting ready to cry. Maybe I can will my tears back where they came from. I really, really do not want to cry on the phone.
"Not good, he stormed out of my room."
"I'm sorry!"
The way she said it, I could almost feel the hug coming across the phone.
"I... I don't know what to think. I have a feeling that he is out of my life for good."
"Look Seth, Scottie could come around eventually."
I hope that Paige and my Mom are right about him.
"I... I hope you're right."
"Seth, everything is going to be alright. It has to be."
For once, I find myself disagreeing with her. How can losing your best friend ever be okay?
"To be honest, I'm a little worried."
Really, does she think that she is alone on that score?
"You're not the only one."
I am truly, honestly scared and worried all at the same time.
"I think this could go bad at any minute."
I didn't want to hear that from Paige.
"Right, now Paige, I just need things to go back to the way they were before I told him."
"No way, you did the right thing. He needs to wake up and realize who he is losing. Seth, I need to run, but don't worry about school tomorrow."
"Okay Paige, I'll try!"
Don't worry about school, who is she kidding? I'll be a joke. Scottie, why can't you just be okay with me? I'm asking too much from him. What I want is for him to realize that I'll always be Seth. I'll just be me.
I still have to deal with tomorrow. Paige might be right, maybe I just need to quit worrying. It won't get me anywhere. She is right; given time, he'll come around. If not. I guess I'll just have to move forward.
Still, I have to see him and the team at school tomorrow. The big question is will the truth be released to the student body. While I want people to know, I want it done in my own time. Don't blame Scottie for being mad. Hopefully, he'll keep it to himself. If the team finds out they might run me off. I don't want to lose the fellowship of the team. I also don't want to walk away from something that I love.
School went by today without any issues. The only real difference between today and other days was that Scottie ignored me or gave me the dirty eye. Right now, I'm in the locker room after wrestling practice. I didn't perform very well today, and Coach seemed less than happy. I even saw him giving Scottie some bad looks. Coach stood up from his cushioned chair and came out of his office. He called out:
"Thompson, Westbrook, my office, now!"
Coach wasted no time once the door was shut.
"Thompson, what is going on?"
Coach was not happy, to say the least, and he didn't need to raise his voice to show it.
"Just stressed, Sir."
"About what?"
Did he really expect me to answer him? I couldn't lie to him... or could I?
"It's nothing, just some family stuff."
Scottie glared at me and opened up his mouth to speak.
"Coach, Thompson's lying to you. He's gay and he's afraid that I'll ruin him."
He looked at Scottie, as if wondering if I really had any reason to be afraid.
"Would you ruin him?"
"Wasn't planning on it."
He really wasn't going to tell anyone? I hope he keeps it that way.
"Good, let's keep it that way."
He looked at Scottie and then pointed at his door.
"Westbrook, out to the lockers, now."
Once Scottie closed the door from the other side, Coach asked me, "Is he right?"
I can't lie to this man again.
"Yes sir, he's right."
"Okay!"
He didn't say anything else to me. Instead, he glared out the window at Scottie and then looked back at me.
"Is this going to impact my team?"
I didn't mean to mess up today. I guess my mind was clouded over.
"No sir!"
"Good, now get out of my office."
As I walked out of his office, I gulped some air out of fear. Scottie made sure that I could see his displeasure.
Coach stepped out of his office with a very serious look on his face.
"Team, gather up!"
Oh no, he's going to tell them.
"Thompson is gay."
Even though I knew this was coming, I still can't believe that I just heard it come out of his mouth. Did he really just out me? Why would he do that? I don't get it.
"This will not impact my team. If it does, I'll deal with it immediately. I WILL NOT put up with any homophobes on my team! Got it?"
Everyone just nodded their heads including me. I didn't expect him to support me like this. He really buoyed me up today, but he wasn't done.
"Now, everyone, including Thompson, go run suicides. I won't put up with sloppy practices unless someone is sick. Now hurry up and get dressed."
After we were all dressed, Coach followed the team out into the gym and watched us run. I've never been so glad to leave the school behind.
Mom was sitting in the living room when I got home. I was going to walk right past her. Instead, my feet turned and walked back to her. I sat down next to her and looked at her.
"What happened?"
She knows me all too well. I can't hide much from her.
"Scottie ignored me all day today and at practice."
She didn't look surprised.
"So then what happened?"
"Well, Coach called Scottie and me into his office. He wanted to know why our practice matches stunk so bad. Well, to make a long story short, Scottie outted me to Coach and Coach outted me to the team."
Mom's face went beet red! She went to grab the phone. I knew she was going to call Coach and chew him out.
"Mom, don't make this call."
"Why? What he did was wrong."
I took a deep breath. I knew that she was right, but after all, the man did stand up for me.
"He stood up for me."
"Well, that is good at least. Okay, I won't call."
She gave me a hug and then I turned and went upstairs.
My feet got me up the stairs in record time. I grabbed my phone and called Paige. Hopefully she answers, because right now I really need to talk. I've given her six rings and I'm not waiting any more on her. Placing the phone down, I went to my desk and started my computer. Within a minute, the phone rang and I picked it up.
"Hey homeboy!"
I laughed and it felt good too. Guess laughter really is the best medicine. Well, I need to get this off my shoulders.
"Today's practice sucked big time."
She was quiet for a second and I knew there was something that I didn't want to hear about to come out of her mouth.
"I heard Seth! It's not good at all, buddy."
I'm really bewildered right now.
"Wait, I'm confused! How did you find out?"
"It's all over the net. The whole story made it to my email. So how are you holding up?"
"Up until you told me how you found out, I was hurting, but now I'm feeling sick."
This has gone from bad to worse.
"What are you going to do?"
"I have no idea."
It's not like me not to have a plan "A" or a plan "B", but I really do not have a clue.
"Well bud, I have homework to do. I'll talk to you later."
"Yeah, I'll catch you later."
Now, I need to just figure this mess out. My Uncle Tim would be helpful, but something tells me that I should ask my dad.
Yeah right now, I need my dad's advice. So, I waited around till Dad got home. In the meantime though, I started my homework and checked the internet for the bad news. When Dad came home, I ran down the stairs and pulled him to the side.
"Dad, I need some help?"
"What's up?"
"Well, I told Scottie that I was gay and things took a wrong turn and now the whole school might know.
"Well, I guess you had to tell him eventually. Did he tell the school?"
Dad asked a question that I honestly didn't have an answer for at this point in time.
"No... I don't think so. It's actually strange the way things turned out. See, he told Coach in Coach's office because Coach wanted to know what was going on with my game, and Scottie's, for that matter. Scottie got the news out faster than I could. Then I get home, and Paige tells me that it's all over the net. I don't know what to do."
Dad gave me a hug. He looked at me and got down on his knees and silently prayed. I am not sure how long he was down there, because after three minutes, I went back upstairs. After about fifteen minutes, Dad came back upstairs. He looked at me and said:
"Son, you'll just have to show them that you are still you, that being gay hasn't changed you. Other than that, I don't have any earth shaking advice."
"Thanks Dad!"
I am starting to feel sick. Maybe, I shouldn't have hit the web looking for how bad things have gotten.
At this point in time my stomach is literally in knots. Hopefully, with some sleep, it will untie itself. All night long, I tossed and turned, dreamed, and spent half the night just staring at the walls. When I was still awake at 2:30 am, I knew that I wasn't going to school today. Mom or Dad would have to call me off, but I'm not going to wake them up to tell them. I'll just have to get up at my regular time. Mom at least will be home to call me off. My alarm went off and I barely made it downstairs to ask my mom to call me off. Mom was making breakfast and for whatever reason, the smell of the pancakes really tied up my stomach. I had to make a run to the toilet. Unfortunately, Paul was in there combing his hair. He wasn't one bit happy with me.
"Really Seth?"
He walked out the bathroom and went downstairs. Mom came up with the phone in hand.
"Am I calling you off?"
I looked up from the floor and said, "Yes!"
Once I was able to get up, I headed downstairs. Mom was already siting down on the couch.
"Does this have anything to do with yesterday?"
"Mom, I honestly didn't sleep last night. All I did was toss and turn. My stomach was in knots and the smell of the pancakes this morning just made me lose it."
She patted me on the back.
"Alright."
She dialed the school's call-off number and explained that I had thrown up this morning. She looked back at me and said, "Sounds like a bad case of nerves!"
She didn't say anything else to me. She turned and walked away. The most important thing is that Mom understood. She took time out to not only call the school, but to listen.