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Only two more days until Jonathan and Ryan would finally talk. Each day that passed made Jonathan feel more anxious.

His decision seemingly loomed over his head and rested on his shoulders like a boulder. It was causing him so much stress from consistently overthinking and becoming overwhelmed from his emotions.

In his family, men were taught not to have emotions other than anger and happiness. He felt like he was going to get whiplash from his feelings constantly changing. Often times he'd feel sad and miss Ryan, only to become angry with his actions that caused this mess.

But then again, he thinks of all the great times they've had. That helps cheer him up. Until, of course, he begins to overthink again.

His grades were slipping by a few points, which definitely was noticed by his parents. As he and his mon walked into the door after school, she began berating him.

"Alright, Jonathan. What's the deal with your grades?" She questioned, leading them to the kitchen so they could talk while she started to prepare dinner.

Jonathan sat down, opening his book bag and pulling out some homework. "All of my grades are still A's. I'm not sure what you're talking about."

His mother put her hands on her hips and shook her head at Jonathan. She sighed and turned around to search for the right seasoning, before she turned back to Jonathan to further discuss.

"Physics dropped down from a 98 to a 94. Your AP Government class went from a 100 to a 97. And your trigonometry grade went from a 95 to a 93. Have you been studying properly?" She questioned as she organized the ingredients in front of her.

Jonathan felt his lip quiver slightly. Thankfully, his mother didn't notice this, as she would probably freak out seeing her son about to cry. He blinked away the bit of tears that were building in his eyes and opened his textbook.

"I had a really big project due for English due so I spent a lot more time on that then studying." Jonathan lied, hoping his mother would accept that answer.

To be fair, he did have a project due that was worth 500 points, but that wasn't the reason for his grades slipping. He completed that project within a couple days easily.

He spent a lot of time fretting over Ryan than actually focusing in on his text books. While he was studying, he would space out in his conflicted thoughts.

Jonathan's mom smiled warmly at her son. "I'm not mad, I just wanted to make sure you're studying properly. What was the project about?"

Sighing in relief, Jonathan smiled as he pulled out the rubric for his project. "It was a combination of a book report and a presentation about the book."

As he explained the entire project, he made sure to make it as complex sounding as possible. His mother only graduated high school and never took any higher level classes; she was bound to be a stay-at-home mother ever since she got into a relationship with Jonathan's father.

It only took two minutes of explaining before she was shooing Jonathan away to leave her some peace to cook dinner. Jonathan climbed up the stairs, breathing out a sigh of relief that his plan had worked.

He bounded up the steps towards his room, his bag barely hanging onto his arm. Jonathan tossed it onto his bean bag and threw himself onto his bed, exhausted both physically and mentally.

Life seemed to be only going downhill. He was lying to his parents, to himself, and to Ryan. It didn't seem fair to Jonathan, that everything was treating him so badly.

Jonathan was still so in denial of his true feelings toward Ryan. He was so scared of his attraction towards the boy and how much he enjoyed his company. His parents would never allow him to even associate with Ryan, let alone let them be close friends.

Another thing that absolutely bothered Jonathan was how much he had changed since meeting Ryan. He was consistently lying to his parents, which ate at his mind every night as he desperately tried to fall asleep.

Even now, as he lay in his bed, his mind couldn't stop replaying this scenario in his mind. All he thought about doing was holding Ryan's hand, hugging him, and even potentially kissing him again.

Tears slowly rolled down his cheek as he slowly began to realize the truth:

He had romantic feelings for Ryan.

Church Boy -> jschlatt auWhere stories live. Discover now