What's Next? || Ant x Stephen

Early Christmas - Chapter Twenty-Four

Ant and Stephen were going down to Newcastle for Christmas this year, so they had decided that they would go down to Stephen's parents for dinner a week before, and even though Stephen isn't very close to his parents, or at least not as closed as he'd like to be with them, but could you blame him after how his mother treated him after he came out, and even though his dad always accepted him and never thought any different of him, he didn't exactly handle the issue with Maureen very well.

So Stephen and his parent's kind of drifted apart, and he only started properly talking and having dinner again, after he got together with Ant, because he wanted his family to know about his relationship and his life, no matter how scared he was for Ant to meet his mother, Ant wanted to meet the younger mans family, and Stephen wanted him too as well, he wanted to get closer again, and he just hoped that his mother wouldn't say anything to offensive. Being around his mother always left Stephen with this huge feeling of panic, because she could be unpredictable about what she says sometimes, and Stephen knows what she could say, he's pretty much heard it all before and he didn't want Ant to have to hear it.

Coming out for Ant had been pretty easy, or at least significantly easier than it had been for Stephen, his family accepted him rather easily, and as said before, Stephen's didn't go as well, I mean a lot of his family on his mother's side, didn't speak to him after he came out. Obviously coming out publicly had been a bit better for the pair, they'd had the odd thing yelled at them in the streets, and they had seen quite a few tweets and comments on social media about them being Unnatural or that their relationship was a sin, and they were going against god, but when they read those ones, they had Dec to reassure them that they weren't going against god, Dec has always been quite open about being a catholic, even though he doesn't speak much about it on Tv, one of the main things that worried Stephen out coming out to him, because of all the things you hear about Catholics not accepting the LGBTQ+ community, but obviously Dec was very accepting, and has always been there for both Ant and Stephen after they came out and after they got together.

They were pretty much ready to leave now, Stephen was pacing back and forth by the front door, not wanting to be late, as much as he wanted to go to his parents, there was also a mix of wanting to get the evening over and done with, part of him not wanting to go. If he was completely honest he didn't know how to feel. He was quite conflicted about the whole thing, and he'd gone over every single worse case scenario possible, as usual.

Ant was upstairs finishing off his hair, he knew how nervous Stephen was about going to dinner, Ant wanted tonight to be perfect, he wanted it go as smoothly as possible, the younger man really needed a break from everything. He needed a break from work, from Michael... from everything, he needed a distraction. Ant hadn't spoken to Stephen yet about what Lisa told him, about Michael on Stephen's first day back shooting Catchphrase, the younger man had either been working late or had came home incredibly stressed, and on the days off that they both shared, he wanted Stephen to forget about work and have a nice calm, relaxed day.

"Hey, you ready?" Stephen said as he noticed in the corner of his eye, Ant coming down stairs, Stephen was still fidgeting with his keys, trying to distract his brain, from over-thinking. As Ant walked over to the younger man, he slowly placed his hand over the younger man's, stopping him from fidgeting for the moment "it's going to be fine, she's trying right?" Ant said softly to the younger man. "Yeah... yeah your right" Stephen replied as Ant moved his hand from Stephen's, the younger man swung the keys around his fingers and said "right, let's go!"

*TIME SKIP*

As Ant pulled into Chris and Maureen's street, Stephen was starting to think about his mother, about whether or not he thought she could actually change, to be fair she has been a lot better over the last year or so. Maybe he was a bit harsh, when she met Ant, saying that she wouldn't change and that she would never accept him. Maybe he should have more faith in her, or give her a chance to prove she can actually learn to accept him...