"Why do we have to go again?" Phil sighed looking at his mom.
"Child, I told you, your grandma wants to go and we want to spend time with her while she's here. Now dress nicely, you know she cares a lot"
Phil sighed loudly to let his mother know how upset he was. His family wasn't the most religious and they hadn't been to church in years, but now that his extremely christian grandma had come to visit for the weekend, they had to abide by her requests.
Phils mom rolled her eyes.
"It's just one Sunday at church, Philly, it won't kill you"
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Phil sighed for probably the 30th time that day, his mom shooting him an annoyed look.
They were sitting in the second row, because his grandma wanted to be as close as possible.
Phil had tried counting the lights on the chandelier, examining the details in the the paintings on the wall and even looking intently at the wooden bench in front of him, but it felt like the mass would never end.
He couldn't care less about what the priest was saying, he just stood up and sat done whenever everyone else did.
He looked at the priest that was reading from the bible trying to blow him up with his mind. It didn't work.
The priest finished and one of the altar boys hurried to take the bible and put it back. The boy caught Phil's attention, though. He must've been a few years younger than Phil, maybe around 19.
What was interesting is he had almost the same haircut as Phil, just mirrored. Phil smiled, watching the boy go back to his spot between the others. He looked different, his soft face, lanky figure and big brown eyes making him somehow stand out.
Phil kept his gaze on him almost the whole rest of the mass.
The boy didn't seem to notice, as he never met Phil's gaze throught the service.
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When mass was over, Phil was standing with his mom and grandma outside the church, as his grandma was talking to some old ladies.
He kept looking around, sectetly hoping he'd spot the altar boy in the crowd of people leaving the church.
As if the universe had heard him, he saw a light brown fringe in the multitude of church-goers.
He sprinted towards him, but as he reached the boy, he realized he hadn't thought about what to say.
The altar boy saw him running towards him and stopped in his tracks looking scared.
Phil stopped in front of him and looked at him for a few seconds before saying the first thing that came to his mind.
"I like your hair"
The boy looked confused.
"Oh- thanks?"
"I saw you during service, we have almost the same haircut, that's why I noticed you" Phil rambled.
He composed himself.
"I'm Phil" he said, smiling awkwardly.
"Dan" the boy replied with a smile.
Phil noticed that he had a dimple on one side of his face. For some reason that made him feel giddy and he couldn't help but grin.
Phil wanted to keep talking to Dan, even though he was bad at small talk. Dan didn't give very long answers but Phil figured, he was just shy in general.
From their short conversation, Phil realized they both liked similar things, which made him happy.
"Phil come on, we need to get to lunch" he heard a voice call.
"I have to go, sorry" he apologized. "Can I have your number? I really wanna know more about your Mario Kart skills" he smiled.
Dan giggled softly and nodded, before giving him his number.
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Phil talked to Dan more than to any other friend. They talked basically every day, at first about their interests or hobbies, but later it developed into Phil telling Dan how the man next to him on the subway had a giant parrot on his shoulder or complaining he had no more of his favorite cereal left, even though he was the one that ate it all.
He felt like he could tell Dan almost anything, and their conversations just flowed effortlessly.
He had learned that Dan was more than just an altar boy at the local church, as he was also in charge of spreading the gospel both online and in real life.
Phil didn't even know churches were using social media to recruit people but he figured it was more effective than handing flyers on the street nowadays.
He looked through the accounts run by him and was disappointed to see a lot of hateful posts, condemning gay people, talking about how women should save themselves for marriage. Pretty average things for a church, but knowing they came from Dan made Phil feel sick.
He liked Dan, everything about him was great, except this. The biggest issue was taht Dan didn't know Phil was gay. He knew it would come out at some point if they would keep being friends, but he was scared it would ruin everything.
After a few days of contemplating it, he decided it would be best to tell him now, as early as possible, to avoid more trouble in the future.
He suggested they meet for a coffee and talk more and the younger boy was very excited at the opportunity to hang out.
They met up the next day at a coffee shop near Dan's place.
"Hey there!" Phil greeted as he saw Dan enter.
Dan smiled as be approached and Phil handed him a cup.
"Hey- oh?" Dan said confused.
"I got you something, cuz I got here first" Phil explained.
"You really shouldn't have, here I'll pay you" Dan said nervously.
"No need. Whoever gets here first pays"
"When did we agree on that rule?" Dan said, rolling his eyes, before sitting down.
"I agreed to it right now, when I made it up" Phil grinned.
Dan shook his head smiling, as he took a sip. He looked at Phil, surprised.
"You remembered my order?? I told you that like a week ago"
"Obviously, I remembered"
Dan blushed, then forced himself to stop smiling. He looked pale all of a sudden.
"Everything okay?" Phol questioned, looking worried.
"Yeah, I'm fine. Oh by the way, there was this guy on the bus with me with a literal rabbit on a leash" Dan said, changing the subject.
They chatted for a while, not really paying attention to how much time had passed.
As it started to get dark outside, they got ready to leave.
"Will I see you in church tomorrow?" Dan asked, hopeful.
"No, I just went that once because my grandma was visiting"
Dan seemed a bit taken aback.
"Right..." he said.
"There was actually another thing I wanted to tell you..." Phil started.
He didn't like this one bit but it had to be done.
"What is it?"
"I really hope that this won't change things between us but I looked at some of your posts on the accounts you showed and I saw all the hate towards uhm, certain groups of people-" Phil started.
He paused for a moment, looking at Dan, waiting for some sort of reaction, but the boy was just staring at him, waiting for him to go on.
Phil took a deep breath.
"I just wanted to let you know that I'm oart of those communities that you talk about. I- I'm gay"
