A War on Two Fronts (Peterick)

Chapter 20

-Patrick-

Its been exactly one year since Pete died and I miss him more and more everyday. I actually survived Vietnam and after my shoulder and leg healed they sent me home.

After I returned home, I even found out where Pete's parents lived and visited them. They were consumed by guilt for how they treated him and everything they said to him. They gave me a picture of him and I offered them some closure. His parents invited me to the funeral and I went of course, but I stayed at his head stone and cried until my eyes ran dry and stared at it for hours replaying every interaction in my mind until the end, and I cried some more. Now I sit in my room and stare at his picture when I can't sleep or just miss him.

Nothing was the same without him. I broke up with Elisa, but I.never told her it was because I could never love her like I love Pete. I'll live the rest of my life without knowing what its like waking up next to someone everyday for the rest of your life. I don't think I'll love anyone like I love Pete.

If anybody knew, they would tell me I'm still young and that I have the rest of my life, but I know love like that only comes once in a life time. Everyday I sit under the cork tree in the park and watch everyone experience what I won't. Being happy with the one you love.

I will never get married to Pete, raise children with Pete, or grow old with Pete and my biggest regret is that I never told Pete I love him until it was too late.

I still have nightmares about it. It happens in my sleep just as it did a year ago and it always ends with me looking into Pete's lifeless brown eyes and being dragged off of him kicking, crying, and fighting to get near him again. I usually wake up sweating with tears down my cheeks and I lay there and cry into the pillow some more holding his picture.

The hardest lesson I ever had to learn is that you love who you love, even if that love goes against everything you have ever known. I wouldn't want to learn that with anyone other than Pete. But there are so many things left unsaid and its my fault. I denied my feelings for the longest time when I should have embraced them. I could live a thousand lifetimes and never deserve Pete because all I did to him was confuse him and hurt him until the very end.

I know moving on would be healthy for me, but I don't want to move on. Even if I did, I wouldn't know where to begin and I feel like I would be betraying Pete if I did, and that breaks my heart more than his passing. He was my picket fence and he protected me from everything. I just can't bring myself to let go of him. I will always love Pete.

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What have I done? Anyways, this is the end of this story and I had a lot if fun writing it. Thank you guys for reading and voting and commenting. It means so much to me and I never believed it would go this far. I just thought it would be a cult thing for my friends that wanted me to post it on here.

Also, there's something I want to clear up. You guys gave Patrick A LOT of shit for being in denial for so long, but you have to remember what time period this story is set in. 1969/1970. Gays were like... the worst of the worst back then and everyone deals with self acceptance in their own way. Patrick didn't want to be discriminated because of how society viewed homosexuality back then which caused him to go into denial and be as indecisive as he was and his acceptance process wasn't as smooth as Pete's. Pete never cared for what people thought of him, but Patrick did. I hope that made sense. So like... yeah..

Thank you for reading and all the compliments on the story. I love you guys. I can't believe this is the end.
-Matthew