Love and War - (Book 1)

Chapter 8 (Part 1 - Almost Ready)

Flashback:

It's time to just say it. Be true, not that Lucas was untruthful, just avoided it. As Lucas made his way to James, whom he had been crushing on for a couple years now, he contemplated how to go about coming out.

'Just tell him you like him and that I'm fine if he doesn't like me because of it, no matter how homophobic that is,' he begins. 'I'm sure he'll still like, however. Somebody as funny as I am, how could you not like me?! He'll say what he does, and that's that. Nothing more to it.

Lucas saw James on his own, the two of them were unaccompanied by their friends, so Lucas thought it would be a perfect chance to confess what he's been trying to express to his crush for some time now. He thought about how cute he looked to him. Then he wondered if he looked attractive in any way. 'I doubt I do; I barely take any pride in how I look.' James saw Lucas approaching him, and smiled. Lucas felt his heart sink.

"Alright?" James says, smiling.
"Yeah, you alright?" he returns.
"Great. What are you up to?"
"Nothing much. What about you?"
"Nothing." 'It has to be now,' Lucas tells himself.
"So... I just feel like I need to say something, but I don't wanna make a long fucking speech like I'm a best man at a wedding, and this won't be as half as funny as best man speeches tend to be. I just need to say that I like you. A lot. In fact, I've been crushing on you for a good couple years now. Probably since we first met; that memory is still really clear. And I'd understand if you won't like me as much as you did because of this, but I just felt like you needed to know. So, how are you... feeling about this?" Lucas comes out to James. The fist person he came out to that a wasn't somebody over the Internet. He feels free of a burden that never bothered him too much. Lucas feels as if he may have just been cleared of sins and charges against him; his spirit is lifted.

James looked perplexed, as if he hadn't expected Lucas to not be straight, which Lucas would understand, due to the wrong image of homosexual people and attitudes and the fact that Lucas doesn't match them. Then James appeared ecstatic. Lucas was now perplexed.

James didn't answer Lucas, at least not with words or speech. All he did was leaned forward, closer to Lucas, and kiss him gently on his lips. James smiled greatly when he broke it up after what seemed like a lifetime, when in truth was only a second or two. Lucas was now also ecstatic and somewhat stunned, however he too smiled back.

They didn't care if anyone else around saw them, for all that mattered to Lucas and James were each other in this moment. "I knew you were gay," Lucas says, grinning.
"I didn't think you were," he replies.
"Well, maybe that's because I'm not. I'm bisexual, if you want to label me. But I'm one of those guys that don't like labels, as I'm the same with my beliefs. 'Cause I'm agnostic, but I don't think it needs to be a major factor in a person's life. A person's background doesn't make them who they are. That's only the surface. No, what makes a person is their emotion and how they act towards things. It doesn't matter who we are; it just matters how we survive."
"Very inspiring. If one were forty years older rather than fourteen, I'd applause you."
"You can't say "one" and then change it "I", you twat. You just ruined my great speech."
"I thought you said you weren't gonna make any best man speeches. Hypocrite." Lucas laughs, causing James to laugh also.

"I love you," Lucas says, meaning each of the words and feeling the emotion and weigh of them, which was evident through the way he said it.
"I love you, too," James says, in the same manner of Lucas.

End Flashback:

"And so here I motherfucking am," Lucas announces to the other recovering addicts, all sitting in a circle on chairs. "Just told you my whole life story, well, the latter half of my life. None of you guys even fucking clapped or applauded me; it may have been really difficult for me to tell you everything that's happened. And you don't fucking take your time to put your two bloody hands together to make a sound! Bloody fucking hell, you guys."
"Alright, mate, we'll bloody clap for you, you prick," one says, while he and the others applaud him sarcastically.
"You're all a bunch of knobs. I hope none of you assholes ever recover. Why don't you all go home and slit your wrists tonight, then I'd come to your fucking home and fucking applaud you. Because I still respect you. You knobs."