Intimidation ♡ joshler

forty two

an: sorry i didn't get the chapter up in time! :^(

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Nothing's been able to bring Tyler down from his elation ever since he talked to Josh; it didn't bother him anywhere as near as much as it usually would when his mother ignored his existence, nor did his father's weird looks and occasional homophobic comments.  

He's the happiest he's felt in a long time.

When he wakes up on Christmas morning, he thinks of Josh like the cliche he is, and he feels so warm and happy again, turning his head to giggle into his pillow—he's disgustingly giddy about it, but this is his first boyfriend (wow, Josh is his boyfriend), and he actually genuinely cares about him.  Tyler never thought the time would come—he should throw himself a party or something to celebrate his accomplishment of the impossible, jeez.

There's a gentle knock at his door, followed by his sister whispering, "Are you awake in there?"

"I'm awake," Tyler calls out, sitting up in bed as Madison opens the door, smiling at him.

"You look really happy," Madison giggles knowingly before saying what she came to say in the first place, "So we have the option to eat before presents or after—what's your vote?"

"I wanna eat now," Tyler answers, and Madison nods.

"Okay, ready to go down now, then?" she asks, and Tyler nods before pulling himself out of bed and following his sister out of the room.

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The Josephs are now all seated near the Christmas tree as Jay and Madison pass out the gifts, and Tyler thanks them whenever one is handed to him; he only asked Zack for a couple things, but they go together, and it isn't exactly cheap.

All the presents are handed out, and they open gifts in age order, starting with Jay, since he's just a little younger than Madison (i decided to make them twins in this story, i keep forgetting to mention that, oops).  Everyone else watched fondly—except for Tyler, honestly, because he's one of those kids that get bored and impatient watching everyone else open gifts.  His parents used to call him a spoiled brat for this, so he learned to fake eagerness while watching others open gifts.

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Tyler's turn eventually comes, and all eyes are on him.  The watchful gazes honestly make him a little uncomfortable and his face flushes a little, but it's not like he can tell them to fuck off and look away—imagine how that would go down, especially since he isn't exactly on good terms with his parents, and Zack... must he say it?

He usually likes to unwrap the smallest presents first, but his smallest has Zack's messy scrawl written across it in sharpie, telling him to open it after opening the biggest of the box—he's pretty sure he knows why.

So, he grabs the next gift in size, eagerly tearing off the paper (in a civil way, unlike Jay—Tyler swears he's like a wild fucking animal sometimes).  When the paper's gone, he smiles appreciatively at two doodle books—he saw one at the store a little while ago back at home and expressed to Zack how cool the activities inside it looked.  He thanks his brother before putting his books aside, moving on to the largest gift.

He already knows what it is before he even opens it, but that doesn't lessen his excitement as the lack of wrapping paper reveals a game system—it's just a Wii, but Tyler's never had one of his own, just played one with Josh.  Again, he thanks Zack for the gift, but with much more enthusiasm, because a Wii is way cooler than two doodle books, as spoiled as that may sound.  But it's Christmas, who cares?