Baby steps ∽『boy ✮ boy -EDITED

Sixth👣-edited

Monday, at seven in the morning, we were already in the car on the way to the capital of the country where my cousin and her family lived.

I was sitting in the passenger seat with my head leaned against the window and the seatbelt placed under my armpits and around my chest, due to it rubbing my neck and irritating my skin. Ryder was humming the song playing at the radio, his hands stuck on the steering wheel and his eyes fixed on the road. From time to time he would turn his head, stealing subtle, not so subtle stares at me. Per total, it was a nicely comfortable drive.

This until Ryder broke the silence.

"What's your family like? You didn't seem too enthusiastic to visit them."

I shrugged my shoulders, shuddering at the mental image of Kathy and her family.

That woman was the devil. Once, when I was young, I spent the weekend at her house. I was around eight years old and I loved to wear pink and red, and I was totally in love with some ribbon bracelets my dad bought for my birthday. Thinking it was unnatural for a boy to wear those kinds of accessories, Kathy hid my things and lied that her husband threw them away. Then she forced me to wear "boyish" clothes, getting me undressed against my will. I remember being left to cry on the cold floor only in my underwear until I agreed to put on the clothes she gave me. Afterwards I got sick and Kathy lied my parents, saying that I ate ice cream without her permission and that I also lost my ribbon bracelets. My dads scolded me and my papa said that he was disappointed when I tried telling him the truth. He thought I was trying to find excuses for my actions.

Then there's Kathy's husband. Before his first son was born, he used to pick on me and make me cry. He would call me a girl and a sissy, then he would try to touch me, saying that was how boys like me were treated in society. One time, before he and Kathy got married and when they used to live in a small apartment with only one bed, I woke up in the middle of the night with him feeling my chest. I tried to brush it off, thinking that maybe he mistook me for Kathy but now, recalling the way he fondled me, I could only think the man was awake and aware of what he was doing.

Oh, and let's not forget about their two boys. One was a spoiled brat and the other was the usual stuck up nerd who thought he was better than others.

Summing up, that family was a haunting nightmare, and their home was a horror house.

Coming back to reality, I realized Ryder had stopped the car in front of a gas station, his hands sitting in his lap instead of the steering wheel and his eyes searching my face instead of being concentrated on the road.

"Are you ok?" He asked with a slight tilt of his head, his bangs sliding down his forehead in a lovely bounce of curls.

I smirked, flipping my inexistent hair over my shoulders. "No, honey, I'm gay! Gay means fabulous, flawless and totally fantastic. Don't you ever categorize me as 'ok', when I am clearly all the above."

Ryder chuckled, making an adorable dimple appear on his right cheek. The skin under his eyes wrinkled while his lips parted, revealing two rows of pure white pearls underneath. It was the first time I saw the ice boy laughing, and to be honest, it was something pretty stunning.

I coughed awkwardly, turning to look out the window when I realized I was staring too much.

"So... why did we stop?"

Ryder's mild laughter died down, his fingers pointing to the arrow which was indicating we were low on gas.

"I have to go to fill the reservoir. " He responded, taking his wallet and exiting the car after he made sure I didn't need to use the bathroom. Even if I did, I would have forced myself to hold it in instead of letting Ryder help me.

A few minutes later I realized I must have fallen asleep because my head was laid against the window and Ryder was climbing back into his seat, two fizzy drinks resting in his hands.

"Do you wanna try?" He asked, stretching one of the green looking liquids in my direction. I took it and stared with wide eyes at the bottle, astonished to see he bought the Apple Bubble Bomb, my favorite juice when I was young and which I hadn't found in years. I remembered drinking it once when I was with Simon. He almost threw up because of the intense smell of chemicals and then interdicted me to drink the "cancerous" juice.

I sighed, opening the bottle and taking a big gulp of the fizzy water. It burned down my throat, overflowing my senses with an explosion of apple taste.

"You like it?"

I hummed in agreement, throwing the empty bottle on the floor next to my numb legs. Then I snuggled into my seat, crossing my hands around my chest and turning my back to Ryder to face the window. We soon began moving again, the car moving idly through the forming sheets of snow.

"So, your dad made you wear a ring when we left the house." Ryder said out of nowhere, his gaze glued to the road.

I lifted my palm, looking at the yellow circle on my ring finger. I started playing with it between my thumb and index.

"Yeah, what about it?"

The jock shrugged.

"I was wondering why."

"Because if I don't Tommy will get mad at me."

"Tommy? Who's Tommy?"

I considered what I should respond before shrugging my shoulders with a smirk.

"My fiancé."

Ryder stopped the car with a sudden creak of the brakes, almost launching us through the windscreen. I looked at him with a terrified gaze, my heart threatening to burst through my chest.

"Easy, man! I don't wanna be wheelchair twins with you!"

The jock's face was blank and shoulders tensed, his knuckles becoming white because of the tightness with which he grasped the steering wheel. He put the car back on the road and began driving in a tensioned silence, leaving me burn holes with my stare in the side of his head.

✿

"Yes, we've reached the town, but there's lot of traffic so we might- Yeah, I know there is a shortcut but it was closed- I don't know, I think they were repairing the roa-No, I am sure we couldn't pass on that alley, there were excavators everywhere."

I tried to hold in my sigh, feeling a headache drilling my head as my cousin was yet to ask her one hundredth question in the last thirty minutes. I was also feeling a throbbing sickness in the pit of my stomach so when Kathy tried to give me her youngest son on the phone I made an excuse and told her our chattering was distracting Ryder so I had to leave.

Once the call was ended I threw my phone-which my papa gave me back-in my pocket, then I let my head drop in my palms and let out a loud huff.

"You ok? What did she say?" Ryder asked on a concerned, but distant voice.

I proceeded to shook my head, but a sudden nausea made me gag and I had to place my palms over my mouth. Now I remembered why I've never drank nor ate before leaving on the road.

Seeing the state I was in, Ryder pulled the car over and unfastened my seatbelt. Then he placed my legs on the edge of the seat above the snow and leaned my head forward in case I was going to vomit. Finally he huddled at the side of my legs, brushing the hair out of my face with his raspy palm.

"Shh! You'll feel better if you try to vomit." He whispered soothingly, moving his caresses from my forehead to my back.

Taking deep breaths of air, I shook my head and carefully leaned back on my seat.

"I'm fine, I'm fine. Only some motion sickness."

Ryder nodded reluctantly, waiting for me to calm down...

...While his fingers kept on rubbing unconsciously over my back.