Telescopes and Flashlight's | I'll Give You The Sun

Untitled Part 1

I take a deep breath. And let it out. Why am I about to say this. I turn off the flashlight and face the sea as if I were just telling it and not him. Like I do all the time. I feel the breeze tickle my neck. You're just telling the sea. You're not telling him, I tell myself.

"I'm-"

My head whips right back on him in a flash. What am I thinking? I'm not actually gonna say that, am I? I click the flashlight on and study his face for a millisecond before he realizes I'm not saying anything. There's this weird look of suspense written on his face, along with a glimmer of hope. I guess that's weird. Once he realizes I'm not going to say anything he says,

"I'm claustrophobic. Sucks. Now I can't be an astronaut," he looks down, his feet shuffling. Something about this very non important secret doesn't seem as important as he's making it out to. I mean, who cares if he's claustrophobic? Apparently, he does.

"You didn't used to be?" I ask and he nods, and I immediately notice his face shut down. Like he's locked himself away. I want to know more. Hell, I need to know more. He's looking at his shoes like he's studying Starry Night, not some freaking bland white sneakers. "Why are you?"

He doesn't look up. If anything, he seems to be focusing on his shoes harder as if he could set them into flames, or burn holes through them or something. After a second he shrugs. I have no idea how to continue without sounding pushy, but something seems so off. It's more than just your average funny story where someone accidentally locks themselves into a bathroom or a closet or something. It's something serious.

"C'mon, why?" I really don't want to be so pushy.

He snaps his head up so that he's just barely making eye contact with me, "Whatever! Okay? Why do you care so much?"

"I don't know, it just seems more serious then your average claustrophobic story," I say casually, trying to hide the inner panic tearing me up on the inside. He hates me.

"Well, if you must know, it is. And I didn't go picking around your last unfinished turn," he says, turning to face my rooftop to avoid looking at me or the ocean.

"Well, yeah, that was personal," I say looking down and squeezing my eyes shut so hard that the insides of my eyelids dance with white speckles.

"Yeah, well so was that one," It's as if I can hear a slight wail in his voice as he says it. He wants to get this conversation over with.

"Okay," Is all I say, "Okay."

He looks down and I look towards my roof. I clear my throat. "I should probably go," I really don't want to, but he wants me out of here and this situation is just getting so awkward. Out of the corner of my eye I can see him look up.

"But we- I mean you haven't even looked through the telescope yet," he says so lightly, I easily could've missed it had I been focusing on the sounds of the waves.

"Yeah but-"

"Just look through the telescope," he rifles through a bag screwing on one last knob to the stand that holds up the telescope, "look. Already done."

I try to act casual as he makes it clear he really wants me on this roof right now. I try not to make it clear that I want him to grab my hand and pull me behind the telescope. I know he won't like that so I just wander to it defeated and crouch down.

And I swear to god I have never seen anything more incredible in my life. It's like taking a shower in the cosmos. It's- god, it's amazing.

I can hear him whisper as he leans over to adjust the telescope. "You see this, this is the first star and there's the next," he points to a few stars, "That's Pollux." He steps back slightly and then recites some random globidyglook in a full voice and then steps back in.

"Do you see it?" he asks and I shuffle through a bunch of things I can say mentally. I haven't been listening.

"Do I see what?" I ask guiltily. I hear him as he stifles a laugh and steps just an inch closer.

"The North Star."

I look up at the sky, feeling his breath, warm and gentle on the spot where my neck and hair integrates. I breathe in his scent silently, feel his body warmth radiate from his body to mine. We're inches apart now.

"No. I don't see it," I say, and everything happens exactly as I hoped. He moves in so that we're touching, well not actually, but we're so close that we might as well be touching. He adjusts the telescope even more so that the stars come rushing closer. But before I can get a good look at it, I hear Brian sigh and then hear a click, and all I see is blackness. Complete and utter darkness.

"Do you see it now?" he asks, his hand firm on the telescope. I know he's no longer asking about anything that has to do with the stars. I think I'm about to cry. I think I know what he's asking just from the way his words slide through my neck and find their way into the flow of my rushed breath.

"Nothing's been more clear to me ever," I whisper, as I silently lay a finger on his hand pressed against the pole of the telescope. I wait for him to wrench it away, or yell at me, or run, or call me names. But he doesn't do any of that. He, well we, stand there silently, our hearts beating in the others chest, our breath fast and at the same pace. And then he moves his head so that his cheek is pressing against the back of my head and his mouth is to my ear. I freeze. Everything freezes. I think the waves stop crashing and the trees stop rustling and the owls stop hooting. He whispers,

"A while back, these kids saw this other kids search history or some websites he'd gone to or something. They made fun of him everyday they got the chance. And then one day they locked him in a storage closet. For a day and a night he sat in that old, cold closet rotting away," Brian's voice cracks. Suddenly I understand that this is no random kid he's talking about. This is a kid, a baseball player with a bonfire of hair that rests on his head, with a fear of closed spaces. "That whole time he sat in that closet thinking he was going to die because he had been born with a curse even though he did nothing bad."

I do probably the worst thing I can do. I twist myself around to look at him. Bad idea. All of a sudden there's this adrenaline coursing through me. I reach out and graze his neck with a single petal of a middle finger, and then I have to, I just have to say, "I can show you it's not a curse," as I lean in and kiss him softly and move away, my eyes lingering at his freckles. He lets out a breath as I press my lips against his once more.

He wrenches away. I stare at him horrified. Was I getting the wrong signals? Reading the wrong notes? He doesn't like me, of course he doesn't, why would he like me of all people? I look at him, he's no longer facing me, he's facing the ladder that leads back down to the ground. He wants to leave. He doesn't like me. Everything he said and did was just an expirement. I feel my heart break slightly. It can't just end like this, I mean it barely even started.

"Brian?" I ask, letting my words drift right past him and up to the North Star. He sighs a sigh so heavy I suspect it's been building up in his lungs ever since he was born.

"I like you Noah. I really, really do. It's just that..." he doesn't finish but that doesn't matter. All that matters is that he likes me. He likes me a lot. He turns his head so that it faces mine. His eyes are begging me to understand something he hasn't said. He looks like a lost puppy, so sad, frightened, confused.

"Hey, hey," I say gently pulling him closer to me, "just for tonight."

That's all I say, and that seems to settle him as I place my lips against his. When we seperate for a breath, our foreheads leaning together, our noses grazing each other's I whisper, "fuck, I'm so gay."

"Is that what you were gonna say? When it was your turn to share a secret?"

"Yeah," I lean in and we make out some more.

He whispers, "why just tonight? Why not all summer?"

I smile. "Just say you're gay, and I'd be happy to do it."

"I'm freaking gay as fuck."

"Good."