Exhale ~A Tyrus One-shot~

You Can Exhale Now

Can you meet me at the swings?
Be there in 5!

Cyrus rolled off of his bed and put on his shoes; he was confused by TJ's text. Why does he want to meet at the park instead of just coming over here? Cyrus wondered. He couldn't help but feel nervous, he had no idea what TJ wanted to talk about.

5 minutes later found Cyrus slowly swinging at the empty park waiting for TJ. He always felt a sense of comfort here, like he could do anything.

"Hey, Cyrus," he looked up and found TJ standing next to the swingset. Something about the tone of TJ's voice heightened Cyrus's sense that there was something wrong.

"Hi!" he replied cheerfully, "what's up? Is everything okay?"

"Oh.. yeah," TJ responded, shifting uncomfortably, "I just wanted to talk and you're really good at that so..."

Cyrus felt himself start to blush so he immediately looked down. He didn't know why he was always so flustered around TJ but he hated that he blushed so easily.

"Is anything wrong?" Cyrus was still concerned.

"No? Yes? I don't know." TJ sighed and sat down on the swing next to Cyrus.

"Should I be worried?" Cyrus asked, even though he already was.

"What? Oh no, no it's not a big deal," TJ quickly said, but the way he was talking still bothered Cyrus; it was like he had something heavy on his mind.

"Why did you want to meet here instead of one of our houses?"

"I guess it's just easy to talk here," TJ answered, "I don't know why but it just feels... safe."

Cyrus nodded, he definitely understood.

"Well," Cyrus said, and then trailed off into silence. He wasn't quite sure what TJ wanted.

"Look," TJ said at last, "I um.. I need- no, I want to tell you something. But I'm not ready for anyone else to know. I trust you and I know you won't tell anyone, right?"

"Of course," Cyrus would never dream of telling someone else's secret, "you can tell me anything, Teej."

TJ smiled for the first time that day and then looked up at the clear blue sky.

"Um ok so.. it's about something that happened in elementary school."

"Ok..." Cyrus responded, not sure where this was going.

"I had this friend and I, well, had a... crush
on them I guess. You know I'm not that uh great with the feelings stuff and for a long time I didn't accept it, I didn't accept myself."

"TJ-," Cyrus began.

"No," TJ interrupted him, "please, I- I need to finish before I chicken out and start talking about basketball."

"Ok," Cyrus had a strong feeling he knew what TJ was going to say. He just wasn't sure how to respond.

"So," TJ continued, "this person I liked- we were really good friends. And one day I was hanging out with them and they started nagging me about who I liked. They kept guessing girls who were in our class. I wanted to tell them but I couldn't because-"

TJ broke off and Cyrus thought he saw tears forming in the older boy's eyes. He wanted to hug him and tell him everything would be okay, but he resisted. He knew TJ needed to do this. Just as Cyrus had needed to do it with Andi and Buffy and Jonah.