A Colored Joy

His name was mine

This is gonna be fun to write and sad to read. Prepare for tears.

(((Trigger warning, bad language and deathly situations)))

It was black as night, but the sky was so bright with him beside me. It was the forth of July when it happened, it was quite and surreal like the ice tea we drank that morning on his mother's porch. I think every moment in my life leading up to that became surreal thst night. I remember staying the night, she thought it was cute we were in our late teens and still spanding the night together. We thought it was sweet she hadn't caught on yet, we'd been friends since we were toddlers. We'd been lovers since my sixteenth birthday. We were known for our name, being together always, and the names other boys called us.

We were both named Darius and we'd found each other when in a park when both our mothers called us and we came to them in a pair. Hand in hand saying we were twins now and didn't want leave the park. In the end they made us a play date so we would keep our "twin", we were  Inseparable from that day on. Even though we looked nothing alike we seemed to take that label with us everywhere. I don't know if it was that we'd been friends since childhood, but we could answer any question about one another. We just grew up like that, there was no real transition into being closer then friends. Yet other people seem to notice, old friends said since middle school we'd been acting "different" and other boys could swear they'd been us holding hands. Maybe they had but we'd never tell.

That's how we got in our first fight. Jae Watson punched me in the face because he thought we were kissing outside of the science room. So Darius punched him in the chest so Jae's brother, Leon jumped in and I handled him eventually Mr. Knökoma found us brawling in the middle of the hall and split us up. We all had a week of detention in the same room, needless to say we fight every day for a week. Until Darius broke down as asked why Jae kept trying to kill me.

"Damn it Jae, why do you keep trying to kill him, he didn't even do anything to you!"

"Because he's a faggot and I saw you kissing!" He pointed an accusing finger at Darius and I. Note, we'd never even kissed girls back then.

"1. We were not kissing at all, 2. What the hell is your problem, and 3. Even if someone's kissing they shouldn't be hurt for it!" Darius's young face was a red blur, and his eyes light up as he talked.

"Actually, they should. I bet you wanna kiss your boyfriend right now! Because you're disgusting, my dad says so." At this point Jae had a smug look on his little face, and Darius was about to blow.

"First of all, Your father's a blockhead and you're a peace of shit. Second, your wrong and dumb, that's probably why you're failing math. And third fight me, you bitch!" Darius said sticking up his middle finger.

"At least I don't eat shit, you faggot. Bring it on shitdick!" Jae said with blind rage.

Soon the punches started flying again. I jumped in soon to, but the funny that many years later Leon came out as gay and ran away from home. But that's not the point, point is were all older now, some of us no better and others are still trying to fight people for who they want to kiss...dumbass. after that we were all suspended for a week. All of us grounded and made to apologize even though our moms knew those boys were wrong, but it had to be done. We were only ten years old at the time.

When we became older the homophobiea became...better and worse. The friends that knew us and knew we were closeted kept our secret and stuck up for us, we even had "girlfriends" at one point. It worked in our favor as new rumors spread and old rumors died down and for a little bit the fights and defending ourselves stopped. We "dated" our close friends Tanika and Mariana, they were known as the twins because they actually were. They had a strict family so we convinced them to let us "date" and followed every rule to a t. You'd think they'd be happy that boys were so well behaved, but their father became  mindful of the way we looked at each other.  Nothing came out of it though, he couldn't prove that we weren't straight, because we were used to it by now. Growing up black and gay is like trying to put on a one man show with seven characters and all of them are hated, and that's something Darius and I played well. We stayed like that, lying to everyone until the very end and even after that. Our shared closet became our home and his room was a summer get a way.

We were still living with our mothers, working on moving in together and eventually moving away from our sleepy small town. We'd live in the country, alone and open for once. Yet for now, we were broke black boys with nowhere to go. So I spent the night at his house, we watched the saw series together, played Silent Hill, and tried to keep our sex quiet. It was the usual, and the next day his mother found us spooning in bed. We tried to make that look manly but I don't think anything would've helped that. So we simply ignored that like we did everything else. We showered and got dressed, Darius and I talk and he watches me. I can see him sneaking looks while I try to get dressed, I smirk at him and try to keep on subject. How he'd been excepted to a university and our plans had been temporally stopped. He told me I should apply for scholarship so we could stay together and move in together even sooner then we planned. I agreed and almost got in, I failed time and time again. No scholarship, no money, no house, and no way of being close to my love were we could be ourselves.

So back to the beginning, it was the fourth of July and we were walking the neighborhood, drinking what was left of a bottle of vodka, and watching what little fireworks was still popping off. It was late in the night sky was dark and illuminated every so often with a pop and a bang; we heard cheering. Every now and again we ducked down; not knowing if it was fireworks or gunshots, but that was just a neighborhood. So if the people down the street wanted to start shooting we wouldn't know. Soon we reach the end of the block. Which led us to another crowded block; a block party was happening the red white and blue sped everywhere form little kids running with popsicles colored in the American flag to grown men who were in whole three piece suits for church that morning; dancing very sinfully with their wives on the Dance Floor. Everyone seemed happy...

To be continued