Untitled [l.s.] - ON HOLD

one

Being gay isn't something I asked for, it's just a part of me.

I had always sort of known. When I turned fifteen in the winter of '09, I fell in love with my first true love, Nick. I seriously thought he was the one, I mean, we went everywhere and did everything together. I lost my virginity to him. He taught me everything I knew, and one day, he suddenly decided he wasn'y gay anymore. He was dating a girl named Leanna behind my back for at least three months out of the six we were together. It hurt, just as it would to anyone, and I knew that. But it was mainly the fact that I had put all my trust and love into this person, and he dropped me at the first sight of huge tits and a flat ass. Even though we were in year 10, he always found a way to seem older than me.

There's never any steadiness after letting your heart broken for the first time, but you just kind of have to deal with the pain and eventually come to trust someone else enough to let them in.

Nick never spoke to me again. Him and Leanna did break up after a while, though. But Nick was popular soon enough, finding himself as the star quarterback for the football team and almost ten girls surrounding him at all times. He had his little clique, but I couldn't help but snicker at the irony when his best friend Luke, the linebacker, came out as gay. Everyone still accepted Luke, and the day it happened was the very first time Nick looked at me since calling it off. He didn;t smile or speak or wave, he just glanced, and that was it.

As for me, I haven't been able to let anyone in since Nick.

I mean, I have my exceptions. But I'm not really looking.

Monday

"Harry! What about you?" someone yelling calls me out of my trance, and I immediately look up.

"What?" I ask because, let's be honest, I was fucking asleep.

"The question was, Mister Styles, what do you think about the first paragraph of Jonathan Edwards's Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God?" the English teacher, Mrs. Pierce, asks me and starts walking toward my desk.

"Uh," my answer that I wrote down is stupid, is what I should say. Instead, I sit up in my chair because I don't want to get scoliosis, "I, um, think that, er-"

"Next time, pay attention and stop daydreaming, yes?" she taps her dry erase Expo marker on my binder where I had started drawing stick figures shooting each other.

"Yes ma'am." I say in a small voice, swallowing all of my dignity.

"Good," she flashes her teeth at me and goes back to the front of the classroom to finish teaching. "However, Harold, I did see you had quite a lot written down. Did you have anything to say on the text?" she looks at me, and I sigh, looking at what I had written on my paper as the answer I'm supposed to say out loud.

It's so fucking stupid, oh my god.
But, I start talking.

"Well, I said that I think Edwards is repeating the pronoun you to make his sermon incredibly personal, almost like to attack us as individuals. It ensures separation between himself and the congregation to make himself like, morally superior. Kind of like, 'hey if I talk about you being sinners, you can't talk about me.'" I breathe because I wasn't during that answer, "so...yeah." I cringe on the inside a little at the silence that follows.

"That's a really articulate answer for someone who dozes off most of the time in class," Mrs. Pierce says as the class laughs lowly. "Well done, Mister Styles." she nods of approval, and I nod back at her as my thanks.

"Pretty good for a homo."

I turn around to look at the group of boys behind me, all laughing and making snide little comments about the dumb queer who stupidly fell for their precious quarterback only to find out he didn't even like sucking cock as much as the dumb queer did.
Apparently, the dumb ass teacher is deaf because she doesn't hear any of it and continues teaching the Jonathan Edwards shit.

"Hey Har-old," One of the boys I recognize as Matt says behind me in sing-songy voice, but I don't turn. "Don't be a big pussy about it. Oh, wait, you don't even like pussy. That's too bad!" he half whispers and half shouts, and I finally snap around out of pure agony. He makes a "V" with his index and middle finger and puts his tongue between them. That's when I lose it. Out of basically fucking nowhere, I'm out of my seat, and approximately seven seconds later, Matt is out of his and on the floor.

"Harry! Harold Styles. get off of him this instant! Go to the office! Now! I said now!" I hear Mrs. Pierce yelling, but I find myself just not caring because I can't see anything but red, and Matt's in the middle of all that red, and my awkward fists beating his awkward face, and all I'm focused on is making sure he never hurts another person ever again, gay or not.

I'm pulled off of Matt, of course, since fights don't get very far in this school.

"Office!" an unknown voice, the administrator I think, yells at me, and my arm is grabbed only to be forcefully dragged with this person.

The only thing running through my mind is: did I hurt him? Did I mean to do that? Do I regret it?

Okay, well, yes, I hurt him. He was bleeding a little.

Yes, I meant to do it.

Hell no, I don't regret it.

I don't remember much after that. I was dragged into the office with the administrator as he called my mum. Then, we waited on her to come. She arrived, and I fell into my second trance of the day, and I ignored everything that was said: my punishment, how long it would last, "mrs. styles did you know your son was gay," "harry how could you not tell me," "mister styles are you listening," "harry please say something," etc. I didn't care. The only acceptable reason is that I was merely fed up with all the bullshit going around, and someone had to end it. Who else was going to stand up for me but me?

"Harold Edward, you've got so much explaining to do," mum says to me as the administrator lets us leave. "suspended for three days, and then a meeting with your teachers! What am I going to do with you? Gem's off to uni, and here I have a..." she pauses, and this is where I actually start listening. "a gay, rebellious son. And let me tell you, darling, I don't approve of any of those things. Your father would be disappointed." she shakes her head in complete disbelief, and I feel the tears coming.

dammit harry don't you dare cry in front of your mother don't you dare nononononononononononono-

Shit.

"Harry? Wha-" I run off, away from her. Who does she think she is? She said she'd always love me, no matter what, but right now, it doesn't seem very much that she does. How dare she bring my dad into this? He's dead, he doesn't care. "Harold!" she calls me, but I've already turned the school's corner onto a sidewalk.

I loosen my uniform tie, and the tears come out of nowhere like a river overflowing on a stormy day. I have to look down so I don't seem crazy or something. I do so and slow my running down to a fast, steady walk. I wipe the tears away, angry. Angry at myself, mum, Matt, Mrs. Pierce, and most of all, my dad for leaving me all alone in a world that judges you if you're the least bit different.

Being gay isn't being different, it's just the same as how everyone else chooses to love. Gay shouldn't have to be labeled as different. Love is love, and it shouldn't change just because you love the same sex. Some boys choose to love girls, and I respect that. Some girls choose to love girls, or even both. But I chose to love boys because it's just easier for me, somehow, to love one in particular, but that's absolute rubbish to others.

Genders shouldn't have anything to do with love, but the world seems to spin and multiply off of the belief of loving the opposite gender. Or else you're separated from everyone as "homo," or "that weird guy." No one seems to genuinely care anymore, anyway.

I find myself a block away from school when I walk straight into someone. "Oh, god, I'm so so sorry I didn't mean to bump into you, I've just had a rough day, I-" I look up, and my voice is shot. I have no idea where it went, and I don't want to find it right now. I swallow the lump in my throat and apologize once more in a voice that's not mine as I look up into the most beautiful ocean of blue I have ever seen.

***

omg well hi, this is chapter one. i hope you guys like it, even though its fetus! my twitter is @ justfabharry, feel free ask any questions (: don't be shy!

edit: hi i've made this chapter simpler to read, because im dumb and didn't space everything out. hahaha ok bye

- dest