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“Tüt-Tüüüüt-Tüt-Tüüüüt-Tüt-Tüüüüt...”
An unpleasant and loud two-tone beep woke me up. “Shit, not again,” I thought, but I jumped out of bed more or less motivated. Now I had to act fast.
What had woken me up so rudely was my pager. Every member of the volunteer fire department has a device like that, which can call you to the fire station at any time of the day or night.
The drive to the station was quick and quiet, after all it was 5 o'clock in the morning and the streets were accordingly empty. We didn't waste any time at the station. Putting on the turnout gear took
half a minute, into the big red car and off we went.
Since the operation site was quite a distance away, I was able to let my thoughts wander a little... And they wandered, they wandered far back to a time when being woken up at night was not an unpleasant reality, but a blurred vision of the future that one looked forward to.
I never had many friends; as a ten-year-old, I only called about a dozen of my peers “friends”. But the friendship with the few I had was all the closer. All the boys in our group lived in a residential area on the outskirts of town, near a large playground that we always hung around.
We had one thing in common: we had no desire to join a sports club or similar organization, even though some parents would have liked us to. Many of our classmates were in such clubs and served as a negative example for us – we had no desire to be told to always do the same thing on a certain day of the week and to expose ourselves to the pressure to perform in sports. Too often we heard: “No, tomorrow I don't have time, I have training. I would like to, but in two weeks is the game...”
One memorable day, however, Tobias, one of my best friends, asked me if I would like to go to the youth fire department with him. His brother Martin, three years older, had also joined the youth group of the local fire department at the age of 10 and had been very enthusiastic about it ever since.
Tobias had been persuaded by his brother to come to the fire station with him, and now he was trying to persuade me to come with him, because he didn't want to go there all alone. No wonder, I let myself be talked into it and agreed to have my first encounter with the youth fire brigade next Tuesday at 6 p.m..
In my youthful carelessness, I thought to myself: “I can have a look at it, but it'll probably be stupid anyway...” But how is it always? First, things turn out differently than you expect.
I didn't really feel like going on the said Tuesday, but I kept my promise. Shortly before 5:30 p.m., I set off by bike...
I was a little nervous, not knowing what to expect. A few boys and a girl, all a little older than us, were already sitting on the steps leading to the entrance of the fire station when we arrived.
Since we had cycled here with Martin and were not completely alone, we didn't feel quite so stupid. He introduced us to the others, but more than a shy “Hi” didn't come from our side at first.
After a short time, the first car arrived in the yard - it had to be one of the youth leaders. Indeed, it was Markus, the youth leader, as he introduced himself. (The youth leader is the leader of the youth fire brigade, also sometimes affectionately called the “youth warden”)
Martin proudly showed us the big red vehicles that were parked in the hall, he explained how many liters of water were in the one and the other vehicle tank and how high the turntable ladder reaches and lots of technical stuff like that. I couldn't remember any of it, it was a bit much at once. But I was impressed, I have to admit. All the technology appealed to me more than I ever would have imagined.
Since it was a sunny and hot July day, the evening theory session that was actually scheduled was postponed and a fire extinguishing attack was practiced instead. Just this: We all had a lot of fun, but we were soaking wet at the end of the two-hour practice session.
On the way home, it was clear that we would be back the following Tuesday. A youth leader, I couldn't remember the name, had given us information and registration forms for our parents, which I had my parents fill out that same evening and immediately put back in my backpack so as not to forget them next time.
In the meantime, I had celebrated my 14th birthday, it was midsummer again and a camping trip was on the agenda. I had already been on such a camping trip the last two years, and this time it was supposed to last a whole week, almost twice as long as the previous trips!
For weeks I had been looking forward to the day of departure, because for us, camping meant staying up late, sitting around the campfire, having deep or funny conversations, and spending all that time with my best friends. Yes, by now my circle of friends had changed: almost all of my friends were either in the youth fire brigade or in my school class.
Since many of my youth fire brigade colleagues were on vacation with their parents during the first two weeks of the summer holidays, our group of fellow campers was quite small, with only 12 people including two youth leaders. One advantage of this was that we only needed one of the 16-man tents for sleeping and could use the second one as a “living room”, which was very comfortable and would certainly earn us some envious glances from neighboring youth groups.
Finally the day of days had come, it was time for the best week of my young life - at least that's what I expected back then. With the youth fire brigade's own Ford Transit with a luggage trailer and a private car, we set off for the event, which was taking place further away for the first time and was organized together with a few other friendly fire departments and aid organizations.
In addition to 23 youth fire brigades, some youth groups from the Federal Agency for Technical Relief (THW) and the Red Cross would also be at the youth campsite in deepest Bavaria.
We were actually the first to arrive at the campsite near the small town of Woertzberg, so we could choose the best place, which of course we were happy to take advantage of. The campground attendant recommended a spot to us directly on the shimmering blue shore of the mountain lake, slightly secluded, surprisingly flat and without any hollows on the ground that could cause you to trip in the dark.
As always, we had quickly pitched our tents and were just starting to distribute the camp beds and choose our sleeping places when the second group arrived and set up right next to us. Now we could watch the newcomers unpack and tidy up and make snide comments about their tent-setting-up style while we refreshed ourselves with ice-cold drinks. It had obviously been worth equipping our Transit with a spacious, gas-powered camping refrigerator.
The first few days were behind us, and we had just survived our first night without sleep, which of course made us very proud. However, our joy didn't last long, because today was the day of the camp Olympics.
This meant that we had to work hard to bring home another trophy, which meant that we had to finish at least third. And that in our condition... Fortunately, only very little alcohol was consumed in our fire department, and even less in the youth fire department, because no one would have survived the day with a real hangover. Our youth leaders set a good example, and we had more than enough fun without alcoholic drinks.
We couldn't believe it ourselves, but at the latest when we held the trophy in our hands, we could no longer fool ourselves: we had actually taken first place! Everything had worked out, we had been a perfect team. All evening we basked in the appreciative comments of the other groups and our youth leaders. This camp really seemed to be going damn well...
Strangely enough, I couldn't fall asleep after our victory celebration and the hard day. Despite my efforts, I was still awake even when our two counselors were already asleep. I decided to take a short evening walk, maybe the cold mountain air would help me.
Without waking anyone, I snuck out of the tent wearing a thick sweater and strolled along the shore of the mountain lake, which reflected the almost full moon. An impressive sight that gave rise to a somewhat melancholy mood that I couldn't explain. Great, now I was even more awake than before, but at the same time somehow totally exhausted. “That's my brilliant idea of a walk,” I thought to myself.
Without realizing it, I had moved quite a distance away from the camp. I tried to find a reason for my depressed mood. I wasn't really in a bad mood, somehow I also had the feeling of floating, but that could also be due to fatigue. But why was I wide awake then? Questions upon questions, and no answer wanted to be found... It was strange. I felt very alone, which was somehow painful at the same time, but also reassuring in a way.
A sound directly on the shore made me jump. I had only seen a movement out of the corner of my eye and heard a sound like a sob. My heart was racing, I hardly dared to breathe for a few seconds. After I had calmed down again, I crept on carefully until I could see around the huge boulder that had blocked my view of the shore.
There sat a boy, about my age, apparently crying quietly to himself. Well, there I was, not knowing what to do: should I scare him to death by speaking to him, or should I just disappear? Lost in thought, I clumsily kicked a loose stone down the slope.
Well, now he had heard me. I saw that the poor guy was quite frightened when the silence was broken by the sound of the stone rumbling into the water.
He stared at me for a while, then realized that I must see his tear-stained face in the moonlight and quickly turned away again. I didn't think about what to do, I just did it. To this day, I don't know how I was able to break out of my stupor, but it worked miraculously.
I sat down on a stone about a meter away from the boy and just sat there and looked at the water. I saw that he was from a youth fire brigade very close to my hometown of Sattelwegen, because he was wearing the typical uniform trousers and a sweatshirt with the inscription “Jugendfeuerwehr Siedenbach”.
At least a quarter of an hour must have passed before he asked in a somewhat unfriendly tone: “What are you doing here?” He didn't really manage to make it sound as dismissive as he apparently wanted.
“I'm sitting on a stone, looking at the lake and talking to you,” I replied after a while, ”and what are you doing?”
He didn't answer for a long time, then he just said, “But I'm not talking to you.”
“Too bad... But I'm talking to you anyway,” was my reply. “I'm Lukas, and who are you?” I held out my hand.
Without taking my hand, he murmured softly, “Emanuel” in my direction, then after a while, “Manu.”
I let go of his hand... Well, at least he said something. “So, what are you doing here?”
“I'm sitting on a rock looking at the lake...” was his apt reply. Great, I'd given him a good opening. But at least he had a sense of humor, you had to give him that.
“Hmm, one-nil to you... Ok, I'll start: I couldn't fall asleep, so I went for a walk. By the way, you gave me quite a fright when I heard you behind the rock!”
A slight smile appeared on his face as he replied, “And I almost fell into the water when you were making all that noise up there...”
It was quiet again for a while, only the lake splashed a little on the shore. I caught myself thinking that Manu is actually really cute. Wait a minute, I thought he was cute? Cute... My God, how gay... Hmmm - What was wrong with me? First this weird mood earlier, and then this...
Manu pulled me out of my thoughts: “I couldn't sleep either, because...” His voice trailed off into the silence...
“Why couldn't you sleep? Because we won first place?” I grinned at him. Ok, bad joke. But I'll do it again, I promise.
“Show-off,” he said with a wry grin, but he immediately became serious again, his gaze was infinitely sad. ‘Anyway, you'll find out tomorrow anyway... By tomorrow afternoon at the latest, everyone will know...’ And again he began to sob, he was really shaken.
I waited until he had calmed down a little, then I asked, ”What will everyone know tomorrow?”
“That... That I...” And again he started to cry, it was getting worse. I moved over to his stone and wanted to put a comforting hand on his shoulder, but he pushed me away at the first touch. He was strong, the little one... It was just stupid that we were sitting right on the water and I hadn't expected such a reaction.
I was already preparing myself for the big splash when I received a brief reprieve. Manu had quickly grabbed hold of me, and for a moment it looked like I would be spared the cool, or rather ice-cold, bath.
Unfortunately, gravity had a different opinion, and we both ended up in the lake. Do you know how damn cold a mountain lake is? Yes, I know, glacier water and all that... Shit, was that COLD!
Since the shore was very flat, there was a maximum of 30 centimeters between the water surface and the hard gravel at the bottom, so my landing was anything but pleasant. Manu had no problems with that, he was halfway on top of me and only got wet down below because he could still support himself with his hands on me. I, however, was completely submerged for a short time and was accordingly wet down to my underpants. The hard stones weren't very comfortable either. Great.
Shivering and spitting water, I growled a grumpy “What a bummer” while Manu pulled me back up. So we stood facing each other in the water, with Manu still holding my hands. In the moonlight, I could just make out the corners of his mouth slowly twisting up until he finally started to laugh. Initially still annoyed, I also started to grin and finally we were both laughing our heads off.
Suddenly I saw that he was still holding my hands. I stopped laughing and looked at our hands, grinning. Manu saw this, also stopped laughing and let go of my hands as quickly as if they had suddenly turned red-hot. His face was also glowing red, but soon a wry grin crept into the corner of his mouth.
He just said, “Ass!” And I grinned back.
“Pleased to meet you, Lukas!“ I still had a broad grin on my face, but it quickly disappeared when I was back in the water. What a dog! ‘I'll get you for that...”
He tried to quickly make it to the shore to safety, but I was faster. His ’Hey!” ended in a bubbling sound as he lay in the water in the same place as me just a moment ago.
He quickly got up and jumped on me, and in no time a merciless wrestling match was underway. At some point we were both so out of breath that we both dragged ourselves to the shore. Now we also realized how cold the water actually was and we both started to tremble like crazy.
“Maybe we should go and get something dry to wear,” I suggested, shivering.
The answer was a chattering “Good idea.”
So we walked back to the camp trembling and in silence. It wasn't an awkward silence, and despite the cold I felt somehow warm and comfortable. It was strange, the... feeling of being alone earlier had vanished.
When I arrived at the camp, I wondered how I could sneak into the tent, dripping wet as I was, to get new clothes. Manu saw my hesitation. “If you can't get to your clothes without waking anyone up... My bag is right next to the entrance, I can lend you something until tomorrow... I'm
not entirely innocent in your bathroom either... We're about the same height, so it should fit you.”
I thought about it for a moment and decided to accept the offer – I would hardly be able to get something out of my bag in our tent without waking anyone. “Ok, I'll gladly accept the offer, thank you!”
“No problem,” he grinned and we walked over to his tent. He took out his bag, then we stood there and didn't really know what to do next. Finally Manu said, ”How about a hot shower? The showers are far enough away from the tents, so we wouldn't bother anyone.”
“Well, that's an idea... But is there even hot water at this time?”
“I think so - let's just go and see...”
“Ok, let's go!” And off we went to the showers. Lo and behold, there was really hot water.
And once again it became embarrassing. Although we had both showered with other guys the last few days, we both hesitated. It was somehow different with just the two of us. Finally, I got fed up with it and took off my clothes, jumping into the next shower without looking in Manu's direction.
Shortly thereafter, I heard the shower running next to me and finally dared to take a look. At the same moment, Manu turned to me, looked me briefly in the eyes, and immediately we both turned away again. I noticed how the blood rushed to my face... Well, it was still better than if it had traveled to any other part of my body.
Soon I was warm again to some extent and I also relaxed a bit. Next to me, I heard Manu turn off the shower and I quickly looked over as he went to his towel, which he had placed on the bench opposite the showers. Along with the confusing thought that I liked what I saw, the feeling crept into my head that I had forgotten something. Oh yes, right: I didn't have a towel. Great.
“Umm... Manu?” I finally dared to say to Manu, who was drying himself off.
He turned around while rubbing his hair dry. ”What?”
“Wow,” it shot through my mind, ‘he looks damn tasty!’ After I had pushed this thought aside with some effort, I finally said to Manu, who had just finished drying himself off: ‘Ummm... I don't have a towel...’ And promptly I blushed bright red again and looked at the floor. I should probably get used to that...
“You can have mine, it's big enough that there are still a few dry spots on it.” And with that, he put the towel next to him on the bench and began to put on his shorts.
I had to go through with it... Sighing inwardly, I turned off the pleasantly warm shower and started to dry myself off. Oh man, the towel smelled of Manu's shower gel, and I felt a certain body part stiffen... Damn, if he sees that... As inconspicuously as possible, I peeked over at Manu, who was just rummaging through his large travel bag. Suddenly he turned around and looked me in the eye briefly, then he said, “here are your clothes,” and put a complete set on the bench next to me. “I'll go return my bag, I'll be right back.” And off he went.
I sat down on the bench, feeling relieved, and absent-mindedly rubbed my hair dry. I was slowly losing my grip on reality, my reactions were completely incomprehensible to me... What was going on with me, damn it? But I thought it better to postpone these considerations until a later point in time. I really should get dressed before Manu comes back, I thought to myself.
Once I was fully dressed, I looked at myself in the mirror. Manu had good taste in clothes, and the stuff looked good. During my self-examination, he had apparently come back into the shower room; he was suddenly standing behind me and said, “Well, how does the gentleman like my choice?”
“His taste is exquisite, I thank him for this bounty!“ A deep bow and an exaggerated gesture underlined my answer and made Manu laugh. I felt even better.
“So, what are we going to do now?” Manu asked after we left the shower room.
“Hmmm... No idea, I'm not really tired either... Any suggestions?”
“Well, I don't know... We could sit down by the lake again...” Manu said with a broad grin.
“Well thanks, and I'll end up in the lake again...”
“I promise I won't throw you in the water! I don't have any dry clothes either, so don't worry...”
“Ok... But don't come too close, otherwise you'll be lying in the water first,” I grinned at him.
So we made our way to the lake and headed for a large boulder where we could sit comfortably. We stopped briefly at Manu's tent, he disappeared inside and came out with his sleeping bag. What a clever guy, the little one! It would have been a bit cold to sit on the damp stone.
Once there, Manu folded the sleeping bag in two and placed it on the ground so that we could sit comfortably, but inevitably we were pretty close. That's the thing about “don't come too close to me”...
For quite a while, we just sat there in silence, each lost in our thoughts. I brooded again about my strange reactions to Manu, but I came to no conclusion. At some point, I decided to discuss these questions later and I remembered what was going on with Manu before our involuntary swim. So I gathered all my courage and asked Manu: “Manu? What was going on earlier?”
Calling my question a mood killer would be an understatement. Manu slumped down and a tear ran down his cheek as he slowly began to speak: “Last night I told my best friend something and he just ran away... Later he came over and threatened me, saying he would tell everyone if I tried to talk to him again... He just said: Don't ever talk to me like that again, or I'll kick the shit out of you!”
After a pause, he continued: “I don't know what I did to him, I've never seen him like this... Shit, man, the asshole has been my best friend since kindergarten!”
Manu started sobbing again and I put my arm around him and gave him a little hug, trying to calm him down: “Hey, it's going to be okay... That asshole doesn't deserve to be your friend if he treats you like that...”
After a while he had calmed down a bit, but was still cuddling up to me. Hmm... What he had said to his friend, he hadn't said yet. What could that have been? My curiosity was aroused: “Manu? What did you say to him that he freaked out like that?”
He sighed, broke free from my embrace, sat up straight and looked me firmly in the eyes. He looked totally tear-stained, but his gaze was hard. “You really want to know? Ok, you asked for it...” And after a short pause: “I'm gay.” He said this last sentence quite emotionlessly, but immediately turned his face away and stared at the lake.
I was paralyzed, it took quite a while for his words to penetrate into my brain. So he was gay... Shocked, I looked at him with wide eyes, unable to utter a sound.
Manu looked at me shyly. There was infinite sadness in his eyes, but I was far too shocked to register it. It was as if he had held a mirror up to me, as if he had said to me, “You're gay.”
Completely absent-minded, I managed to say something: “Don't take this the wrong way, but... I need to think, I'll be right back...” I stood up and looked briefly at Manu, who was staring at the lake again, then I started walking. I walked fast, it seemed to me as if I saw more clearly the faster I walked. It was only when I almost ran and was soon completely out of breath that I slowed down again.
I had walked along the lake and arrived back at the place where we had both fallen into the water earlier. I sat down on the stone where Manu had been sitting and tried to organize my thoughts. Manu... Manu was gay. And me, what about me? Was I gay too? Wasn't that the logical conclusion of my feelings for Manu, which I had experienced earlier?
I had never been interested in girls, I had thought I was just too young. On the other hand, the thought of sex was definitely present in certain lonely hours and often led to incidents that required new shorts. What did I think about? Certainly not girls, I had to admit to myself. Hmmm...
Slowly I got used to the idea that I might be gay. I just tried it out and whispered softly to myself: “I'm gay!” It didn't sound that bad. Then I remembered that Manu was probably still waiting for an answer from me. It hurt me to think about how he must feel right now, the pain was almost physically felt. Well, then I had to do something about it, didn't I? I ran off, just as fast as I had run here, rather even faster.
Panting, I reached the rock on which Manu was still sitting, staring at the lake. Slowly I approached the last few meters, trying to control my breathing and calm down again, but although he must have heard me, he didn't turn around. I sat down next to him and started talking: “Manu, I'm sorry... I'm sorry for just running away... I needed to think, you know? It's not about you, I don't have a problem with you... That you're gay.”
That had taken a lot of strength – I guess I wasn't completely over it after all. “It's just... I mean, I... I don't know what's wrong with me... earlier in the shower, that was...” I gathered all the courage I could scrape together. “Manu, I really like you... I think I'm gay too...” Wait a minute – did I just say that? Wow...
From his reaction, he had expected anything, but not that. His head jerked around and he stared at me in disbelief. His speech center seemed unable to produce more than a “Huh?” We looked into each other's eyes for a long time, sinking into each other... Suddenly I noticed that a red glow was appearing on the horizon and I looked at my wristwatch. It was really starting to get light again, and we both had to yawn heartily at the same time.
We looked at each other and started to grin. Except for a two-hour nap in the sun before the Olympics, I hadn't slept since the day before yesterday, and I was slowly realizing how tired I was. Once again I had to yawn extensively, the first cautious sunbeams tickled my nose. Again we looked each other in the eyes.
We just wanted to stretch out on the sleeping bag for a moment and looked happily into the still slightly reddish sky, while cuddling each other. It didn't take long for us both to fall asleep...
Was I dreaming of our nightly swim in the lake or was it really ice-cold water that was flowing into my face? I slowly woke up and realized that my left arm had fallen asleep and that something was lying on it. Finally, the fog before my eyes had cleared enough for me to see that it was Manu lying on my arm and right next to me.
He had also just opened his eyes and looked confused under his soaking wet hair. Wait a minute, why was his hair wet? And why was water dripping from my hair into my eyes? I turned onto my back and looked directly into the grinning faces of my two youth leaders and some of my youth fire brigade colleagues.
Somehow there was also a fire hose, which also made it clear to me where the water came from. Markus, the youth leader, reacted promptly to my confused face and said, still grinning broadly: “Come on, guys, I don't think they're quite awake yet, a little refreshment please!”
No wonder: my nice colleagues didn't need to be told twice. And it worked, I really woke up, sat up and looked at my wristwatch to see that it was about 12 o'clock.
Manu slowly stirred, and he too saw the people standing around us. Now my brain was fully functioning again, which resulted in an immediate reddening of my face when I realized what kind of picture we must have presented. The face next to me showed a similar color, which indicated that Manu was also fully awake again. Now I was curious to see what was going to happen to us...
Markus whispered something in the ear of Holger, the other youth leader, after he had seen our anxious facial expressions. Holger then asked the other young people to finally move towards the tent with him if they still wanted something to eat, which nobody needed to be asked twice. What remained were two visibly embarrassed boys and my youth leader.
Markus sat down in front of us, smiled at us crookedly and just said, “And?”
I threw a questioning look over at Manu, who looked like a whipped dog and was obviously trying to stare into a hole in the ground in front of him. Since I couldn't expect any help from him, I had to face our problem more or less alone. I wasn't angry with him though, after all he had experienced enough yesterday and didn't know Markus anyway.
I decided to use the classic counter-question tactic: “And?”
“Well, it looked pretty obvious to me what I saw this morning when we finally found you... We let you sleep until noon, but you can't just lie here all day, can you? Besides, sooner or later someone would have stumbled across you...” Markus had a look on his face that I couldn't quite place. I was sure that he wasn't angry, I would have noticed that. It was strange, he seemed more worried...
I didn't know what to say, so I didn't say anything. My counterpart sighed briefly and then said, “Well, don't you want to tell me who you are first?” and looked at Manu.
“Manu...” he murmured quietly and raised his eyes for the first time since we had woken up. Apparently he had given up his plan with the hole.
Markus held out his hand and said, ‘Hi, I'm Markus, Lukas’ youth leader, nice to meet you! I have to admit, though, that I already knew who you were, since you both disappeared, it was almost obvious...”
It was hard to believe, but Manu shook the offered hand with a shy smile. “Hi, nice to meet you too!” It seemed as if he had enjoyed a good upbringing – so nothing stood in the way of marriage. At least that's what my grandma said.
After an embarrassingly long moment of silence, Markus looked at us kindly and invited us to go eat. “Manu, I already talked to your boss, you can eat with us. But I think we should talk later, okay?” We obediently answered his question with a hesitant nod and followed him to our tent.
During dinner, everyone except Manu and I talked normally, but there were no stupid comments, which surprised me a lot.
Markus and Holger must have given clear instructions and threatened draconian punishments or promised a gigantic reward, because normally the boys were always up for any joke. Only occasionally did someone give us a curious look.
After the plates were washed and the leftovers of the feast were disposed of, Markus threw the rest of the pack out of the tent: “Guys, you don't want to stay in the tent in this great sunshine, do you? Come on, get a sunburn or do something useful!”
With half-hearted grumbling and the usual “slave driver” and “hey, we're on vacation” comments, the boys left for outside. What remained was a tension that made me quite nervous.
“So...” Markus began a monologue with a sigh, ”You caused quite a stir this morning, we looked for you for half an hour. Manu, you can be glad that I know your boss well, I was just able to stop him from waking you up and giving you a dressing down. Since your cozy rock is not exactly in the middle of the camp, we took turns keeping more or less watch so that no one would disturb you. I would say you owe us something for that... How about an explanation, for example?”
He looked at us questioningly, but when we didn't answer, he continued: “I realize this is hard for you, but we did overhear a few things... Maybe this will make it easier for you... So, when we went looking for you, we realized that you don't actually know each other, at least that's what your respective friends said. That you both then disappeared could either be a very strange coincidence, or there is more to it. After we then heard a few pretty
nice comments from your former best friend, we put the rest together...“ He looked at Manu, who had looked up after the last remark.
“What did he say?” Manu asked quietly.
Markus obviously found it difficult to answer this question. Finally, Holger said without looking at us, with an angry undertone in his voice: “Maybe the fag drowned in the lake... Then at least he can't grope us in our sleep... Quote end...”
Manu looked at me so helplessly and hurtly that I couldn't do anything else but put my arm around his shoulder, squeeze him lightly and hiss with clenched teeth: “I hope I meet that asshole in the dark...”
“Oh, he's already in trouble!” Holger said with a nasty grin on his face. ”After Markus confronted him, he made it very clear that he would make sure that your nice friend would wash all the dishes for the rest of the camp and clean the toilet if he even thought about saying a word about it to anyone.”
Wow, that was news! I would not have expected that my two youth leaders would stand up for us like that. “Well done, you'll get a piece of sugar for that later!” I beamed at them, relieved.
“So, our Lukas has found his usual cheek again... Then he can tell us what's really going on with you,” Markus grinned at me challengingly.
As surprising as the wave of relief had hit me, it had vanished just as quickly. “Umm... Well, we... Oh, I don't know... Manu?” I looked over at him, seeking help. Judging by the expression on his face, he was also glad that the whole camp wouldn't know about him for the time being and was therefore safer.
“Yes, it's true, I'm gay... Does Jakob know yet?” he asked, and explained to me: ”My youth leader...”
“Yep, he didn't really know what to think of it earlier, but I think he'll get it sorted, as I know him. At least he was rather confused and a bit helpless than angry, and that's a good sign,” Holger explained.
Markus once again managed to throw me off my stride with his question: “And what about you, Lukas? Do you have something to tell us?”
Well, they hadn't torn Manu's head off either, so what the heck... If you're going to do it, do it right, that had always been my motto. Solemnly, I turned to those present: “Holger, Markus... I think I've got a crush on Manu...”
With that, I looked over at Manu, who stared at me as if I had three eyes. ”Wow! Lukas, no one's ever said that about me...”
The radio had been playing the whole time, which we always had with us at the campsite. Just at that moment, the chorus of the well-known song by “Fünf Sterne Deluxe” began: “Willst du mit mir gehn, willst du mit mir gehn?” (Will you go out with me, will you go out with me?) The timing couldn't have been better... Manu looked into my eyes with a dreamy look, and we forgot the world around us.
At the end of the refrain, we began to perceive our surroundings again. “I think that was a yes,” Markus said with a grin.
I looked at Manu questioningly. “Well, yes... YES!” he grinned happily at me.
Of course, Holger couldn't resist saying: “Love must be beautiful...” He didn't get to finish because after a brief consultation via eye contact, Manu and I each grabbed an open and not-quite-full bottle of soda from the table next to us and poured it over Holger.
Laughing, he wiped the soda out of his face. “Just wait, I'll get you yet!”
Also laughing, we ran out of the back tent entrance, which was not completely closed, followed by my youth leaders. Wait a minute, why did I just trip over someone? Manu was behind me, wasn't he? He was, and he fell on me again. It was becoming a habit...
While still falling, I saw some of my friends running in all directions. So, it seems like there was a big eavesdropping attack. This thought had barely ended when Markus and Holger were already lying on top of us.
Groaning, I rose after the other three had pulled themselves together. Now I saw who had been lying under me: Tobias. Holger said what I had been thinking: “Well, did we catch an eavesdropper?”
Tobias looked at me shamefacedly and then said with a cautious grin: ”I should probably congratulate you, hmm? So, congratulations!”
Manu and I were blushing so brightly that we had to try again. Nevertheless, we managed to get a “thank you” out of them in unison. Slowly, the other eavesdroppers also cautiously gathered behind the tent again when they saw that there had been no trouble. Soon our entire youth group was back together again.
“Let's go into the tent,“ Markus suggested. We all settled down in the tent in silence. There was a tense silence, all eyes were on Manu and me.
“Well, you've heard it anyway... So, may I introduce Manu from Siedenbach, my friend!” I finally dared to break the silence.
Tobias was the first to stand up and shake Manu's hand. “Hi, I'm Tobi! Welcome to our bunch of bastards and congratulations again!”
The ice was broken, the whole bunch shook my new friend's hand and congratulated us. Eventually everyone had said their piece and it became quieter again. Markus asked for silence and asked: “Manu, Lukas, there's one more thing you have to decide: should your, um, relationship stay between us for now?”
We looked at each other and nodded. “We'd prefer to keep it between us for now, we need time to get used to the idea that you all know before we think any further!”
Holger clapped his hands: ”I say, to celebrate the occasion, let's cool down first... Follow me inconspicuously, we still have some delicious ice cream in the fridge!” Hollering, everyone jumped up and followed Holger behind our tent, where the bus was parked. Manu and I didn't even want to get up until Markus walked out of the tent in front of us and tousled our hair as he passed. ”Come on, you've earned the ice cream the most!”