“Have a good flight,“ the lady at the check-in desk with the Dutch accent smiled at me and pushed my boarding pass over the counter.
”Do you really have everything?“
”Yes, Mom!” And even if I had missed something, it would have been too late anyway. There were still 20 minutes left before boarding. We were running pretty late.
“And always put on plenty of sunscreen. The sun is dangerous down there!“
”Yes, Mom!“ I replied, slightly annoyed. After all, at 16, I was no longer a little kid.
”Now leave the boy alone. I think he can take care of himself quite well already,” my father came to my rescue. You could always rely on him. Thanks, Dad!
We strolled silently through Schiphol Airport towards customs. I felt a little queasy at the thought of not seeing my parents for the next 12 months.
When we arrived at customs, I put my hand luggage on the conveyor belt to the X-ray machine and looked at my parents. My mother's eyes were a little wet.
“All the best, son, and have fun. Take care.” My father gave me a big hug.
“Take care, come back safely,” my mother said, and did the same to my dad. ‘And bring us a handsome son-in-law,’ she added with a grin.
I had to smile. ‘Oh, Mom, you know that my taste in men doesn't necessarily match yours.’ My mom really likes long hair on men. Not really my thing.
“Too bad. Take care,“ my mother smiled at me.
”You too. I love you!” I replied and turned around. Lost in thought, I passed through customs.
I looked at my watch. 10 minutes left until boarding. A little disoriented, I looked for my gate. Why do airports always have to be so confusing?
Thanks to my disorientation, boarding was already in full swing when I finally reached my gate. To be precise, I was pretty much the last one to arrive. Well, at least I was still on time and finally made my way through the narrow aisle of the plane to my seat.
Once there, I pushed my backpack into the overhead compartment above me and let myself fall onto my seat, still a little lost in thought. How convenient, an aisle seat, at least I can stretch my legs, I thought just as my gaze fell on my neighbor on my right.
“Hi Chris, good to see you,” Benjamin smiled at me.
I squinted my eyes. This could only be a bad dream.
I opened my eyes, but Benjamin was still sitting there. “If there is a God, then I ask him: why?” it went through my mind. “Why him and then also here of all places?”
“Earth to Chris! I said: Hello, nice to see you!” Benjamin was still smiling.
“H... hello,” I stuttered. Hey, that went well. So, I could still make a perfect fool of myself.
“Well, you don't seem particularly happy to see me here,” Benjamin asked. No, I couldn't say that I was. After all, Benjamin was the main reason why I was so afraid of going to school in the morning for a while. Strangely enough, however, his question sounded more disappointed than sarcastic, as I would have expected.
“Can't say I disagree,” I snapped back, a little harder than I had intended. I had been looking forward to not having to endure all those idiots for the next 12 months. And now this. But anyway, a flight like that doesn't last forever. I should be able to ignore him for 12 hours with the help of a book.
“It's a shame, since we'll be together for the next 12 months...“
”What?“ I interrupted him. ‘You don't mean...’
”...I'm also taking part in the exchange project?” ‘Yes, that's exactly what I mean,’ he completed the sentence.
I slumped down in my seat and felt the tears well up in my eyes. Anything but that. The thought that he was planning the same thing as me hadn't occurred to me yet. But it was obvious. What else would he be doing on a plane to Kuala Lumpur at the beginning of the school year?
I turned my head to the side and fought back the tears. The last thing I needed was for him to see me like this. I had to sniffle briefly and shortly after that I felt a hand on my right shoulder.
“Chris, what's wrong?” Benjamin asked in a soft voice.
I turned to him abruptly and swept his hand off my shoulder.
“You know exactly what it is. Leave me alone!“ I hissed at him fiercely. An older lady on the other side of the aisle looked over at us with interest.
”Okay, okay,” Benjamin admitted somewhat meekly, although his expression darkened. He then turned away and stared out the window.
Refreshment tissues were handed out, the flight attendants gave some safety instructions and finally the plane was ready for takeoff. Unspectacular. I put the headphones of my Walkman into my ears, listened to the sounds of Rosenfels and thought.
Once again, I felt really bad.
I had always been a loner at school, but that had never been a particular problem for me. Until four years ago, when the classes were reshuffled and I met Benjamin. That's when the psychological terror began. It got so bad that I didn't dare go to school afterwards. And Benjamin was the leader, I was really afraid of him.
I then started swimming in the swimming club at some point and found a few good friends there. During this time, I gradually realized that I was gay, which initially led to my already weakened self-confidence taking an indefinite vacation. By a stupid coincidence (or my own stupidity, I had a crush on a swimming buddy, or whatever you might call it, and had stared at him a bit too clearly), it finally came out in my new circle of friends. But to my surprise, the reaction was consistently positive, my new friends supported and even motivated me to the point of coming out to my parents.
However, it turned out that my panic about telling my parents that I was gay was completely unjustified. “What exactly is your problem?” they asked. Nothing has changed; we still have a great relationship. My self-confidence decided to cut its vacation short and came back to me, at least partially. Only at school did no one know my little secret.
Half a year ago, I got my hands on a brochure about this exchange project for the first time. I was hooked immediately and my parents also thought it was a good idea, so they were willing to finance the story for me without hesitation.
I was happy. Just the thought of not having to see the idiots in my class for a whole year made me happy. My friends from the swimming club had organized a great farewell party and everything suddenly seemed so perfect.
Until I got on the plane and met Benjamin. All at once, I felt like I had been transported back four years.
I was annoyed with myself. Why did I have tears in my eyes again?
Did I really want to let some jerk ruin the chance of my life?
No!
But what could I do? We would be stuck with each other for the next 12 months, whether I liked it or not. So chronically ignoring him was not a solution.
What then?
At some point I fell asleep over my thoughts.
2
My neck hurt a little when dinner was served and I woke up. Benjamin was still sitting next to me, so it wasn't a dream. I decided to continue ignoring him for the time being, and so we sat in silence chewing our curry chicken.
He also made no effort to talk to me, which suited me just fine. So I finally immersed myself in my book and waited for the flight to finally come to an end. Scheduled flights are boring.
After what felt like an eternity and a mediocre breakfast, we finally arrived in Kuala Lumpur. I was just wandering through the huge satellite terminal, looking for a little entertainment for the next six hours of waiting for the connecting flight, when suddenly someone grabbed me from behind. Startled, I turned around. Benjamin.
"Hey Chris, wait up.”
“What do you want from me?“ I looked at him blankly and realized I was getting slightly aggressive.
”Come on, I'll buy you a beer or whatever,“ he said kindly.
”Thanks, I'm good!“ I snapped back, about to turn away again. But he held me.
”Please!” He almost begged. And he gave me this puppy-dog look that almost made me melt. Benjamin wasn't bad-looking, after all: 1.80 tall, slim and fit, deep blue eyes, a sweet face and that tousled, dark blond hair gelled up. No, in my opinion he wasn't bad-looking at all. But an asshole is an asshole.
“I don't know what the point of this is, but okay,” I agreed to his offer, still a little reluctantly.
A few minutes later, we found ourselves in a rather cozy bar on the upper level of the satellite terminal, each of us with a beer in front of us. By the way, ordering this had not been a problem for us 16-year-olds here. Trial and error.
Benjamin took a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket, lit one, and put the pack on the table.
“You don't mind, do you?” I asked as I reached for the pack.
“Of course not, but I didn't know you smoked,” he said in astonishment, giving me a light.
“I usually don't either. But there are situations...“ I replied.
”OK, I see. I know what you're getting at.“
”Oh yeah? Really?“ The cynicism in my voice would have been noticed by a deaf person.
”Hey, that's not fair now...” he complained.
“As if you've ever cared about what's fair,” I snapped back.
He looked at the floor. ‘I know.’ He hesitated and then added quietly, ‘And I'm sorry.’
I didn't know how to react. I wanted to tear him apart. But I took a deep breath, took a sip of my beer and remained silent.
After a moment, he looked in my direction, feeling insecure. Something was wrong here. I didn't buy the repentant sinner. What was this supposed to be? Was this a new, particularly subtle way to screw with me again and take away what little self-confidence I had left?
I looked into his eyes. To my amazement, I saw insecurity in them.
“OK, something's fishy here. So, what do you want?“ I finally asked him firmly after taking a nervous drag on my cigarette.
”I want to apologize to you. I treated you badly for a long time and I want to apologize for that and try a fresh start.” His voice trembled a little as he said this.
I was speechless. He imagined it all to be very simple. I had no idea how I should react. Should I yell at him now? Should I forgive him?
“Well?” He asked expectantly, yet uncertainly, holding out his hand. I hesitated. But would I be better than him if I rejected him now?
I took a last drag from my cigarette and stubbed it out. Then I took his hand, whereupon he smiled shyly and whispered, “Thank you!”
We looked at each other for a while in silence. I wasn't quite sure about the motives behind his sudden change of heart. Why? Was he just afraid of being thrown into a group of strangers alone?
“You don't trust me at all, do you?” he said, interrupting my thoughts. I took a deep gulp of my beer and looked at him.
“Right!“ I replied after putting the glass down again.
”I see. But you can, you'll find out.” Well, I was curious to see.
It was worth a try, because I had nothing to lose anyway. So I slowly began to engage with him a little, discovering some surprising similarities in our views. Whether it was about our teachers, classmates or whatever. I had the feeling that I was dealing with a completely different person than the Benjamin I knew. So the last hours waiting for the connecting flight, as well as the flight itself, were quite entertaining. We had a lot of fun together.
3
After another ten hours of flying, we finally reached Auckland. During the descent, we both squeezed our heads in front of the stamp-sized window in the airplane to catch a first glimpse of New Zealand. It was fascinating. So much green and so much water all around.
Immigration was unproblematic, and since we didn't have any food with us anyway, the sniffer dogs didn't find anything on us, of course. So about half an hour after landing, we stood a little disoriented with our travel bags at the exit of the customs control and wondered how to proceed. We decided to follow the crowd for now and shortly afterwards we arrived in the large arrivals hall, where a whole bunch of people were waiting with signs bearing the names of some schools or surnames.
I looked around a bit and finally spotted a tanned guy standing a little apart, holding a sign with “Capella” written on it. “Bingo,” I said and headed quickly for him, with Benjamin following me.
“Hi, you want to go to Capella?“ the tanned guy greeted us with a harsh, northern German accent when we finally stood in front of him.
”Yep, I'm Benjamin,” my comrade-in-arms took the initiative, to which I added a shy ”And I'm Chris.”
“Nice, I'm Tjard. We're still waiting for four other guys who must have been on the plane with you. Then we'll leave. OK?"
Benjamin and I nodded in sync. ”Of course.”
So, during the next 10 minutes, Rene, a long-haired bomber with several piercings and a goatee, Martin, a slightly smaller, chubbier boy with bright eyes, as well as Kevin and Dustin, obviously twins in skater outfits, joined our group. After exchanging pleasantries, we set off and shortly afterwards we were all sitting in a minibus on our way to our destination.
I got off the bus and took a deep breath of the fresh sea air as I looked around. Then I caught sight of our new home for the next 12 months for the first time. The “Capella” proudly stretched its two masts towards the sky.
“Right, then get your stuff out of the bus and on board.” Tjard pulled me out of my thoughts.
We hastily hauled our luggage out of the van and climbed aboard via the narrow gangway. Once we had arrived, we first spread out to our cabins. The correct technical term is “chambers”, which better represents their size. The chambers were just under four and a half square meters in size, with bunk beds on the left and right. The thought of four people living together in this small space initially shocked me a little, but I quickly got used to it.
I was to share my cabin with Benjamin and two other boys who had not yet arrived. Due to the limited space, I let Benjamin go first to get settled and waited on deck until he was ready. After a good half an hour, he was finally ready and I went downstairs.
I threw my duffel bag on the upper bunk on the right and began to stow my belongings as best I could in the small cupboards (wardrobes). I was finally in the process of stuffing the empty pocket under the lower bunk when the door was bravely slammed shut behind me.
“Ouch!“ I cried out loudly. ‘Can't you idiot be careful?’
”Sorry, I didn't know...” an unfamiliar voice stuttered behind me. I sat up carefully and turned around.
“Well, it's okay. It wasn't that bad...” I started, but I didn't get any further. What I saw took my breath away. In front of me stood the boy of my dreams. A little shorter than me, but with an athletic build and an absolutely cute face. I had never believed in love at first sight before, but when I saw him, it just ”clicked.”
“Well then...“ he said with a visibly embarrassed smile on his face. ‘So I'm Tjorben.’ So Tjorben was the name of this divine being.
”I? Um, well... I'm... Chris,” I answered dreamily. With my stutter, I had probably just made a complete fool of myself again.
“Yeah, I'll just go outside, then you can put things away here in peace,“ I finally said, and tried to squeeze past him out of the chamber. But he held me back.
”Are you all right?” he asked, whereupon I immediately blushed.
“Yes, I'm fine. I'll see you around, then.“ My attempt to sound confident in response to this failed miserably.
”OK!” he replied with a grin, heaving his bag onto the bunk below mine.
I climbed up the companionway and sat down on the deck. I took a few deep breaths to clear my mind, but I didn't quite manage it. Dreamy-eyed and probably grinning like an idiot, I gazed up at the evening sky. It was dawning and the first stars were already visible.
“I asked if you got everything under control,“ Benjamin's voice suddenly brought me back to reality.
”Oh, ... uh ... yes!” I absolutely had to do something about this constant stuttering.
“Are you all right? You're acting like you've smoked some bad shit,“ Benjamin asked with a grin on his face, which of course made me blush again immediately.
”No, I'm fine,” I replied, slightly embarrassed.
“Well then,“ Benjamin said and held his pack of cigs under my nose. I gratefully took one out and he gave me a light. I thought to myself that I should quickly stop with the smoking before it becomes a habit.
”So? What's your first impression? Have you already met someone?” I asked Benjamin after we had sat next to each other in silence for a moment.
“Yep. I was talking to a guy earlier who's also in our chamber. He looks a bit like Antonio Banderas, you'll recognize him, but seems OK. And you?“
”I guess I met the fourth member of our chamber crew. He kicked the door into my back.”
“Ouch!” said Benjamin. ‘What did you do to him that he wanted to kill you?’ I shook my head and we both laughed.
Some time later, the new crew of the Capella was finally complete and everyone was sitting in the mess for dinner. There was a hungry silence as people eyed each other. I was no better and also looked at the people with whom I would spend the next year and also discovered relatively quickly our fourth “roommate”, whom Benjamin had previously described to me so impressively, sitting right next to Tjorben. The two seemed to already know each other. Benjamin was right, he did look a bit like Antonio Banderas, albeit considerably younger. I was also surprised to discover that there were four girls among the participants.
When the skipper, or at least I assumed he was the skipper based on his age, stood up, all the plates had been cleared, so everyone was concentrating on the inevitable speech that was about to follow.
“Welcome on board for starters, I'm Rolf, skipper and owner of this beautiful ship. I suggest that each of you briefly introduces yourselves before I bore you with a few unavoidable details.”
The girls volunteered to go first, but they couldn't manage much more than their names. The male participants weren't much better, though. It's always fascinating how shy a bunch of pubescent teenagers can be. Well, we still had plenty of time to get to know each other a little better.
After the skipper had given his speech on the subject of watch duty, behavior on board (saving water, saving electricity...) and route planning (long-term towards Europe), I went to my bunk relatively quickly. The day was quite exhausting and I was really tired.
4
The next morning was rainy and it was not particularly warm at just under 10 degrees. Benjamin complained about the bad weather in the middle of summer, after all, it was mid-August, until Falk informed him that the seasons in the southern hemisphere are reversed. Deepest winter at 10 degrees is quite bearable. Benjamin blushed slightly and the rest of us laughed heartily. Benjamin had never been very good at geography.
After breakfast, the individual cabin crews were assigned various tasks. These included getting provisions, raising the sails and whatever else needed to be done. Benjamin, Tjorben, Falk (the name of the Banderas guy, as it turned out) and I were assigned to get drinks together with Tjard. As a result, the morning was over faster than we would have liked. In the afternoon, we finally got our first sailing lesson: which rope to pull when, and what the heck a bowline is. It was all pretty confusing, but Tjard was trying hard to turn us landlubbers into sailors. Whether he succeeded would become clear later. Falk and Tjorben seemed to have it all pretty well under control. I, on the other hand, hadn't really noticed much that day, as I had been busy staring at Tjorben most of the time. I even imagined that he smiled back at me a few times. Or was it just my imagination? It must have been, because it would have been too good to be true. Hopefully nobody had noticed.
After dinner, by the way the last dinner that the skipper had prepared (in the future we would have to do it ourselves, bon appetit), we had shore leave for the last time for the next few days. Therefore, we set off with the entire crew for the Americas Cup Village, where, according to the skipper, there should be some nice pubs. We could forget about going to a disco on a Tuesday evening in winter in New Zealand.
Due to the fact that we had to split up into two tables because of our group size, two groups were unfortunately formed immediately. At one table sat Benjamin, Martin, the twins Kevin and Dustin, and Rene, constantly watched by Sandra. Sandra was particularly distinguished by her pronounced female features in combination with too much make-up. At our table I sat together with the rest of the crew.
Falk sat opposite me, surrounded by Susi and Nathalie, I myself sat between Falk and Steffi. Of course, quite a few beers were consumed and the evening was quite fun. From Falk, I learned that he and Tjorben had probably known each other for ages and came from the North Sea coast. They had lived next to each other and had both grown up as captains' children. Falk's father was a fisherman and Tjorben's old man probably steered huge container ships across the oceans. That at least explained why the two of them had found it so easy to practise tying knots.
When I looked over at Tjorben again, dreamily, which of course I couldn't help doing, I noticed that Susi, who I thought was a little naive, was making a play for him. Tjorben gave me a slightly helpless look in response, which I could have sunk into. I smiled dreamily in Tjorbens direction, not realizing that this look could be misunderstood. Apparently, Steffi, who was sitting right next to Tjorben, noticed the look and now began to give me strange compliments, so that I was completely unsettled within a very short time. Fortunately, Falk noticed my uncertainty and engaged me in a conversation.
“Not really your type, is she, Steffi?“ he asked me.
”No, not really... she's pretty forward,“ I replied, a little embarrassed.
”I can understand that. But don't worry, I'll protect you from the bloodthirsty women,” said Falk with a diabolical grin on his face. We had to laugh and clinked our beer glasses together.
Tjorben was on his way to the restroom when there was a sudden commotion at the neighboring table. I looked over and noticed that Martin and Rene were already gone. Sandra stood up angrily and slapped Dustin across the face. Then she stomped over to our table.
“Nathalie, we're leaving!” she announced in a brusque tone of command. Nathalie looked a little surprised, but made a move to get up. The other two girls gave us a questioning look. Falk seemed to understand, though.
“It's okay,” he said, ‘go with them, we'll take care of this.’
Steffi and Susi nodded gratefully and ran after Nathalie and Sandra, who had already left the door. I was just realizing what had happened when the three others came over to us from the neighboring table. They were visibly drunk.
“I think this just became available,“ Dustin stated and sat down as a matter of course on the chair where Steffi had been sitting a moment ago. Kevin and Benjamin joined us, too.
”What the fuck just happened?” Falk turned to Dustin with a dark look on his face.
“Oh, the old slut, she doesn't want to be fucked. But you can see how hot she is to feel my cock,“ he slurred. Kevin and Benjamin started laughing, Falk pulled a played-out, bewildered expression.
”Oh? You can tell?” He asked, his forehead wrinkled.
“Of course. Unless you're a loser like him.“ Dustin pointed at me, whereupon he received a blank look from me.
”Well, don't give me that stupid look. Benjamin told me everything,” he continued, bawling.
I felt anger rising inside me. I should have known better. WHAT had Benjamin told him? And I, the idiot, had even confided in him.
Anger may sometimes be helpful or even relieving, but when I get angry, I tend to have a tendency towards knee-jerk reactions because my brain temporarily shuts down. So I tried to suppress the rising anger for the time being and looked over at Benjamin. However, he had nothing better to do than to grin at me nastily and explain:
“It's true that you're a cocksucker. Someone like you...” But he couldn't finish the sentence because the rage inside me was now stronger and had already shut down my brain. The next moment, Benjamin was already holding his hands in front of his face, and a little blood seeped through between his fingers. I grabbed my jacket and headed for the exit, while Dustin called after me:
“You'll pay for this, you dirty ass-fucker!"
But I only half heard that. As soon as I was outside, I started walking in a daze. I don't know how long I walked, but eventually I found myself standing on a quay not far from the ship. I looked calmly out at the water when my mind started working again and I slowly realized what I had done. Shit, I had completely lost control, something like that had never happened to me before. I hated myself, I had never hit another person before and I didn't know why it had happened this time. OK, Benjamin had ruined everything for me. Goodbye fresh start with open-minded people. Nobody would want to have anything to do with me now. Of course, at that moment I didn't consider the possibility that the people here could be just as tolerant as those at the swimming club at home. After all, Dustin had just proved the opposite to me.
A wave of despair hit me. I was ashamed of having lost control, of having beaten Benjamin, even though he might have deserved it, as well as the botched start and the open rejection. I slumped down and fell to my knees. As I took in the oily smell of the pier, the tears came and I couldn't do anything about it.
It took quite a while for me to calm down again, but eventually the tears dried up and my head began to clear. I sat down on a bollard, stared out at the water, admired the lights on the other side of the bay and breathed in the smell of the sea. The night was clear and bright with moonlight. It was cold, but I didn't care. I was only interested in one question: How should I proceed now? Would Falk and Tjorben still talk to me? I was afraid to go back to the ship, I was afraid of their reaction.
“There you are. Are you okay?” Falk was suddenly standing behind me.
“Yes, I'm fine,” I lied and turned around.
“Yeah, sure. Tell that to your grandma or someone else.” He sounded really worried. ‘Man, you look completely exhausted. What's going on?’
He looked me in the eye. But I could hardly stand the look and turned away.
“I... I...” I began to stammer, while tears welled up in my eyes again. ”Oh, leave me alone. I'm not worth it.”
“What are you talking about?” Falk replied firmly. ‘Now finally tell me what's going on.’ I had to cry again. Shit, I felt like a little kid and it was so damn embarrassing. I didn't want anyone to see me like this. But Falk took me in his arms and stroked my hair.
“Hey, strong man. You almost broke Benjamin's nose and now you're sitting here crying? What's going on?” he asked me as if he were talking to a small child. But there was so much warmth in his voice.
“Oh crap, I lost control, I hate myself for it. This shouldn't have happened. But... but...,“ I stammered.
”What but?“ he immediately followed up.
”Well, Benjamin totally ruined the start for me. I was hoping to finally be rid of him. But no, he absolutely had to show up here.”
“Can you explain that to me in more detail?” he asked calmly. I stared at the dusty and oily floor of the pier below me and told him about my tense relationship with Benjamin and his sudden change of heart on the way to Auckland. Falk just listened and didn't say a word. When I was finished, he just asked one question:
“So it's true what Benjamin said?“
I sat up straight and stared at him in disbelief and fear. He didn't mean...
”So, you're really gay?” he asked. Bull's eye. Tears welled up in my eyes again.
“Yes, damn it!” I finally replied, sobbing harder again, ‘You just had a dirty cocksucker on your arm. Satisfied?’ I buried my face in my hands.
But he took me in his arms again. It didn't seem to bother him. He gently stroked my hair again and said,
“Hey, that's no reason to be sad. What's the problem with that? The main thing is that you are able to love another person at all. Which I don't trust certain other people to do.“
”You mean...?“ I looked at him in amazement.
”No, it's not a problem for me. My brother was...” He swallowed noticeably, ”My brother is gay too.”
Despite the onset of relief, it still took a little while before I finally had myself under control again. But then I wanted to know exactly how on earth Falk had come to realize that it was true.
“Falk, how did you know?” “Is it that obvious?” I really didn't need this right now.
“No, not really, don't panic,” he replied. ‘First of all, my brother is also gay, so I interpreted your reaction to Benjamin's claim that way. But apart from that, I noticed that Steffi probably received looks that were meant for Tjorben. You've had those looks on you all day.’ He grinned.
“Oops. Please don't tell Tjorben, okay?“
”I promise!” He smiled at me. ”And now it's time for bed. Come on.”
Tjorben and Benjamin were already asleep when we came to our chamber. I still lay awake for some time and thought. It had turned out all right in a direction with which I could live so far. At least Falk was fine with it, that was a start. But how would the others deal with it? Did they know too? Eventually Morpheus showed himself merciful and took me in his arms.
5
When I came to breakfast the next morning, I just caught sight of a rather hungover Benjamin with a slightly swollen nose before Dustin greeted me lovingly:
"Well, there's our little ass-fucker. Well? Where's mom this morning?”
While I was still wondering whether I should be annoyed by the comment or just ignore it, Falk had already jumped up and run over to Dustin. He grabbed him by the collar and pulled him off the bench he was sitting on.
“Let's be clear about this from the start: If you can't keep your filthy mouth shut, I'll shut it for you. Is that clear?“ Falk spoke so loudly that everyone heard him. Dustin's eyes were obviously filled with panic.
”Hey, OK, I'm cool, man,” he replied in a quiet, frightened voice.
“That's settled then.“ Falk sat back down and turned to Benjamin before going back to his seat:
”And the same goes for you. Got it?” Benjamin also seemed intimidated now and just nodded.
I sat down at the table with Falk. He winked encouragingly at me and smiled, ”So, now there should be peace.”
I still couldn't quite grasp what had just happened. I had never experienced someone taking initiative for me in this way before. I couldn't quite interpret it yet, but it became clear to me at that moment that, by all appearances, I had found a damn good new friend.
When we finally set off around noon after a lesson in the basics of navigation from the skipper, Tjorben and I were responsible for the lines on the foredeck. We were all excited, I guess.
I was in the process of shooting up the spring and securing it on the nail when Tjorben addressed me:
“Tell me, Chris, what exactly happened last night? All I heard was that you probably gave Benjamin a punch in the nose.“
”I'm not proud of it, believe me,” I replied, ‘but...’
Tjorben took my head in his hands and smiled at me. I could have immediately sunk into that smile, into those deep eyes.
“Hey,” he started, ‘Benjamin seems to be an ass. And so does Dustin. If you punched Benjamin, he probably deserved it.’ I looked down at the wooden deck, embarrassed, because I was still ashamed of it. Whether he deserved it or not, it just wasn't necessary.
“You seem like a nice guy,” he continued, ‘and if you have a problem, come to me, okay?’ He was still smiling, and I tried to hold back the tears welling up in my eyes, and nodded a ‘thank you’ to him.
Since our cabin crew was on duty for the 8 to 12 watch, I spent the rest of the afternoon in my bunk so that I would be well rested in the evening. The previous night, I hadn't gotten nearly enough sleep anyway. When I came on deck shortly before eight, armed with a coffee mug, the other three were already taking over the watch from the girls.
Falk was already at the rudder and the girls were on their way below deck, but Susi and Steffi couldn't resist giving Tjorben and me a slap on the backside. While Steffi whispered to me, “Have fun, my hero!” I blushed again, of course, and threw Tjorben a helpless look, which, however, looked over at me no less helplessly. Falk, who had observed the whole scene, began to giggle stupidly.
“Hey, don't laugh like that!“ Tjorben snapped at Falk and jabbed him in the ribs with his elbow.
”Sorry,” Falk giggled, ‘but your faces were just too funny.’ Tjorben and I just shook our heads and had to laugh too. Only Benjamin stood a little apart, like counterfeit money, and didn't change his expression.
“Well, now that the gentlemen have calmed down,” the skipper interrupted the good mood, ”Benjamin and Chris, please go to the front and keep a lookout. If anything happens, here is a radio, channel 15. I assume you know how to use it?”
I nodded silently, and the good mood was suddenly gone. The thought of standing there alone with Benjamin all the time did not suit me at all.
“Falk and Tjorben will stay here at the rudder. But we'll switch later, because rowing is quite exhausting in the long run. All right?” Everyone had understood and nodded again briefly before I went forward, followed by Benjamin.
For a while, we just stood in silence, which I personally preferred, and stared out to sea. It was another moonlit night with a fascinating, if alien, starry sky. From here, you couldn't see the Big Dipper, but you could see the constellation Scorpius and the Southern Cross.
Except for the sound of the bow gently cutting through the waves, it was absolutely quiet. I admired all the small islands around us, between which the moon was mysteriously reflected on the water. How nice it would have been to hold a person you love in your arms and dream together.
“You have quite a powerful punch, you know that?“ Benjamin suddenly interrupted the beautiful mood. I had almost forgotten that he was standing just a few feet away from me.
”Benjamin, I didn't mean to do that and I'm really sorry. Unfortunately, I overreacted,” I explained to him calmly as I turned to face him.
“I messed up, didn't I?“ He asked, looking down sheepishly.
”You could say that,” I replied and turned away. In my opinion, everything that needed to be said had been said. I really didn't feel like having any further conversation with him. But apparently Benjamin saw it differently:
“Man Chris, I don't know what came over me either. I... I didn't mean to. I must have had too much to drink. Please, I'm sorry, it'll never happen again,” he stammered and swallowed. I felt anger rising up inside me again, I could hardly believe what I had just heard. He was once again taking a very simplistic view of the situation. I swallowed my anger down as best I could – I didn't want to risk another loss of control under any circumstances – and turned back to him.
“Look,” I started calmly, ”you wanted a fresh start and you blew it. I don't even want to know why. By the way, I think it's pretty messed up that you're trying to explain it with your alcohol consumption. I would have thought you had a little more self-control. But in the end, I don't care. The fact is, you put on a pretty bad show and I gave you something on the nose that I shouldn't have done. I apologized, you apologized, I think we're even so far. Otherwise, I'd like to ask you to just leave me alone in the future. I don't think we'll get along in the long run.“
”But...”
“No buts. Please just leave me alone, okay?“ I fought hard with myself not to become aggressive. Truce was okay, but that was all I could give, even if I wanted to.
”Do me a favor and at least keep Falk away from me. Tell him we're cool, okay?” He almost begged a little.
“Sorry, but I have nothing to do with that. You'll have to sort that out with him yourself.” I looked out at the water again. The moon was moving towards the horizon and slowly taking on a reddish color. Somehow moonsets are much more fascinating than sunsets. Or is it just because you don't see them as often?
“What have you done with Benjamin?“ I suddenly heard Tjorbens voice behind me, Benjamin was gone.
”Nothing. We just had a little talk,“ I replied.
”Hmm, he came aft in a pretty agitated state and asked Falk to leave him alone in the future, since you two, and I quote, are cool. Did I miss something important?”
“Not really. He just apologized for last night and I asked him to just leave me alone for a while. That was about it.“
”About it? Come on, there's got to be more to it than that. You've known each other for a while,” Tjorben said thoughtfully. This sweetheart was absolutely not stupid. So I told him the whole story of Benjamin and me and also told him about the hopes I had put into this trip, the shock when I met Benjamin on the plane, and the panic I had felt since the night before that no one would want to talk to me anymore.
“No matter what others say: I like you! So stop brooding, OK?” was all Tjorben replied with that smile that was predestined for a gun license. I could have melted away on the spot.
We stood there in silence for quite a while, enjoying the atmosphere of this fascinating night. Now that the moon had disappeared below the horizon, many more stars could be seen in the sky. So Tjorben likes me, I thought as I looked up. Could it be that he is gay too and has feelings for me? Probably unrealistic, I thought. I spotted a shooting star and made a wish anyway.
6
The following two days were relatively unspectacular. Steffi and Susi continued to make a little play for Tjorben and me, Benjamin mostly avoided me, and I mostly hung out with Falk and Tjorben. Whether we were scrubbing the deck or on watch, we had a lot of fun together, and I slowly realized that I had fallen deeply in love with Tjorben. Knowing that the chances of Tjorben feeling the same way as me were practically zero, I had of course completely forgotten the shooting star during the one night. At least I could be with him and have fun.
Then the weather turned bad, at night it had already started to rock quite a bit. Breakfast was just over when the skipper called the entire crew on deck for a sail meeting. The wind had increased noticeably, it was cold and drizzling slightly.
“A cold front is heading straight for us and the weather forecast predicts winds of up to 9 Beaufort. So it's going to be pretty uncomfortable for the next 36 hours. Try to get enough sleep so that you're fit for your watches. Also, I don't want to see anyone without a life jacket up here anymore, the sea is already coming onto the deck in parts. If anyone needs something for seasickness, I have some pills,” the skipper explained afterwards, sending everyone who wasn't on watch back down below.
Tjorben, Falk, Benjamin and I decided to put on some weather-appropriate clothing and then went back up on deck, ready for the next four-hour watch. The pressure on the rudder had become so great that we now had to steer in pairs. We therefore all stayed close to the rudder; it would have been impossible to keep a lookout at the bow anyway, as spray repeatedly washed over the deck when the ship plunged back into the waves with a hard blow.
The weather forecast was right, just two hours later the wind speed had increased to 8 to 9 Beaufort. The sea was covered with white crests that lay in stripes in the wind. The water appeared dirty dark gray and again and again huge, almost black walls of water came rolling towards us and hard blows went through the whole ship. It had become impossible to move without constantly holding on to something. Falk and I stood together at the rudder, Tjorben and Benjamin sat silently next to us. Conversations were only possible by shouting anyway, the roar of wind and rain was just too loud. Apart from us and the skipper, there was no one left on deck.
Suddenly Benjamin jumped up and a moment later he was hanging over the railing. The first victim, I thought a little gleefully, unaware of what was going on below deck. The skipper went to Benjamin, they talked briefly and Benjamin was given something. Then he disappeared below deck.
“Everything OK with you?” the skipper called to us, we all nodded. Tjorben, however, didn't look quite so fit anymore either, which turned out to be correctly observed a few minutes later. The skipper also wanted to give him something, but Tjorben refused and remained at the railing.
“I'm going to wake Tjard, can you manage for a moment alone?” the skipper asked us, to which Falk and I nodded again. ‘And keep an eye on Tjorben!’ he added and disappeared.
He was back in less than two minutes. Just as Tjard appeared on deck a little later and wanted to relieve us at the helm together with the skipper, Tjorben collapsed at the railing. Falk and I immediately ran to him, but the skipper held me back.
“Take him down to his bunk. And give him this!” he said, thrusting a suppository into my hand. Falk and I carried Tjorben, who was quite weak and green in the face, below deck. In the swell, it turned out not to be that easy; we almost fell down the companionway.
It was stuffy below deck, as all the hatches were closed, and a distinctive smell hit us, making me swallow hard. Tjorben and Benjamin were apparently not the only ones who had been affected. In our room, Benjamin was already lying in his bunk, at an angle. We helped Tjorben to get out of his damp clothes before we put him to bed as well. I held out the suppository.
“I don't need it,” he whispered.
“Don't talk nonsense, you're totally on the ropes,“ I replied firmly.
”No... I...“
”No backtalk!“
”OK... but... can you... so...?” he asked, now visibly embarrassed. So that was what was going on, that's why he had resisted.
I nodded briefly to Falk, who then disappeared from the chamber and took care of Tjorben.
“Stay here,” Tjorben finally begged as I was about to leave, and reached for my hand. He was shaking all over, so I took his hand. It was ice cold. A short time later he had fallen asleep. These suppositories apparently really took your shoes off.
Apart from Skipper and Tjard, as well as Falk and me, Rene and Martin were the only ones who could still be described as fit. The rest of the crew had been affected to a greater or lesser extent, and most of them were lying in their bunks, numbed by Skipper's drugs, and sleeping. So it was just six of us fighting on deck for the next 24 hours. We had reefed the sails further, and all that was left was a few handkerchiefs that the wind was tugging at. I had sore muscles from all the tugging and hauling. In my whole life before, I had never longed for a hot coffee so much. Despite our rain gear, we were all more or less soaking wet from the rain and spray, freezing and exhausted. From time to time I dozed off briefly, but there was absolutely no way I could get any real sleep.
When the storm finally died down 24 hours later and the rest of the crew, Tjorben was the first to reappear on deck, had recovered and rested enough, we fell into our berths like stones and fell asleep immediately. I dreamt of Tjorben.
7
The beach seemed endless and I was all alone there. I sat by the water and watched the waves, which were so straight as if someone had drawn them with a ruler, while they slowly approached the beach, broke with a glistening, and finally washed around my feet. Suddenly, a figure emerged in the middle of the surf and came running towards me. After a moment, I recognized that it was Tjorben. I stood up and walked towards him. He had that dreamy smile on his face again, which made me melt on the spot. We looked deep into each other's eyes and he gently stroked my hair; it felt incredibly real. Then he pulled me towards him, kissed me on the forehead and whispered:
“Hey, wake up. Time to get up.“ Oh no... just when it was getting good!
I woke up and opened my eyes. The first thing I saw was Steffi, leaning over me.
”I was really sorry to have to wake you up. You looked so cute while you were sleeping,” she explained, completely enraptured.
I looked at her, wide-eyed.
“Well, now it's time to get up. After all, you've slept for almost 18 hours,” she tried to cheer me up and gave me another kiss on the forehead. Perplexed as I was, I sat up and motioned for her to leave, smiling distractedly.
“How sweet. Too shy to show yourself in front of a woman,” she giggled, but then disappeared.
I decided not to dwell on what I had just experienced and to get on with the day instead. So, after a quick, cold shower and a hearty breakfast, I found myself on deck, coffee mug in hand. Fascinated, I gazed out over the sea, which had completely changed its appearance since I had last seen it a few hours ago. The water was as smooth as glass and deep blue, except for a slight ripple caused by a light breeze and a gentle swell. The sun was shining, and only a few scattered clouds could be seen in the otherwise clear sky. All but a few of the sails had been set again, but the ship was moving only very slowly. I began to smile; the day promised to be perfect.
I took advantage of the good weather and climbed into the jib net at the front to relax a little. I was on watch, but Benjamin was at the helm and otherwise it was quiet. Tjorben apparently had the same idea, because after a few minutes he followed me.
“Thanks for... well, you know,“ he said a little embarrassed after we had just been lying there and dreaming for a while.
”Don't mention it. What are friends for, otherwise?“ I replied, smiling at him.
”Friends? Are you serious?“
”Yes, of course, or do you see it differently?”
“No, I just didn't think that you... oh, it doesn't matter. Friends!” He held out his hand, grinning happily. I grasped it and looked into his fascinating blue eyes for a moment. The boy made me feel emotional.
Shortly afterwards, however, he jerked his hand back. The happy expression on his face had disappeared and a shadow had fallen over his features.
“What's the matter?” I asked.
But Tjorben didn't answer. Instead, I saw his eyes fill with tears. Suddenly he got up, climbed up and disappeared. And I lay there, didn't say a word and didn't understand the world anymore. What had I done wrong? I was completely at a loss

Lukas
So now the time had come.
My twin sister and I were on our way to the airport to start our new life. Well, it wasn't really that new.
Lara and I lived in the USA from birth until the age of eight. After that, the whole family moved to Germany because of my dad's job and now, nine years later, we were just going back. Our parents left a week ago. However, we still had to finish the rest of our schooling and in the meantime we were staying with our grandparents. I didn't even want to imagine what kind of scene they would put on at the airport when we had to leave.
Lara sat next to me and didn't say a word, which is really unusual for her. She was actually a person who liked to talk a lot. To be honest, sometimes a little too much for my taste. But don't get me wrong, I really love my sister more than anything. She's the only person who knows I'm gay. As twins, we trust each other unconditionally.
When we arrived at the airport, our grandparents weren't as bad as I had imagined. Actually, the whole farewell went quite smoothly, although I have to admit that I had a few tears in my eyes.
I was really glad that I could finally relax after all the formalities at the airport.
Lara, who was sitting next to me at the window, looked at me.
“So, do you already have any idea what it will be like when we come back after such a long time?"
I just shrugged.
I mean, sure, we've been in contact with my uncle and aunt, who live on a farm near Rapid City, but still, nine years is a relatively long time, especially at our age.
Lara grinned to herself, which could not mean anything good. “I'm curious to see what this Matt looks like. If you go by the children's photos, then he must be a real cutie now. Maybe he's something for you.”
Since I told Lara that I'm gay, she's been trying to set me up with almost every guy. Matt isn't really our cousin either. My uncle remarried about eight years ago and Matt is the son of his new wife, so he's our stepcousin, if that's a thing.
"Lara, just because he's cute doesn't mean he's gay.”
“What isn't can still happen. Who could resist you? If you weren't my brother, I would have thrown myself at you long ago."
Well, I really didn't look bad. Black shoulder-length hair, about 1.85 tall and relatively well-trained, since I was in the swimming club for a long time and took it really seriously.
Lara also had black hair that reached her hips, big brown doe eyes and, as far as I could tell, a really good body. In addition, Lara radiated joy to everyone she saw.
"Lara, I'll find someone for myself, don't worry.”
“If you keep up the same speed in finding someone as you have done so far, then I can keep waiting forever for the four of us to go out together, and you don't want to take that joy away from me. So it's better for me to give you a hand, just to be on the safe side."
In the meantime, the plane taxied to the runway.
“What do you think, is the ranch still the same as it was nine years ago?” I asked.
Lara smiled. ”Quite possible. I certainly hope so. I haven't been this excited in a long time. I couldn't sleep all night and had to run to the bathroom all the time.”
“I noticed. I'm actually surprised that Grandma and Grandpa didn't say anything about the constant slamming of the door during the night. Shame on you for robbing me of my sleep, poor little boy.“
”All right, I'll do it when I find the time."
At that same moment, she gave me a kiss on the cheek.
“I hope you know that I love you very much."
I just nodded. Of course I knew that, just as she knew it in return.
Lara leaned her head on my shoulder and slid a little back and forth in her seat to find a comfortable position in which she could stay for a longer period of time. I also tried to make myself a little more comfortable, but it wasn't that easy in economy class. I really didn't know how I was going to survive this hours-long flight without damage.
But somehow you get through everything, and that's how we did it here too. Lara and I slept through most of the time because of the last night, so the time passed even faster.
Unfortunately, our parents couldn't pick us up from the airport. But our cousin had taken on this task. Now the only problem for us was that we didn't know what Matt actually looked like.
After we finally had our luggage back and were standing in the airport hall after tons of security checks, Lara asked, slightly worried:
“Hey, does Matt actually know what we look like, or is it better if we quickly make a sign?”
"I think our parents are smart enough to have shown him photos.”
Lara's disbelieving look showed me that she was not yet completely convinced of this.
When we were still standing around alone after ten minutes, I also slowly began to have my doubts.
Now it was really getting to me.
"Let's just go around and ask all the guys who are about our age if they are Matt, otherwise we'll still be standing here tonight.”
Lara grinned. “It's a good thing the airport is so small. It's best if we go in separate directions, just shout when you've found him.”
So Lara and I went off in different directions to look for Matt. I hadn't walked more than two meters when I felt a hand on my shoulder.
"What do you want now, Lara?”
But when I turned around, it wasn't Lara standing before me, but the dream of my sleepless nights. This boy in front of me had bright blue eyes, short blonde hair and mesmerizing lips. He was a little taller than me, so I had to raise my head a little to look him directly in the eye.
It was impossible for me to say anything. I felt like I was standing in front of an angel.
“Sorry, are you Lukas? I'm Matt."
It took me a while to understand what he had actually asked me. This couldn't be possible, this cute boy couldn't really be my cousin. How would I survive the next few years if I always walked around with a semi-erection in his presence. I didn't even want to think about it.
“Yes, I'm Lukas. I'm glad we finally got to meet.“
I held out my hand in greeting, but instead of taking it, he pulled me towards him and hugged me.
”After all, we're family now, so we might as well dispense with the formalities,” he said after he let go of me.
I was just about to cope with everything when I heard Lara behind me.
“Hey, you should be looking for Matt, not flirting.”
“This is Matt and he found me.”
Lara let out a small scream and threw herself into Matt's arms.
“It's nice to finally meet you,” she beamed at him.
“You kept me waiting for a long time.“
”Yes, I know, I'm sorry too, but I just left too late. I hope you're not too angry with me.“
”Nonsense,” I said, interrupting her. ”Now you're here.”
Matt smiled, oh God, and how he smiled. Actually, he would need a license for that. In any case, it almost bowled me over.
“Well, that's good. Come on, let's go to the car.”
Matt grabbed most of the luggage and went ahead.
Lara and I followed him.
“Well, isn't he something for you?” she whispered to me. ‘I mean, he looks totally cute and that smile, it should be illegal.’
I had to grin, Lara had had exactly the same thought as me.
“I'm not denying that he's cute, or that I don't like him, but like I said, that doesn't mean that he's gay. Even if he were gay, which I don't really believe, then Matt doesn't necessarily have to fancy me.”
“At least he hugged you. Not every guy would do that voluntarily, because otherwise he'd panic about being labeled as gay.“
”Lara, I think you're just reading too much into some things.”
“Hey, where are you guys?” Matt called to us from the front. ‘We should hurry to avoid the rush hour traffic, otherwise it will take us hours to get out of the city.’
We walked a little faster again to catch up with Matt.
When we arrived at the car, we loaded everything into the trunk, where it was quite crowded. It took some skillful packing to fit everything in.
“I thought your parents had already brought most of your things, so where did you guys get all the stuff from?” Matt asked, shaking his head, when we had finally stowed everything.
“You'll have to ask Lara about that; she kept bringing more stuff that absolutely had to come along. But you know how it is with women."
Matt laughed with me while Lara acted offended.
Before I could say anything, she went to the back door and got in.
“You can sit in the front, bro.”
The grin she gave me let me know that Lara had just started her attempts at romance again. Well, that could be really fun. Not only did I have to keep myself from falling over my cousin's dream, but I also had to deal with my sister, who had set her mind on literally marrying me.
“How old are you, Matt?” Lara asked from behind.
"Eighteen. I just finished school and now work on my father's ranch.”
“And, are there any young cowboys on your ranch that I could consider?"
Matt grinned and I felt queasy again. I quickly looked out of the side window to distract myself. Lukas, pull yourself together, after all Matt is part of your family, it doesn't look good if you throw yourself at him.
“We already have a few young cowboys working for us, but as I said, they work and that's what they should continue to do. It's not good if they get too distracted, then their work will only be flawed.“
”No problem, I can give you a hand with the work.”
“I think it's better if you distract them. I wouldn't trust a fence that you repaired,“ was my answer to Lara, which, however, earned me a light blow to the back of the head.
”And that's coming from the king of DIY. You don't even know how to hold a hammer properly.“
”I love you too, sis.”
“I know, brother.“
Next to me, Matt started to laugh.
”You don't have to understand your mood swings, do you? One minute you're fighting and the next everything's fine again, without any actual solution having been found.“
”Maybe I should point out that we never fight, we just discuss things. Actually, we've never fought at all.”
I don't think Matt has yet understood our logic; he just shook his head and grinned.
“By the way, you're both invited to a friend's birthday party tonight.
Maybe you won't need to look for a cowboy then, Lara.”
I looked at Matt blankly. “And why are we invited?”
“Well, probably because I've been pestering Seth for weeks about you moving in with us. I guess he just wants to meet you. Besides, it's the best way for you to meet people our age. When Seth throws a party, he throws it right.“
”Shouldn't we at least get him a small gift?” Lara asked from behind.
“Nah, it's not necessary. Then Seth would only think too much of himself. In my opinion, he already has too much self-confidence anyway.“
”I doubt, though, that Lara and I will grow old today.“
Matt looked at me questioningly.
”We've been up for about 26 hours. I'm already starting to feel tired.”
“Oh, you'll have plenty of time to sleep when you're old. If it's absolutely impossible, then you'll just have to get some sleep this afternoon. Your parents won't be coming to the ranch until the evening anyway. So you still have almost the whole day to relax.“
”We really don't get any rest,” Lara sighed. ”But what wouldn't we do for international understanding.
Do you actually speak German, Matt?“
”My dad tried to teach me a little, but I wouldn't say that I really know how to do it. I wouldn't starve in Germany, that's for sure.”
“That's not a problem with all the McDonalds and Burger Kings around us,” I replied. ”If you want, we can help you learn German a bit. But you can take us with you if you ever fly to Germany. We promise you will have a very comfortable life with us.”
“I can imagine that very vividly. I'll definitely take you up on the offer to learn German. By the way, Lukas, you'll probably have to sleep in my room for the first week. We didn't quite finish renovating your room. But it won't take too much longer.”
I was honestly shocked. I already found it hard enough imagining living in the same house as him, but now I'll also be sleeping in the same room. Images of him walking back and forth in front of me in just his boxers suddenly appeared before my eyes.
Just thinking about it made my little friend stir. I think I'm in for the hardest week of my life.
“Hey, why are you so pale all of a sudden? Is the idea of sleeping in a room with me so bad?“
”It's okay, I'm just extremely tired right now."
Suddenly my cell phone rang in my pocket. Surprised, I took it out.
“You can also crash at my place if it gets too hard for you. You know it's absolutely no problem,” it said on the display. The message was from Lara.
I really love my sister for understanding me so well. But here I had to go it alone. So I shook my head slightly, I knew Lara saw it, and put my phone back in my pocket.
I was extremely quiet for the rest of the drive. Lara and Matt talked about everything under the sun. I just stared out the window and slowly calmed down again. After all, I only had to sleep at his place for a week. And that doesn't mean we have to spend the whole day together. Somehow I would get through it, after all, I had Lara to help me.
Finally, after what seemed like an eternity of driving along a lonely, deserted road, we came to a stop in front of a huge house.
“Wow,” was the only thing that occurred to me at this sight.
“I didn't remember it being so big,” Lara said behind me.
"We've added on a few things in the last couple of years.”
Before we could say anything, a woman came storming out of the house. She was in her early to mid-40s, with long blonde hair that fell in waves onto her shoulders.
“That's my mom, she got up really early today to get everything ready for you. I don't think you can eat as much as she has cooked.“
”You don't know how much we can eat together,” said Lara as she jumped out of the car.
Matt's mom came running towards us with her arms outstretched, hugging me first and then Lara.
“Hello, welcome to our home. My name is Kaitlyn. I'm so happy to finally meet you. You must be totally exhausted after that long flight. Come with me to the kitchen."
As Kaitlyn was already on her way into the house, Lara and I were still standing in front of the house, frozen.
“I haven't yet realized everything she has told us, but I think it's best if we just go after her.“
”I'll take care of your luggage and then come,” said Matt, while he already opened the trunk.
When Lara and I were on our way to the kitchen, she asked me again:
“Hey, are you sure you're okay with sleeping with him?“
”I'll be fine, it's not for long.“
”Okay, if you think so. But you know you can always come to me, right?“
”What are you giving him, anyway? I'm in favor of an 8 ½.”
Lara and I have been in the habit of rating all male beings around our age for some time now. I know, it's totally lame, but this little game can really liven up a day at the park.
“Are you serious now? After all, he's our cousin.”
"We're not blood relatives, he's just married into the family.”
At that moment we arrived in the kitchen.
“Twelve,” was the only thing I said to Lara.
“Sit down first. I've cooked something so that you can regain your strength after the long journey.”
"Thanks, but don't go to so much trouble. Lara and I will sleep most of the day anyway today to get back to some degree of fitness.”
“Don't even try to avoid eating. According to my mom, you only get fit if you eat enough,” came from the direction of the kitchen door.
Matt came into the room and sat down at the table opposite me.
“And Mom, do I get something to eat too, after all I had to get up almost in the middle of the night to pick them up. I think I need to regain my strength too.“
”Oh, my poor boy, you're not going to fall off the face of the earth on me, are you? But don't gobble so much and leave some for Lara and Lukas.”
After dinner, Matt showed us around the house. Then we went to our rooms, Lara's first.
“I think I'll be happy here,” was her only comment. “I hope you'll be able to manage without me for the time being. I have to get settled here first.”
Matt and I went on.
“I can tell you one thing: once Lara has settled in here, you won't be able to set foot in the room before the other one. She has an almost frightening penchant for chaos.”
“Do I have to conclude from this that you are more of an orderly type? Maybe I should make you wait outside my room for a while then. Unfortunately, I'm not so good at keeping things tidy either.”
“Don't worry, I'm not that fanatical. I just like to see the floor."
At the end of the hallway, Matt showed me the bathroom first. Then he opened the door opposite the bathroom and I just thought to myself: take a deep breath, you can do it.
My suitcase was already in the room, right next to a huge couch.
“I hope you don't mind sleeping on the couch. We can still fold it out later. If you want, we can swap, and you can sleep in my bed and I'll sleep on the couch. Whatever you want.”
“I think I'd fall asleep in the hay right now, I'm so tired. It's okay that I'm sleeping on the couch. I can't take your bed away from you."
Matt looked at me. ”Okay. I'll leave you alone for now. You know where the bathroom is. Get some rest, you still have a lot to do tonight.”
I had almost forgotten about this party. Then suddenly something occurred to me.
“Matt, when are our parents coming home?”
"I guess around seven, and we want to go to the party around nine. So you still have plenty of time to say hi to each other. If you want, I can wake you up around half past six so you can get ready.”
“Yes, that would be nice."
After I had showered, I went back to Matt's room wearing only boxer shorts. I was so tired that I literally collapsed on the couch and fell asleep almost immediately after closing my eyes.
Matt was lying next to me, wearing no more than his shorts. Slowly, his hand glided over my chest and to my stomach.
“Well, already rested?” he whispered in my ear.
He was so close that I shivered when I felt his breath.
He gently circled my belly button with his finger. His lips were on my ear and my neck at the same time.
Oh my God, my whole body was tingling.
Matt's hand moved under the waistband of my shorts. Now I couldn't suppress a soft groan.
I felt his hands on my shoulders...
“Hey Lukas, you should get up slowly now.”
Only slowly did I understand his words. Startled, I opened my eyes wide and sat up. I looked straight into Matt's grinning face.
“You should tell me about your dream sometime. It seems to have been pretty hot. I think I might like it too.“ With these words, he let his gaze wander meaningfully between my legs. I felt the blood rush to my cheeks. The whole thing was so embarrassing for me.
”I'll wait for you downstairs.”
Matt was still grinning as he left the room. Would I be able to look him in the eye again after my performance? Why does my cousin have to be so cute?
When I slowly got up, there was no sign of my excitement. Just as I was about to go to the bathroom, I ran into Lara, who wanted to come into my room.
“Hey, not so stormy. Say, what did you do with Matt? He grinned like a Cheshire cat when he came to meet me.“
”Let's not talk about it.“
”Oh, so bad?“
”Worse. Much worse."
Lara looked at me with questioning eyes.
“I'll tell you later. I have to go to the bathroom first and get ready for this party. I'll see you downstairs.“
”Well, okay, but don't do anything stupid. I'll come up in half an hour if you're not ready by then."
So I went to the bathroom first. In the shower, I tried to calm down again. How could I stand being in a room with Matt for a whole week if I was already dreaming of him even though he wasn't in the room? I imagined his body wearing only shorts and immediately realized that it was a mistake. As soon as I had even the image in front of my eyes, I felt it starting to stir between my legs again. I really should get out of the habit of doing that. I quickly took a shower, wrapped the towel around my hips and went back to my, no, to Matt's room. As I stood in front of my suitcase looking for clothes, I realized that I had absolutely no idea what to wear. Sometimes I'm even worse than my sister when it comes to things like this.
There was only one solution to the problem. I took my cell phone and sent a desperate “help” to my sister. On the side, I sent a quick prayer to heaven that she had also taken her cell phone downstairs.
After half a minute, I heard footsteps in the hallway and Lara was standing in the middle of the room.
"What kind of problems do you have again, dear brother?”
“What should I wear?“
”And that's why you're driving me crazy with worry?” ”Reach into your suitcase and put on whatever you find. It's a simple birthday party, so what you wear isn't that important.
Are you going to tell me what happened with Matt?
“I dreamt about him,“ I said, while I put on my boxer shorts and my black jeans.
”And that can't be the problem?“
”He woke me up in the middle of the dream.” I pulled my red polo shirt over my head.
Lara was still looking at me questioningly.
“I dreamt that he was about to seduce me and that's exactly what I looked like.”
"Ouch...
But look at it this way, Matt doesn't know that you dreamt of him. When you think about it, it's not that bad that you had a hard-on and he saw it.”
“The problem is that I know I dreamt about him. Besides, he told me to tell him about the dream when the time was right. What do I do when he brings it up? I really don't know how I'm going to look him in the eye now.”
“Now don't make everything worse than it is. I'm still here to support you. You'll manage, you're not that weak.
Ready?“
I ran my hand through my hair again briefly so that it at least looked somewhat organized, and nodded.
”Well, come on.”
With these words, Lara pulled me by the hand out of Matt's room.
As we were about to go to the stairs, Matt came towards us.
"I was just about to get you, your parents just arrived.”
Lara let go of my hand and immediately stormed down the stairs.
Matt looked at me and could hardly suppress a grin.
“So?” he asked, “Have you cooled down a bit?”
I tried desperately to prevent my face from turning red.
“Don't worry, I'm fine,” I said more aggressively than intended.
“Are you sure you're all right? Did I offend you with what I said? If so, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to.“
”It's okay. You didn't say or do anything to offend me. I'm always a bit grumpy when I haven't had enough sleep.”
Matt nodded. The way he was looking at me now, he was annoyed with me. This promised to be a wonderful evening.
“Do you think these clothes are okay for the party?” I asked Matt to lighten the mood a bit and looked down at myself.
"Yes, it's fine, you look really good.”
I can't say why, but somehow I immediately felt calmer when I had Matt's approval of my outfit.
“Thanks,” I said, grinning. “I'm going to go down and say hi to my parents. You coming?”
"You go ahead. I want to change quickly for the party. See you in a minute.”
I nodded and continued towards the stairs. Maybe it's better if Matt is offended. Then it may also be easier to deal with his attraction to me. But that doesn't matter now.
When I entered the kitchen, my mother jumped up from her chair and pulled me into her arms.
“I thought you didn't want to greet us at all. You don't know how happy I am to have you both back.“
”I'm happy to see you too, but we were only apart for a week.“
”You just don't understand how a mother feels. You'll understand me when you have children of your own.” With these words, Mom released me from her embrace.
I went to the table and greeted my father.
“Well, big guy, how are you doing?” my father asked, patting me on the shoulder in friendship.
“I'm okay, just a little tired.”
"Are you sure you still want to go to that party tonight? Wouldn't it be better if you got a good night's sleep first?”
I had to grin, only my mom would say something like that.
Before I could answer, Kaitlyn came to the table with plates and cutlery.
“You can start setting the table, dinner will be ready soon.”
Lara got up and helped distribute the food.
"By the way, where's my son, Lukas?”
“He went back to his room to change. He said he'd be right down.“
”Well, it may take a while for him to come back down. I think we can start eating.” With that, Kaitlyn placed a huge pot of chili con carne in the middle of the table and started putting some on everyone's plate.
While we were in the middle of eating, Matt came into the kitchen.
"You're being really accommodating. Would it have been too much to ask if you'd waited for me to eat first?”
“Matt, you knew very well that dinner was almost ready when you went upstairs to get them. Nobody asked you to change clothes.
Now sit down and eat something before everything gets cold.“
”All right, all right. But it's actually Lukas' fault that I had to change again,” with these words he came to the table and sat down with us.
I turned my head in his direction. ”What do I have to do with it all of a sudden?”
Matt grinned at me. “Well, I can't turn up at the party in my sluttiest clothes when you look so extremely good in yours.”
When I realized what he had said, I choked on a kidney bean. Help, I think I'm dying right now. Did Matt really say that I look extremely good? Lukas, take it easy, don't think too much again, good-looking doesn't really mean much, does it?
“After all, I still want to get a nice girl today. It wouldn't be good for my self-confidence if I were to stand alone in the corner while Lukas captivates all female persons,” Matt now spoke up again.
Okay, that's it. Now I'm really dying. Of course I had actually hoped that Matt might be gay after all, even though I didn't want to admit it to myself. But that's settled now. Great, now I'll spend the rest of my life with a cousin I'm secretly in love with, but who's absolutely straight. Wow, I've really always dreamed of something like this. How did I deserve so much luck?
Lara looked at me with her big doe eyes. I smiled sadly at her and shrugged.
Why was I so down, I mean, I've only known Matt for a few hours and I've slept most of the time. Besides, nothing is lost yet. After all, I'm still young and the world is open to me. There are bound to be plenty of cute gay guys here.
But unfortunately Matt is not one of them, it came back from my subconscious.
“Are some of our old friends going to be at the party tonight?” I heard Lara ask.
“Hmm...” Matt replied with his mouth full, “Mary has been asking about you a lot. She told me that you two used to be best friends. Otherwise, I don't know if anyone from your past will be there.”
“Oh my God, Mary. I haven't thought about her in years. But don't tell her that. When I think of all the nonsense we used to get up to. I'm looking forward to tonight more and more.”
“Not me,“ I replied. ‘At least when I think back to how much you and Mary always enjoyed teasing me.’
”Don't worry, brother, as soon as she sees what a cutie you've become, she'll be annoyed with herself for not being nicer to you.“
”I couldn't agree more,” Matt now piped up.
The guy is really driving me to my death. He's always making comments like that, and then he'll talk about some woman he's dying to pick up. Does he even know what he wants? My mood is getting more and more miserable.
Otherwise, dinner was pretty quiet. After everything was cleared away and put in the dishwasher, we sat down on the porch to talk for a while. I felt like I was in one of those kitschy Western novels, but it was actually really pleasant.
In the middle of our conversation, Matt stood up. “Okay, we should probably get going to Seth's party.” Lara and I also stood up, albeit very moderately.
“Why don't you two go to the jeep, I'll just quickly get the keys.”
We quickly said goodbye to our parents (my mom couldn't help but say, “And behave yourselves”) and went to the car.
“Can you please tell me what's going on with Matt?” I whispered to my sister. ”First he tells me and the whole family how good I look, and the next moment he's talking about all the women he wants to pick up. Do I have to understand that?”
“Have you ever thought that the chatter with the girls is just a cover? Maybe he hasn't come out to anyone yet.“
”You're the only one who knows I'm gay, and yet I don't tell Mom and Dad about some girls all the time."
We had now arrived at the jeep.
“Hey bro, don't worry about it too much and enjoy the evening. Maybe you'll find a cute guy at the party, then you won't need to worry about Matt anymore.“
”I'll never find another cutie like Matt. I mean, Matt is really the dream of my sleepless nights.”
“Well, we can go now,“ Matt called to us from the house after saying goodbye to his mother and our parents.
So we all got into the car and Matt drove off.
”How long will it take to get to Seth's?” Lara asked again from behind.
“About a quarter of an hour. If we were to drive cross-country, it would be even less, but I don't want to do that to you today. Your day was already exhausting enough without me introducing you to the gravel roads here.”
I feel sick just thinking about it. Maybe I should mention that I can't do long car rides without pills for motion sickness. But not even those help on some dirt or gravel roads. I just have a very sensitive stomach.
“If it's up to me, I can do without getting to know it,“ I replied to Matt.
”Unfortunately, the most beautiful places here can only be reached via such routes, but if you don't want to drive, then we'll just have to ride there.“
”Oh God, that's even worse. I haven't sat on a horse in ages. I don't even know if I can do it at all anymore.”
“Don't worry, Lukas, you never forget how to do something like that, and if you want, I'll be happy to give you a few lessons again.
That's Seth's house up ahead, the one with all the cars in front of it. It seems like the party's already in full swing."
With a skillful parking maneuver, Matt stopped in front of Seth's house. With a slight feeling of pressure in my stomach, I got out of the jeep. Lara took my hand in hers. As I looked up at her, she smiled encouragingly at me. Maybe I should also mention that I was always the reserved and shy one of the two of us. I guess that's not least because of being gay, I just can't approach people openly. But I'm glad that I have a sister who fully supports me and is always by my side.
After Matt had locked the car, he walked towards the house.
“Well, come on, they won't eat you right away. Although some of them will probably fight to be allowed to eat you.”
Was this going to be my life for the rest of my life? My cousin is my absolute dream boy and always makes such insinuations, but by the way he is totally heterosexual.
Matt went ahead and skillfully held the door open for us. Lara and I went into the house.
What we saw was really a party like the ones in the books. You couldn't exactly determine the number of guests because the masses were not limited to just one room. Wow, throwing a party like this has always been my dream, but unfortunately I had no idea how to pull something like this off.
Matt pushed us from behind to get us moving. We had barely taken two steps when a guy came towards us with a beaming smile.
"Hi, you must be Matt's mysterious relatives. It's great to finally meet you. Matt's been telling me for weeks that you're coming to the States.”
Since I still felt a bit overwhelmed by all the impressions that were coming at me, Lara did the talking for both of us.
"Hello. I'm Lara and this is my twin brother Lukas. And yes, we are Matt's relatives, even though I can't tell you what's so mysterious about us.”
“Well, Matt couldn't really tell us much about you. The only thing we found out was how old you are and when you arrive in the States. The only thing Mary could remember was that she and Lukas always teased him. So you'll understand that you both won't really be able to relax today.”
“I also remember very clearly how I was always teased,” I now piped up, giving my sister a dark look from the side.
“Oh, Lukas, that was ages ago. I hope you're not still holding that against me,“ said two arms that suddenly went around my shoulders from behind. Startled, I turned around and looked into a girl's face.
”Mary?”
“Of course. And I really hope you've forgiven us for the pranks back then, after all, we were all just kids back then,“ she beamed at me with a smile.
”It's no wonder you're throwing yourself at him now, Mary. You go after anything male and handsome,” Matt said.
Mary turned to him and allowed him a glance at her tongue. “You're just being so bitchy because you'd rather throw yourself at him.”
Matt's entire facial expression went haywire and before I could even react, he had already turned around and stormed off. There was an oppressive silence in the room until suddenly there was a thunderstorm. It was Seth shouting at Mary.
“Do you ever think before such shit comes out of your mouth! When I come back, I don't want to see you here anymore and I advise you to give me a wide berth in the near future!”
With these words, he turned around and stormed off in the same direction as Matt. I just stood there and didn't know what to do or say. There was just a huge vacuum in my head. I don't know how long I had been standing there when I felt someone take my hand in theirs. I looked to the side and saw the sad eyes of Lara.
Matt
Great, now it was all over before it even started. I really thought there was a chance that I could become friends with Lukas and Lara, but now...
Well, actually, I was hoping for something more than friendship with Lukas. I mean, even when his parents showed me the photo of the two of them, it hit me like a blow. The guy looked incredibly cute. And he was supposed to be my cousin. I kept hoping that he had just been well-photographed in the photo and didn't actually look too good in real life. Well, and I guess I had raved a little too much about the two of them to Seth, especially about Lukas. When we were sitting together again at some point, he just asked me,
“Tell me, Matt, could it be that you have a crush on Lukas?"
I can still remember exactly how I stared at him. My head was in total chaos. But Seth just took me in his arms and whispered in my ear that everything was fine. I just looked at him blankly.
“You didn't expect me to hit you and yell at you or something?"
I still wasn't able to say anything. I mean, it was just a shock to me that Seth had just said it.
“Hey, I'll always stand by you, whatever it is. You're like a brother to me and I'm not just going to abandon you just because you've got a crush on Lukas.”
“Thanks.“ That was the only thing I could say, then I threw myself back into his arms and started crying like a little kid. After Seth had calmed me down to some extent, he looked at me grinning.
”I'd love to see Mary's face when she finds out she's right about calling you a fag.”
Mary, that was another thing. Since I let her down once, she told everyone who wanted to hear it, and actually everyone who didn't want to hear it, that I'm just a fag, as she always says so nicely. However, there was never any real chance that anyone would believe her. But it hurt every time I heard her say something like that again. That evening, Seth and I sat together for a long time and I was finally able to really open up. It was a huge relief for me that he continued to stand by me. I'm really happy to have him as a friend. Just as I thought that, I felt a hand on my shoulder. I didn't have to turn around to know it was Seth. He sat down next to me.
“You like a big finish, don't you?“
”Believe me, it wasn't planned at all.“
”You're pretty shaken up. Do you want to talk?“
I shrugged my shoulders.
”You know,” I finally began, ”when I saw him at the airport today, I was really shocked. He looked even better than in that photo. At first I didn't dare to talk to him. I just stood there and stared at him. And when we finally found ourselves on the way to the ranch, I still had something on my mind that I had been chewing on a lot lately. Lukas was supposed to sleep in my room for the first few weeks. I just convinced myself that it wouldn't be so bad. But I wasn't really convinced. My good intentions were also pretty quickly gone when I found him in my room after he had showered. He fell asleep on the couch in nothing but his shorts. You really can't imagine how horny this guy looked. The worst thing was that his... well, his dreams seemed very stimulating for him. Man, my imagination really didn't have much to do with it. It really wasn't missing anymore, and I would have attacked him. And somehow Mary's saying was just too much for me. I don't understand why I didn't just ignore it like I always do.“
”Maybe because what she said was true? You would have liked to have thrown yourself at him.”
I had to grin wryly. “You're probably right.”
I was already afraid of my next question. “And how did Lukas react?”
Seth thought for a moment. “He didn't really react at all. At least not while I was still there. Even though he looked a little confused.”
“Well, great, so how are we supposed to proceed now? I can't face him anymore. Who knows what he thinks of me.“
”Matt, have you ever considered that he might feel the same way as you? I mean, if I may say so as your hetero almost-brother: You look pretty damn good.”
“To be honest, I've thought about it briefly, but I just don't want to get my hopes up too high. It would just hurt too much if I were to be disappointed. I'm just kind of afraid of what's going to happen now.“
”I hope you know you can always come to me.”
I nodded. “Can I crash at your place tonight? I don't think I can sleep in the same room with him tonight. I guess I wouldn't be able to close an eye.”
“Sure. But you know you can't keep running away from it all the time. At some point you have to talk to Lukas.”
"I know, but today I really can't do it anymore.”
“Come on, let's go back. I guess the party broke up after that scene.“
”I'm sorry I ruined your party. Today really doesn't seem to be my day."
Lukas
Lara pulled me away from the general unrest that was just developing. As my brain slowly started to work again, I found myself on the back porch.
“Matt is gay. My dream man is into guys.“
”So, do you have a plan for how you want to proceed now?"
I grinned at Lara crookedly from the side. ‘Seduce him.’
However, that only earned me a push in the ribs.
“Lara, can I ask you a question on the side? How are we going to get home now? I doubt that Matt will show up again anytime soon and the party seems to be over too.“
”That shouldn't be a problem. I'll just pick up some guy, beguile him with my charm and then ask him to drive us home on the side.”
“If I were you, I would start using my charm right away before there are no more guys left to beguile with it. I have another suggestion: we can just call Mom or Dad.“
”That's one option, but what are you going to tell them about why Matt isn't driving us back?”
“You know that they won't pry anything out of us if they realize that we don't want to talk about it. Besides, they would rather us call them than have us driven by some guy you picked up on the side."
Lara shrugged. ‘Yes, you're probably right. I'll call them in a minute.’ With that, she took out her cell phone.
While she was busy with it, I looked at the property behind the house and followed my thoughts. My dreams had come true in a single moment, and yet I couldn't really be happy. I don't know what it was, but I didn't really feel comfortable with the whole thing.
“Dad's already on his way. I guess we should go to the front, it probably won't take that long for him to get here."
We slowly walked together in front of the house.
“Hey kid, why are you so quiet all of a sudden?“
”Oh, I don't really know what to think about the whole thing. It all seems so easy to me now. I mean, Matt is my absolute dream guy and he's gay. Somehow... oh, I don't know either.”
Lara grinned at me. “Man Lukas, you can be really exhausting. Did you ever think that maybe fate is just being good to you? It's not like you don't deserve to have some luck.”
We sat in silence for a while, when I saw Dad's car, I had made a decision.
“I want to tell Mom and Dad. It's best to do it tonight. Will you help me?"
Lara looked at me from the side. ”You know I'll stand by you no matter what you decide to do.”
Dad had meanwhile come to a stop in front of the house. Slowly, Lara and I got up and went to meet him. Without saying a word, we got into the car and Dad drove off immediately.
“I guess you don't want to tell me what happened?” Dad asked after a few minutes.
"Not now. But... I'd like to talk to you and Mom today.”
Dad looked at me with raised eyebrows but didn't say anything. No one said anything for the rest of the drive. I tried to figure out what was going on in my head, but it didn't really work. It had actually been quite easy with Lara, because the whole thing hadn't been planned. I was on the verge of despairing. How did I actually come up with the idea of telling my parents everything? Okay, now take a deep breath. It's not going to be too bad. My parents aren't really stuffy or anything like that, and as far as I can remember, they've never said anything negative about gays. I was getting more and more nervous.
When we finally stopped in front of the farm, my Dad said that we should go inside and tell Mom, and he would take the car to the garage. Lara took my hand as we went into the house. Mom was sitting in the kitchen waiting for us.
"What happened? Why are you back so soon and why didn't Matt drive you?”
“There was a small incident, but I don't really want to say anything more about it.“ Ok, now take a deep breath. ‘Mom, I actually want to tell you and Dad something. Do you have some time for me?’
”Lukas, you know we always have time for you. So, what's up?”
“Can we wait until Dad gets here? I actually wanted to tell you together.“
My mother nodded and I sat down opposite her. Lara did the same. So we sat there in silence, waiting for my dad to finally arrive. He wasn't long in coming. He looked at us three in turn and then sat down next to my mom.
”So?”
“Well, I wanted to tell you something about myself that has actually been on my mind for some time. I guess you should give up on the idea of a daughter-in-law. So, what I really want to tell you: I'm gay."
It felt incredibly good to have finally said it. However, I also felt insecure because I still didn't know how my parents would react.
Matt
I lay in Seth's room and thought about the day. Actually, all of that would have been enough for half a year. Suddenly I started.
“Shit!”
Seth woke up from my scream.
"Hmm... Matt, what's going on?”
“I didn't think about Lara and Lukas at all. I drove them both here. I didn't even think about how they would get back.“
”Matt, it's just after three now. Don't you think they'd be at your place by now? They'll have called for sure, or one of the others will have driven them. So don't worry and get a few more hours' sleep.”
With these words, Seth turned to the side and pulled his blanket over his head. However, I was not at all reassured. That was typical of me again. As soon as I have a little problem, I forget everything around me. Hopefully they both arrived home safely. I don't even want to think about what I might have to listen to from my mother tomorrow. Maybe Seth was right and I should really try to get some more sleep. So I did the same and lay on my side, closed my eyes and tried to create some order in my head to get some more sleep.

The list of those I would most like to shoot into space, preferably without a spacesuit, top
3. Ms. Sina Palm - my landlady, who constantly lurks around the house as if she expects me to burn it down, blow it up, paint it pink or do something similarly terrible to it at any moment. Since I once chased her out of my garden very forcefully, we have been at loggerheads.
2. Doctor Friedrich Lodenberg – my father, who never tires of emphasizing how incredibly disappointed he is in me. Since I quit my law studies, I am just as worthless in his eyes as all the jobs I change are like other people's underwear.
1. Alasdair Landon – my brother's best friend and my neighbor. He's gay, stubborn and arrogant. All of these are traits that I don't particularly like – and I'll be damned if I'm going to hide it! I'd much rather just ignore the guy, but unfortunately for me, that's almost impossible.
Until now, Alasdair was in fourth place on my list of the unloved, but that has just changed with a loud bang. The bang that accompanied the impact of a half-full beer bottle on my beloved garden table. I storm angrily onto the terrace and throw deadly glances at the balcony above me. “Hey, you completely stupid morons!” I yell against the party noise. Because the purest orgy is taking place above me, organized by my oh-so-highly esteemed neighbor. ‘This is a damn expensive table, you assholes!’ It actually only cost fifteen euros, but these idiots don't need to know that.
A face framed by dark hair leaned over the balcony railing. Alasdair. “The table only cost fifteen euros,” he stated coolly.
Damn it. I hate that guy! “And so you think you can use him as a garbage can?” I spat.
“I had nothing to do with the whole thing. Besides, it was probably an accident, so don't get so worked up.”
“This is your damn party, so you're damn right you have something to do with it!”
Alasdair sighs as if I were a defiant child and he were the long-suffering father. “All right,” he says. “I'll ask my guests not to throw beer bottles at you anymore.”
“And that's it?!“ I ignore the attempt to turn the situation into a joke.
“Of course not. I will identify the culprit, whip him, and ultimately force him to beg you for forgiveness by kissing your feet.” Alasdair gives me a look of forbidden innocence that makes me want to slap it off his face.
“Fuck you, asshole!” I snap and storm back to my apartment. The patio door slams shut behind me with a loud crash.
Ten minutes later, there is a knock on my front door. In the meantime, my mood has changed from “pretty angry” to “extremely angry”. The loud music and the noise of the party guests are constantly getting on my nerves. I open the door with some force and see my brother Lars standing there.
He stares at me in shock, but then immediately regains his composure. “Hey, little brother. I heard there was a little accident with a beer bottle.”
“What's it to you?” I actually like Lars, but right now I'd kick even Mother Teresa out into the street.
“I just wanted to make sure you're okay.”
“Shouldn't you be one floor up, drinking away the last of your sanity with your best friend and all the other idiots? Yelling? Raging a little?”
“Well, well. You're in a really great mood.”
Before I can say something that would certainly not have been friendly, I hear a clearing of the throat and Alasdair appears next to my brother. He must have been standing next to the door against the wall, so I couldn't see him.
I grab the door and slam it in front of them. Or rather, I almost do it. Alasdair intercepts the door and pushes it open again. He is bigger and stronger than me, so I don't even try to stop him. Instead, I fold my arms across my chest, position myself in front of the entrance like a grim guard, and glare darkly at Alasdair. In my mind, I picture strangling him. “Get out!”
“Not until I've apologized.”
“I couldn't give a damn about your apologies!”
“Didn't you just tell me a few minutes ago that you wanted an apology?”
“Didn't you claim a few minutes ago that you had nothing to do with it?”
“Oh, come on, Tom. Do we always have to argue? I apologize and you stop killing me in your thoughts. How about it?”
I stubbornly stick out my chin and size him up with narrowed eyes. Why did my brother have to become friends with this guy? I've hated Alasdair from the moment I met him. But since he and Lars realized how incredibly well they get along, I have to deal with his presence all the time. Even in my own four walls, I'm no longer safe, since Lars and I share the ground floor of the house.
“How about you crawl under the nearest bush and die there?” I reply, taking a threatening step towards him. He remains unmoved, raising only one eyebrow in a mocking gesture that always infuriates me. My hands clench into fists.
Alasdair watches me closely. “Are you going to hit me?” Again that raised eyebrow, again that mocking undertone.
“I'm not a brainless oaf who can only get his way with violence!” I hiss, my hands still clenched into fists.
“Well, I'm curious. How do you get your way then?”
Before I can answer, an arm comes around Alasdair's waist from behind and pulls him back. Simon. Alasdair's friend. Or current bed bunny. Or whatever. Do all the party guests want to gather in front of my door one by one? Do I have a tasty portion of rat poison hidden somewhere in the depths of my cupboards?
“You left me all alone up there,” the bunny whines.
Alasdair strokes his hair and kisses him on the mouth. ‘I'll be right there, sweetie.”
Immediately, Simon switches from whiny to erotic, or at least to what he thinks is erotic, and breathes, ’Oh yes, I like it when you come.”
I feel sick on the spot. For the second time that evening, I slam a door shut.
In the middle of the night, something wakes me up. In a remarkable mixture of disorientation and annoyance, I let my gaze wander around the room. It's dark. Of course. What else would it be at this time of night? And it's quiet. Very quiet. Obviously, even the last party guests have now drunk themselves into a coma. Or passed out in sheer joy at being able to enjoy the company of the great Alasdair. Whatever, I couldn't care less. As long as I have my peace.
But if it is dark and so quiet, what woke me up?
For some unfathomable reason, I suddenly feel very uncomfortable. Even more, all at once my hair is literally standing on end.
A touch of panic makes me freeze. I can't move a millimeter, even though everything inside me is screaming to jump up and run away.
What the hell is this again? Did I spontaneously lose my mind overnight? Little children are afraid of the dark. I certainly am not.
At least that's what I thought.
In my mind, I walk the path from my bed to the light switch. Actually, it's only three steps. A ridiculously small distance that suddenly seems infinitely large to me. As if I had to cross a dark forest full of dark figures.
I laugh. An ugly, strange sound.
Then suddenly I hear something else. A scraping sound, as if something big is creeping along very carefully and slowly. My breath catches in my throat. I listen almost compulsively, but at the same time I want to cover my ears.
A kind of soft whistling joins the scraping. Or rather – breathing.
Just a moment ago, these sounds were not there at all, but now they are mercilessly intruding on me. Scratching – inhaling – scratching – exhaling – scratching – inhaling...
This can only be a dream, I realize. Even if it is a pretty realistic one.
This realization should actually be followed by relief, but nothing of the sort happens. Instead, I watch with growing horror as the darkness in front of me thickens, as if all the darkness in the world were gathering in front of my bed. My whole body is shaking miserably.
“Damn it, don't be like that,” I say to myself and realize that my voice is shaking too. It's just ridiculous.
The concentrated darkness comes closer, climbs over the edge of my bed, and takes over the blanket just in front of my feet. It devours it with a huge black maw. I can't help but wonder what will happen when the darkness reaches my body. I want to jump up, but I still can't move.
Like a hypnotized rabbit about to be swallowed by a snake. The thought is meant to be mocking, but it has a completely different effect on me. A scream of fear escapes from my throat.
Very loud and very piercing.
Damn, I hope I only screamed in my dream. It would be too embarrassing if someone had heard it.
The darkness is now so close to my big toe that a sheet of paper wouldn't fit in the space between. My breathing is racing and I feel drops of sweat on my forehead.
Then, completely out of the blue, the nightmare is suddenly over. No shuffling, no strange breathing, no abnormal darkness. My paralysis disappears and I jump up. Much too fast and much too violently. My feet get tangled in my bedspread, the yielding mattress offers little secure support. For a brief moment, I hang in the air, arms flailing wildly, then I fall off the bed.
A sudden pain shoots through my left hand.
“Shit! Damn!”
My swearing is followed by a loud rumble. This time not from my room, but from the one above mine. Alasdair's bedroom, as I know from painful experience. More than once I've been able to listen to the bastard during his sex games. Experiences I would have gladly done without.
Is he up there again? Or is he trying to tell me to be quiet? If so, he would deserve a good beating for it...
I refrain from swearing loudly again. Not out of consideration, but because I don't want to admit that I fell out of bed the next morning.
But that's exactly what will have happened to him.
This thought brings a smile to my face.
A little later, I am fast asleep again.
The next morning, still half asleep, I drag myself into the kitchen and am not pleased to find not only my brother there, but also Alasdair. This is unusual for three reasons. Firstly, I am not a late riser and am normally fit and well after getting up. Secondly, my brother never gets out of bed early at the weekend and, thirdly, Alasdair certainly doesn't.
I ignore them both and go straight to the kitchenette to get a glass from the cupboard. A sharp pain shoots through my right wrist as I open the door. I must have sprained it during the night.
“Coffee's on the table,” Alasdair says.
“Fascinating.” Carefully, not to put too much strain on my aching wrist, I pour myself an orange juice, keeping my back to the two of them.
“You look tired, little brother.”
What impressive powers of observation. I say my thoughts out loud and Lars answers with a laugh. He never holds it against me when I make snappy comments. Probably because he knows that I actually like him a lot. Which, of course, I would never openly admit.
“Did you sleep badly?” Alasdair asks, as if it were any of his business.
I remain silent.
“Or did you dream something bad and fall out of bed in fright?” he asks, proving that he has not failed to notice the noises coming from my bedroom.
I turn to him abruptly, spilling orange juice on the floor. ”Shit!”
While I clean up the mess with a damp kitchen towel, I avoid Alasdair's intense gaze. Two things worry me in a way that is hard to put my finger on. There is an expression on his face as if he knows something that I am unaware of. Something sinister. In addition, I suddenly notice the fascinating contrast between the strong blue of his eyes and his dark hair. What the hell do I care about the eyes of this asshole?
Guided by a sudden urge, I go to the kitchen table where Alasdair and Lars are sitting and wring out the orange juice-soaked cloth over Alasdair's head. Two pairs of eyes stare at me in complete disbelief.
“Uh... little brother...?”
“Well, Tommy...“ Alasdair uses the pet name I hate so much. ‘...if you think I should take a shower, you could just say so.’ He gets up and walks towards the kitchen.
“As if a shower would change your stench!” I spit at him and feel an aggressiveness in me that goes beyond the normal level. I fix Lars with burning eyes. “Do you always have to let this guy into our apartment? Can't you, damn it, meet at his place? Or even better, at the nearest dump?” I feel Alasdair moving behind my back and try to ignore him as best I can.
“Do you think that's a good idea?” asks Lars.
“Huh...? What...” I can't get any further. Alasdair is emptying the rest of the orange juice from the Tetra Pak over my head. At first I'm speechless. Then I'm overcome with rage. I turn around, punching at his face with my clenched fist. But Alasdair easily dodges me. I curse, punch again, and again I only hit air. “Fucking arsehole!” This time I aim for his stomach. He brushes my arm aside with a casual movement.
“Come on, Tom. Stop it. You're acting like a madman.”
His words only fuel my anger. But no matter how hard I try to hit or kick him, I just can't do it. Not only is the guy strong, he's fast too.
At some point, he has enough. Before I can react, he is standing behind me, effortlessly grabs my arm out of thin air, twists it behind my back and forces me onto my tiptoes.
“So, now what?”
I feel his breath on my ear as he speaks. Every hair on my body stands on end and I try in vain to free myself from his grip.
“Are you going to calm down now?” Alasdair asks again.
I bare my teeth. ‘Let me go and you'll see.”
“We can stand here all day if you like. I don't mind.’ Alasdair tightens his grip on my joints a little. It doesn't really hurt – he'd have to be much more brutal than this – but it's not pleasant either.
Once again, I push against the handle. Unsuccessfully. “It was obvious that you enjoy this kind of thing,” I hiss. All at once, I become very aware of how close our bodies are. Panic rises up inside me. “Let me go!”
“Only if you promise to be peaceful.”
“I'm not promising you anything, asshole!”
“Well, in that case...” His breath brushes my cheek, which almost drives me crazy.
“Is your little friend so bad in bed that you have to snuggle up to me?” I put as much venom into my voice as possible. ”I can definitely think of better ways to spend an evening than being pawed by a damn gay!”
“First of all, I'm not pawing you, secondly, my friend is neither small nor bad in bed, and thirdly, are you sure about that?”
I can almost feel Alasdair's grin.
Anger is raging inside me, along with another, more elusive feeling. Suddenly I feel sick. Very sick. Did I hit my head when I fell out of bed? And have I overwhelmed my body with all this tussling?
“That's enough, Alasdair. Leave him alone,” Lars interjects. His voice has the calm determination for which I have so often secretly envied him. And indeed, Alasdair wordlessly releases the grip on my arm, goes back to the kitchen table and takes a big gulp of coffee. He looks at me over the edge of his cup.
I just look back, stand frozen for a moment, my mind a complete blank. Then I storm into the bathroom and throw up.
There's a knock at the bathroom door. “Are you okay?” It's Lars.
I breathe a sigh of relief. Having to deal with Alasdair again would be too much. My fingers glide absentmindedly over the cool tiles and rough grout of the floor I'm sitting on.
“Can I come in?” Lars asks. When he doesn't get an answer, he carefully opens the door and peeks in.
I give him a pained smile. “Probably something I ate, or something.” The voice scratches unpleasantly in my throat.
Encouraged by my peaceful behavior, Lars enters and sinks down on the floor next to me. “Pretty cold, the tiles,” he says.
I shrug my shoulders.
“If there's anything you want to talk about, you know you can trust me, Tom.”
I shrug my shoulders again. “What would I want to talk about?”
“That's up to you.”
“Mhm. Ok.”
We sit in silence for about ten minutes before Lars speaks again: ”What bothers you about Alasdair?”
“Is there anything else we can talk about besides that ass?”
“See, that's exactly what I mean.”
“Do I always have to have a reason for everything? I just can't stand him!”
“Is it because he's gay?”
“I don't care what the guy does in his bed.” As long as I don't have to listen to it.
“Our father is not exactly tolerant in that regard.”
“Our father is not tolerant in any respect. But I'm not him. And I don't listen to him anymore either.”
“No, of course not. But sometimes...” Lars interrupts himself.
“Sometimes...”
Lars looks at me sideways. There is caution in his eyes. “Sometimes...” he continues. “Sometimes I wonder if his opinion is not more important to you than you want to admit.”
“Nonsense!” I clarify. “Would I have dropped out of law school, which was so important to him, otherwise?”
“One doesn't exclude the other.”
“And pigs can't fly. So what? What do you actually want from me, Lars?”
“I want to know if you're okay, little brother.”
“I'm six feet tall.”
“Kar. Tall, big mouth and absolutely determined to avoid serious conversations.”
“Isn't it nice how well you know me?”
“Sure. You're like an open book to me, and I can flip through the pages any way I want.”
“You wish.”
Lars sighs, then smiles. “You know what I'd really like right now? A delicious piece of cake at Café Bach.”
A little later, we're actually on our way to Café Bach.
I just lost my job. It's an inconvenience that happens to me again and again. My brother thinks I provoke getting fired. He's only partly right. In fact, I just don't make any effort to not get fired. And if I think my boss is a brain-amputated idiot, I'll tell him so.
Of course, I'll have to look for a new job. My father is insanely rich, but since I no longer live my life according to his ideas, I don't get any support from him – besides, I wouldn't have accepted a cent from him. Not anymore.
A few months ago, things looked different. Until I turned 22, I was an extremely obedient son. Obedient and successful. My high school graduation was as good as could be hoped for, and in law school I was among the best of the best from the very beginning. My father's clients already saw me as a competent new addition to his firm.
My father thanked me for all of this with a generous financial allowance. I lived in a luxurious loft apartment in the middle of the city and went to the most exclusive restaurants and clubs. My clothes were chic and expensive, and so were my friends.
Everything seemed perfect, that is, until I woke up in my huge mahogany bed on my twenty-second birthday and suddenly realized that I hated my job as a lawyer, that my friends were nothing more than money-hungry, superficial liars, and that my large, perfect apartment was filled with nothing but expensive furniture.
Of course, these problems had been looming for a while, but I had always been very successful at repressing any thoughts along these lines. That morning, however, I couldn't do it anymore.
I quit my studies, broke with my father, who refused to accept it, and moved into the apartment where we live now with Lars. My brother is still in fairly good contact with our father. After all, he is studying medicine. That doesn't make him a suitable successor for the law firm, but it is a respectable profession. Nevertheless, Lars does not accept financial support from our father. He never has. He has always been very strict and clear in his views on this.
Would I have a better relationship with our father today if I had followed my own path from the beginning, like Lars, and always stood on my own two feet? Do I even know what my own path is? Shifting from one uninteresting job to the next is not truly fulfilling either.
Whatever. I shake off my gloomy thoughts. I can have a good time at lunchtime. We are halfway through the month, the rent is paid and my account is not overdrawn at the moment. So it's enough if I don't start looking for a job until tomorrow.
I spontaneously go to the city park. Although it is autumn and already relatively cool, I lie down in the middle of the meadow, which is so popular in summer, stretch my arms and legs and stare into the cloudy sky. A bird is circling in the distance. My eyes follow it without too much interest. Nevertheless, I am aware of the animal's enormous size. Some kind of bird of prey? There is something disconcerting about the way it flies. But then, my knowledge of birds is pretty limited. Shrugging my shoulders inwardly, I close my eyes and try not to think about anything, which works surprisingly well for me.
At some point, a shadow falls on me and I squint unwillingly upwards. A woman is standing in front of me. Late twenties, long blonde hair, big eyes, full lips, self-confident charisma, very pretty.
She smiles and squats down next to me. “Hi. I'm Sara.”
I remain silent, but she is not deterred. A woman like her probably always gets her way sooner or later.
“Isn't it a bit cold to lie on the meadow like this?” She runs her fingertips over the grass, barely touching it. ”And a bit damp?”
“I like it when the moisture soaks my clothes and makes them slowly become clammy,” I say with a serious voice.
She laughs, straightens up again and holds out her hand to me. ”And I like to invite pretty young men to coffee.”
“That's probably great for the pretty young men.” And presumably any man she paid attention to would do cartwheels for joy or drop to his knees. Objectively, she is absolutely desirable. Yet I feel only the all-too-familiar indifference. Sure, I've had a few girlfriends and been in bed with almost all of them. But none of them really excited me. While other guys my age are crazy about sex, for me it has only ever been quite nice. The moment of climax is of course not to be sneezed at, but after that I have never really felt satisfied. And whatever the woman has to be like to awaken my passion, it is definitely not the beauty in front of me.
She looks at me with raised eyebrows. “You're not making it easy for me. Don't you like me?”
“You're a very attractive woman,” I say, and I mean it.
“But...”
“No buts.”
“Am I too old for you?”
“No, I like mature women.”
“Mature women?“ She playfully kicks me in the side. ‘I'm not that old!”
I get up after all, look at her face up close. ’You're right. Not a single wrinkle. Except maybe here...” I touch her very briefly next to her right eye.
Even if she is not the woman of my dreams, a little distraction wouldn't be a bad thing, I decide. Before she can become indignant again, I give her my best smile. “What was that again about coffee?”
We go for a drink. After that, I take her back to my place.
In the entrance hall, we meet Alasdair and his bunny Simon. The latter gives me a dark look, as if he knows exactly how I feel about him. He puts his arm around Alasdair's waist, kisses him and looks straight at me.
What's that supposed to mean?
Alasdair returns the kiss, but he doesn't seem very enthusiastic. Is the little one getting on his nerves too? I certainly hope so. I'm not interested in their relationship at all, but I'm more than tired of hearing them regularly at night. Maybe next time Alasdair will get one that doesn't squeal like a stuck pig. On the spur of the moment, I rename Simon from bunny to piglet. And I tell him right away. Including the reason.
His dark look turns into a deadly one. “You're just jealous because things are going so well between me and my Ally-babe!” he snarls.
Ally-babe... It doesn't get much more stupid than that.
“Right,” I snap back, ‘as if I'm interested in your relationship.’ Then I turn to Sara: ‘Let's go inside. Piggy and Ally-sweetheart will probably be fine without us.”
She looks at me with raised eyebrows. ’Yes, I'm sure they will. By the way, I don't squeal like a pig, but hiss and purr like a tiger. Is that better?”
I grin. “Much better.”
I simply leave Alasdair and Simon standing there and lead Sara to my apartment.
A little later, I realize that there is indeed something feline about her. My back is adorned with a few scratch marks, so passionately she pounces on me.
For me, it's the same as always: a brief climax, then a feeling of emptiness, as if something is missing. But now I have learned to hide these feelings very well, so that Sara finally lies happily and contentedly in my arms.
We cuddle a little longer, then she goes home. But not without giving me her phone number first. I promise to get in touch with her.
That night Simon squeals particularly loudly, which he is definitely doing on purpose. In between, Alasdair's distinctly deeper, rougher groans cannot be ignored either. Why does this damn apartment have to be so poorly insulated?
I pull the blanket over my head and try to fall asleep. In vain.
A rhythmic banging joins the groaning. Bed against wall, I suspect, and curse.
When an hour later there is still no peace, I've had enough. Enraged, I jump out of bed, slip into boxer shorts and a T-shirt, and march up to Alasdair's apartment like a threatening thunderstorm.
I ring the doorbell as if it were to blame for everything, and I don't stop even when I hear someone tampering with the lock.
The door is flung open and Alasdair stands before me. He is wearing nothing but skimpy boxer shorts that show more than they conceal. And for the first time, I realize how attractive this bastard actually is. About six feet tall. Well-formed muscles. Quite strong, but not excessively so. A rugged face, high cheekbones, straight nose. Full, boldly curved lips. Big, blue eyes and black, curly hair. Skin that looks so even and velvety that I am almost tempted to run my fingertips over it to see if it feels the same. Suddenly, an uncomfortable lump sits in my throat.
“You can stop sounding now,” I hear Alasdair's voice.
His strange undertone jolts me out of my reverie. I realize that I'm staring at him, feel caught, and involuntarily take a step back.
Damn! Angry and defensive at the same time, I fold my arms across my chest. “Did I interrupt something, Ally darling?” At least I manage the ironic tone perfectly.
“If you put it that way, yes, you did.” Alasdair doesn't even appear to be remotely embarrassed.
“And do you really think it's necessary to let the whole neighborhood in on your screwing?”
“Since the whole neighborhood is taking a keen interest in what I'm doing in my bed anyway, I'm just doing the good people a favor, don't you think?”
“No, I don't.” Of course, I understand his innuendo immediately and feel embarrassed, albeit unjustifiably so. ‘Can I help it if not everyone around here gets off when two guys jump each other?’ I add in a very aggressive tone.
“And what about you?”
“What?”
His next question is accompanied by a strange grin as he asks me: “Do you get off on two guys jumping each other?”
For a brief moment, I am simply speechless. Then, before I even realize what I'm doing, I give him a resounding slap in the face. The sound of the slap echoes in the empty stairwell, while I feel the urge to storm back to my apartment. But I must not do that under any circumstances. To flee now would be tantamount to an admission. And since I am certainly not gay, I don't want to give rise to such suspicions. As if I didn't have enough trouble with Alasdair already!
I glare at him angrily, he looks back silently. His eyes are large and unusually dark in the dim light of the stairwell. I try to interpret his expressionless face. I don't succeed. What is going on in that bastard's head?
“I don't want to know what you're up to and I certainly don't want to hear about it!” I return to the subject.
“Right...” Alasdair's voice sounds husky, which is something I've never heard him do before.
Are you getting sick, asshole? Poor, poor Ally-darling.
Alasdair clears his throat. ‘Maybe Simon and I have exaggerated a little.’ Now he sounds like himself again. So unbearably self-confident.
“A little exaggerated...? That seems to me...”
“...a little understated?” Alasdair interrupts me. ”Simon is angry with you. And he has every reason to be. You always go out of your way to insult him.”
“The little pig shouldn't be such a baby about it.”
“I'd like to return that to you, word for word.”
“Fuck you!”
“I would if I could.”
Alasdair and I look at each other. He's amused, as usual, I'm angry, as usual.
“By the way, we heard your beautiful girlfriend too at lunchtime,” Alasdair finally says.
“That wasn't my girlfriend.”
“But you had fun, didn't you?”
“So what? Do you mind?”
“Although... I didn't hear a peep out of you.” Alasdair tilts his head slightly and looks at me with a playful expression on his face. ”Didn't you like it with her? Or are you just a bit more reserved in bed? Although, to be honest, I don't think the latter is likely. Considering the passion with which you always go at me...”
Alasdair grins broadly. He winks at me and I would like to slap him again. Or better yet, punch him in the face. Meanwhile, the mention of Alasdair, me and passion in the same sentence strangely gives me an uncomfortable feeling in the pit of my stomach. “I have no intention of discussing my sex life with you!” I hurl at him.
“Hm, no? Why not?”
“...
“Come on, Tommy.”
“Don't you dare call me Tommy!”
“Isn't it perfectly normal for men to talk about sex?”
“Except that our preferences are miles apart.”
“I said talk, not live it out together, Tom. But if you'd rather...”
“I'm leaving now!” I interrupt Alasdair. It's much too warm and stuffy in the stairwell. Extremely unusual for this time of year, but I can feel myself starting to sweat and find it difficult to breathe. It's definitely time to go back to my apartment.
“Too bad.” A slight smile plays around the corner of Alasdair's mouth. It creates a small dimple on his right cheek, which I just notice for the first time.
And which doesn't matter at all.
“I would have really liked to know what your preferences are.”
I tear my eyes away from Alasdair's lips and dimple and concentrate fully on my venomous reply: “I like feet, especially when they smell nice of sweat. I also like to sniff old panties and I'm crazy about nibbling on lower lips.”
“Really?” Alasdair laughs. ‘I even believe you about the first two things. The last one seems a bit exaggerated, though.’ As if it were just an unconscious gesture, he bites his lower lip. And to my shame, I can't do anything but watch him. Even as he continues speaking, I still stare at his mouth.
“By the way, I like athletic men with green eyes, blond hair and a beautiful voice.”
“I have green eyes,“ I hear myself say.
“No kidding.”
“And blond hair,” someone with my voice adds.
“Are you quite sure about that?” Alasdair takes a step towards me and is suddenly very close to me. Too close. I know I should step back, feel his breath on my neck like on the night of the party and hate it! Yet I can't move, I'm completely frozen.
Alasdair runs his hand through my hair. It's a careful but firm touch that makes my scalp tingle, then my entire body.
“Hm, actually. You are blonde,” Alasdair mutters. With one hand still in my hair, he puts the other on my shoulder and pushes me backwards with gentle pressure. On legs that no longer belong to me, I stumble backwards until I feel the cold, unyielding wall at my back. Alasdair comes even closer to me, although I can no longer retreat, trapped between him and the wall. I gasp desperately for air, feel my heart racing as if it wants to jump out of my chest.
I grasp Alasdair's shoulders to push him away, at least in theory. But instead of putting my plan into action, I cling to him even tighter, as my knees suddenly become so weak that they can hardly carry me anymore.
Alasdair puts a hand under my chin and forces me to look at him. As his mouth comes closer with excruciating slowness, his gaze pierces mine. The dark blue of his eyes is like a maelstrom I cannot escape. The pitiful rest of my mind screams first angrily and then in panic, as my body no longer makes any attempt to defend itself.
Then, all of a sudden, Alasdair stops, frozen in mid-motion. I wonder if he's just realized who he has in front of him? I breathe a sigh of relief. But to my horror, the sound I make sounds more like a disappointed sigh.
Alasdair lets go of me and steps back. His entire body radiates tension. He tilts his head as if listening for something.
Simon? – Hardly, he would have made himself heard with a loud screeching long ago.
“Go back to your apartment and close the door,” Alasdair says in a hushed voice. His tone is commanding and brooks no argument. Normally, I wouldn't have taken it, of course. But at that moment, I'm just glad to be able to disappear as quickly as possible.
Without saying a word, I turn away, hurry down the stairs and enter the apartment where Lars is sleeping peacefully, unaware of what has just happened in the stairwell. What would he say if he knew that his brother almost let Alasdair kiss him?
Almost kissed by Alasdair. And I wouldn't have resisted.
No sooner have I entered my room, this truth hits me with full force.
Shit! Shit! Shit!
In helpless rage, I beat on my old bulky waste couch until exhaustion overcomes me and I sink to the floor, completely exhausted.
Why did I let this happen? I'm not gay, I don't even like the guy. So what was that about? Why didn't I just smash his face in like he deserved?
A long-forgotten memory assails me. At the time, I was out and about in the city with my parents. My mother was still alive, so I couldn't have been older than eight years old. On a bench, I saw two men kissing each other openly. I was very irritated, but at the same time I couldn't take my eyes off the scene. “When two men kiss, they're homosexual,” my mother explained. “Just disgusting. Repulsive!” my father added. “The likes of them should be locked up!”
A tortured laugh escapes my throat. Maybe I should kiss Alasdair after all. Just to give my father another reason to loathe me.
What would his lips have felt like?
I push this thought away, but others, no less unwelcome, follow.
Why did he suddenly send me away? Did he just want to know if he could kiss me? A little bonus for my self-esteem? The chance to finally get the upper hand in our constant arguments?
“Shit!”
Suddenly I realize that it could only have been a trap. A trap that should never have been dangerous to me.
If I had been well rested and fit, none of this would have happened. Alasdair only had a chance because it's the middle of the night and I couldn't get a wink of sleep because of his damn fucking with his stupid friend!
Eventually, as dusk is already falling outside, I finally go to bed. I have myself more or less under control again and am determined not to let Alasdair take advantage of the almost-kiss. After all, strictly speaking, nothing happened at all. After all, I may have tested him too.
With these thoughts, I fall asleep

“Why don't you tell your story for a change?” a good friend of mine asked me a while ago, to which I probably gave him a rather puzzled look. ‘What could be interesting about my story?’ I thought, but just shrugged my shoulders in response.
For a few days, this question didn't leave my head, until I really sat down to tell my story.
But first, let me introduce myself. My name is Isaiah (I know, a really great name), I'm already in the older semester. I have black hair, ice-blue eyes, and I make up for my small height with my big mouth.
“Isi! ISI!” my sister almost screamed into the phone, so that I thought my eardrums would burst. Exhausted from the night shift and lack of sleep, I grumpily asked what she wanted from me that was so important. Of course, she didn't get to the point right away, but first talked about everything under the sun. Until... until she finally got to the point and told me her great news. She had found a new RP chat and I had to register there immediately (!!!!). Yes, I confess. I'm into online role-playing games. But not to send figurines around, but written texts.
After a little back and forth, I actually registered.
There were a lot of idiots around, but also really good players. One of them caught my eye. I was captivated by his diversity and vocabulary. So I steered my character towards him.
I've never been one to be afraid of contact.
For some time, we played regularly until we arranged to meet outside the chat. At first only via the flower or other communication devices. But I became more curious. This guy I didn't know was on the same wavelength as me, but could still give a good counter.
Without realizing it, I kept thinking about him, which didn't go unnoticed by my best friend.
Sam, my best friend, wanted to know the reason for my change. So I met up with him and told him. I got a look of disbelief from almost black eyes, then the brown curly head shook grinning. Sam didn't need to say anything. He knew how to express everything with looks and gestures. I could really trust him with anything; after all, I've known the little guy since the sandbox.
Back then, Sam was one of my neighborhood kids. Four years younger than me, but pretty mature for his age. And he was damn good-looking. But back to my story.
I kept in touch with my ominous acquaintance, and couldn't wait until a message from him appeared on my screen. But sooner or later this wasn't enough for me (and apparently not for him either). I wanted to know more, almost everything.
So a meeting was arranged.
I don't need to mention that I was totally excited, right? Although it was totally embarrassing how I behaved, after all, I was well into my twenties.
We chose a small café. I was there half an hour before the appointed time and was already enjoying my second cup of coffee with lots of sugar when a voice tore me out of my thoughts.
“Isaiah?”
I looked up in amazement. Someone said my name, but I couldn't place the voice.
So I looked at the person and was struck dumb. On a tall, athletic body sat a head that knocked my socks off. Green eyes had a golden shimmer that fascinated me. And the guy had a mouth that was literally inviting you to kiss him.
It should be noted that I had long known that I was attracted to my own sex and had already come out.
I still couldn't stop staring at him until another question burst my thoughts.
“You're Isaiah, aren't you?”
“Yep, have a seat,” I offered him directly and pulled my legs up a little towards me. Yes, I liked to spread out under the table.
He sat down and ordered a coffee as well. For a while, we just sat there, talking over our cups.
I couldn't remember who started the conversation first, but suddenly we couldn't get enough of each other. We talked about our characters, discussed God and the world after death. Not a topic for me, I was a pagan. It was all just humbug to me.
After what felt like the twelfth cup of coffee, we said goodbye, at least in the real world. Because the chat continued directly.
And I had to talk to someone, right away!!!
I dialed Sam's number. After the third dial tone, the familiar voice answered.
“Yeah, bitter?” (he always said!)
“It's me, Isaiah.”
“What's up? You never call?”
“I met up with him.”
“With whom?”
“Kai, you idiot. Who did you think?”
“Oh? Tell me! What's he like?! Is he hot?”
I was almost tempted to say “yes,” but I just managed to pull myself out of the noose. And I told him everything. Really everything.
“Isi? You're in love!” he said with a laugh at the other end.
I almost dropped the phone in shock. What had the idiot just said? Just to be sure, I asked again.
“You're in love. You haven't raved about a guy or a woman like that in years. Go for it!”
“If only it were that easy,” was the only mental response. I said a curt goodbye and was left alone with my thoughts.
Was I really in love with Kai? Of course, he had been on my mind for quite some time. Now even more so, having seen him live and in color.
I suppressed the burgeoning feelings in the bud. Provoked an argument and showed him a side of me that he didn't know yet. Cold, heartless. In short, I had mutated into an asshole and liked the role. Even though my heart was melting with longing. It kept wanting to be with Kai. Wanted to hear his voice and be loved too.
To escape him, I used my free weekends to party... and for other things, of course null
It was in August when my heart suddenly took the lead. It didn't want to take a back seat any longer. So I wrote to him in a cloak-and-dagger operation about how I felt.
And I swear! I had never suffered as much as I did at that moment. There was no reply for days until a message suddenly appeared. He wanted to meet me.
The café was our meeting place again and I was there too early again.
But so was he this time. His eyes shimmered unfathomably when he saw me. My heart leaped. He looked so damn good in his jeans and tight T-shirt. Now you could really see that he did sports.
Not knowing what to expect, I sat down with him and ordered a coffee. There was silence between us. I, the bigmouth, couldn't get a word out.
However, he quickly recovered.
“Do you mean my message seriously?”
I didn't know what to say at first. I was too perplexed. Did the guy think I was walking down the street telling everyone I loved them?
“I don't joke about something like that and you know it,” I spat at him quietly.
“Calm down, Cian, (I hate it when you call me that!) I didn't mean to offend you. But it is a bit strange to fall in love with someone you've only seen once. Especially you, who doesn't believe in love at first sight.”
Now my patience was at an end. I slammed the coffee cup down on the table and stood up.
“You're right, Kai. It's damn strange.” With those words, I just left him sitting there and left.
I wanted to, at least, but at the door I was yanked around and felt warm lips on my lips. Lips that tasted of black coffee and slightly of tobacco. Which were so endlessly addictive. I returned the kiss, which I broke after what felt like an eternity.
“What is this?” I hissed again. Did I get an answer? No. Instead, Kai pulled me closer to him and kissed me again, and I was only too happy to return the addictive kiss.
Life couldn't be better at this moment. Really not.
A voice pulls me out of my thoughts, as do two warm arms hugging me.
“What did you say?”
“What are you writing?”
I look at the screen and smile happily. “A story about love at first sight and a love that withstood every storm.”
A gentle kiss hits the back of my head, because I lost all my hair a year ago. I gently take his right hand and blow a kiss onto the ring on his ring finger.
Yes, I am still with Kai and have been married for a year. There is still so much to tell.
But that's for part two....
I shoo my husband out of the room again, because I want to continue telling our story.
I quickly skim over what I have already written and have to smile. Our first kiss. A kiss that started it all.
It had been a week since I met Kai at the café and we kissed. A week of total stress and aching longing.
But now it was Friday evening. I finally had the weekend off again. I didn't have to work. And maybe I had time for Kai too.
That name haunted me for the whole seven days. It twitched when I just thought of him.
Michael, my roommate with whom I shared a house in the mountains, had persuaded me to turn night into day again. Just to enjoy life.
And there I was. In front of my three closets. Every single one was stuffed with pants, shirts and so on. Yes, I admit it. Shopping was my great passion.
Michael, meanwhile, had made himself comfortable on the couch in the room and kept eyeing me.
“Isi? You've changed quite a bit. What happened at the meeting?”
I dropped the pants I had just picked out in shock. I hadn't expected that question at all.
But maybe I should explain why. Michi and I lived together and partied together, but if we could avoid it, we kept out of each other's lives. We were loners, after all.
“What makes you think something has happened?” I hissed at him as I picked up the pants again and took a closer look. Dark denim, loosely fitting on the hips. Perfect. Now just find a matching top.
Michi stretched out on the couch, grumbling, and kept watching me, simply ignoring the tone of my voice.
“Well. You'd better stay at home this weekend, hole up in your realm and not be seen for a long time. You still look at pretty asses, but you don't go after them anymore.” That hit home! Had I really become like that? I never let anything get away and got what I wanted. Whether it was at a party or on my way home from work.
I ran my hand through my black shaggy mane and turned to Michi, who just grinned stupidly. He knew exactly that he had me in his trap.
I decided to do what I did best. Ignore people.
I'll skip the part where I got ready for the party night. It would take forever to describe that.
So there we were. Michi, Jonas, Maik and I. The bass was pounding out of the speakers around us, twitching and sweating bodies rubbed against each other on the dance floor.
I had to grin. Today the hunt would be especially fun.
Was I thinking of Kai? Well, we had kissed and we apparently loved each other too. But we weren't together. And, my goodness, I was young and wanted to let off steam.
And that's what I did that night. But the sex really hadn't been fulfilling. So Mr. X wasn't allowed to stay until breakfast, but had to go straight home. I had allowed him to call a taxi from my phone. But instead of sleeping, I sat down in front of the PC and waited...
and waited...
and waited...
until suddenly Eiskuh messaged me and said that someone was texting me. I clicked on the blinking something in my task list and grinned. So Kai was just as sleepless as I was.
Hesitantly, we began talking. Like two shy schoolboys, we eyed each other. Neither of us seemed to understand what had happened in the café.
I knew one thing though. I wanted him! And I was going to have him.
In my party mood, I asked him if he wanted to do something else. After all, the night was just beginning. He agreed.
I took a shower to feel fresh again, got dressed and got behind the wheel (sober!!!!).
We met on the bank of the river. I parked my car next to his. He was leaning against the bonnet, probably warming his backside with the hot metal.
As calmly as I could, I leaned over to him.
“Hey, you,“ I said quietly.
“Hey, you,” came the quiet reply, which made me grin. And a smirk also spread across his lips. I watched him out of the corner of my eye. He didn't really fit my type, which had changed fundamentally since Leon. Leon? Maybe I'll talk about him. But back to Kai. He was tall, muscular, and blond. But if you think that just means he's good-looking, you're wrong. Kai also had a lot on the brain. Talking to him about mundane things was really fun. So was the silence, as I noticed. It did me good just to feel his closeness. It made me calmer. My gaze wandered to the gently flowing water of the river. He followed his thoughts and I followed mine. We really hadn't spoken a word until the sun slowly appeared.
“What will happen to us now?“ Kai quietly broke the silence.
I sighed softly, knowing that this question would come at some point.
“I don't know, Kai. We know how we feel about each other, but will it work out for us?” I pushed myself off the hood and stretched extensively.
Inwardly, I asked myself the question. We were fundamentally different in our views, in our nature. Kai was the emotional one, I was the rational one. With him, it was often the heart that spoke, with me it was very often the head. He brooded, I acted. So how could a relationship develop from that?
“What if we just give it a try?” I heard the beautiful little voice from the side. I raised an eyebrow and looked at Kai. Try? We were grown men! But he looked at me so wonderfully naively right now. Damn it! That ass was really softening me up. I turned to him and let my hands slide over his ears to the back of his neck. He shuddered. So that was his sensitive spot, huh? I had to remember that. Without saying a word, I stretched out towards him. I felt his hands on my hips, and I suddenly became warm! So I didn't waste any time and kissed him, tenderly and gently. And I have to say, he tasted really heavenly!
A shout of “attack” rings through the room, tearing me out of my memories. Before I can understand anything, two little devils are sensed in the bed while a big devil is standing in the doorway laughing. My children are visiting me that weekend when I write down my memories. Jem (my oldest) and Mari (my... our little princess). Yes, I also had excursions into the ladies' world.
Before they wrecked my lap, I put it aside and let myself be stormed by both of them and used as a cuddly pillow.
My eyes wander to my husband, I see his dreamy look and fall in love with him all over again.
Every second weekend of the month, we became a small family. Times we all enjoyed. Especially the little ones. They are thoroughly spoiled by Kai!
Mari in particular likes to take advantage of this with her bright blue saucer eyes and black curls.
I push the princess onto my belly and stretch out my free hand to Kai. With a smile, he climbs into bed with me and snuggles up to us.
Now is no time to write down the memory... but to feel the present...
See you in part three!!!

Foreword
One of the details that I changed while revising the story is the age of Paul and the other characters. In "We're the Pet Shop Boys," Paul was still 18 and in the 13th grade of a FOS, while in "Liberation," I lowered his age to 17, so he is now in the 12th grade. At the time, I had chosen 13th grade and 18 as his age because I was 18 during the creation of the story and was also in the 13th grade then. Since many of the characters, especially Paul himself, were based on my real life, it made the most sense to me at the time. Although I was still 17 at the time of my inner coming out, everything else fit chronologically. The reason I changed the age now is that upon closer consideration, I found it somewhat unusual for Paul to have his inner coming out only at 18. No question, such cases exist – for many gay individuals, 18 might even be quite early – but somehow 17 felt more realistic for this story after long reflection. While this makes the story feel less personal for me, I think it will seem a bit more logical to most other readers.
All of this is fine and good, but some readers might wonder what the point of this story is after reading it. It is essentially a classic and sometimes somewhat predictable coming-out story with a lot of clichés, similar to countless others already present on this site. But perhaps it will entertain some or at least distract from all the negativity out there for a short time – if that were the case, I would actually be satisfied. And besides – just because something exists in a similar form many times does not mean it has to be bad; on the contrary. Personally, I enjoy reading every coming-out story anew, no matter how many similar ones I have read before, and I never have anything against a good love story. It seems that many other readers feel the same way, as otherwise, stories of this kind would hardly be so frequent, right? So why not publish or read another one? This story may not be artistically valuable or innovative, but I still hope that some readers will find joy in it.
Back to the topic of logic briefly: I don’t want to give away any content here, but some will surely wonder how realistic it is that all of this happens in such a short time. Admittedly, it is extremely unlikely, and I am aware of that (and sometimes I had to roll my eyes a bit while proofreading, I admit it). On the other hand, the two alternatives would have been to write the story in such a way that there are always time jumps of several weeks or months between the individual events, which, in my opinion, would have disrupted the flow of reading a bit, or to simply omit individual plot elements completely, which would have been more realistic but, honestly, also more boring. Therefore, it is now in this form – not everything has to be close to reality; sometimes fantasy is simply much more beautiful.
Finally, a brief note about the Pet Shop Boys quotes in this story. I originally included them in the original story because, first, I wanted to (to be honest, I originally started writing the story just to incorporate the quotes somewhere) and, second, they were and are in a way the "soundtrack of my life," however strange that may sound.
While revising the original story into "Liberation," I thought long about whether to remove the song lyrics or keep them – in the end, I obviously decided to keep them. I know that most readers may not find much meaning in them, but somehow I still found the idea beautiful, and in a way, these quotes are also the unique feature of the story. So here’s my tip: If someone doesn’t see any sense in the song lyrics, they should just skip them; the story works just as well without them.
By the way, I only realized afterward that the idea of using song lyrics in stories is not new and has been practiced here on Nickstorys.de very often. Back when I was writing the original version, I thought I was incredibly revolutionary... null
Since there is hardly a feeling or life situation about which the Pet Shop Boys have not written a song, it was not so difficult to find the appropriate quotes for each part of the story. Nevertheless, some PSB nerds might notice that some of the lyrics come from songs that actually deal with a completely different situation than what is described in the story. A prime example is perhaps the song "To face the truth," which is actually quite clearly about the end of a relationship. Still, I incorporated it after the coming-out scene in this story, as the two lines "It hurts too much to face the truth / To face the truth" fit very well in my opinion. Furthermore, I often focused more on the overall mood of a song rather than ensuring that the content matched the story exactly. Most readers probably won't care anyway, but I wanted to mention it just to be safe.
So, that was enough preliminary remarks for now, which I believe were necessary to explain the context of the story a bit. There isn't much more to say for now, except of course, enjoy reading!
Chapter 1
"The night is a time to explore who you are
Are you what you want to be?
Could you really be a star?
Sometimes you want something you never had
In the middle of the night, you can let yourself go slightly mad"
The ringing of the alarm clock jolted me roughly out of sleep. Who doesn't know that feeling? One moment you're deep in the most beautiful dreams, and the next moment reality catches up with you – and out of bed you go, unfortunately. It's not easy being a student.
The dream I was pulled out of today was somehow different. As far as I could remember, it was nice, but primarily strange. I had been cuddling with someone, but who? Was I mistaken, or was it one of my friends? No, definitely not, that couldn't be.
After I silenced the alarm clock with a well-aimed hit (serves it right) for the next twenty-four hours, I got up and, still a bit dazed, went to the bathroom to prepare for another school day. I had already forgotten the mentioned dream and instead went through the expected events of the day in my mind.
By the way, my name is Paul. I am 17 years old, have short dark blonde hair, and I am in the 12th grade of a vocational school (FOS). The latter was also the reason why I had to get up so early. After breakfast, I first went to the train station and then took the S-Bahn, which was only two minutes late today, to school, which was located quite centrally in Munich. Since we lived in a small suburb, this meant I had to spend quite a bit of time on the train every day, but this problem could easily be solved with a good book. Or alternatively with school materials, if I had been too lazy to study the day before, but that never happened. After all, I was also too lazy to do that on the S-Bahn...
I really couldn't concentrate on reading today, so I somewhat dreamily observed the various commuters who shared the terrible fate of having to take an S-Bahn at just after seven in the morning. A bit further away, someone was on the phone in a language completely foreign to me, which apparently prompted the man to speak a little louder, since no one would understand him anyway. The woman sitting across from me had a small notebook open in front of her and was quickly sketching all kinds of people sitting with her on the train. And the boy back there, who had just boarded, actually looked quite nice… Stop! No, certainly not. But the girl one door over was quite nice. Much more attractive! Or?
"But every now and then, often at night
a particular feeling would surface in spite
of what I’d told myself and tried to deny
I kept on asking the question: why?"
Upon arriving at school, my mood was quite mixed. On one hand, I was subconsciously still a bit confused about my feelings, even though I was convincing myself that they didn't exist. Besides, I was still tired, and the thought of the upcoming classes didn't make me any happier. However, I was looking forward to seeing my friends and classmates.
"Morning," I greeted Felix, with whom I had been in the same class for six years now and who had become one of my best friends during that time. We had met in secondary school and then went to FOS together. He responded with a still somewhat sleepy "Hi," but soon engaged me in a conversation about which of our subjects today was the most unnecessary – we agreed on religion – which ended in a small competition about who was least interested in all of it today. This was eventually interrupted by our economics teacher, who came in and tried to teach us all about the use of results. With varying success.
I really couldn't concentrate on the class because I was too distracted by Simon, who was sitting diagonally in front of me. I had been in the same class with him since we came to FOS two years ago, and we had become quite good friends, although I didn't know him as well as other long-time friends. Anyway, he looked quite good sitting there – he was of average height and build for our age, maybe even a bit slender, his light brown to dark blonde hair was cut into a perfectly styled haircut from all sides, and the clothes he wore just looked perfect on him, even though they were just ordinary jeans and sweaters. Occasionally, he would turn around and smile at me when our eyes met, which triggered a strangely warm feeling in me every time.
"Paul?" Mr. Bergmüller's voice interrupted my daydreams.
"Hm?"
"Could you perhaps answer my question? How do we find out the annual surplus after calculating the balance profit?"
"Um… Sorry, I was just a bit distracted…," I replied somewhat embarrassed.
"I noticed, yes. Next time, please pay better attention, okay?"
If it were only that easy. It was only after I had subconsciously admired Simon for a while that I suddenly became aware of what I was doing. And it shocked me. How could this be, I thought. He is a boy. I am not gay. And I don’t want to be. I tried for a while to find arguments for why I had to be into girls, and when I was somewhat convinced, I decided to distract myself by actually paying attention in class. Simon continued to throw me occasional glances, but I ignored him and stared blankly past him at the board.
The rest of the day passed by without me really noticing much of it. During breaks, Felix, Simon, Lukas, whom I also knew since the beginning of FOS, and I talked about all sorts of things, but I wasn’t really present, which Felix noticed as well. After class, he brought it up on the way home:
“Hey, what’s going on with you today? You seem so distant…”
“Oh nothing, just didn’t sleep well,” I tried to brush it off. It sounded only somewhat convincing, but at least we changed the subject and made some silly jokes about various teachers instead of talking about deeper things.
“I’m building a wall, a fine wall
Not so much to keep you out
more to keep me in”

Chapter 2
“See boy strange on the horizon of love
he’s calling to you
What do you say?
See boy strange as an example of youth
so close to the truth
but still far away
And he’s such a strange boy
will he make a good exchange for
the one before the closed door
that you left behind?”
Once home, I first set about tackling the mountain of homework for the day – although I was somewhat unfocused while doing so. When the obligations for that day were finally done, I sat down on my bed and thought about a part of my life that I had been suppressing until now.
When I had just turned 16, my little sister Marie had asked me when I would finally come out as gay since I seemed to fit every sign of it. Just for fun. And it really shouldn’t have bothered me; after all, I wasn’t. Sure, I had never had a girlfriend, but that was probably more due to my shyness. But what else?
The problem was that since that day, I had been haunted by a certain fear of actually being gay. For all those years, I had always denied it, looked for arguments for why I couldn’t be, and tried to appear as hetero as possible to others. Not that they would start thinking anything about me.
I could probably deceive everyone very well, but the doubts remained with me, growing stronger day by day, my counterarguments becoming weaker. How could this be? I didn’t want this! Why me?
Until two or three weeks ago, I was still sure that this could only be a phase, that it was normal and would pass. My very last shield behind which I could hide for a while longer. But in hindsight, I also realized that this couldn’t go on. Sooner or later, I had to face the truth, no matter how uncomfortable it seemed. Sure, I could have kept going like this, and probably no one but myself would have ever had doubts about my sexuality, but then what? Get married, have kids, grow old – always plagued by self-doubt and never really happy?
I had started to at least engage with the topic of homosexuality. Not that it would affect me, I had told myself at first, just to inform myself. For two years, I had repressed everything that even remotely related to the topic – people, movies, even the Pet Shop Boys, my absolute favorite band, I had only listened to with a guilty conscience.
By now, I had at least reached a point where my fear of the topic had somewhat diminished. I was still sure that I was into girls, even though everything was so obvious. I just couldn’t admit it to myself.
Until today. The looks from Simon, my strange feeling about it – all of that had awakened something in me, and after all these years, I was on the verge of finally opening a door that I had wanted to keep panically shut.
“Guess there’s no place to hide, when you’re screaming inside
There’s no place to hide, when you’re screaming inside”
I took my phone, opened an anonymous internet browser just in case, and typed with trembling fingers the words “gay coming out” into the search bar. It was the first time I had explicitly searched for this topic, and also the first time I admitted to myself that it could affect me.
The DBNA website was displayed, which I had heard of before – but until then, I had never dared to click on it. This time, I did. I read one article after another on the topic of “internal coming out” and “how do I know if I’m gay,” and I noticed with a certain relief that what I had hidden from all these years and what I simply didn’t want to acknowledge was indeed true. I was gay. Not what I wanted. But well, it couldn’t be changed. And now? Now it was over, no more internal hiding from myself. Still slightly trembling, I put my phone down and fell onto my bed, feeling strangely liberated.
“Then we went on, after hours, there was a place down below
It was there I realised the meaning of the show
You’ve got to love, to learn to live, where angels fear to tread
You need to cast off any guilt or shame
When thunder roars and lightning scores, you’ll still be glad you’d came
Are you gonna go to the Sodom and Gomorrah show?
It’s got everything you need for your complete entertainment and instruction
Sun, sex, sin, divine intervention, death and destruction
The Sodom and Gomorrah show is a once-in-a-lifetime production”
In the evening, I was strangely cheerful and somehow relieved. What I had been most afraid of for the last two years had come true. Actually not good. But objectively speaking, it wasn’t as bad as I had feared. Yes, I would have to say goodbye to many ideal notions and life goals, and it certainly wouldn’t always be easy. But otherwise? Otherwise, I could live my life the way I obviously wanted, even if it had taken me some time to figure that out.
I couldn’t fall asleep for a long time, so I lay awake in my bed and thought for the second time that day about my life, this time much more positively than in the afternoon. When I finally fell asleep, I was surprisingly happy.

Chapter 3
“Ask me why, I’ll say it’s most unusual
How can I even try to explain why today I feel like dancing
singing like lovers sing, when I wouldn’t normally do this kind of thing?
I wouldn’t normally do this kind of thing”
Once again, the ringing of the alarm clock jolted me awake. My first thought was: Already? My second: I don’t want to. My third: I’m gay. And then all the memories of the previous day slowly came back.
As I was on my way to the train station, nearly freezing – in moments like these, I hated winter – it somehow felt as if people could see what was going on inside me. As if I had changed overnight, as if they were all curiously scrutinizing me. The thought of being gay suddenly felt extremely strange, and although I was still the same person as yesterday, everything felt different.
Upon arriving at school, Felix gave me the latest news about the party that was supposed to take place at his place this Friday. Not only some people from our current class would come, but especially our friend group from middle school. I was really looking forward to seeing certain people again.
“By the way, Lena is coming too,” Felix mentioned and winked at me meaningfully.
“Uh-huh. Great,” I replied less than enthusiastically. I liked Lena; she was a good friend. For a while, I thought I had a crush on her, but I soon realized that wasn’t the case. That, however, didn’t seem to stop everyone else from wanting to set us up. That Lena herself wouldn’t have been opposed to it was somewhat of an open secret.
“Come on, Paul, I know you like her. And she likes you. You’d be perfect together,” Felix said, unwilling to let go of this topic.
“Not so loud,” I murmured more to myself and looked a bit embarrassed around the classroom to see if anyone had noticed. Of course, Simon and Lukas both had grins on their faces.
“Are you not going to introduce her to us on Friday, Paul?” Simon teased me. “I’d really like to meet her.”
"Yeah, let's see." I replied shortly and for the first time in my life, I was glad that our math teacher, Mr. Krämer, just walked in. "Sorry," Felix whispered to me, who had obviously noticed that I felt a bit uncomfortable with the topic, and then the class began.
Even today, I could only half-follow the lesson, and once again, Simon was the reason for it. Since I had now admitted to myself that I was probably gay, I could think about such things without too much guilt. Was I mistaken, or did he look even better today than yesterday? Occasionally, he turned back to me, and while I was shocked yesterday that I was even thinking about him, today I wondered why he did that. Well, he was probably just being nice; it's not unusual to smile at a friend. But didn't he realize what he was doing to me? He looked so sweet when he beamed at me. And every time he turned around, I would have loved to take him in my arms and cuddle up to him.
But I should rather not have such thoughts, because he was probably just as straight as everyone else, and if he ever found out, I could easily imagine that he wouldn't be too thrilled about it. Maybe I should just try to find a boyfriend, I thought, because then I wouldn't have to constantly crush on people I had no chance with, who wouldn't be okay with it either.
"It’s mad, to be in love with someone else
When you’re in love with he, she’s in love with me
but you know as well as I do
I can never think of anyone but you, all my life
Play with fire, play with guns
it’s easy to impress someone
Turning in my sleep, you called me a fool
To fall in love, is it so uncool?
Now I want to wake up
How I want to wake up"
The rest of the week passed surprisingly quickly. In my free time, I continued to inform myself about homosexuality, coming out, and everything related to it. The fears I had until then gradually diminished, and I was able to come to terms with being gay more and more each day. I often wondered why it had taken me so long to accept it, as I had often felt bad about it before and was plagued by self-doubt. But it wasn't so bad now. So why the fear?
Outwardly, I initially felt strange, as if I were suddenly someone else and everyone would notice, but I quickly realized that wasn't the case. On the contrary, no one seemed to have noticed anything, neither in my family nor among my friends. This helped me to become a bit more relaxed and I gradually managed to forget about the topic and return to a certain normality.
Overall, everything was going quite well. Until Friday.
Chapter 4
"I’d rather die than satisfy their curiosity
I’m kind of shy and dry and verging on ugly
They wonder what that I have got that they have not
They’ll never understand that none of that matters
Every boy and man feeling lonely
can’t understand why you’d be with me
Furthermore, we laugh and we draw
more attention every day so they say
Bet she’s not your girlfriend
Oh no, you couldn’t make her happy”
It was Friday, school was over, and I was full of anticipation for the party tonight at Felix's. I briefly considered what a gay person should wear and ended up with what I always wore. It would be even worse otherwise. After that, I spent a few minutes in front of the mirror – not that I was particularly meticulous, but my appearance did matter to me to some extent – and when I deemed the result acceptable, I quickly packed my things, said goodbye to my mother, and set off.
When I arrived at Felix's, things were already happening, so I mingled with the attendees after grabbing a suitable drink in the kitchen. Laura, Maja, Emma, Hannah, and Julian, whom I knew from my old class in secondary school, were already there. And Lena. I was somewhat afraid of encountering her, but I smiled at her as I entered the room. Only Simon and Lukas were missing, who lived a bit further away and always took a little longer.
“And Paul, how’s it going? Long time no see!” Julian greeted me, with whom Felix and I had laughed a lot in secondary school. It was nice to see him again after we had unfortunately had little to do with each other following our school transfer and the start of his training.
“Everything’s great, and you?” I replied.
“Yeah, things are going pretty well. What’s new with you guys?”
“Oh, nothing really.” A small part of me would have liked to answer that I was gay by now; on one hand, I wanted people to know and to deal with it openly. Thankfully, the part that preferred to handle it more cautiously and keep it secret for now maintained control.
After Julian moved on and I had briefly lost myself in thought, Lena suddenly stood next to me.
“Hi,” she said and smiled at me.
With Lena, as I said, it was a bit complicated. I liked her a lot – as a friend. And there was a time when I saw more than just a friend in her. Since I enjoyed being with her so much, I thought for a while that I was in love with her, but I quickly realized that wasn’t the case. Now I know that I was probably just looking for a girlfriend to prove to myself that I was into girls. So it was good that nothing more had happened between us back then, as she didn’t deserve to be "used" by me for such purposes.
The thing was that it was a kind of open secret that Lena had indeed had feelings for me for a while – hence Felix's comment the other day at school. In the eyes of our friends, we were probably seen as the perfect couple that just needed to find each other – at least that was the impression I sometimes had. As I said, I had sensed at some point that it wouldn’t be a good idea for us, and that had now been confirmed, but unfortunately, she didn’t know anything about it. And I couldn’t tell her that she should look for someone who deserved her, since, first, I officially didn’t know that she had feelings for me, second, I didn’t want to hurt her, and third, I would have had to explain why it couldn’t work. And for the last point, the question of why, I had only gotten the answer myself a few days ago, namely, that I was gay.
“Hey. How are you?” I replied, smiling back a bit uncertainly.
“Pretty okay so far. How’s it going with you?”
“It’s alright. Everything’s good.”
At that moment, Simon and Lukas came into the room, having just arrived. My gaze immediately fell on Simon, who looked stunning as always. However, his expression seemed a bit clouded for a moment as he looked in my and Lena's direction, then he put on a smile that unfortunately wasn’t as endearing as usual and came over to us.
“Hey, hey! You must be Lena, right? I’ve heard a lot about you!” he greeted us both. Lukas stood a step behind him and grinned at me. I was a bit confused for a moment about what to do and therefore let Lena do the talking.
“That’s right. And you are…?”
“Simon. Paul and I know each other from the FOS.”
“Oh yes, he and Felix have told me about you. You must be Lukas?” she asked, nodding in his direction.
“Exactly,” Lukas replied.
“And what have you heard about me, Simon?” Lena asked now. “Only good things, I hope!”
"Sure, of course. But nothing specific otherwise..." Simon replied somewhat hesitantly and threw me a quick glance that I couldn't quite interpret. Questioning, perhaps a bit dejected, uncertain. Then he smiled again as if nothing had happened, saying he didn't want to disturb us further and said goodbye in the direction of Felix and Julian, who were currently engaged in a lively discussion with Emma and Maja about something. The music, apparently. As if there was still much to discuss, when it was clear that each of them had no taste in music in their own way, right?
"Paul? What's wrong?" Lena suddenly asked.
"Hm?"
"You seem so absent and have been staring at the two of them the whole time. Is everything really okay with you?"
"Oh, yes, everything's fine, just a bit distracted..." I replied, slightly embarrassed. Was it really that obvious that I was looking at Simon longer than usual?
"Distracted, huh," Lena grinned now. "And that, even though you're talking to me? What a thing..."
"Well, hehe, it's just that there's a lot going on at school right now, you know? So I guess I can be a bit unfocused sometimes..." I tried to explain somehow while secretly wondering how I had managed to get myself into such an unnecessarily awkward situation again for no real reason.
"Sure, everything's fine, it's okay. I think there's food now, right?" Lena said, thankfully not wanting to press further.
In fact, the pizzas that Felix had ordered for us had just been delivered, so we all sat down together at the table and ate. Although Lena and I were sitting next to each other, since we weren't alone anymore, we joked more with the others and talked about all sorts of things. After that, we played various games, which I mostly lost (but as the saying goes, bad luck in games, good luck in love), before someone had the idea to turn the music up even louder, after which we all gradually started dancing and goofing around. It was sometimes hard to distinguish between the two with us anyway. And even though I had absolutely no sense of rhythm in such situations, I still had fun, even me. Until the moment when Lena slowly came closer to me and almost touched me while dancing. She was definitely not being pushy, but rather cautious, yet still clearly so. Maybe she had had one too many drinks after all? No, definitely not; she wasn't too keen on that.
In hindsight, I don't know why I did what I did. It was quite hasty and thoughtless, but on the other hand, it felt like the only option. In any case, I thought to myself at that moment that this couldn't continue between us. She deserved someone who could really love her, unlike me, and besides, I felt that our friendship would ultimately suffer if I already had an uncomfortable feeling about being with her sometimes. So I gathered all my courage, smiled at her somewhat uncertainly, and said, "Hey, can we maybe talk outside for a moment?"
"Sure, anytime." She looked briefly pleased, then seemed to notice from my expression that something was wrong.
We made our way out of the room towards the front door, and I felt like we were being thrown a few curious glances here and there. I started to tremble a bit and felt hot. Was this really a good idea? I could still just back out. No, it had to be done, I encouraged myself.
Once outside, we walked a few steps down the street; I didn't want anyone to overhear us in the end. Lena looked at me questioningly from the side but followed me without objection.
"What's wrong?" she finally asked when I still hadn't said a word. I probably seemed totally unfriendly, but it just felt like my throat was constricted.
"Nothing, um, well..." I managed to say, not very cleverly.
"Did I get too close to you in there? I'm sorry, I shouldn't have done that..."
"Hm, it's fine." I said. I couldn't do this.
"No, obviously not. What's going on with you? Is everything okay?" she continued, and now her voice suddenly sounded empathetic, and I remembered exactly why I valued her so much as a friend.
"So, yes, everything's fine, but... um..."
"Come on, Paul, spit it out. Whatever you want to say, I won't be mad at you for it."
"So, I'm sorry, I've noticed that you might be imagining more between us, but that unfortunately won't work. It just can't..." I stammered, staring past her into the darkness.
"Yeah, I figured that. It's okay. You don't have to say why, but I hope I didn't do anything wrong or hurt you in any way?" she replied somewhat dejectedly but composed.
"No, it's not your fault. It's just... um..."
"Yeah?"
"So... promise me you won't tell anyone, okay?" Oh God, I really couldn't do this. I was scared of her reaction, I was shaking all over, I suddenly felt much hotter again, and I could barely speak straight.
"Of course, Paul. You can trust me, okay?"
"I'm... well, um... I... am gay." Did I really just say that? What had I done? What if she didn't understand, what if she went back inside and told everyone? Why didn't I just leave it alone? Doubts overwhelmed me, and suddenly I was really afraid of what could happen next.
"Oh, okay. That's a bit... unexpected, but not bad!" she said softly, smiling encouragingly at me. I still couldn't believe that this was really happening.
When I didn't respond, still staring past her into the darkness, she stepped closer and put her arm around my shoulder.
"You don't have to be afraid, okay? I have no problem with it, and I won't tell anyone unless you explicitly allow me to, okay?" she said gently. "Admittedly, I didn't expect this and I'm a bit disappointed, as I could have imagined more with you... as you said... but you can't help how I feel. And I'll always stand by you, no matter what happens."
"Thank you," I finally managed to say, even though I still felt unable to speak.
"You're welcome. That's what friends are for, right?" she smiled at me now. I only nodded slowly.
"Should we go back inside, or do you want to calm down a bit first?" It felt strange to be cared for by her like this, but I was just infinitely grateful to her at that moment.
"Just a bit longer. I don't think I can go back in there now..." I murmured quietly, astonished that I could obviously speak again. At the same time, I felt a certain panic about going back inside with the others and pretending nothing had happened. I was relieved, but still extremely unsure, and it felt like everyone could see what had happened if we went back in now.
"Hm, I understand... If you want, we can take a short walk and talk about it...?" Lena asked cautiously.
"I don't think I can talk much right now; I'm still shaking too much when I speak..." I tried to laugh, but it didn't really work. Maybe I should just go home and calm down?
"Okay. Maybe you need a little quiet time first, right?" Lena said exactly what I had just been thinking. "We can go inside quickly, grab your things, you say goodbye to Felix and tell him you're not feeling well... Right?"
"Yes, you're right!" Together we walked back to the house where Felix lived. "And thank you!" I said quietly just before we reached the front door.
Inside, it was extremely hot and loud compared to the cold night air outside. In a trance, I followed Lena back to the others, still unable to fully grasp what had just happened.
"Hey, where have you two been?" Felix greeted us, looking at us curiously.
"Oh, just getting some fresh air; he wasn't feeling well," Lena replied, thankfully for me—I didn't feel like I could speak right now.
"Oh, okay? Is everything alright again, Paul?" Felix asked. He sounded a bit concerned now, his grin fading.
"Yeah, I'm fine again..." I stammered. "But I think I'd rather go home and rest a bit..."
"Hm, that's too bad, but if you think so, that's probably best..."
"Yeah, probably. Thanks again for the invitation; I still had a lot of fun!" I managed to say, and then Lena accompanied me to the hallway, where I quickly packed my backpack and got dressed again.
"Are you leaving already?" I suddenly heard Simon's voice behind me. He stood in the doorway between the living room and the hallway, the party in full swing behind him. I couldn't read his expression.
"Yeah, unfortunately I'm not feeling well. But I'll see you on Monday at school."
"Okay, that's too bad. Have a good trip home and get well soon!"
"Thanks," I stammered, smiled at him a bit awkwardly, and turned to Lena, who said she would take me to the door.
"Bye," I quickly said to Simon; he smiled back at us, said "Bye, see you Monday," turned around, and went back to the others.
Finally outside in the fresh air, I felt a bit better again, and I noticed that I was regaining control over my body and calming down a bit.
"Can you make it home alone, or should I take you?" Lena asked now, still sounding a bit concerned.
"No, it's fine, thanks. Besides, I don't want to ruin your fun completely."
"Okay, as you wish. Maybe you'd like to meet again tomorrow, then you could tell me a bit more?"
"Let's see, if you want..." On one hand, I wanted to talk to her about it now that she knew, but on the other hand, the thought of discussing my being gay, which I had only accepted a few days ago, felt strange.
"Sure. If that's okay with you, of course. But you can really talk to me about anything."
"Thanks. And have fun with the others. See you tomorrow!"
"Good night, Paul. See you tomorrow!" Her gaze was loving, concerned, sad, and joyful all at once, and I would have loved to talk to her about all of it right then. After all, it probably wasn't easy for her either. But that could wait until tomorrow. I smiled gratefully at her, waved goodbye, and made my way home through the cold winter night.
"We all make a mess of our lives from time to time
It’s part of the process that you stumble as you climb
And if you ever feel the pain is far too big a deal
I say with pride I’ll be on your side
You’ve got a home here
Call it what you want, you’ve got a home here
You’re gonna want it when you can’t
face the world and you need some support to succeed
You’ve got a home"
Chapter 5
When I woke up the next morning – it was Saturday, which meant I didn’t have to get up in the middle of the night – I still hadn’t fully realized what had happened in the last few hours. My mother had been a bit surprised that I was home so early again, but she had bought my little white lie that I wasn’t feeling well and needed some rest. After I got ready for bed, I lay awake for a long time, feeling relieved about how my first outing had gone, but at the same time, doubts crept back in about whether it had been the right step or if I should have waited longer. I also worried about what would happen if all the other party guests found out somehow what had happened while I wasn’t there. That thought scared me quite a bit, but I tried to push it aside. Lena would never tell anyone, and no one could have overheard us, I thought, but an uneasy feeling remained. I finally fell asleep late at night.
At breakfast with my family the next morning, I wasn’t very talkative and my mind was on all sorts of other things. The others probably noticed, but fortunately, they didn’t bring it up. Everyone has a bad day sometimes.
After that, I checked my messages on my phone. At the top was one from Lena, asking if and when we wanted to meet today to talk. I suggested we could meet in the evening.
Additionally, Felix and, to my surprise, Simon had messaged me. Both seemed to want to know if I was feeling better. I didn’t open the messages, turned off my phone, packed my backpack, and took the subway to the city to take photos. I just needed to switch off, clear my head, and think about something else, and that worked best for me when I was wandering around with my camera in hand. I could deal with the others later; right now, I needed time for myself.
“Cross a windy bridge, one winter night
Past Embankment Gardens, enter warmth and light
Face the music (it’s never easy), forget the chill
Face the future (it’s never easy), find the will
If life is worth living, it’s got to be done
One might be forgiven for thinking it’s a life on the run
Many roads will cross through many lives
but somehow you survive”
In the evening, I met Lena for a walk. It was a bit uncomfortable due to the cold, but I didn’t want to meet at either of our homes or in a bar or café for fear of being overheard. Not that it was all that likely, but the risk felt too high. I was already struggling with the thought of even talking about it, as every thought that left my safe inner self as a word could theoretically come back to me someday.
Lena was already at our meeting point, standing in the glow of the streetlight with her jacket pulled up to the top.
I greeted her, and she seemed happy to see me. At least.
“How are you?” she asked.
Well, what was I supposed to say? On one hand, good, because she knew. And on the other hand, bad, because she knew. Complicated. To be honest, I didn’t even know the answer to the question myself.
“Um. Quite okay. At least I think so. It just feels extremely unusual that you know, and somehow the thought that it’s no longer a secret scares me. But I’m really grateful to you for reacting the way you did.”
“I understand. And… how did you… actually find out?” It seemed Lena was also struggling to find the right words, but her curiosity ultimately seemed to win out.
“Well, it had actually been obvious for a while that I just wasn’t really interested in girls and was in boys. If I had been honest with myself. But… I didn’t accept it; I didn’t want to be gay and tried to suppress it for two years, tried to convince myself that it couldn’t be true. I was just scared, and only recently did I slowly start to cautiously confront the topic. Probably because I wouldn’t have been able to hold out much longer otherwise. And eventually, my fear went away, and I could accept it for myself.”
“Oh, okay. I can imagine that it wasn’t easy…”
“Well…” Surprisingly, it felt good to talk to someone about what had been on my mind for so long and what had become my best-kept secret over time. So much so that I had even hidden and suppressed it from myself.
“Are you mad at me that nothing will come of us? I wanted it for a while, to be honest, but at some point, I just realized that it wouldn’t work. And eventually, I could also admit to myself why.” Even though it sounded strange – this question had been on my mind the whole time, as I somehow felt a twinge of guilt towards her.
"Well, ... as I said, I'm of course a bit disappointed because I didn't expect it. But somehow I already felt that you didn't want it; I just didn't know the reason, which was much worse for me. I'm actually a bit relieved that it's not my fault. But to be honest, you can't help it, so why should I be angry with you? I'm just happy for you that you've finally found yourself."
"Okay, good. I really wish you someone who can love you the way I couldn't!" I said, and even though that should have sounded pretty serious, I just couldn't help but grin at her playfully.
"Thanks." Lena laughed now too. That felt good and I liked it much better than the serious conversation we had before. "By the way, how did you even know that I wanted something from you? I mean, of course, I showed some tendencies, but was it really that obvious?"
"What? Of course it was obvious!" I couldn't help but laugh. "Felix has been telling me all the time what a perfect couple we would be. I'd rather not know what he thinks happened between us yesterday after I suddenly fled..."
"Oh." That seemed to embarrass her a bit now. "Yeah, that's true, he did look at me strangely a few times yesterday after I didn't want to say what happened, but I didn't think much of it..."
"Well, he's probably more my 'problem' in the future since I see him every day, and he definitely won't let it go that easily." I said. Well, if he just asks, he would eventually lose interest.
A cold gust of wind blew past us, causing the trees next to the sidewalk to sway restlessly. In the darkness, it looked almost ghostly. We walked a few meters silently beside each other, each lost in our thoughts.
"Is there actually someone else you have a crush on?" Lena suddenly asked. That came a bit unexpectedly, and I hadn't really thought about it myself, but...
"Well, ... um, no, not really..." I replied somewhat shyly.
"Sure? Maybe Simon?" She said it as a joke, but that hit the mark with me. I hadn't realized it myself, but now that she said it, I realized that I had been quite infatuated with him over the last few days and weeks. Embarrassing. Hopefully, I wasn't being as obvious as she was with me, because then I would have some problems.
"How did you come up with that?" I dared to ask cautiously, praying that she hadn't noticed how my voice had changed a bit, how I had become more tense.
"I think you looked at him strangely a few times yesterday. And he looked at you. But I might be mistaken, right?"
"Yeah, definitely." I tried to cover my embarrassment with a laugh, which seemed to convince her. Lucky me. Not that it would have been bad if she had known my next secret, but she didn't need to know everything. A man needs his secrets; I had read that somewhere.
We talked for a while about this and that, then we said goodbye and made our way home.
"Looking back now, I can see, the ghost of myself as I used to be
Looking back now, I can see, the ghost of myself haunting me
Looking back now, I can see, the ghost of myself wondering what to be
Looking back now, I can see, the ghost of myself searching for the key"
The next day was a Sunday and passed relatively quickly. I tried to distract myself by doing various things for school; otherwise, not much happened. I was a bit tense when I thought about the next day, as I didn't know what Felix, Simon, and Lukas would say. If they would say anything at all. From their perspective, not much had happened, yet I was still unsure.
Chapter 6
"We're meant to be friends, that's what it says in the script
Is it really the end if sometimes I stray just a bit?
Oh no! It should be poetry not prose
I'm in love with you, do you think it shows?
And everyone knows when they look at us
of course they do it must be obvious
I've never told you, now I suppose
that you're the only one who doesn't know"
(Pet Shop Boys – It must be obvious*)
At school, I was greeted by Felix, who immediately bombarded me with questions.
"Hey, what happened on Friday? Something else must have happened, right?
"No, I just suddenly didn't feel well..." I tried to deflect, but I couldn't talk my way out of it that quickly.
"Come on, something happened with Lena! Did you kiss? Or argue? I didn't get anything out of her on Friday, she just said I should ask you..."
"No, we didn't kiss, and everything is fine between us..."
"But would you like to kiss her?" Felix asked now. He had sensed an exciting topic, and generally, I could discuss the love lives of various people with him all day; it was usually fun. But not when it came to my own, and especially not if he could get closer to my secret.
"No, not really, but whatever..."
"No? Why not? You would fit so well together!"
"Well, no, we're just friends, nothing more."
"Are you sure? I somehow don't believe you. She looks good too, don't you think?" He just wouldn't give up, which I was already finding a little annoying on a Monday morning. It was exhausting.
"Yeah, I don't know, she does. But..." I didn't get any further, as Simon just walked into the classroom and approached us. I fell silent, but he seemed to have already caught on to what was going on.
"What, you don't know? Why not? She actually fits you really well..." he immediately chimed in – had everyone conspired against me now?
"Oh please, don't you start too..." I tried to fend him off, but it was probably too late.
"Imagine, he doesn't want to kiss her either," Felix interjected again.
"Really? You can't just let that opportunity pass by?" Simon grinned at me mischievously. I felt a bit worse again when I thought about whom I would actually like to kiss right now. That could not come out.
I was just thinking about how to get out of this embarrassing situation when our German teacher's arrival saved me once again. "Good morning," she announced in a voice that suggested it didn't feel like one to her. "I need some grades from you, which is why you will all be working on a project." She got straight to the point. "You will work in pairs; I have already assigned the teams to keep things from getting out of hand. Your topics are listed on the information sheet that I will hand out. Any questions?" No one raised their hand. "Who is excited and can't wait to get started?" Very funny. But fine, let's just do that too...
When she presented the group assignments she had set, I was quite surprised. I would be working with Simon. He immediately turned around and smiled at me.
Finally something positive. But at the same time, doubts crept back in. What if he started to suspect something? I definitely had to hold back on the infatuation, and overall, I should stop thinking about him, as that would lead to nothing. Except maybe to ruining the friendship. In the worst case.
We were to present the epoch of Expressionism in a presentation. Well, too soon to be happy. Simon came over to discuss our approach.
"How do you want to do this? I think we should at least meet once so we can handle everything together and prepare, right?" he suggested.
"Yeah, that's true. When would you have time?" I asked.
"Hm, maybe today? That would work well for me."
"Yeah, okay, it works for me too. Where should we meet?"
"I don't really care, but it might be a bit tricky at my place," he replied, looking at me questioningly.
"You can come over to my place if you want! My parents and my sister won't be home this afternoon anyway..." Did I really just invite him to my house? I wondered if that was such a good idea. But well, why not, we were only going to study anyway.
"Sure, I'd love to!" Simon said, beaming at me. If he only knew what havoc he was wreaking on me with that look...
"Would it be okay for you if I come right after school? Because it takes a bit of time for me to drive home and then to you," he asked.
"No problem, we can do it that way." That settled everything, and I spent the rest of the school day alternating between looking forward to the afternoon, feeling a bit anxious, and convincing myself that we just wanted to do schoolwork and that it was nothing special.
"In the air I can feel something magical becoming real
From the other side looking in
Come on throw the dice and tonight we’ll win
(Live it) It’s the story of our lives
(Don’t give it) It’s the way we’ve always been
Though the mountains may divide, we can reach the sea
And I believe, we can change, we can make it more than a dream
And I believe, we can change, it’s not as strange as it might seem”
(Pet Shop Boys – More than a dream*)
When the class finally ended, we went home together, talking about all sorts of topics on the S-Bahn, just not about the schoolwork we were supposed to be doing. Just like always. We laughed a lot, and I was relieved that I had no problem being alone with him or talking to him normally.
“Do you want to eat something?” I asked when we arrived at my place. Yes, a little snack wouldn’t be bad before we got to the mandatory part, we both thought, and so we spent a few fun minutes looking for something to eat, preparing it, and consuming it.
Afterward, we went to my room, but instead of doing German as planned, Simon first took a closer look at my shelves while we continued to chat.
Suddenly, he became serious again and asked, “Why don’t you want to be with Lena?” Just like that, without warning, and no longer teasing like in the morning in front of Felix and Lukas, but rather curious and interested.
The answer “because I’m gay” was out of the question, but otherwise, I realized that I wanted to tell him at least part of the truth. At least as much as possible. I don’t know why, but the situation was completely different than at school, where I usually just felt embarrassed.
“I don’t know. Do you know the feeling when you’re really in love with someone, when you can only think about that person and would give anything to get closer to them? I just don’t feel that with Lena. I like her; she’s a very good friend, but unfortunately, nothing more.” Wow. Did I just say that, someone who had never had a relationship in 17 years and was generally labeled as “unromantic” by his environment?
“Hmm, yeah, I think I understand what you mean. I know that feeling,” Simon replied, still serious.
“Really? What about you? Do you have a girlfriend?” I dared to ask.
“No, but…” he started, then fell silent in the middle of the sentence.
“But?” I cautiously probed – I had no idea where I suddenly found the courage.
“Well, the feeling you just described. There’s someone for me that fits that description…”
“Cool,” I just replied, as I was somewhere between curiosity, hope, and disappointment.
“And what about you? Is there someone…?” Simon asked, looking at me seriously and questioningly. His gaze was somehow strange and hard to interpret.
“Hmm, yeah. I think so, but…” I stammered, as that was getting closer to the truth than I actually wanted. But something inside me compelled me not to change the subject as I would have liked to, but to hold his gaze.
Simon looked at me slightly sadly, then tried a smile, which didn’t really convince me. The situation was strange; I was sitting on my desk chair, he was on my bed only about a meter away. Somehow, I was extremely tense, I felt hot, and I noticed I was starting to tremble slightly.
“Paul…?” Simon began, but then he stopped, looked to the side, and said, “Sorry, maybe this is getting too personal; let’s leave it.”
“No, it’s okay, go ahead,” I replied, trying to make my voice sound friendly and not too nervous.
“You know, well… the person I meant… is you,” he murmured quietly, avoiding looking at me. I was speechless and couldn’t believe he had just said that. Could it really be that my deepest dreams were coming true right now?
“Sorry, I shouldn’t have said that… Maybe I should just go?” Simon asked now, tense, as I needed to process the information and couldn’t say anything yet.
“No, it’s okay… you know… I feel the same way…” I finally stammered and looked uncertainly at Simon, who now also looked quite surprised. Then I stood up, walked over to him, sat down next to him, and cautiously put my arm around his shoulder to comfort him and also to assure myself that it wasn’t a dream.
Simon also seemed to slowly realize what had just happened. He still looked at me uncertainly and asked, “Really?”
“Yes. That’s also the reason why nothing will happen with Lena. I… am gay.” Although he probably already figured that out himself, I still found it extremely difficult to say those words.
Now his expression brightened a bit; the tension seemed to fall away from him.
“Well, me too,” he mumbled, embarrassed.
And then we embraced, cuddled up to each other, and let ourselves sink back onto the bed. It felt incredibly and indescribably beautiful to be so close to him, to feel his body and to slowly stroke him. We looked into each other’s eyes, smiled at each other, and then our faces came closer together and we kissed. Once. Twice. And a little more often. This was surely one of the most beautiful moments of my life so far, and it felt so extremely good that I might as well not even start to describe it, as there are truly no words for this feeling. This must be what "happiness" feels like.
“A nervous boy in several ways
I never knew the world could operate this way
I was nervous when we stopped to speak
and the world came crashing around my feet
We don’t talk of love, we’re much too shy
but nervously we wonder when and why”
I felt how the constant touches all over my body excited me more and more, and Simon seemed to feel similarly. So it was only a matter of time before our hands began to explore the more intimate areas. Before I could no longer think clearly from excitement, I interrupted the stroking for a brief moment and looked at Simon uncertainly. “Should we stop?” I asked him slightly nervously. I didn’t want to push him into anything he might regret later. Instead of answering, he just smiled at me happily, shook his head, and continued with his caresses, which now dangerously aimed toward my groin. He commented on this with a cheeky grin, and I just had to kiss him again. I think I was in love.
Later, we both lay still on my bed for several minutes, trying to comprehend what had just happened, then I turned on my side and kissed him. He still felt just as incredible as at the beginning. I would have never thought it possible that I could feel something like this.
“I don’t know why
it always comes as a surprise
to find I’m here with you
You smile and I am rubbing my eyes
at a dream come true”
After we had gotten dressed again after a while, we realized it had gotten quite late. Of course, we hadn’t done any German, but at that moment, we both didn’t care at all!
“I think I love you!” I whispered softly into his ear, to which he smiled at me, kissed me again, and said, “I love you too.”
Of course, there were plenty of questions we wanted to ask each other, but since he had to go home soon, we decided to wait until the next day.
“I don’t think I can pretend nothing happened at school tomorrow,” Simon said as we said goodbye, and I had to agree with him.
“Whatever, it just has to work. No one can notice anything,” I said. He nodded seriously, and then he left after we kissed one more time to say goodbye.
When my parents and sister came home a little later, I had already cleared away all possible traces and acted as if nothing had happened, which they bought, even though the others were surely wondering why I was suddenly so unusually cheerful.
“You can live your life lonely, heavy as stone
Live your life learning and working alone
Say this is all you want, but I don’t believe that it’s true
‘cause when you least expect it, waiting round the corner for you
Love comes quickly, whatever you do, you can’t stop falling
Love comes quickly, whatever you do, you can’t stop falling
I know it sounds ridiculous but speaking from experience
It may seem romantic and that’s no defence
love will always get to you”