Together Forever

by David Horne

  “I’m sorry if I was harsh back there. I never meant to disrespect you like that, and I’m sorry if I did.” He sincerely said to me.

  Although we were both facing each other, most of the time, we were just avoiding each other’s eyes.

  “Yeah, you did,” I confirmed.

  “Listen, I like girls. This, for me, is just fooling around with my best friend. It’s better to bust a load with a buddy then only with my hand, you know? But we should stop. I don’t want this affecting what we have.”

  Maybe he really was straight, and that was nothing more than just sex to him. That could be the case, even though I really wanted him to feel something for me too. Perhaps it was just my head making me see things that weren’t really there, just to give me some hope. But, faith in that would eventually destroy me.

  The best thing for me to do was to call it off and even distance myself from him until all of what I was feeling went away, but I craved his presence too much to let this opportunity slip through my hands.

  “I don’t feel anything. I just think that you’re hot too, and I would like to keep coming with you if that makes any sense.” I reinforced the lie with a fake smile at the end.

  “Are you sure you don’t feel anything else?”

  “Yeah. What makes you think that I do?”

  “You told me yesterday that you loved me when I left.”

  “But that was eight years ago. It’s gone now.”

  “First loves are never truly gone. Not the ones that are real enough, at least,” Daniel said to me with a calm voice.

  He seemed to be talking from experience. Was it possible that one of the girls he dated back in school was his first love? He got up and looked at me right in the eyes this time.

  “Are we cool then?” He asked me.

  I nodded positively with my head, and he smiled softly, just before stretching his hand out to me. I grabbed it, and he pulled me up, right into his arms, holding me with them. Both of our bodies were glued onto each other, and even though Daniel was a smidge taller than me, he was facing down so that his lips could reach mine one more time.

  “You like those kisses, huh?” I asked sarcastically.

  Daniel laughed.

  “Maybe,” he answered just before kissing me again.

  This time, he put his tongue in the mix, making for much more of a passionate kiss. Since we had already come twice today, I wasn’t really sure how the kissing was part of his sexual desire, but I wasn’t complaining.

  “Maybe you could stay awhile,” he suggested.

  “Okay,” I agreed.

  I picked up my phone, and Carla hadn’t sent me any text message yet, which was weird. So, I decided to write her first:

  Me: Is everything okay?

  Now, I just had to wait for her reply. I placed my phone down on Daniel’s bed and saw that he was getting undressed, leaving only his boxers on. He threw himself onto his bed and laid there, staring at me.

  I don’t know what was going on through his mind, but I wasn’t getting ‘sex only’ vibes from him. Maybe he was just confused, or he got off with this kind of intimate stuff. I honestly didn’t know which of us was most confused about what was going on.

  “Can you imagine if we had done this when we were still teenagers? I mean, the number of times I jerked off in this room was insane. It would’ve really helped to have a jerk-off buddy back then,” Daniel revealed.

  “But you could fuck any girl that you wanted. You didn’t have to use your own hand.”

  “Yeah, but I was still horny,” he said. His doorbell suddenly rang, and Daniel got up immediately. “It’s probably some delivery for my dad. I’ll be right back.”

  He did put on some pants before heading down, but the fact that he still went with his six-pack showing off was quite arousing. I took the opportunity to look around his room a little more. On his shelf, there was still one book from high school, which I thought was quite odd.

  It was a book from a class that we didn’t have together since it was optional, and I decided not to take it. I picked up the book and opened it. It was sketched all-over, with some random drawings and some class notes. I found some pages with hearts and a name written-off right next to it. I flipped the page over and was able to quickly figure out which name it was; it was mine. Since my name is Alex, it could be both for a boy or for a girl, so he would be covered if someone found the book.

  I wasn’t shocked, I just didn’t know how to process the fact that he might’ve felt something for me too. Next to the book was a diary. And I know that you shouldn’t read other people’s journals, but it was stronger than me. The journal was locked with a number code lock pad, but I didn’t have to guess hard for it: it was just three zeros.

  Entry #1 – 22.04.2012

  My dad keeps saying that journals are for girls, but my mom gave me this to express my emotions. I have been acting like a dick for the last couple of weeks. I’m just sad that soon I’ll be out of here and that Alex can’t come with me.

  I don’t even want to become a nurse. That is Alex’s dream, not mine. I feel trapped like I’m not in control of my life. My dad keeps saying that it’s going to be good for me to be away from Alex. He always said that he liked guys and was a bad influence for me. That he was making me too soft. And maybe it’s true. The things that I have been feeling are not typical.

  The other day I was fucking this girl at this party, but the only thing that I could think of was how much I would rather be doing it with Alex. I hope my dad never finds this diary… He can’t know what I’ve been feeling for him. Maybe I should’ve stopped talking to him all those years ago –

  Daniel ripped the journal away from my hands, and his violent expression quickly turned into a sad one once he saw that I was crying. I wasn’t even aware that I had tears falling down my face. Without being able to look him in the eyes, I just started running away. Once I reached his door, he grabbed my arm violently, stopping me from opening the door.

  “Don’t go,” he said with his teeth closed. He also couldn’t stare me in the eyes. “Please,” he begged me.

  Facing the door, I got my chin up and stopped crying. “I have to,” I told him in the most severe voice tone that I could. Then, I opened the door and got out. I didn’t even look back.

  As I was getting into the car, I saw Daniel standing just outside his door, staring back at me. I ignored him and got in, and, about one minute later, I was already home. Since it was Saturday, I knew that my mom was going to be home, so I had to be careful so that she wouldn’t realize what was going on between Daniel and me.

  When I opened the door, I could see that my mom was sitting on the couch, watching a food documentary. She greeted me, and I replied, just before heading upstairs into my bedroom, as I always do. I wish that I could have my own house by now, or an apartment really. Despite having been saving money for it for years, I still don’t feel comfortable moving out.

  As I was entering my room, I realized that I left my phone on top of Daniel’s bed. I smacked my head, punishing me for being such an idiot. How could I forget my phone? Not only was it a costly phone, but I also didn’t want to go back into his house.

  I couldn’t believe that such a thing was happening. First, Daniel kisses me and jerks me off out of nowhere, and now I had to find out that he was in love with me back in high school all along. Processing my emotions was something that I wasn’t able to do at the moment. Everything was fuzzy in my head.

  The clock on my bedside table was showing 4:15pm. It was still super early, but I killed the lights and got into bed. I took off all my clothes first and then just closed my eyes. I couldn't even sleep with my mind working like crazy to process everything, but I had to decide what to do next.

  What I was most upset about wasn’t the fact he probably felt something for me, too, was that he was blaming me for such feelings. Like I was making him like me back. I’m pretty sure it doesn’t work that way… I think that Daniel has been repressing his
feelings all these years. He probably likes guys too and has been hiding it to himself. This obsession with other guys maybe isn’t just a sexual thing, he probably feels attracted to them but doesn’t admit it.

  I know that it can be quite hard to process the fact that you’re not straight, and he was just 17 years old when he wrote that entry in his diary. However, I was still upset about his attitude. And I was also not over the things that he said to me in the car. Even if a big part of me wants to go over to his house right now and tell him that I still feel something for him, I don’t trust it to be that strong a feeling to walk into the mess that he’s currently in. I don’t need that drama right now.

  Nevertheless, I should go talk to him and maybe get my phone back. With a lot of effort, I got up and get dressed again. I decided to just walk to his house since it was so close to mine, so I quickly got on my way.

  “Where are you going?” my mother asked.

  “To Daniel’s,” I answered with the door already open.

  When I got close enough to Daniel’s house, I saw that Carla’s car was just parked outside. What was she possibly doing here? I knocked on Daniel’s door, and it took him a really long time to come and open it.

  He was still shirtless when he looked at me. By his expression, he wasn’t expecting me to be back so soon. Right behind him came Carla, from upstairs. Why was I getting so upset over the two of them being in his bedroom?

  “I left my phone here,” I said to Daniel, looking away from him.

  “I know,” he said. “I’ll pick it up.”

  Not that I was expecting him to be friendly after me reading his diary, but he could’ve at least asked me to get inside. Carla approached me with a bitchy expression on her face. I never saw her acting like that before.

  “I called you, and he answered. Thanks for letting me know that he wasn’t gay,” Carla said.

  “But I never said he was.”

  “Yeah, you never said that you were hitting on a straight dude either,” she said without dropping the bitchy attitude. She was unrecognizable. And what the fuck was she talking about?

  Daniel came with my phone and handed it over to me, trying to close the door right after. However, I was able to stop it and get inside his house.

  “What the fuck did you tell her?” I asked him in a threatening tone.

  “The truth, dude. I already said that I don’t want anything with you,” Daniel said.

  “I can’t believe what I’m hearing,” I exclaimed, laughing nervously. “What the hell Carla? You’re my best friend!”

  “Not anymore. You’re harassing Daniel for years! Do you think that’s good?”

  “I’m not harassing anyone! He was the one who kissed me!” I shouted.

  “Dude, get your shit together!” Daniel also raised his voice, but he couldn’t look at me directly. “I’m not a faggot!”

  “The Carla I know would never be with a guy that said that word,” I said to her. She remained quiet, which was really unusual for her. I don’t know why she was acting like that.

  I went over to Daniel and grabbed my phone from his hands, but before I left, I stared him right in his eyes.

  “You know what you’re doing. And you bet that you just lost me forever.” I said to him.

  I saw the look in his eyes, and he didn’t like what he heard. I could sense his sadness, but he didn’t say anything. The door closed behind me with a bang, and my guess was that it was Carla. I don’t know why she was acting like that; I’ve known her for years! What did Daniel tell her about me that made her turn on me like that?

  Saying that I was hurt was an understatement. I was beyond furious.

  Chapter Two

  I never thought to be going on my first ever trip out of the country with both my childhood best friend and my current best friend. I also never thought that we wouldn’t be on speaking terms either. We were already in line to board the plane, and this was the first time that I was seeing the two of them together since the incident at Daniel’s house.

  Working with Carla hasn’t been easy either, plus I am starting to think maybe I didn’t know her as well as I thought I did. To this day, two weeks later, I still don’t know what he said to her that afternoon. However, as time goes by, the less I want to find out.

  Both of them were hugging a lot, which I thought was quite weird, but it was only when I saw the two of them kiss that I understood that something was up. Carla was not the type of girl to date any guy, so my guess was that they were just having fun, no strings attached. Still, it made me cold to my core to watch them having such intimacy with each other.

  I was angry, sad, and confused. I had been so excited to finally go on this trip but when it happened, it was under the worse possible circumstances. They were both relatively close to me, but neither one of them looked my way.

  “Hey,” said Raja, arriving just behind me.

  “Hi, Raja,” I greeted him.

  Usually, we never talk, but we always greet each other every time we see each other. Raja attended the same high school as Daniel and me when he arrived from India. At the time, he was an outcast and bullied, so I always tried to be kind to him.

  “I thought you and Daniel were together,” he said, looking at Daniel and Carla kissing each other again.

  “Why?” I asked him.

  “Because you two were doing something in the changing room.”

  “I’m sorry you had to see that.”

  “It’s okay. But what happened?”

  “Turns out that he doesn’t want people to find out that he sucks dick, so my guess is that he grabbed the closest girl available.”

  “I thought Carla was your best friend,” Raja said.

  “Yeah, she was.”

  “Shit. I’m sorry, Alex.”

  “It’s okay.”

  At this point, I didn’t even care if Raja could tell anyone about what Daniel and I were doing in the changing room the other day at the hospital. Let them know. Daniel deserved it.

  As we were boarding the plane, I found out that Raja was going to sit by my side, along with some other random passenger. I took a close look at Raja: brown and soft skin, light-brown eyes, and short black hair. He’s not muscled like Daniel or even me, but he is slim.

  Since I was sitting on the seat that was closest to the corridor, I was also closer to the other three positions right across me. In them, Daniel, Michael, and Carla were sitting. Great.

  Raja was putting his headphones on to watch something on his tablet when he noticed where I was looking. He glanced at Carla and Daniel, holding hands just across from us and then looked at me.

  “Ignore them,” he said to me. “Here,” he said, giving me a headphone splitter. “Connect your headphones, and let’s watch this movie together.”

  Raja has barely ever talked to me, but I appreciated how sweet he was to me at the moment. I connected my headphones onto his tablet, and Raja placed it in the middle of both of our seats, leaning onto my leg to hold it a little better.

  “What do you want to watch?” he asked me.

  “Whatever you want,” I answered.

  “Do you like horror movies?”

  “Yeah, I love them,” I answered.

  “Cool,” Raja said with a big smile. “Me too. Let’s watch one.”

  Unfortunately, I glanced over to my right and saw that Daniel was looking this way with a rather unsympathetic expression on his face. I ignored him and focused on the movie that had just begun playing.

  Luckily, there was Wi-Fi on this plane, so my phone was still connected to the internet. My mom was texting me and asking how the flight was going so far. This was going to be a very long trip, around three days total across four different flights. We were going to be on this one for the next thirteen and a half hours. Hopefully, Raja has enough movies for us to watch on his tablet.

  The film that we were watching was surprisingly good. Somewhat old, but I had never heard of it before. Probably because it was an Indian produ
ction. It had a lot of scary scenes in it, but neither Raja nor I seemed to be bothered by them.

  We weren’t even one hour into the movie when I got a message on my phone via an internet messaging app. It was from Daniel.

  Daniel: Can we talk?

  I went ahead and blocked his number. Then, I locked my phone and focused on the movie. I wasn’t going to let him ruin this trip, I just had to ignore him as much as I could.

  My phone vibrated once more. It was Daniel again, this time through a social media app.

  Daniel: Meet me in the bathroom. It’s serious. Then I’ll leave you alone.

  Me: No.

  I probably shouldn't have answered, but I was getting pretty frustrated with his now changed attitude toward me. This was the first time he was talking to me since that afternoon.

  Daniel: Please. I just want to talk.

  Why did I want to go and hear what he had to say? Maybe because just the thought of being alone with him again makes me tremble. Instinctively, I replied.

  Me: Fine.

  Was I dooming myself? I wasn’t going to let him get into my head, but I was actually interested in hearing his version of what happened that day. I was mostly curious about Carla and why she was behaving the way that she was toward me.

  Daniel got up and headed to the bathroom. For a minute, I thought that it was too obvious to go right after him, but then I realized that there were more bathrooms on this plane.

  “I have to go to the bathroom,” I said to Raja.

  “Okay,” he answered.

  If Raja were to pay more attention to his surroundings, he would figure out that we were together. However, if he eventually does realize that we’re both missing, I think that he won’t say anything to anyone. I also realized that I was still thinking about protecting Daniel. He was the one that told me to meet him in the bathroom. Why was I afraid of people finding it out?

  I shook that feeling off and went for the bathroom, opening the door as quick as I could. It was a tiny bathroom, just like every airplane bathroom. The space was so small for both of us that our bodies were already touching.