Davide

This is an incredibly dark story, but I love it. Capturing what Simon was feeling throughout the story in such a dark state, to the point where I can feel it, doesn't seem like an easy task. And it's made harder because it's the central aspect of the whole story, but you did an amazing job at it. I hope you weren't capturing your own experiences, no one deserves to go through anything remotely close to what Simon did (this isn't a question, that would be way too personal).

This is a great story and I recommend it to anyone who can stomach it's themes. But this is the darkest story I've read by a mile, so think it through carefully before deciding on whether to read it. The reason I love this story is because it digs deep into the emotional impact of what happens, but the reason I warn you is the nature of themes it digs into. If you can handle it, you should definitely read it.

Another aspect is we sometimes see writers abandon a story because they get stuck, not knowing how to continue it, or lose interest in continuing. That can't happen if the story is fully written before posting it, any issues like this would result in the story not even start to get posted.

I meant to talk about it, but something pulled me away while I was writing my comment and I forgot when I returned. The main thing that stroke me is how serious the diagnosis is. PTSD, depression and anxiety already feels like a lot at once, but he has, if I understood it correctly, strong versions of all three. The fact that he was function as well as he was for most of the year, comparatively speaking, makes me proud of him for how much he fought internally. But I lack the technical knowledge to comment more specifically. I'm looking forward to seeing character dynamics from different angles, I like seeing how things shift with the way they're perceived by different characters. I don't know if that one will be a Tommy or Jonah perspective, I'm hoping for the first one because I want to see an outsider perspective to part of the main group, but the other one would also be interesting for different reasons.

“So…” James’ voice was calm. “Is this where you make your move on me too?” I like the role reversal of this last line in comparison to Olly's experiences with other friends.

I forgot to say one thing. I love that, both when Jonah asked if Tommy has a boyfriend and throughout all his flirting, he never felt the need to say he's straight. Unlike some guys, Tommy is comfortable enough in his sexuality that he doesn't need to shoot down any chance of someone thinking he may be gay.

Great chapter. Huge progress for Jack, the biggest signal of that for me is how he acted around Tommy. And Nick is finally going to get help, he should have gone to a psychologist years ago, but better late than ever and now he also has the impact of helping Jack through his hard times. Tommy has good chemistry with Jonah and Jack, and it feels like he would have it with the rest of the group as well. I'll miss him when the SftF sequel starts and they go back to school, I wish Tommy would start going to Harrison West too.

Thank you for the detailed description. When I say pizza is best in Italy, I mean on average. Naturally, individual restaurants will vary. And yes, pizza is ultimately great around the world. A cool thing is how much it differs from country to country, and sometimes within a country, while being very recognizable as the same food item. Two of the pizzerias you mentioned are Una Pizza Napoletana and Leggera Pizza Napoletana. It's interesting to note that they both include the expression Pizza Napoletana meaning Neapolitan Pizza, but it's not surprising that pizzerias would like to name themselves after it's birthplace, Naples.

I would not have caught that, but it makes a lot of sense with the passage you highlighted. Of course it's not certain but, if your guess is true, I agree with the guess of her doing matchmaking.

The ending with Kris's mom seems ominous, I hope Phillipe is right and it's actually something good. And Ethan's sudden disappearance makes it two things to worry about regarding Kris. Seeing his thoughts about being gay in a small town, I think he needs someone he can talk to freely without hiding being gay. The way Leah figured him out, wasn't homophobic and got sad for him, I hope she can be that person.

"His old man used to say, “You want something, you take it. You don’t ask.” Dean lived by that rule. Better to take than to need. Better to be the one who walks away first. Nobody leaves me, he thought. Not anymore." Dean keeps lying to himself, but it seems like it's getting harder to ignore, considering he thought about Kris multiple times during a date. But seems like Leah is playing an important role for Dean, and maybe that's something he needs before he can be honest with himself about love. Leah is making him slowly start to dispel the outlook at life and dating from the quote above, which is just bad for himself. He needs to let people in, but he keeps his walls up whenever Leah tries to ask anything remotely personal. But the way he acts in the morning, by staying, that's a start of something.

When it comes to pizza, Italy wins at their own creation. (I'm not familiar with the regional variations within Italy, so I can't comment on those.)

Throughout this chapter, part of me was getting worried about Jack and Nick's relationship, while another part felt the worries were exaggerated. The first part was winning early, but the second part got more ammo as the chapter went on and the ending sealed the deal. After seeing Jack be outright mean to Nick in the previous chapter and most of the time refuse to do anything he was asked to, this chapter was now showing him be only grumpy to Christian and Jonah and eventually reluctantly agree with what they wanted him to do. So it seemed that his anger was aimed more strongly at his boyfriend than anyone else, which concerned me. Plus, while we saw Jack smile and even laugh in this episode, every time it happened it was because of something Christian or Jonah said or did, it was never aimed at Nick. This seemed to support him being better around people who aren't Nick. On the other hand, Christian presented a possible alternate explanation that doesn't make Jack's actions present a threat to his relationship with Nick, "But Jack knows you love him. He uses that. Tests it. Manipulates it. We’re just backup dancers in his drama right now, so he doesn’t try as hard with us." In addition, even though every time he talked nicely before the very end of the chapter was to people who aren't Nick, he did say things that showed a strong love towards Nick, despite not saying them directly to Nick. And then last bit of the chapter put an end to my worries, with Jack's request for the to sleep naked and especially his addition explanation that "I wanna feel close to you. Like before."

I'd like that, I enjoy seeing characters from different perspectives. Plus, if at least some of these take place during the summer break, they would be an answer to me saying I'd like to see a bit of how life outside school for the rich friends.

I'd enjoy you exploring Christian being straight but curious more, but I actually like that you're saying he's not bisexual. I think having an open minded straight character in the main cast is good.

I'd enjoy any opportunity to see a bit, or least hear more about, of what's life like in the rich teenagers land most of Nick's friends live in when they're not at school.

Please don't send Noah anywhere with Jack! But I know meant to say Nick and I agree. As for chapters, there's 45 in total, so 4 left.

I saw stories claiming to have been posted in 2011, 14 years ago. If you say it was actually 20 years, does that mean 2011 was some kind of GA website change and that's only the date on the new site? I know that people stop writing because life gets in the way, that's probably pretty common, but they usually never come back. An author leaving isn't a surprise, returning is. I wasn't around when you left, but I'm glad you returned.

A story being moved out "abandoned" 14 years later, wow! Although I guess I could say the same thing about an author reappearing 14 years later, which you also did.

Early into the story, we saw Jack have one or two episodes that were pretty bad and we didn't know anything about why at the time. But then he got better and, despite some worse moments, he didn't have anything remotely close to as bad for a long time. Long enough that I almost forgot how bad it got. But mental health stuff doesn't get fixed that easily, nor it ever fully goes away. Lately, Jack has been through very difficult stuff regarding his parents, so him having another episode shouldn't be surprising. What was a surprise was how much worse it was this time, in the previous chapter and continuing to now. It's a very difficult situation for Jack, he even mentioned in better moments that he doesn't know why he's being mean. But it's also very difficult for Nick, especially before help from Christian and Jonah arrived. No matter how much he reminds himself the stuff Jack says is the illness, it takes a toll on him. And his insecurities start asking "What if? questions. I'm glad Nick's mom finally realised she should have gotten him professional help from a therapist when his dad died and I hope he takes on her suggestion to do it now. In the meantime, it looks like Christian is a big help as support for Nick. And Jonah, with his joking insults, seem strangely effective at helping Jack. Maybe things will start to get better.

They don't feel like the dialogues of typical fifteen year olds to me. But children and teenagers who have gone through difficulties in aspects that impact mental health often grow up faster. So I think the dialogue is realistic because of what Nick and Jack went through.

Colombia does look gorgeous to visit, but traveling from Europe to South America isn't cheap. Plus I'd need to do it as part of an organized visit, so that I'd have a guide that knows which places are safe. I don't know how that happened, and it doesn't really matter, but the quote you're replying to is from @LittleBuddhaTW, even though it appears attributed to me.

Doing all that might take slightly longer than the 3 weeks left until chapter 45 gets released anyway.

Kris interpreting the conversation with Ethan at the café, when it looked more like almost a date to me, was funny. I'm worried about what implications this situation could have for Kris. Ethan seems to be interested in Kris but, with him being his boss, what will happen if Kris isn't interested back? Could Ethan hold a grudge and hurt him through the job, maybe by saying something that will hurt his chances at the interview. Meanwhile, Leah is interested in Dean, she wouldn't otherwise keep finding excuses to go to the shop to talk to him. But Dean asking her out sounds like part of the lies he's been telling himself. He's clearly interested in Kris, we can see that from his thoughts and not charging the 300 dollars. But he also thinks he's straight, so going on a date with a woman sounds like an attempt to silence the part of him that realises this. So both Kris and Leah have people interested in them, although in different ways. And they're both interested in each other, but they're both lying to themselves about it. They're once again different and similar. We'll see how this will develop and how long it will take them to admit it.

When I started reading a story where the main character's mom is an ER doctor, I should have probably expected an important character to end up there at some point. But I didn't think of that and, even if I had, I would have probably expected some kind of accident, nothing close to what happened. Nick's mom did a great job at focusing on her medical knowledge and not letting her personal connection to Jack affect her to the point of interfering with the quality or speed of the medical help she could give until the paramedics arrived. Last chapter, I was confused about the level of jealously Jack had at Tommy, considering his much more accepting reaction to the Jonah situation, b now I don't think it really was about Tommy. The way Jack thought Nick would leave him, combined with what we know about Jack, seems to point to him thinking no one would love him like that. The way he was treated by his parents his whole life made him not have experienced this level of love from probably anyone before Nick. And him looking at whatever medical condition he has as he was building up to an episode, combined with memories of his parents' letter about that topic, could make him think he's too broken for someone to love. So I think these worries made Jack latch on to the first reason his insecurities could find for Nick to possibly want to leave him, but it would have been something else if not Tommy.