Drew Payne

Thanks for your feedback. Yes, Freddie is on Simon's saide and that will be important. As for Simon for texting his dad, "Leave me alone, you hateful bigot!", I'm afraid that will not be happening anytime soon. Simon has only told Freddie about the texts but much more importantly, his dad pays for his phone and Simon is very afraid that if he upsets his dad then his dad will stop paying for it, and Simon will be really screwed. His phone is so important to him. And Simon isn't finished with his dad, as I writer I just can't leave that alone...

“No,” Freddie said. “Jeff’s a year older than us, he’s seventeen. He met Karl last year when he was sixteen.” “I didn’t think he was seventeen. I thought he was the same age as us,” Simon said. “He looks good for an older man, doesn’t he?” Freddie joked. “He’d been at the college a year before we got there. A whole year and his only real friend had been Karl. And he’s a year older than Jeff, so at least Jeff doesn’t have to see him around college the rest of this year. Which is one good

@Talo Segura thanks for this feedback, I'm really grateful for it, as I am with all the feedback I get. A little history of this story to explain how I got to where I am. This story started off as a short story, describing just five different days in Simon's life. It only featured Simon, his mum, Niki and his dad, with the shadow of the boyfriend who dumped him (No Freddie, Vee and Jeff). For a story as short as it was going to be, 10,000 words at the most, the character of Simon worked, being so naive and socially inept. As I started writing it, I quickly realised there was much more to the story to tell, this story will probably run to about 70,000 words long (Big change). But I have very much painted myself into a corner with Simon's character. He's self-isolating (He didn't make friends until the second term he was at college), socially inept and without great insight (He didn't realise his first boyfriend was only using him for sex and had probably lied about his age, Freddie saw that straight off). This college world is being very much seen through Simon's eyes and he's reacting very much to the alpha males and alpha females in college, he barely sees the other people who also disappear into the crowd there, like himself, and he's only reacting to the thing he fears the most, those alpha males’ and females’ homophobia. Freddie does have a "them & us" attitude as well, though his is very much more confrontational. He's is very gay, camp even, and is easily spotted as gay, so he's developed this as a defence. And this seems attractive to Simon, who is really looking up to Freddie. Saying that Freddie's only seventeen. When I was at college (16 to 18), I was very struck by how divided it all was into clicks and little groups and that these groups didn't mix. I had my little group of friends at college and I didn't mix outside of them. When I started my training, several years later, I was shocked again at how people fell into clicks (Exactly like my time at college) and how they didn't really mix (The Five Future Nurses are a sly dig at five women I did my training with, who always sat together in every lecture, always in the same line-up and always looked down on everyone else because we would never be as "good" nurses as they were going to be). I have created a character, in Simon, with very little insight and it is biting me in the arse. I am trying to find ways to work around it, especially with Simon's opinion of his dad, but it isn't easy. Please bear with me. I am glad you like the group of four friends that have, in a way, taken over this story. I so wanted to write about the importance of friendship, especially with the character of Simon. A big thank you should go to @Marty for the wonderful edit he has done on this story.

Thanks for the feedback and I'm so glad you are noticing the change in Simon. I wanted to show him slowly coming out. I couldn't have him suddenly standing on a canteen chair and shouting, "I'm queer so get over it!" (Of course Freddie would but he was born out and proud). Also, the benefits of being with his new friends far out weight what other students there think of him. Plus, these are the first, real adult friends he's had. He wasn't that close to his previous school friends, Phil and Harrison. They were friends through convenience, they needed to be friends to survive school (That was my experience as well). But here Simon has made friends who like him for who he is. Freddie is also really enjoying being Simon’s gay mentor, his gay big-brother. I really enjoy writing these types of relationships, and I am really enjoying writing the dynamics of this little queer group.

Thanks so much, I am really enjoying writing this. I will explain later about how Freddie and Vee became friends with Jeff. But Freddie does draw queer people to him and this story is set in a town well outside of London with not a lot of alternative subculture. Freddie is based on two men I knew when I was coming out and they just drew me straight into their social circle so quickly and it did me the world of good. As for what happens at the Vale Side Junction Group... Spoilers Sweetie! Spoilers! I am about to write that chapter

Thanks for your feedback and I'm so glad you liked that line, I am rather proud of that line. That's the joy of writing Freddie, I can give him lines like that because they're in character for him, and I give him other lines like this, just wait. But giving Simon friends is an important part of this story and can give me so many plot choices.

Thanks for your feedback. I don't know about falling into clover, all that has changed is that Simon has friends now. But he isn't alone now, there are people he can talk with, and people he can explore the gay world with. Plus, in the character of Freddie, he can say the obvious to Simon, the things that Simon hasn't realised.

“It’s called the Vale Side Junction Group because it’s based in Vale side, that’s why,” Simon told them all. The four of them were grouped around one of the round tables in the canteen, their different lunches partly eaten in front of them. Freddie was wearing a dark grey blazer and a bright green waistcoat, which was opened to reveal a crisp white tee-shirt, and his hair was jelled into large curls. Vee was wearing a dark blue, very loose-fitting shirt over a pale grey top, and strangely th

Thanks for your feedback, and yes you get it. I wanted to show Simon finding it all too much and making the wrong decisions as he tried to come out on his own. I wanted to show how important friends are to him by him trying to do it without friends at first, and then showing the difference friends makes. But writing Freddie is such fun, it really turned around writing this story and into his mouth I can put all those things that do not occur to Simon (That Max was actually a real shit), and he can talk to Freddie, and Vee and Jeff, about things he'd never been able to talk to his mum or Niki about, and he does. Now, Simon may have a bit of a crush on Jeff but do remember that Simon has a terrible taste in men.

Thanks for the feedback. Freddie is just such fun to write, and he has such a mouth on him. He's based on two men I knew and who really helped me when I was coming out. But I really wanted to make Freddie camp ("Wearing his sexuality like a gay sash") and very sexual. Lets have a little dig at a stereotype. Wait until you hear what he gets up to on dating amps...

Simon sat on one of the hard concrete benches that evenly flanked the college’s main entrance, and waited. The bench was as hard and uncomfortable as all the other benches around the college. It was also identical to all the other ones, the ones in the courtyard, the ones stretching along the back of the college, and those facing the basketball court and five-a-side football pitch. Had they bought a job-lot of these benches when the place was being built? Simon wondered. It was one of the thousa

For such a long time most of my friends were gay, it wasn't until I met my husband that I got close straight friends (He has a lot of straight friends). My first gay friends really turned my head around, I'd finally found people who knew what I was going through. I grow up in a very straight, very homophobic area.

@Parker Owens, thanks, I am so glad you enjoyed this chapter. If I was really cynical I could have easily had Freddie reject Simon but then I would not be able to make my point about how important friendship it is in coming out. Also I wouldn't have had the chance to write more of Freddie. I am several chapters ahead in what I've written and Freddie has been so enjoyable to write.

@Timothy M., I knew you would like this, it's what you said he needed all along, but I didn't want to say because I didn't want to give anything away. I did want Simon make the first move in making these friendships, he's been so passive so far and I needed to get him moving forward. Also, friendships are so important to help us come out. As for Simon making three new friends, well I have enjoyed writing Freddie, Vee and Jeff so far (Is that a spoiler?).

@Talo Segura, thanks for your feedback, I really like that you're wondering what is going to happen next. It is amazing when people become involved with something I've written. This serial publishing is so addictive, for me as a writer. This is a spoiler-free zone so I cannot say what happens next, but it has been very enjoyable to write. Simon's coming out is very different from my own but one of the big turning points for me, when I was coming out, was when I first made gay friends, people who shared my sexuality and were also experiencing some of the same things that I was. I found myself an amazing support network and it helped me so much. This is what I wanted to show with Simon. The previous chapters have showed him struggling on his own to come out, and he didn't do a very good job of it. Now he is no longer alone, he's got his own peers. As for Simon liking Jeff, well please remember Simon is sixteen, still very naive and didn't realise that Max, his first boyfriend, was only using him for sex. He's has very little experience in relationships and doesn't really know how relationships work. Watch what happens next.

@chris191070, thanks for your feedback, I'm so happy that this chapter works. Simon so needed friends but I had to get him to move out of his Comfort Zone to do so. He's been rather passive in his life, coming out is a positive move forward for him, but it is a move out of his previous comfort zone.

@Marty, thanks for the feedback and the amazing edit. Right at the beginning of this story, Simon admitted to himself that he'd dated Max in the hope that Max would help him come out. Max was only interested in getting his cock sucked. Here I've finally given Simon what he needs, even if he doesn't know it, some friends to help him come out. There are things he just can't ask Niki, like how big a shit Max was. Of course he should have told his mum and Niki about coming out to his dad, but he still can't unlearn his instinct to keep things a secret to "protect" his mum, and his dad had been bullying his mum too. Wait until Niki finds out about all this, that was fun to write too. Simon's dad doesn't communicate with his mum, he preaches at her. He's more interested in "saving" Simon then to actually talking to his own wife. Simon's dad is one screwed up guy, communication isn't one of his best qualities.

Having finished his last class of the morning, anatomy and physiology, Simon was slowly walking towards the college canteen. His next class, after lunch, was “library time”, where he was supposed to study by himself. An hour and a half, by himself, sat in the college’s library, one of the few people from his course who would actually be studying. Even the Five Future Nurses wouldn’t be there. But he knew his good intentions wouldn’t last long. Boredom would soon set in, and he’d turn to his phon

@Rupert, I don't call it cowardice, I just call it a different choice. I don't know if I could either, but I feel people should have the choice.

@starboardtack, thanks for your feedback, it's so welcome. I based the couple here on an actual couple I once knew. He was her second husband and she had dementia. She's forgotten who he was but talked on and on about her first husband. The pain on his face when she did was heart-breaking.

@Defiance19 thanks for your feedback. Yes, Hal took back control but he also couldn't face what was ahead of him, and why should he? At the end of her life, she had cancer, my mother decided enough was enough and stopped eating and drinking. It was the only choice that was left to her. I have nursed people, at the end of their lives, who have expressed a wish just to die, and there was nothing they could do. I really believe now, people should be given the choice.

Thank you for such wonderful feedback. I wanted the young man on the beach to be a contrast to Hal's damaged body and to given him a jolt of envy. I put hints in the text to Hal's actions, I thoughht I'd put too many, but I still wanted the ending to be a shock. We talk so much about people "fighting" cancer, what happens when they lose that fight? We give they so few choices. Yes, I did leave Hal in a comfortable he'd so loved as a child.

Thanks for your feedback, this is a tragedy. But Hal is taking control of his life, which he has had little of during the prepares year or so. I also wanted to show the choice that so many people with a terminal illness are denied, the choice to say enough-is-enough or to carry on.

The sun was hot that morning. Hal had taken off his sweater and just sat there on the sand in his baggy shorts and equally large tee-shirt. (These clothes had once been much tighter.) It had taken him twenty minutes to walk down there and he was now tired, so he just sat on the sand and slowly waited for the energy to return to his body. It wasn’t an unpleasant wait; the sun was warm on his skin. It felt good just to be outside in the open air, not cooped up in his tiny room back at the cott

@Parker Owens, thanks for your feedback, it does me such good. I wanted to show a pattern with Simon here, keeping things to himself because he doesn't want to worry people, but just look at his upbringing. Saying that, Simon is only sixteen and he can change. Of course things here will come back but in a very different way, because there is a very big change coming (No spoilers though).