Storms - 18. Daniel

Sorry for the long wait. My beta's kind of gone AWOL. It happens, I should know. If anyone feels like giving me a hand with it until Dayne returns, send me a PM or something.  
Content warning: Severe bullying

I slept uneasily. Several times I woke up drenched in sweat, feeling sick and empty, tears streaming down my face. A couple of times I was seconds from a full blown panic attack. I tried to take deep breaths and think happy thoughts.

I thought of Michael. His eyes and his face and his arms, his smooth, firm chest, and the warmth and comfort of being near him. It calmed me enough that I could get back to sleep, at least for a little while.

Most of Saturday was spent just waiting for the time to pass, so I could go to the party. So I could see Michael. It made me feel sort of pathetic, how much I depended upon him. Julie was my friend too, and Deacon, Siobhan and Amy were all nice to me, but none of them made me feel the way Michael did. None of them made me feel safe like that.

I didn’t feel like eating, so I prepared a tuna pasta bake for Mum, which I covered in cling film and stuck in the fridge. Then I told her goodbye, and that I might not be back until the following day. It wasn’t like Michael had explicitly invited me to stay the night, but I still hoped. Just to be safe, though, I told Mum I might be staying over at Julie’s.

There was enough cash in the biscuit tin that I could buy him a birthday card on the way. I stopped by a newsagent and bought one with a colourful graphic of a birthday cake and the words Happy 16^th Birthday! on the front in gold lettering. I didn’t dare write anything too personal in it, but settled for, Happy Birthday, Michael! Hope you’ll have a great year, and thank you for being my friend! I wanted to get him a proper present, but couldn’t think of anything I could afford that wasn’t too crappy. When I’d asked him the day before what he wanted for his birthday, he had simply told me, ‘I just want you to come to my party and have a good time!’ I decided to try my very best at that.

I reached Michael’s house a little after six o’clock. The party was clearly already starting, because I could hear music blaring from the stereo before I even rang the doorbell. I recognised the music as one of the bands Michael really liked.

Liz opened the door. ‘Daniel! Hi!’ She hugged me, which was unexpected but nice. ‘Come on in! Michael’s in the living room. He’s gonna be so happy you made it!’

As promised, I found Michael in the living room with Amy, Deacon, and Julie, plus a couple of year elevens I didn’t know.

‘Hey! You made it!’ said Michael, and Julie popped up to hug me straight away. Michael patted the empty seat next to him on the sofa and gave me a one-armed hug as I sat down.

‘Happy birthday,’ I said, and gave him the card.

He took it, read it, and then gave me one of his radiant smiles. ‘Thank you, Danny!’ Hearing him call me Danny again made my heart flutter, and I found myself grinning. ‘Let me introduce you to these guys. This is Loubna, Niko, and Jasper. Guys, this is Daniel. He’s in year ten, Julie’s classmate and friend. Right, Julie?’

Julie nodded and met my eyes with a big grin on her face. She seemed overjoyed to be there.

Siobhan showed up soon after, and a steady trickle of mostly year elevens followed, interspersed with the odd individual from year ten and even nine, mostly appearing as someone else’s plus ones. Liz had invited a couple of uni friends as well to help her chaperone. They seemed to find the prospect of attending a party full of high schoolers hilarious.

Michael had to mingle, of course, and Amy and Siobhan wanted to dance, which meant that by extension Deacon had to dance as well, but Julie stuck to me for most of the evening.

‘I’m not really much of a dancer,’ she admitted. ‘Never had much practice . . . I’ve not been to a party since primary school. My mum is just super overprotective, you know?’

‘How did you manage to convince her to let you come?’ I asked.

‘I got her to ring Liz. She told her all about the party and who would be here, said that she and her friends would be here the whole time to keep an eye on things, lied through her teeth and said there would be no booze . . .’ She grinned. ‘Mum gave in when she promised to walk me home by eleven.’

‘Liz is nice,’ I said.

‘Yeah, I really like her.’ She gave me this quizzical look. ‘You’ve been here before, then?’

‘A few days ago,’ I said, hoping I didn’t sound too deliberately evasive. ‘We had Chinese food and watched a movie.’ It wasn’t a lie.

Julie nodded slowly. ‘Liz just seems like such a cool person, you know? A bit like Anna. Deacon’s sister? She’s awesome too.’ She sighed. ‘I wish I had a cool older sister.’

‘Me too,’ I said. Instead I was stuck with a mum who barely cared whether I lived or died. I shook the thought from my head. ‘You look really nice, by the way!’ I told Julie.

‘Aww, thanks!’ She beamed. ‘Amy helped me get ready. She’s amazing at picking out outfits for people. She should be a stylist when she grows up!’

Some of the last people to arrive were Patrick and his posse. I tried my best to stay out of their way, but I knew they had noticed me, and from the moment they arrived I felt like people kept looking my way, sniggering. No doubt Patrick was reminding them all of the posters. They had all been torn down within an hour of the start of the school day on Thursday, but enough people had seen them, and snapped pics of them on their phones. As one of the school’s more obvious bullies, Patrick had, as I understood it, been called into Mr. Hugh’s office for questioning, something he was no doubt bitter about.

At half past ten, Julie began to say her goodbyes, and Liz left her best friend Jenny in charge while she walked her home. Without Julie there, I gravitated towards Michael. Thankfully, he didn’t seem to mind. He offered me beer and introduced me to the people he was talking to, and while I still felt out of place, I laughed at their jokes and managed to have a good time. Being next to Michael helped. Being next to Michael always helped.

Jasper, from before, joined the conversation and stood next to me. When everyone was laughing raucously at a particularly dirty joke told by a guy called Sanjay, he turned to me and said, ‘Hey, Daniel. I’m so sorry about what happened to you the other day, with the posters. Whoever did that is a genuinely disgusting person. Just wanted to say that. There are people who support you. Okay?’

I nodded, and found myself smiling. ‘Thank you.’ This guy was really nice, and pretty hot to boot. I liked him.

‘You flirting with the new guy, Jasper?’ asked a girl I thought was called Evie. My face suddenly felt hot, but Jasper laughed.

‘Just making conversation,’ he said.

‘Yeah, cause after Trev’s party I was pretty sure you’d hook up with Michael.’ Evie grinned, wagging her eyebrows.

‘Who says we didn’t?’ Jasper put an arm around Michael’s shoulder, and I felt suddenly a bit jealous. I was pretty sure they were joking, but still. ‘Best I ever had!’ said Jasper, and placed a wet kiss on Michael’s cheek, who laughed out loud. The crowd whooped.

‘Don’t fib, Jasper. I totally dumped him, guys. My heart belongs to another.’ Michael gave a dramatic sigh.

Jasper put on a mock pout and withdrew his arm. ‘And here I really thought we had something special, Storm.’

Not long after, Patrick sidled up to Michael, bumped his fist and said, ‘Excellent party, bruh!’

‘Cheers!’ said Michael with a grin. ‘You guys were a bit late, weren’t you?’

Patrick shrugged. ‘Ended up pre-drinking at Neal’s, with his brother and his pals. Kind of lost track of time.’

As conversation resumed, I felt Patrick’s eyes on me. He wasn’t stupid enough to say anything in front of Michael, and I knew I had friends here, but I still felt uncomfortable. Finally, I quietly excused myself and went to the toilet.

I took longer than I needed to, spending a few minutes standing before the mirror staring at my reflection. My hair was definitely getting overly long now, but it’s not like I could afford a haircut. The last time I cut it, Mum had taken my stepdad’s beard trimmer and basically shaved it off. That had been more than six months ago, and my curls now flopped all over my head like some kind of semi-fro. It was not a good look on me. My curls were looser than most. I wondered, not for the first time, what my father had looked like. I suspect he may have been white, or part white. I am lighter than my mum, too, not to mention how light my eyes are.

It hadn’t occurred to me when I decided to go to this party that some of my bullies would be here as well. I knew Michael wouldn’t let anything happen to me, of course. I was safe with him. But Patrick and his cronies still scared me, and I worried about what they might try to pull while Michael wasn’t looking.

Taking a deep breath, I turned away from the mirror. Then I opened the door to return to the party.

Outside the door stood Patrick and three of his friends. ‘Hello, Danny,’ he said, smirking at me. ‘You want a drink?’

Before I had time to make a sound, they were forcing me back into the bathroom, shutting and locking the door behind them.

‘Hold him still,’ Patrick said, and two of his friends grabbed my arms and pulled them behind my back. ‘Open his mouth.’ The third guy, named Dinesh if I wasn’t much mistaken, forced my head back and my mouth open, pinching my nose.

Patrick stepped up to me, a mostly full half bottle of cheap vodka in his hand. He opened it, put it to my lips, and began to pour.

With my nose blocked and my head held back like that, I had little choice but to swallow, though much of it spilled down my front. When about half of the strong liquid was gone, Patrick relented, and I coughed and spluttered for a little while. I felt like I might be sick.

‘There you go!’ he said pleasantly. ‘All good and drunk.’

Patrick’s friends let me go, and I swayed on my feet. The room was spinning dangerously. I had never had this much alcohol before in my life, much less all at once.

‘Strip him,’ Patrick ordered his friends, and they started to pull at my clothes until I was naked. I tried to protest, tried to fight back, but I seemed to have lost control of my motor functions and could only bat weakly at the arms holding me down and ripping my clothes.

Patrick pulled a sharpie out of his pocket and they pushed me face first over the edge of the tub.

‘How much would you say his arse is worth, Neal?’ he asked one of his friends.

The boy apparently named Neal answered, ‘Not much, mate. A quid per go, maybe?’

‘Yeah, that’ll do.’ Patrick began to scribble on my arse. It tickled, and I squirmed. ‘Here, wanna snap this.’ There was the click click of a phone camera.

Next, I was being moved again, turned around, pushed into the tub. I tried to focus on the people in front of me and eventually managed to find Patrick’s face. He was unzipping his jeans, and now he had his dick out, and I wondered for a moment if he meant for me to suck it, but he wasn’t hard.

Then he took aim, and began to piss. The yellow stream hit me square in the face. I raised my arm to shield myself, and tried to get up, but the slippery tub wouldn’t let me, and I slid back down. Patrick’s friends followed suit. I covered my head and cowered while they each covered me in urine.

‘I feel like I should take a shit on him, too,’ Patrick said when they were all done, tucking his prick away inside his pants. ‘You’d probably like that, wouldn’t you? Disgusting little faggot. Sadly for you, I’m all out of bowel movements. I could jerk off on you, though. Would you like that? It’d be hard to get it up looking at your fugly mug, but I could probably close my eyes and think of England.’ The others all laughed.

Just then, I heard something outside the door. ‘Dan? Where did you go?’ Someone tried the door handle. ‘Danny, are you in there?’ It was Michael’s voice.

Before the others had time to react, I cried, ‘I’m here! Help! Help me!’

Michael didn’t need to be asked twice, and started banging on the door. ‘Is someone in there with you? Open this door!’ he demanded.

Patrick suddenly looked slightly panicked. He obviously hadn’t planned on getting caught.

‘What’s going on?’ said another voice, this one older, deeper. One of Liz’s uni friends, no doubt.

‘I don’t know, but we have to get inside,’ said Michael. ‘Help me get the door open.’

‘Stand back.’

A series of loud bangs followed, and then the door burst open and a tall, beefy twenty-something whose name I was pretty sure was Jamal burst shoulder first into the room. Michael came after, crowding into the space that had never been designed to fit six people. I focused blearily on his face. His expression moved from shock to pure rage as he took in the scene and realised what was happening.

‘What the fuck do you think you’re doing?’ he growled at Patrick.

‘What do you mean?’ said Patrick, but his voice had gone up half an octave and his eyes kept flitting to Jamal’s muscular frame. ‘We’re just having a little fun, right guys?’ His friends nodded. I said nothing. I was beginning to feel rather sick and wasn’t sure I dared open my mouth.

‘Think Dan sees it that way?’ Michael’s voice was deadly quiet. ‘Get the fuck out of my house!’

‘You don’t need to get so touchy about it, we’re just playing—’ Neal tried, but Michael interrupted him.

‘Playing?’ he roared. ‘You are hurting my friend! Now get the bleeding hell out of here before I call the fucking coppers on you fucking wankers!’

Jamal placed a large hand on Patrick’s shoulder. ‘You heard the man. Let’s go.’

It seemed the threat of a fifteen stone black man was what it took. I had never seen anyone scarper quite so quickly, and Jamal followed them to make sure they left.

The moment they were gone, Michael strode over to the tub and knelt next to me. ‘Dan, are you okay? Did they hurt you?’

I shook my head. ‘I . . . ’M okay, just . . . You shouldn’t touch me. Got pee on me . . .’

He blinked. Then his expression darkened again. ‘They fucking pissed on you?’ he said quietly. ‘I’m gonna murder every last one of those fucking fucks.’

‘Michael,’ I slurred weakly. ‘I’m okay. They . . . They’re gone now.’

Michael nodded. ‘Yeah. None of those bastards is ever setting foot in this house again, I can tell you that.’ His expression softened. ‘Here, let me help you.’ And although I was covered in pee, he put his arms around me and pulled me out of the tub. I stood swaying while he found a towel. He wiped off the worst of it. ‘You can have a shower in my room,’ he said. ‘Put your clothes on, I’ll be right back.’ Then he vanished.

When he returned a few moments later, I had somehow managed to get my clothes on all right, though my shirt was unbuttoned (several buttons had been torn loose when they stripped me) and I had my socks in my hand. Michael put one arm around my waist and draped my arm over his shoulder, and then we left the bathroom and started up the stairs.

We walked in silence. The whole corridor seemed to be spinning, and my footing became progressively less steady. By the time we reached Michael’s room, I clamped my hand over my mouth and stumbled towards the bathroom. I only missed the toilet by a little bit.

Michael was there at once, soothing hand stroking my back as I puked up vodka, beer, and crisps.

‘You’re lucky, really,’ he said, while I wiped my mouth on the back of my hand. ‘Better to get it out now and you’ll be less hungover in the morning.’

I would have laughed, but I couldn’t seem to manage. The room was still spinning and I tipped over onto my side.

‘What did you drink?’

‘Vodka,’ I mumbled. ‘Patrick . . . He made me drink vodka.’

‘Ouch.’

‘You . . . You said I was your friend,’ I slurred.

‘Well, you are, silly.’

‘I know . . . But . . . But you told them . . . And now he’ll find out . . . It’ll get back to him.’

‘Who?’

‘Loz . . .’ I realised too late what I had said, and froze, staring straight ahead at the toilet bowl, working my mouth like a fish on land. ‘I . . . I mean . . . I mean . . .’

‘Loz? That burly, quiet kid in your year?’ He grabbed my arm and pulled me into a sitting position, trying to get eye contact. ‘Is that who’s been hurting you? Is that who . . . Danny, look at me!’

I focused my eyes slowly on my friend. My best friend. ‘No,’ I said, my voice quiet and monotonous. ‘I mean . . . It’s not . . . You can’t know this . . .’

‘Well, I do know this!’ said Michael. ‘Just tell me the truth, Danny. Please.’

I blinked, and unbidden tears began to fall. ‘. . . Yes,’ I whispered, voice barely audible. ‘He’s the one who . . . But it’s not what you think. It’s not . . . Not really. I never . . . I didn’t say no!’ I grabbed hold of Michael’s shirt, and gritted out, ‘Please, Michael, you can’t tell anyone! He’ll . . . If you tell anyone it’ll only make it worse. So . . . So please. Just don’t . . .’ I couldn’t hold it in any longer and fell to pieces, my forehead falling against Michael’s chest as I sobbed out my pain. Michael just put his arms around me and held me, stroking my hair.

‘Shh,’ he whispered. ‘It’s okay. I won’t . . . I won’t tell anyone, I promise. But, Danny . . . You should. It’s not okay, what he’s doing. You know that, right?’

I found some sort of resolve then, and looked up at Michael’s face. ‘I’m gay,’ I whispered.

He blinked. ‘That’s not what I meant,’ he said softly. ‘That’s not what’s not okay. If you liked him, if this was something you wanted . . . But it’s not, is it? It doesn’t matter if you didn’t say no. What it’s doing to you . . . It’s not okay. Is it?’

I shook my head, even as I wanted to sing with joy because I had come out to Michael and he hadn’t rejected me. ‘No. It’s not.’

He pulled me to my feet and helped me wash the smell of piss out of my hair while I stripped and cleaned myself off. Michael had already seen me naked twice now. It didn’t matter. He fetched me a large t-shirt and clean pants to wear, and then we brushed our teeth and he pretty much carried my drunken self to bed.

‘I’ll be right with you again,’ he said. ‘Just gonna go say goodbye to everyone downstairs, okay?’

I nodded, and was asleep before my head hit the pillow.

* * *

When I woke up just before dawn, it took me a moment to realise where I was, and for the previous night’s events to settle in my mind. This was the third time in my life that I woke up next to Michael. Like last time, his arm was draped over me, but as opposed to Friday morning, this time we were facing each other. Michael was still asleep, and I found myself smiling. I could see the contours of his face in the light from the bathroom. Michael was beautiful while he slept. But then, of course, he was always beautiful.

I don’t know what made me do it. I raised my hand and stroked his cheek, lightly. He didn’t stir. He was fast asleep. And before I could stop myself, I had closed the little distance between us to kiss him on the lips. I realised too late how stupid this was. Michael stirred, and opened his eyes.