The Tide Began to Rise - Repost - 18. Chapter 18

< ??? POV >

It’s about 1 in morning. I can’t sleep. I’m just too excited to get my plan in motion. I went out to my car and drove to within 2 blocks from Tyler’s house. I decided to walk the rest of the way. I didn’t want to make a lot of noise when I approached the house. I taped the note that I had written to the door and left. I couldn’t help but smile as I walked back to my car. Soon Tyler’s world will come crashing down.

<Tyler’s POV>

(Yesterday after school) My friends and I drove up to Council Bluffs. There really wasn’t much to do. We decided to go up to the mall. We walked around, going in clothing stores and stuff like that. I wanted to buy new clothes so I could stop wearing all this black. I got a bunch of jeans, and shirts. It was very strange for me to buy pink and other bright colors, when all I wore was black, dark, depressing colors.

When we were walking out of Aeropostale, I saw Peter. My eyes lit up. I dropped the bags I carrying and ran after him.

“PETER……..”I yelled “PETER……WAIT”

He stopped and turned around to see who it was. When he saw me running towards him, he got a huge smile on his face.

“Oh my gods, Tyler, how the heck are you? You look great. You look happy.”

“I’m good. I’m living with a friend from school. I just bought a bunch of new clothes. The black was kind of depressing.”

“It was. That’s great that you have a friend that will do that for you.”

“Yeah, his mom is great. Anyway, how have you been? I haven’t seen you in a while.”

“Yeah, I’m sorry about that. I really am. I’m going to find a way to make that up to you. I have been good. I broke up with my girlfriend. I caught her cheating on me. Her story was that she was cheating on her boyfriend with me. Whatever, you know?”

“That sucks dude.”

My friends finally caught up to me. Brent was carrying my bags.

“Thanks for dropping you stuff for me to carry.” Brent said.

“You’re welcome. I saw Peter and I had to talk to him. I’m not sure you got a chance to meet him.”

“No I didn’t……Nice to meet you. I’m Brent. Tyler is living with me and my mom.” Brent said, reaching out to shake Peter’s hand.

“Nice to meet you. It’s good to know that Tyler has such good friends. Oh hey, it nice to see the rest of you as well. Ty, give me your new cell number, I tried calling the old one but it doesn’t work anymore. I have to head back to my place and get ready for work. I will call you later.”

I told him my number. We all said goodbye to Peter. We continued to shop for a while. Eventually we got hungry. We decided to go to Quaker Steak & Lube. Brent sent a text to his mom to let her know what is going on.

After dinner, we all headed home. Brent and I did our homework, and then went to bed.

(Present)

“Tyler…….Tyler……wake up.”

I opened my eyes to see Julie standing over me.

“What is it?” I asked

“I found this on the front door when I heading out to go to work.” She said, handing me an envelope.

I took it and opened it up. There was a single piece of paper inside. The words were red, dark red. It looked almost like dried blood. Just from the color, I was freaked out. I read over the note:

You worthless piece of shit
you should have died
since you yet live
your life will be lived in fear
you will pray for death

I read it and reread it. By the third time going over it, I was trembling. Who the hell wrote this? There was only one person that I could think of that would send this kind of note. He is in jail. There is no way that the guard would allow him to send me a letter. I started thinking if was a prank. I tried putting it out of my head. I couldn’t get every thought to leave though. I got just enough to leave so that I wasn’t freaking out.

“What was on the paper?”

“Just a note from a friend.” I lied. I had to lie to her. I didn’t want her freaking out. I knew if I had showed her the note, she would have freaked out and maybe locked me in the house.

Julie left the room; I got up and got dressed. I went out to the kitchen to get something to eat for breakfast.

<Brad’s POV>

I woke up the next morning. The first thing that popped into my head was my mom. I had told her I was gay last night. She told me that she was fine with it, but we really dint talk about it. She did ask me some questions. I really needed to talk to her and get her true feelings out. I just have this feeling that she was only saying what she thought I wanted to here. The more I thought about last night, I realized that after I came out and said “I’m gay” my mom wouldn’t look me in the face.

I got out of bed and put a pair of shorts on. I went out to the kitchen and found my mom sitting at the table with the paper and a cup of coffee. I went over and sat down. She didn’t ever say a word. Now I know something is not right between us. Every morning that I sat at the table with her, she would always strike up a conversation. She would ask how school was, how my friends were, and what my plans were for the day. Today was silence.

“Mom can we talk?”

“You need to go get ready for school.”

“No, I want to about last night.”

“We will talk when you get home.”

“I’m not leaving until I know how you really feel.”

“Damn it Brad, do as you’re told.”

“How you feel about this, about me, is more important to me then school. I can always make up the school work. So I’m not leaving until we talk.”

“Fine Brad.”

“I know you said that you support me and that you are here for me; but after I told you, you wouldn’t look me in the eye. I want to know why. I mean I expected for some things to change. Definitely the way you look at me. I didn’t think that you would stop looking at me entirely. Can you tell me why?”

“This is not easy for me. You are my only son, my only child. I never thought that you would be gay. That thought never crossed my mind. I had imagined that you would get married to a beautiful woman. Then you are her would make a beautiful baby. Then I would spoil it rotten. When you told me that you were gay, my heart broke. I saw all the hopes and dreams I had for you go out the window. I couldn’t look at you because I was afraid at what I was going to see and think of you. I don’t want to think anything bad about you. I just need some time to get used to this news. I mean you can’t expect me to be completely fine in one night.”

“I know, I just wanted to know if it was a big problem or a small one. There is something else I wanted to ask you. Last night you said that you wanted to ask me if I was gay for a while. What made you think I was? I mean before I started letting things slip.”

“Well, I guess it was the way you did things. Most boys don’t mind getting dirty or sweating. You do, every time you get one drop of sweat on your brow, you run to the shower. You never seemed to be interested in girls. I know that you tired to fake it, but if I followed your gaze, I saw that you weren’t looking at a girl. I wouldn’t say you act like a girl, but you don’t act like a normal guy either. I noticed that you would rather watch a chick flick then an action movie. You are more sensitive. Things made you cry that other guys would find funny or stupid. I know I sound very stereotypical, but that’s what I saw with you.”

“Wow I thought I had hid that better. I never realized I did some of that. Thanks for talking mom. I feel better now.”

I looked at the clock. It was about noon. “It’s about noon, do you want to get some lunch?”

“Sure, on the way I will call and let the school know you are with me.”

I went back to my room to get dressed. I felt a lot better knowing that everything was good with my mom. Now I feel that things will go great when I tell Tyler Tomorrow.

<Brent’s POV>

After school I called my mom. I asked her if she could meet Tyler and me at Wal-Mart. She said sure. We drove up there. We needed to go there to get some food and drinks for our get together and for Halloween. For this weekend we decided that we would just do junk food: Pizza, chips, salsa, and pop.

For the Halloween party, we wanted to do finger foods. We decided on small sandwiches, chicken wings, cookies, chips and dip, stuff like that. For the drinks, we went with Orange sherbet Punch, the one with ginger ale.

While we were up in Council Bluffs, we decided to go out for dinner. We went to a Mongolian Grill called HuHut. It is amazing food. You choose all the food you want and all your sauces. The only thing they do for you is cook your food.

After dinner we went home. There wasn’t any homework for us to do, so we just watched TV. Around ten mom went to bed. We waited for a couple minutes to make sure she wouldn’t came back down stairs. When we were convinced she was going to say up there, we started to cuddle. Tyler laid back into me. I wrapped my arms around him. We stayed that way, watching TV until two in the morning. Tyler was falling asleep. Instead of waking him up, I carried him to his room.

I laid him down on his bed. I half rolled him over so I could get the covers out from under him. When I tucked him in he said in a mumble “stay with me.” How could I say no to that? I got in the bed next to him. When I got under the covers, Tyler rolled over and laid his head on my chest. I reached down to pull my phone out of my pocket. I set my alarm for 6:30. That way I can wake up and go back to my room before my mom wakes up. I put the phone on vibrate. I didn’t want to wake Tyler up when the alarm went off.

With Tyler resting his head on my chest, my hand on his shoulder, I started to fall asleep. The last thing I saw stuck in my mind. Tyler laying there sound asleep. He is so cute.

The next thing I know, my phone is going off. I press end, and put it back in my pocket. Tyler was still sound asleep on my chest. I need to get back to my room. I lifted Tyler’s head with my free arm, and I gently slid out from underneath him. I laid him back down. I made sure he was covered with the blankets, and then I left and headed up to my room. I got undressed and climbed into bed. I fell asleep right away.