The Good Side Of You | Monty and Winston

Chapter 9: Welcome to Liberty

Ever since Winston could remember, his parents had consistently wanted one thing: for him to follow in their footsteps and graduate from Princeton. His father was very proud of their family's alma mater, and Winston going there had less to do with his own future and more to do with his father's ability to boast about their family legacy.

Mr and Mrs Williams were smart, matter-of-fact people with very little time to spare and a fondness for their wealth and academic reputation. The only parental responsibility they seemed to take to heart was making sure their son always had the best of everything, and they were quite content with letting Winston do as he pleased as long as he didn't bother them too much. They were very open-minded, but not that affectionate, which meant they weren't very close to their son. Truth be told, love was one thing that was sorely missing from Winston's life... until he met Monty.

Monty was all he had now that he had lost his place at Princeton and the tiny crumbs of attention he had previously received from his parents. If he was honest, it was a kind of relief for him, to not have to live with the secret of having cheated on his SAT anymore, of pretending to be someone he was not and wasting his life by trying to be like his father. His family had the money and influence to send him to a decent enough school anyway, even if it couldn't be Princeton or another Ivy League, and he could study whatever he liked now that they had lost their interest in his future. He felt truly free from the burden of his parents' expectations, and now he would be able to dedicate his complete attention to what truly mattered to him: Monty.

Winston knew someone had tried to frame him, and he trusted Monty when he said that Clay Jensen and Ani Achola had to be behind it. Even though Winston told Monty not to seek revenge against them and stay out of any more trouble so as to not further jeopardize potential scholarships that may come his way, that didn't mean that Winston couldn't do a little investigation of his own. It wouldn't be too hard now that he had enrolled in Liberty for the last semester of his senior year. He didn't say so to Monty, but it made his blood boil to think they had dared to frame the boy he loved for murder. Someone needed to pay for that.

Winston had been walking on clouds ever since Monty told him he loved him. Although, his happiness had been a little damped by the fact that Monty's father was making it so difficult for them to see each other lately. Winston found it surprising that he didn't throw Monty out of the house when he found out Monty was gay, but he hadn't seen this obsessive vigilance coming. Because of this, he was excited to be transferring to Liberty. It meant he would see Monty every day.

But Winston wasn't a fool, nor was he kidding himself. It didn't matter that Monty's family knew about them, he knew that Monty wasn't ready to take their relationship public, yet. His father would kill him, or so Monty said.

"I told Estela to stay away from you," Monty told him a few days after he had found out that Winston would be transferring to Liberty. "I don't want to take any risks. You know how dad has been lately. He could pop up at school at any time and see you two together. I don't want to give him any excuse to come for you."

Winston wondered if protecting him from his father was all Monty was worried about, or if he was still ashamed of people finding out he was gay. Most likely both.

"It's going to be hard for her. She really wants to meet you, for some reason," Monty said, sheepishly. Estela loved to tease him about Winston.

"Yeah, I really want to meet her, too."

Monty felt a pang of guilt at the sadness with which Winston said that. He tried to tell himself that there was nothing else they could do. They had to hide their relationship from his father at all costs. As far as the rest of the world was concerned, they were nothing to each other.