The Sight (bxb)

Chapter 8 - His Fifth Vision

"I hope you're on your way home," was the first thing his mom said, completely ignoring the polite duty of a greeting. Evan rolled his eyes, as he usually did when she didn't have a chance to see him, and answered.

"I am, I was just getting dressed," he told her. Since he spent less time at home, she was stricter with him. He understood that she was just worried about him, but he didn't want to deal with it.

"You have ten minutes," his mom threatened him and immediately hung up. He knew that she wouldn't seriously punish him even if he didn't make it on time, but for peace of mind and within the family, he decided to meet this limit.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," he muttered into the silent phone and put it in his pocket.

He wasn't far from the house, so it took him half the time to get to his door. All the way to his house, he watched his own hand every time it moved back and forth. As he reached for the doorknob, he watched his hand. As he waved to his mother, he watched his hand. As his back hit the bed, he reached his hand out in front of him and watched it again. He couldn't help himself.

"I'm going insane." He sighed softly. He didn't know what fascinated him so much about his own hand. For a moment he imagined it holding another, in the next moment he saw the image of two hands connected in front of him again.

Against his better judgement, he picked up the phone and texted the only person who could help him. She texted back immediately, telling him she was on her way over.

...

She barged into the room as if it belonged to her. Not that he expected anything else. After more than ten years of being friends, his room was almost like her own. She knew every corner, every place to hide after bedtime so that no one would discover her, and he wouldn't be surprised if she knew exactly what was hidden under his bed. Not that he knew that myself. The space under his bed was intended for all the things that didn't fit elsewhere, things that he didn't want to put away, or at least for candy wrappers. It was a mess.

"Okay. What's wrong?" she asked him the moment her eyes laid on him. When he didn't answer right away, she didn't hesitate and threw herself on the bed next to him. He sighed again like a hundred times in the last half hour.

"Everything?" It sounded more like a question than an answer. Not that he had any answers. Everyone always told him that growing up was hard, but no one bothered to mention that it was so very hard and that with every solution came a new problem.

"Sounds harsh," she commented, not surprised by his statement. Angie was his journal to write down his problems, and she never complained because he was the same to her.

"You have no idea." Muttering, he held his hand out in front of him again, focusing on the blurring image of the ceiling between his fingers.

"Did you get a new hand cream or...?" Despite his bad mood, he burst out laughing. It was hard to stay gloomy when she was by his side. That is, if she herself was not the source of his bad mood.

"I had another vision," he confessed after he calmed down from laughing. Angie remained silent, waiting for further explanation. "I saw them holding hands with someone else," he added.

"That's it?" She didn't seem upset, let alone aggravated.

"I think their hands were the same size," he told her what was still gnawing at his mind. He couldn't get that image out of his head – two masculine hands linked into one.

"Same size mean...?" That was what he liked about her. In difficult moments, she let him say as much as he wanted to. She didn't insist, she just offered the opportunity to confide.

"Both men, I think," he said almost inaudibly.

"Hold on." With one flick, she got into a sitting position. Then she turned her head, pulled his hand down so she could see his face, and looked into his eyes with a serious look in hers. "You like Kieran, but you're worried about your mate liking another boy?" He knew how it sounded. He was a hypocrite, but he couldn't admit it out loud.

"I..." he started, but suddenly he couldn't find his voice, "I guess."

"You know you could be bisexual, right?" She said so suddenly that it made him look at her in disbelief. Not that he didn't think about his orientation in weak moments, but the word bisexual seemed almost foreign to him. He was so taken with the idea that his mate could be male that it didn't occur to him that he might like multiple genders.

After he paused and didn't answer her, Angie spoke again. "As in liking boys and girls." She explained to him as if he were a small child. And surprisingly, he felt that way. His parents always talked about girls, and he and Angie always talked about boys, so talking about both sounded alien to his ears.

"Shit," was all he could say.

"C'mon, I have to get you out of the world of toxic masculinity." She pulled his hand, which she still held in hers, and pulled him off the bed. He was still silent, lost in thought and so empty at the same time. His black and white world was suddenly enveloped in a grey light.

"I'm always prepared," she said as she rummaged through her small black purse, the size of which definitely didn't match its contents. After a while, she successfully found what she was looking for, as she let out a triumphant sound.

"What's that?" he queried not being able to see what she found. She turned back to him with a huge smile and showed him the contents of her hands with an expressive gesture.

"You paint pictures, I paint nails."

And that's the explanation of how he ended up with black nails for the first time in his life.