The Real Me

Chapter 3.

Chapter 3.

I’d known I was different since I was little.

In preschool when all the other boys were playing in the sandbox and having a kick-about; I was playing with the girls in the playhouse, pretending to cook for them. I had a big appetite even then.

The girls hadn’t minded that I was different, and it stayed that way as I grew up and realized that I didn’t like girls the way the other boys did.

The girls I would hang out with always came to me for advice on everything; boys, fashion, all the stuff girls would talk about. Occasionally I would go to the park and play football with the boys and they didn’t mind too much, but they didn’t come too close.

We would play football, and then they would all go off to a mate’s house while I walked home alone in the rain.

Then when we got to about 14/15 years old, the bullying started. At first it was just petty name-calling.

“Oi faggot!”

“Gay boy!”

“You off to see yer boyfriend? Twat!”

Mum found out through one of the teachers who had come across the name-calling and so I told her the truth. I was gay. She took it better than I expected. She couldn’t do much about it though; I went to an all boys’ school.

But just a few months before I auditioned for the X Factor, it turned physical. I could be walking home from school, walking to my dads, going to the café to meet up with friends. They would always find me and beat me up.

More often than not I would lay on the ground for about half an hour after the beatings just so I could stop crying, then I would go home, continue to my dads but ignore him until I was cleaned up, call my friends and say something came up.

When I auditioned, I kept quiet about being gay. I didn’t want to seem different again. Even when I got put in a group with Liam, Harry, Zayn and Louis, I still didn’t tell anybody. I didn’t tell Simon, I didn’t tell any of the other contestants.

The only person who found out was Mary, and that was only because she heard me crying in the kitchen late one night.

*Flashback*

I’d been feeling bad for not telling everyone about my sexuality, everything was being bottled up and I couldn’t take it anymore, so I decided that comfort eating was the only way to feel better.

I was digging into a bag of Nachos with a bowl of Salsa and hadn’t realized I was sobbing so loud.

“Niall?”

The familiar Irish lilt of Mary’s voice floated through the kitchen.

“Marwy?” I replied, bits of chewed up Nacho going everywhere.

“Niall? What are you doing down here so late? It’s 1.30pm!”

“Couldn’t sleep..”

“There’s something else isn’t there.”

I continued eating for a moment.

“I have a secret, and I haven’t told anyone yet.”

“Everyone has secrets Niall, yours can’t be too bad.”

“I-”

I sniffed and took a deep breath.

“I’m gay, Mary.”

“Is that it? I thought you were gunna say you weren’t really Irish.” She winked and came and sat down next to me.

“You mean, you’re not.. disgusted by me?”

Mary chuckled.

“Why would I be disgusted Niall? You can’t change who ya are, and you shouldn’t change, for anybody, and if you do want to change who ya are, then it should because you want to, not because others want you to.”

After Mary’s speech I put the food away, gave her a hug, and went back to bed.

And from that day on, I vowed I wouldn’t change for anyone but me.

~

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