A/N:
There's no chapter 71, I deleted it because of how bad it was💀 enjoy this though❤️🥰
CHAPTER SEVENTY-TWO
we don't need words
•••
ɴᴏʟᴀɴ ᴍᴜʟʟᴇɴ
On our last day before I had to leave, Oakley insisted on taking me out on a date. He promised me a good one this time, so when he took me to a dark alleyway with a bunch of sketchy security guards standing outside, I was concerned.
"Don't worry, these people can't say anything," Oakley reassured me as he led me inside the building where we were met with what looked like an endlessly long staircase. It was dark except for the white LED strips on each step that ensured we wouldn't trip in the darkness.
"That's not what I'm worried about," I said. Oakley looked around briefly before realization hit.
"Fair. But I promise you'll love this."
Once we finally reached the top and passed two other security guards and a solid, heavy door, we were stood in the back of a room with at the end of it a giant window. I kept walking towards it, and then I noticed the huge stage at the end of the venue, along with a shit ton of empty seats.
The place we were in was separate from the rest of the seats. It was still big, about the same size as my living room, but the seats were set up in groups with tables as well, and the groups were all set far apart, along with a bar at the very back of the room right next to the door. There was no one here except for the security guards guarding the door, just like the two at the bottom of the stairs.
"I've never been to a concert," I admitted.
"I figured," he said with a grin. "That's why we're here."
"Wait, who's performing?"
"First this band called Breakers is up. They're the opening act. After that is Holly Burnstock. She was the opener for my last tour. I think you'll like them."
"This place is enormous," I said, looking back at the venue.
"I know!" His face lit up like he'd just had a happy memory flooding back.
"What is it?" I asked when he kept staring at the stage with his content smile on his face.
"I performed here for the first time roughly two and a half years ago. It was all pretty new to me still. People knew of my music and I already got played on the radio, but I'd never performed in a place like this yet."
"How did you not freak out?"
There must've been tens of thousands of people here. Things were different for me. I was an actor, and all people could really judge was how well I was doing my job. If they complained, it was either about my character or my work, but they never got to judge me. For Oakley, whatever people thought of him was raw and real, and scariest of all, live.
"I did. Looking back, they shouldn't have let me play here. It was too much, too quickly." His smile was still there, a little faded, but still there. "I think it was a little triggering."
"You think so?"
"Yeah. It was my first tour, I didn't sleep very well, or eat very well, the tens of thousands of people were just cheering me on. On one hand I got a ton of shit for being rude or unprofessional or a bad performer. On the other they praised me like I was otherworldly." He chuckled, clearly seeing the humor in the situation after all. "I hate how much sense this all makes."
"Hey, no bad thoughts today, alright? It makes sense. That's good."
He held my hand, interlacing our fingers. I looked around the room, but there were still just the security guards, so I held his hand a little tighter.
"If I ever do anything stupid again, promise me you'll hold me accountable. You can never blame yourself, alright?"
I nodded. "I won't." We stared at each other for a few seconds before he talked again.
The biggest grin spread on his face, and I wrapped my arms around him and he hugged me back in a death grip.
"Let's sit down," he said, guiding me to a table at the far corner of the room. There was more than enough space, but he decided to sit right next to me. "The doors open in forty minutes so the audience can enter, and then they start playing roughly half an hour later."
"Why are we this early?"
"It's my last day with you. I don't wanna waste a second of it," he said. We looked at each other with bittersweet smiles. We both knew that me leaving was only temporary, but it somehow felt so permanent.
He leaned his head on my shoulder, sighing deeply as he rested his arm over my lap. I wrapped an arm around him and pushed a stray curl away from his face, but it fell down the moment I let go. So I kept sweeping it back gently, sometimes pulling at the curl to watch it bounce back up.
We sat in the comfort of each other's presence for a while, until we heard the sound of a giant crowd coming in. There was a screen above the window that showed us the parts of the venue we couldn't see. It was kinda cool how many people there were.
Oakley was so quiet that I thought he'd fallen asleep for a minute, but then he did speak. "I like this." He removed his head from my shoulder and closed his eyes. "Kiss me now, and it'll be the best kiss in my life."
"What about our future wedding?" I asked.
He opened his eyes. "Too many people watching."
"Okay, fair," I said, the most high-pitched giggle leaving my throat. My face grew hotter, but Oakley didn't seem to care about that. So I leaned in. Once our noses were touching, I kissed him, and maybe he was right. It was that going down the rollercoaster type of feeling. Not just butterflies and sweaty palms. It was the adrenaline of not being the two of us in our bedroom. It was weird to me. It wasn't quite so bad that I was anxious, but the feeling was definitely new. "Happy now?"
"Very." He returned to the position we were in before, with his head resting on my shoulder.
I let my eyes close for a few minutes until the door opened and sounds of laughter entered. As much as I wanted to ignore it and continue playing with Oakley's hair, or interlace our fingers, or simply enjoy each other's company, my reflex was to create a distance between us.
"She's seriously insane, I'm telling you. You wouldn't believe it."
Oakley sent me an apologetic look before turning toward the group of people that had just come in.
"Danny," he said to the guy he recognized. "How are you?"
"Dude, I'm great. You remember that girl Tessa from my party the other day?"
He looked back at me, but I didn't have much to say.
"Tessa?" he asked, thinking about it for a few seconds before he remembered. "The brunette with the pink streaks?"
"Yeah, her! I asked her out. She said she'd meet me here so I wanted to be early."
"Early, huh? That's new."
"He's head over heels," another person said, but they left as quickly as they came, leaving just the three of us.
"Yeah, yeah," Danny said, waving with his arm in disinterest. "What are you guys doing here so early anyway? I don't think we've met. I'm Danny," he said, holding out his hand to me.
"Nolan," I introduced myself. We're on a date, I wanted to add. I really wanted to, but the words got stuck in my throat, never coming out the way I intended.
He and Oakley seemed pretty close, and from what I've heard, Oakley felt like he could trust him. Why was it so hard for me to trust him, or anyone, for that matter?
I was almost certain that the purple glow of the lights would cover my reddened face, until my eyes met Oakley's. I wasn't sure how to read his expression at first. Maybe it was my own bias, but it felt like disappointment, or frustration. It wasn't until he gave me a little encouraging smile that I finally realized it was simply concern. He was concerned for me.
"Oakley told me a lot about you."
"I did?" Oakley said, apparently not remembering mentioning me to him before.
"Yeah, at my party the other day. You said Nolan was going to kill you. You didn't tell me why, but seems like you're pretty alive."
"Right. I'm on this new medication so I can't drink. Nolan's just been looking out for me," he said, turning towards me with yet another smile.
"Dude, if you'd told me I would've made sure you didn't have anything!" He looked at Oakley in shock, but Oakley calmed him down.
"That's why I didn't tell you. This thing was like three weeks ago. I'm fine. I take my pills, drink enough water, all that shit."
"I'll still be watching you, though. Especially once we're touring again, because you get all..." he didn't finish his sentence, but I could imagine it. It was the way Oakley described it. Jetlag, extreme pressure, lots of stress, but also the high energy of a crowd on top of a large stage, with everyone watching you. "I will make sure you're okay."
I could tell by just the tone in his voice that he meant it. He cared for Oakley in the way a real friend should. I wanted to trust him too. The guy I let the night in the woods even knew, and nothing disastrous happened. The security guards had probably caught on too. If they could keep quiet, so could Oakley's literal friend.
But I couldn't say it. The harder I tried, the more my heart started beating. The air was feeling hotter and it was getting harder to breathe.
"Nolan?" Oakley said. His hand was resting atop my wrist. I had scratched on it. It was now a bright red color.
"I- I'm so sorry," I said. I still wasn't breathing the way I was supposed to. I was so stuck in my head that I hadn't realized Danny had already left to greet the girl he liked until I looked around to make sure no one was looking at me. Oakley held my hands and looked me in the eyes, and I could feel myself relaxing ever so slightly at the sight of the deep, inviting colors of his.
"What's wrong?" His eyebrows furrowed a little.
"I'm a fucking coward, Dimple." I couldn't look at him anymore. My face turned hotter every time I tried.
"My boyfriend is not a coward. What's going on?"
"I wanted to tell him but I couldn't."
"We don't have to. Danny is chill. He could be the last person to know and he'd be fine with it."
"I don't want to say it for him," I told Oakley. "It's for myself. I think I want people to know, but I just can't do it."
"Don't rush yourself if you're not real, all right? Your time will come."
It was hard to explain what I was feeling. I wanted people to know; the people I knew we could trust, at least. But even the thought of telling someone made my heartbeat speed up like I was having a heart attack.
"I think... I think I wanna tell some people. No, I do. I want people to know. I'm just... when I try... I can't do it. I can't say it."
"We don't have to say it," he said again.
"But—"
"Hear me out, Nolan. We don't owe anyone an explanation. We can just be us. If that's really what you want, of course."
"I don't get it."
"We didn't really tell anyone before, did we? Gen found out, you didn't tell your parents, did you even really tell your friends?"
I shook my head, realizing that he was right. We didn't need words to tell people we were together. We could show it through our actions.
Oakley voiced my thoughts almost verbatim. "We don't need words to tell people we love each other."
I didn't give him a warning before I kissed him. I just did whatever felt best, which was to do this immediately before I could chicken out.
He smiled against my lips, betraying how happy he secretly was this entire time. That was all I needed to know that I'd made the right decision. I put one hand on his jaw, pulling him a little bit closer. He pulled away just a little bit to tell me something.
"I love you."
"I love you more," I said letting out a deep sigh. I really did that. My heart was still racing and my hands were a little sweaty, but thus far, it was worth it. What I didn't want, however, was anyone questioning us about it, because I would collapse.
"The show is starting in a few. Do you want to see it?"
"Yeah," I said. I hadn't realized how much my hand was shaking until I let Oakley take it. He saw it. He watched me, almost as though asking if I was alright. I gave him a tiny nod, and the corner of his lip raised a little. "Let's go."
So we did. He held my hand the entire time, walking to a door right next to the giant window. I didn't even spare a glance at anyone else, and neither did he. They were on my mind, but they were distant. I hadn't felt like that in way too long.
"I think I like showing you off," I told him.
"I know I like showing you off," he said, kissing me on my cheek once more. "The view from the balcony is insane."
I nodded, and without another word, we entered the balcony portion.
Music was already pumping through the speakers, but it was all fading, muddling in the background as people filled up the large space below us.
Oakley looked at the crowd in awe with a smile so wide.
"The Breakers are coming on in a few minutes," he said in my ear so I could hear him properly. "Some people skip the openers."
"But there's so many people already," I said, looking down the railing. There must've been thousands of people, and the venue wasn't even all the way filled up yet. From this distance, the people looked almost like a colony of ants, except it kind of sounded like an overcrowded conference room. At least it did, until all the lights turned off and people started cheering. Apart from the noise of the crowd, it was quiet, until red lasers shot up towards the ceiling and a harmony filled the place, overpowering the cheering of the crowd.
"Holy fuck," I said in surprise. Oakley wrapped an arm around my waist so we could stand closer to each other.
"Did that scare you?" he asked, once again in my ear so I could hear him over the music and the crowd. His lip grazed my ear lightly, and my muscles tensed a little. I turned my face towards him.
"Of course not," I lied.
"Then why are you blushing?"
"I'm not!" I said. "It's the lighting. Of course I'm gonna look red in red lasers."
"Okay," he said, moving away. He was still smiling as he watched over the crowd. The light illuminated his features in a way I could only consider angelic, even if it was a harsh red, even with his proud smirk, even with the way I knew he saw himself.
He caught me off guard by turning his head toward me again.
"What?"
"You're coming over tonight?" I asked.
"As always." He was about to turn away again before I rested my hand on his jaw, preventing him from doing so. "What?" He asked again.
"Nothing," I said. "I'm just enjoying myself."
"By staring at me?"
"Yeah. And the music is quite good too."
"So you like the Breakers?"
I nodded.
"I knew you would," he said, a content little smile on his face. "That's why I chose this concert to be our first."
It was the sweetest thing he could've said, but also a complete lie. "You're just saying that."
"No, I mean it."
"Are you trying to tell me you're psychic?"
"No, but I do know you pretty well."
"Apparently better than I know myself."
"It's psychedelic."
"What?"
"The genre. It's psychedelic. That's how I knew you'd like it."
"There's a music style called psychedelic?"
He nodded.
"And what would make you think I'd like that? And don't say just because I've done them."
"You like things that help you escape reality for a bit."
"What makes you think that?"
"Your two favorite places on earth are in the woods and an hour drive away from the closest neighbor. Oh, and you also have a thing for irony. I thought this would be exactly that."
"Maybe you do know me better than I know myself," I said. "But if I'm being honest with you, psychedelics did not help me escape. They did the opposite for me."
"Oh. Well, how does that work?"
"I don't know if I... I probably shouldn't be talking to you about this."
"You can. I'm fine with it," he reassured me. "I love your serious conversations."
"Okay then," I said. But I wasn't exactly sure how to word this. "It felt like... I was more here," I tried, but Oakley furrowed his eyebrows like he didn't understand. "Uhm, it felt like I could see the world so much more clearly? I didn't stress about anything or anyone, because ultimately it didn't matter. It's hard to explain."
"I think I get it. It's like at the end of the day, nothing really matters."
"Yeah. Like, I could get my thoughts straight without having to worry about everything. Worrying didn't exist because... nothing really mattered."
He looked down the railing again, and I followed his gaze. He said something I couldn't quite understand, so I leaned over and asked him to repeat himself. He leaned back over to me again.
"Do you ever miss it?"
"I don't think so," I told him. "If I need to not think about things for a while, I'll call you, and we'll disappear together."
The song in the background faded away, coming to an end before the band picked it up again with another one.
"Sometimes I feel like I'm holding you back. I know you want us to be out but I'm still so fucking afraid."
"I told you you're not holding me back. Not at all. It doesn't have to be all at once. It can happen over the course of a year, or two, or a decade, or even never. I don't care. What I care about is that I can share this with you. I can share the thing I love with the person I love, and as long as I can keep doing that, I'll be happy."
"But I still feel trapped, Oakley." I didn't know how to say it, but I felt like I was going against nature by trying to hide it. The longer it went on, the more energy it required. Everything was becoming frustrating and confusing. "I don't think wanna stay in anymore. But I'm too afraid to be out. It's conflicting. That's why I wanted to tell your friend. I thought it would be a step in the right direction, toward where I want to be."
"You don't want to stay in, but you're afraid to be out? So all that's holding you back is fear? It's not about the industry anymore?"
If the industry could get over me doing drugs, surely they could do the same with me being gay. The idea that they wouldn't was also just a product of my fear. Ava had made me realize that.
"Nolan?" he asked.
"Do you think maybe we could do the same thing publicly one day? We should just hold hands on a red carpet and then we'd be out. We can do that, right?"
"One day, absolutely. We can talk about it once you get back, alright? Don't rush it because of me."
I nodded, and he took the opportunity to hug me tightly.
I finally felt like I could relax. I could collapse and I'd be content. But like whenever it came with us, the moment was cut short.
"Fuck you," a girl's voice said before she poured her drink all over me.
I was too shocked to even reply, but Oakley didn't seem to share that issue.
"What the fuck is wrong with you?" Oakley asked, turning towards her with such anger in his eyes.
I'd never seen him this angry before, yet somehow he was holding back. His eyes had turned red, his breathing had turned deeper and his body was tense, but he kept himself composed.
I, however, felt like I couldn't breathe. I couldn't tell if my eyes were prickling from the drink in my eyes or because I was starting to cry, but I felt like I was sinking through the fucking floor. My limbs felt heavy, my heart was beating wildly against my ribs like they were trying to keep it caged, my drenched clothes stuck to my skin like molten plastic.
There was a bunch of yelling, a bunch of background noise, even the door of the door opening and closing up multiple times. And I was the center of attention.
Oakley reached out for my hands, but he couldn't keep them still.
"I can't breathe," I managed to push out. "I can't—"
I couldn't hear him over the noise of the cheering audience. I couldn't see him over the black spots in my vision. I hadn't noticed we'd moved until the sound of a door closing caught me off guard, but the noise had reduced once it did.
"Deep in, deep out, Nolan. You'll be okay," he said. He set an example for me, but I couldn't stop shaking, making every single bit shaky and inconsistent.
"I can't—"
"Breathe in," he said. I tried, but I couldn't fill my lungs up properly.
I couldn't die like this.
"Nolan, look at me please."
I closed my eyes and shook my head. I needed to focus on getting my heart rate down before I died of a heart attack.
"I know I've written a few songs about you, but there is one I really love," he said. Why he was bringing it up now if all moments beat me. "It's about how I realized I liked you. And then about how I started to love you."
"What?"
"I said I wrote a song. It's only just a demo, but I'll play it for you. Tell me what you think."
A song started playing vaguely in the background, but I could barely hear it over the crowd in the room next to us and the sound of my own breathing.
"You hear the guitar in this part, going like..." he was quiet for just a second, but then started mimicking the sound of the guitar in the song. "And there's a violin hidden in the background, do you hear it?"
I nodded, looking at him kneeled in front of me, both of his elbows resting on my knees.
"Do you hear the water I've recorded? It's not exactly how I wanted it, but this is still rough."
The water was very scenic and loud compared to the rest of the song, but he made it work somehow.
"Don't change it," I said. "I like it."
"You do?"
"Yeah."
He smiled at me as he took my hand again, letting the song play in the background. I finally recognized the place we were in. It was the staircase that led us upstairs. Another group of people walked toward the room, but they didn't pay any attention to us.
"I'm so sorry about what happened," he said. "We're all like, sticky and wet now."
"No, I'm sorry for freaking out. I ruined it."
"I'm pretty sure it got ruined when my ex-girlfriend poured her drinks all over us."
"Your ex-girlfriend?"
"I'd say she's not, but apparently she is. She told me she was angry because I led her on. I made it very clear I didn't want to be with her, though."
"It's okay."
"It's really not. You have nothing to do with it. She can be mad at me but she had no right to do this to you."
I almost laughed at how serious he sounded about all this. "You're making it sound like she hit me with her car."
"She made you have a panic attack, Nolan. This isn't okay."
"Sorry," I said. I shouldn't have freaked out like that.
"I won't do it again."
"Do what again? Get panic attacks? You can't promise me that."
"You're right. I'm sorry."
"Nolan," he sighed.
"Right, I'm s— I'll be quiet."
"Do you need something? I can get you some water."
I shook my head again. I didn't want him to leave me alone.
He put our faces together and took a deep breath. I looked up, my eyes meeting his. I followed his example, taking deep breaths, and letting them go slowly. We did that for a few minutes before he let me go. Just being around him was so calming. He could make me feel better in an instant.
"Are you alright?"
I nodded, letting him wrap his arms around me.
"You're my hero," I told him.
"If there's a hero in our relationship, it's definitely you."
"Me? Literally how?"
"Usually you're the one making sure I'm alright. You remind me to take my pills, you remind me to eat, you make sure I'm doing well. You're always there for me."
"You're making it sound like it's a chore. I love you. Of course I want you to be happy and healthy."
"I love you too. We don't need to prove anything to anyone. I don't care about what everyone else is thinking."
I didn't want to go back to the concert. As much as I'd been enjoying myself, I felt like I couldn't show my face there again tonight.
"Do you want to go home?"
"And do what? Sit at home sulking? I feel like shit."
"You don't want to stay here and if I'm being honest, neither do I."
"You're just saying that."
"I'm not. We can find another place if you want to. Our date doesn't have to end here."
We could find another place, but it wouldn't change anything. I would freak out again, and we'd have to leave again, and we'd start over again. Or we could go home and have another date in the shadows. I didn't want to do that anymore.
"We're all covered in... I don't even know what this is."
"Then we'll take a shower and continue."
I rolled my eyes, but he didn't care.
"Do you want to... what's another normal date? We could go watch a movie together! We won't have to interact with anyone, but it's still a normal date. It's only seven, so we could catch one at nine-thirty probably."
"What if people see?" I hated to bring up that point, but I couldn't stop thinking about it. There were so many things that could go wrong if I came out now, and I was afraid.
"Friends see movies together. We'll just have to make it look like... not a date."
"Then what's the point?"
He looked me straight in the eyes, not saying anything for a few seconds. It looked almost like he was waiting for me. "The point is that we're together and that we're having fun."
He tried his best not to look hurt, but I could hear it in the way his voice had dropped.
"I'm so sorry..."
"No, don't. It's fine."
"I meant... I don't know why I said it like that."
"If you want to try again some other time it's fine. We don't have to do this today."
"I'm leaving for two months, Oakley."
"But you'll be back, right?"
"Right."
"And you promised you'd try to be here on your birthday."
"Yeah."
"Then we can continue this in a month from now. On your birthday. And we'll have the best day of our lives."
"Okay." I nodded, and forced a small smile on my face. I didn't like the turn the conversation had taken and there was now a tension between us I didn't like.
"Do you want me to drive you home?"
"You're not staying over anymore?"
"Do you still want me to?"
"Or course I do."
"Okay. Then I'll stay."
•••
AUTHOR'S NOTE:
I'm sorry for another late update. I have this new habit where I fall asleep while writing, so things either don't get saved or I only get to write a paragraph before I'm gone 🥲🥲
Has anyone seen Heartstopper? I almost cried honestly 😭
Question of the update: I have none this time writing this note made me tired
Bye bye 👋