18 | Jade | it's not up to you
Monday
Jade was feeling weird for the rest of the day. Although after the incident they continued their day usuall, something was different. She felt judged by every one of her friends and it sucked.
Just right now, she was walking home with Luke and Calum because Luke was coming over, and they talked about the events of lunch break again. She had now understood that the problem was that she told Brenda and her friends that Mason was gay.
But she still didn't understand the why it was that much of a problem because they weren't homophobic. They accepted it, so where was the problem?
Generally, she didn't understand the big thing about coming out anyway and she had thought Mason was out. He had told her, their friends knew, she had thought that he was open to talk about it.
"Mason has already come out, why doesn't he want anyone else to know?", she wondered on the way home.
"Just because he is comfortable with us knowing, it doesn't have to mean that he's comfortable telling other people about it", Luke explained to her, laying an arm around her shoulders.
She knew he wasn't mad at her, and this little gesture assured her that they were okay, but she also knew that he didn't approve of what she had done.
"Where's the difference though? It's the twenty first century, as if homophobes still existed"
"Oh they exist, trust me", Calum scoffed.
"Yeah well maybe in the older generations but not in a high school. Teenagers are all really open about stuff like that"
"We don't know", Calum said tensed. "Just because you aren't homophobic, and just because our friends aren't, it doesn't mean that everyone at our school is."
"Well, I've never seen a gay kid being insulted at school. Didn't Mason say that that one girl from Luke's party was a lesbian? She's never been humiliated in school."
"Yeah well that's because most men find it hot if two women hook up, but disgusting if two men do." Calum pushed through his teeth.
"Really?", Jade dropped her mouth open.
"Oh yes, trust me, many guys even watch lesbian porn exclusively", he assured her.
"But why?", she shook her head strongly, while pulling her eyebrows together. "I don't get turned on if I see to guys kissing, it would have to be a man and a woman to do it for me."
"You see?", he pointed out, "that's the difference. Gay men don't get fetishized, not by women and most certainly not by straight men. I'm not saying that gay women have it easier than gay men, but they have such a different place in society, you can't compare that one girl being out to Mason being out."
"There shouldn't be a difference though", she crossed her arms in front of her chest.
"No there shouldn't", Calum agreed. "But there is and you shouldn't blame Mason for not wanting to be out to the whole school. It's his place to say if he feels save in an environment to come out. It's not up to you to decide that for him."
Jade began to understand.
Calum had said some things that she hadn't considered before and for the first time ever since Mason had come out to her, she really tried to put herself into his position.
He might not have fully accepted himself. Maybe Mason himself was still insecure about who he liked and who he didn't, which would only be plausible.
So far he had come out to his parents and even though his mom seemed to support him, his dad didn't and the way Jade had reacted at the beginning, wasn't that great either.
Jade felt really bad about how she had responded in that moment, but she had been in shock and even more in denial, she had just not been ready to admit that they were completely over.
So Mason hadn't made the best experiences with outing himself. It made sense that he might not have been ready to give it another go.
In this moment, she just wanted to turn around, run to Mason and tell him how sorry she was. Not just for telling Brenda, for everything. She wanted to hug him and let him know that she had messed up, but she was willing to do anything in her power to make it up to him.
But she knew she couldn't because for one, she didn't know where exactly Mason was and even if she did, she was sure he didn't want to see her.
If she was him, she wouldn't want to see him.
The three of them walked home quietly, Jade was lost in her thoughts and also Luke and Calum didn't talk. It was a weird atmosphere, but Jade was glad that they all remained silent.
She needed the conversation to be left open, because there was still a lot that needed to be said, or to be more specific that she needed to think about. Switching to a different topic would've just pushed everything to the side as if there whole conversation had just meant nothing.
Several minutes later, all of them reached Jade's and Calum's home. While Jade was opening the door, Calum stepped aside from her and Luke, his hands gliding down his pockets.
He cleared his throat. "You guys just go on in... I think I'll go for a walk."
"You sure?", Jade assured, while turning the keys in the lock. "We've just had a twenty minute walk from school."
Calum shrugged, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. "Yeah... I wanted to smoke a bit anyway, so..."
"Okay", Jade shrugged, not asking him any more about it.
She turned round and with a loud clack the door opened. Calum watched his sister and his boyfriend disappear inside, followed by Anastasia screaming "Lukkkieee."
And then all the noise was shut down by the front door snapping back.
Calum turned around, feeling his heart pounding in his chest really hard.
'Let's do this', he whispered to himself, while pulling a ton of air through his lunges.
1020 words
shortest chapter so far and i'm so sorry about that mainly because i again haven't updated in two weeks...
i know i said it in the last chapter, but i'm graduating soon, meaning my finals are coming up and i need to study a lot. additionally to that , last Saturday was prom so i was too hangover to update on Sunday XD
BUT to say how sorry I am, I'm going to update tomorrow again, with a longer chapter <3
lots of love and thank you so much for reading and your patience,
xoxo Amora