Chapter 10
Gavin’s POV
I rubbed Ivan’s back with small circles as he stared down at Devon’s sleeping face. After we managed to help Devon from his hyperventilation, he popped some pills and went to sleep until morning. Devon was breathing normally but Ivan was worried sick. He told me that he had never seen Devon reacting this way.
A knock on the door pulled us away from our respective thoughts and turned towards the door. Blake peered in. “Clyde and I made pancakes. You guys should eat. It’s still 7. He’ll wake up soon,” he assured us. Clyde nodded his head. “Yea, we should,” he said and looked up at me. I smiled and kissed his cheek and pulled him up from the bed. As we were about to leave, we heard some shuffling behind us and saw Devon was waking up and pushing his blanket away.
“Hey, hey, you alright?” Ivan quickly went to attend him. Devon sat back on his bed and sighed. “I slept until morning?” he asked. Ivan nodded his head. “You were hyperventilating last night. What happened?” he asked. Devon’s eyes glanced up at me and I noticed he looked nervous.
“Who’s that?” he asked finally. I smiled and waved a hand. “I’m Gavin, Ivan’s boyfriend,” I introduced myself. He carved a small smile and looked at Ivan. “Where’s Blake?” he asked. “With Clyde in the kitchen,” he answered. “Want to go eat some breakfast?”
Devon nodded his head sheepishly and slowly got out of bed. “Oh, meet you guys in a bit. I feel like I need a shower,” he said and hurried to bathroom. I followed Ivan towards the kitchen and already Clyde was stuffing the pancakes in his face. “Don’t worry. We got more. I heard Devon’s voice just now. He’s awake?” Blake placed more hot pancakes onto the plate and smacked Clyde’s hand when he tried to reach for more. “He’s in the showers,” Ivan replied and plopped down on one of the seat.
We were talking about random stuff until Devon appeared and sat at the empty chair at the end of the table next to Ivan but further away from all of us. Blake was sitting near the counter since he was still cooking that never ending pancakes. “Good morning,” Devon said sheepishly. He had a new bandage around his right hand again and a smaller patch of bandage below his jaw.
“Since you passed out last night, let me introduce you properly. Devon, this is Clyde. Clyde, this is Devon,” Blake said, gesturing at his fiancé. Clyde made a small wave before continuing to eat his breakfast. Devon just smiled at him and looked at Ivan. “About last night…” he started. Ivan looked at him thoughtfully. “Are you okay to tell us?” he asked. Devon just shrugged. “You’re kind of my guardian right now so you should know anyway,” he said. Ivan nodded his head.
“Due to my situation, I developed an anxiety problem especially around big built and tall men…” he said and his eyes fell on both Clyde and I. It was quite a compliment considering both of us were not that built, we just happened to work out more and thus, have more muscles. “So, if I need to be meet someone with that kind of built, I have to be introduced from a safe distance, like at least five meters,” he continued. “Walking around in the mall or the park are a hassle, I admit. But I can’t help it. I’ve been bullied by those kinds of people for the past three years,” he said nonchalantly.
Blake had finished making pancakes by this time and placed a plate filled with three pancakes in front of Devon. “So you’re okay with us?” I braved myself to ask. Ivan turned to me and looked at me with a death glare. Devon shrugged. “I think so. I’m not fainting or hyperventilating right now,” he answered and started to eat his breakfast.
Ivan ruffled his hair and smiled. “You got any medication prescribed for you?” he asked. “Yep. One type only though, thank God. Only to be eaten whenever I feel like hyperventialing,” he replied.
“Well, that sort it out. I called your father last night about you passed out and make sure you call him after breakfast, okay?” Ivan said. “He was worried sick and he sounded tired too,” he added.
“Yeah. Since he is trying to get the guys behind my…bully to jail or something,” he replied, unconsciously stroking his bandaged arm.
Blake’s POV
I couldn’t stand wondering about the bandages so I needed to ask. “Dev, are those…from the guys who hit you?” I asked. I felt Ivan glaring daggers at me for being blunt but I ignored it. Devon pursed his lips as he looked down at his hand. “Yea, they hit my hand with a steel baseball bat. It was fractured to two places but it will take me about 3 months to properly heal so I can’t do any writing for now.”
My heart sank when he said that. Devon has always been writing since he was able to grip a crayon. He loved writing. He wrote stories when he was younger and would pass them to both Ivan and I to read. Not only the people who hurt him because of his sexual orientation but they intended to destroy his life as well. Good thing it was only fractured.
“I got this from a wood splinter when they hit my leg with a bench,” he pointed at the bandage below his jaw. I saw Clyde and Gavin winced as if they were imagining it. “Good thing I was looking away at that time. If not it might hit my eye instead,” Devon continued, rather nonchalantly as if it was just a faraway memory.
“How long?” Ivan asked. Devon looked thoughtful for a moment. “It started in high school, but it was rather tame. Just name calling and petty pranks. They were the jocks and the popular guys in school. I guess they were insecure enough being around me,” he shrugged. “But they started become violent towards me when our school lost this year’s baseball tournament. They kind of blamed it on me. Not everyone on the team was bad. Only these three people.”
“Pssh. Well, that’s stupid,” Gavin said. “Immature people,” added Clyde.
“Good thing there was some of their teammates passing by the locker room and heard me screaming, apparently. I passed out before noticing someone else came in and when I woke up I was in the hospital. My father told me he was trying to get the people who did this to me to juvenile centre as they are not 18 yet. So, their families were angry about that and started to threaten me. So, here I am.”
Devon ended his story as he sipped his juice. “So ridiculous!” Ivan broke the silence. “Well, don’t you worry about that Dev. Croxton is the best place for you now. Heck, you might just want to live here for the rest of your life.”
He smiled at that and nodded his head. “I’d love that.”
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Ivan’s POV
Blake had moved out completely to live with Clyde and Devon was making himself at home already. He had helped to add more decorations and cleaned the whole apartment while waiting for the semester to start.
Even though his right hand was bandaged, it proved no trouble as he swiftly cleaned the house and even cooked meals. To be honest, he was like a God sent as I was starting to get busy with my projects as the campus was reopening soon. Gavin was still working at the campus while waiting for his Natgeo result and he was terribly fidgety about it. I had to smack some sense into his head literally as his nervousness was affecting me as well.
Even when I came back home late with Gavin who would stayed over from time to time since my apartment was nearer, Devon would get us some simple supper as he knew we didn’t eat dinner beforehand. He was like a mother hen too, always nagging Gavin whenever he left his clothes or stuff around.
I was still shocked by his story, of how he was bullied just because he was gay. To be honest, he wasn’t flamboyant or lively like how people usually stereotyped gay people were. He wasn’t the showy kind either. He was just like your average teenager, just doing his stuff. Heck, he didn’t even had a girly thing on him, hair clips or earrings. He was just into pretty stuff and writings. Lots of writings. And he was always seen around with his phone, tapping like a blaze on it since he was unable to use a pen for a while. But, I guessed some people hated the person who was labelled as something offensive for them. It was sickening.
Though, I wished he was more open to us. It always seemed like he was holding something back. And I always tried to show him that it was okay if he wanted to say anything on his mind. Blake and I will always be there for him, unlike his so-called friends who turned him away as soon as he was targeted by the bullies, afraid to be caught up.
Gavin had complained to me few times how my attention was taken by Devon now and to be honest it was adorable that he was jealous but at the same time I felt like smacking him because Devon needed to be around someone at this moment. And I honestly didn’t want to leave him alone. Call it paternal instinct or something but both Blake and I were close with Devon since we were little so we always felt like wanting to help him in some way or another.
But he needed to open up more and tell us. We would always listen.
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So sorry for the late update. I was meant to update it last Friday but my pendrive where I kept my progress was missing the whole week! I didn't want to rewrite everything again so I allowed myself to search for it for a few days and lo and behold I found it this morning! ;__; I apologize once again and hope you enjoyed Devon's outlook so far :)