Is this jealousy?
"Are you free after school on the evening of the eighth?" Cami asks me as we take a seat on the squeaky cafeteria chairs at lunch. I shrug in response.
"I don't know. You're going to have to be more specific. What day is that?" I say, not bothering to do the maths as I rip open a sachet of sugar and pour it in my coffee. I don't think I'm completely sure what the date is today.
I take a sip of the not nearly hot enough drink. The coffee the school sells is not in my top 10 list of the best coffees, but I'm going to have to settle for what I can get if I want to get through the day. You can taste the cheapness of it.
"This Friday," She replies, taking a bite of her tuna sandwich. I grimace at the smell of it. Once she swallows, she carries on, "I'm having a house party to celebrate my birthday. But if you can't come then, I'll have to change the date. I can't have my birthday party without my best friend, can I?" She nudges my shoulder.
"I'm pretty sure I'm free," I say, although I already know that I'm completely free. I don't have much of a social life apart from Cami, which I blame on myself. My anxiety hates me socialising with people who I'm—or it's—not familiar with. I also don't go to parties to avoid the alcohol as my medication has a bad reaction with it.
"I know it's two days before the London trip, and my birthday is during it, but I couldn't find any other time. It's not like people will still be hungover on the day of the journey, anyway."
I pause halfway through taking another sip, and my eyes widen. I had completely forgotten about our school trip to London. I had brushed it to the back of my mind to prevent myself from overthinking about it and getting overly anxious about the flight. I told Cami not to talk about it too much for the same reason. But now that she's mentioned it, it reminds me that we're going on Sunday. In five days. Oh shit.
Then I remember that the sheet of paper that is to tell us who we will be sharing a room with for the week is supposed to be taped on the History Department Office this lunchtime and I abruptly stand up, causing Cami to look at me in alarm.
Before she can ask where I'm going, I say, "We get to find who we're staying in a room with like right now."
Her eyes widen with excitement, "Oh crap, yeah." She dumps her sandwich crusts in the bin next to the table we're sat at and stands up. I dispose of my coffee cup, and then we grab our bags and bolt from the cafeteria, up the stairs, down the corridor, and towards the History Department Office.
Expectantly, the hallway is already milling with students trying to find out who they're going to share a room with, pushing and shoving each other out the way so they can see.
I chuckle in amusement at the sight of a girl stomping her feet after finding out she's with a person she doesn't like. The mirth lasts until I push my way to the front and find out who I'm sharing a room with for the week. My smile drops. Next to my name is none other than Alex Montgomery.
"Looks like we're in a room together," I can hear that very same boy who's name I just read in my head say behind me.
I turn, coming face to face with Alex. His expression matches the amusement in his voice in the form of a grin, and the frown disappears from my face. At the outset, I was disappointed because I forgot about our civility and hoped to be with someone I'm friends with, but now I remember we're not on bad terms anymore, I guess it won't be that bad.
"I guess so," I say.
I still can't fully trust him yet, and I'm always on-edge about the fact that he can change his persona anytime he wishes. However, if anything happens between now and Sunday, I can always ask to change rooms. Of course, the school won't allow two students with a high chance of disputing with each other together in a room for a whole week.
It's stupid that they're putting us in a room together in the first place, as they have no idea Alex apologised to me. First, it's the tutoring, now it's this. What are they trying to do?
"It seems we're in one of the few two people rooms so it will just be us two," He says, and I can tell he's trying not to laugh. I raise my eyebrows. How lovely. If he tries to beat me up, I'll have no one there to save me. Comforting.
"Great," I respond absentmindedly, trying to find Cami in the crowd of students. "Excuse me," I say after seeing her, then I make my way over to her. I can hear him laugh about how polite British people are before he walks away in the opposite direction as I did.
When Cami spots me, she reaches out and grabs my arm.
"One second you were there, the next you'd been swallowed by the crowd," She says, panting as though she has just been running. "Anyway, who are you with? I'm with that new girl, Lucy. She seems nice, but she's really quiet. We're in one of the two people rooms so I'll have no one else to talk to. I guess you can come into our room until lights out."
"You'll never guess who I was put with," I say. Cami doesn't respond, but she raises her eyebrows as a way of telling me to 'go on'. "Alex Montgomery." Her mouth forms an 'o' shape.
"Oh. Well, uh, that's not great. I'm sorry you're in that situation. You're going to have to come into my room until lights out in that case. You'd go insane if you were stuck in there with Montgomery all the time. I know I would." She answers as we begin to walk back to the cafeteria. I don't respond.
She knows about Alex and I agreeing to be civil, but she patently still hates him. She's hooked on the idea that he's going to go back to his old ways and laugh about how he tricked me with all his friends. Though I am nervous about that happening, I don't particularly agree.
"Excuse me," I hear a small voice from beside me. I turn my head to see that it's Lucy. She looks skittish, so I smile at her, which relaxes her a little. "I still haven't made any friends yet so would it be alright if I sat with you guys for the rest of lunch again?" She asks, hopeful.
"Sure," I say. We walk in silence for a bit until I decide to break the seemingly awkward silence. "So, how come you're coming on the trip too? I mean— you're new and weren't here when we made the payments, so I didn't think—"
"Oh, my mom heard about the trip and asked if I could go if she paid the full price all at once 'cause I told her I've always wanted to go to England and she's really nice like that. They said they had space for me as someone dropped out for some reason, so my mom paid, and here we are."
I raise my eyebrow. I wonder how she was able to afford it all in one go, but I don't ask. I just smile at her and she smiles back, and it feels so natural.
Soon, we find the three of us sat around a cafeteria table, Cami and I chatting away mercilessly as per usual. Our love for talking is one of the things we first bonded over, back when we were kids, and I lived in England.
"So, Lucy, where are you from?" Cami asks after realising that Lucy hasn't said a word since we sat down. Cami leans forward towards the shy girl, resting her chin in her hand.
"Oh, I'm from L.A," Lucy replies, her cheeks going pink from the sudden attention.
"No, but like where are your parents from?"
"Aren't you Latina? Shouldn't you know better than to ask questions like that?" Lucy says with much more confidence than she had before, sitting up a bit straighter and looking directly at Cami. I may be overlooking this, but I don't think my first impression of her being shy is entirely how her personality is.
We're both taken by surprise at her sudden directness. It's clear Cami has touched a nerve with this, and I have to agree with Lucy. If someone said this to me, I'd be annoyed too.
Cami mutters out an apology, but whether or not she's genuinely sorry isn't clear. She then wholly dismisses the conversation and takes out her phone to send invites to everyone in the year for her newly decided birthday party via instagram. Once she sends the invitations, both Lucy and I get a notification. OK, so, she likes Lucy enough to invite her. That's good enough.
"Are you sure your parents will be OK with you having a party? Especially with the number of people that you've invited." I ask, taking a peek at her phone. She's basically invited the whole grade, and by the looks of it, people of other grades too.
"Yeah, yeah," she waves her hand dismissively, tucking her phone away in her bag. "They're away on a business trip thing from Thursday until Saturday night. They won't know so it'll be fine. Please apologise to your parents about the noise beforehand for me, though, as I literally live right next to you."
The bells rings as she says this, so all three of us get up and make our way to our next lesson.
After school, Alex is waiting by my car. I'm not disconcerted by this. We have come to the agreement that Tuesday will be our tutoring day, thus he will wait for me by my car on this day each week, or vice versa, depending on who is let out first. I make sure to I park my car away from where most of the other students park theirs, so I'm hidden towards the back of the school, to avoid anyone seeing and making up any sort of rumours.
Tuesday is the only day Alex can be sure his parents will be out of the house. I don't question why his parents need to be somewhere else, but I take the offer anyway. Tuesday works just fine for me, and if we need to be alone, I'll take it.
It's the first time Alex has actually been in my car, which makes it feel somewhat weird. I don't know whether or not I should make any sort of small talk, but my awkwardness overtakes me and I end up not saying a thing. Neither does he, so we arrive at his house not not even having said one word to each other.
Once we're seated in this vampire dining room, the atmosphere changes and I feel more comfortable with him again. When Alex plucks up a conversation, and everything feels more familiar once more, my awkwardness vanished entirely. I think being in close proximity, like the car, is the reason for the uneasiness.
I'm thankful that it's not so awkward regarding us in general anymore, ignoring our car situation. We've had a few friendly conversations since his apology, and have confirmed we're on good terms, so some of the tension is now finally gone, and I've been feeling more relaxed around him, whether that be now or in school.
It kind of feels like I'm hanging out with a friend, or at least an acquaintance, not being tutored by Alex. I'm not sure he feels the same way, though, but I've decided that however he feels, is OK. Either, there will be an improvement, or there will be no change, and no change seems less likely following the apologies.
"How have you been holding up since you came out?" I ask as I put a box around the word equations I most definitely need to remember according to Alex with a yellow highlighter.
"Great," he smiles. "I haven't lost any friends or anything, so it's all good. I'm still quite surprised. I'd expected them to be a lot more homophobic."
Even though no one at school has cared about the coming out, or said bad words at all regarding it in any lessons that I share with Alex, I still don't know how his friends have reacted behind the scenes. I care enough about his situation, if not about him, to ask.
The school, on the whole, doesn't care, and I can't say I'm surprised. Although Luke Maddison did call me a closeted fag in art a few weeks back, no one else has ever really come across as properly homophobic, or against gay people enough to say anything about Alex's coming out to his face. People have talked about it, sure, but not in a bad way. More like in a shocked way, and a few people have asked him things about it, like if it's true.
Don't get me wrong, people have joked about gay people, or used the word gay as an insult like 'that's so gay', but there have never been any actual homophobic incidents. I think Luke calling me a fag is one of the very few times I've heard someone say that word at school.
Thinking about that makes me feel more unwinded about my own coming out. It won't happen soon, I can definitely be sure of that, as I still need to gather as much mental courage as I can, because things can be unpredictable. There hasn't been a gay person come out in our year yet. I also want to figure out what exactly I am before I broadcast it to everyone. But knowing that Alex hasn't suffered publicly makes me feel a bit better.
"People probably don't care so much anymore. I mean, it is the 21st century," I reply, continuing to highlight random words to make it look like I've done more than I have. "Hey, what made you come out so suddenly?"
"Honestly?"
I nod, so he sighs, pursing his lips and tapping his pen against the wooden table.
"Well..." He hesitates, "there's this guy I like and, I don't know, he just kind of encouraged me to do it. He doesn't know he's done that, of course, as he doesn't know I like him, but..." He sighs again, "I don't know. I just looked at him one day and said in my mind 'I'm going to do it' so I did. I had this stupid notion that if I told everyone I like guys then maybe he'd recognise me more, and something would happen. I realise how ignorant that sounds now. I'm just crazy about him. I don't even know if he likes guys, though." He looks up at me and pulls a face, "And now I'm embarrassed. Sorry."
"Sorry for what? You don't need to be embarrassed." I reply with a laugh, poking his arm. "So, what's this guy's name? Is he from our school?"
I'm aware of how childish I may sound asking questions like that like I'm some sort of 12-year-old girl asking her friend about their crush at a slumber party, but I don't care to feel embarrassed about it. Alex is kind of an almost friend now. It's acceptable to ask this, right?
He clears his throat. His embarrassment is obvious now, yet I already know my teasing he will have to endure won't stop anytime soon. "Er... he does. You might know him, actually."
"OK," I drawl, leaning forward towards him. "then what's his name?"
"That is something I will not tell you."
"Oh, come on, tell me." I persist.
"Nope. I intend to keep it to myself."
"Fine, but I'm not letting it go." I laugh, leaving it there for Alex's benefit. Hm, maybe it's Jacob Daniels. Oh, or Mason Anderson. I can see Alex and him together. It's kind of cute.
Unexpectedly, a new feeling washes over me as my mind begins to process all of this, as I think about him actually being a bisexual man, a queer man, and the fact that he likes someone, and that someone may be Mason Anderson, or Jacob Daniels, or any other guy in our school. The more I think about everything, the more the feeling seems to pang in my chest.
Jealousy. I feel jealous. But of what? The fact that Alex knows his sexuality and has come out and I don't feel confident enough to do either of those things? Or is it because Alex likes someone? And that someone isn't me?
But why would I feel jealous about that? I've only just stopped hating him, and I don't even know if I like him completely right now— as a friend, of course. I know for sure I don't entirely trust him as of yet. We've still got a long way to go if we want to be proper friends. Like I said, we're kind of like almost friends, I guess.
I've only been acting all friendly towards him because I do want to be his friend one day, as long as he changes and doesn't go back to being an arsehole. That's not going to happen if I act all cold and distant.
I can understand if I feel jealous about him knowing who he is and being able to come out. It's been years, I'm still not sure what I am and I'm still yet to tell someone how I'm feeling. One of my biggest fears is having to come out, and here he is, stating it so calmly and confidently on Twitter with the knowledge that he could be furiously bullied for it.
He's said himself how shocked he is about the reaction, though if I'm honest myself, I'm not. But his shock just shows how he prepared himself for the backlash. He came out with that comprehension. And here I am, scared to come out because of that. Am I a wimp, or is he just really sure of himself?
Something tells me that him coming out is not the reason I'm jealous, but that just leaves me feeling painfully confused. I don't like this guy. Why would I care if he likes someone? Sure, I'm happy for him, and I do hope he has a happy ending to this. I'm just nice like that. I, in no way, would I expect that person to be me.
Suddenly, the confusion becomes all too much, and I find myself feeling claustrophobic and clammy. I don't bother trying to think of a valid excuse to leave and just blurt out the first thing that comes to mind. "I need to go home."
"Already?" Alex replies, and I can swear he has a hint of disappointment in his voice. "You've only been here an hour. You haven't finished all your questions."
"I'll finish them at home. I just remembered that my aunt is coming over from Italy so I need to go now." I lie, not caring if I sound rude. I just need to get outside into the fresh air, and I do not want to have a panic attack in front of him. That is a situation that I'd preferably not have repeated.
"Are you OK? You look like you've seen a ghost." He says, concerned. I nod and force a smile on my face. Grabbing all my books and shoving them in my bag, I squeak out an apology and make a beeline for the door. I can hear him say, "See you at school, then." as I leave the room and soon enough, the house.
I thank the Lord that it had not escalated into a panic attack, at the same time cursing his damned dining room. Each time I've been in there, I've had to leave after feeling panicked abruptly. I don't know if it's the tacky décor or the family of vampires that lived in there previously put a curse on it, but it's something.
Once I'm home, I feel near enough to calm. I have no clue what washed over me. One second I was fine, chaffing him about his crush, the next it's that same thing that was making me feel as though I couldn't breathe. I had no reason to feel embarrassed, yet I did.
I take out my phone to send him an apology message, but I see that he's already texted me.
I smile sadly at my phone.
I feel a bit bad about lying to him, but I just don't feel comfortable about telling him that I was on the verge of a panic attack. I know I've always said it's nothing to feel embarrassed about and I live by that, but I still do feel embarrassed about it. Which therefore makes me feel embarrassed about being embarrassed, and I'm just one big embarrassed mess.
I groan and rest my head on my steering wheel, still sat in my car parked outside my house. Someday I hope I won't feel like this anymore, but for now, I guess I'm going to have to live with it.
Embarrassing.
Dm me if you're feeling down! I'll try to cheer you up or help you in any way, I promise.