Set Me Free

I woke up that next morning with one of the biggest headaches of my life. I haven’t had one like this since I got my first hangover.

I tried moving my arms to rub the sleep out of my eyes, when I realized that there was someone on top of them. My first instinct was to scream and try running away, but the events of last night played over and over again in my head, making me just want to throw up
instead. And the worst part; I actually liked it...ugh. *shudder*

Can you blame me, though? I’m a guy and we have needs...needs that haven’t been fulfilled in quite a while. I felt so f-ing dirty about it. Why Jenny of all people; hell, it could’ve been one of her friends and I’d like that better.

I was too upset last night to actually think clearly though, so I can’t be fully blamed for my actions...but I never want to wake up next to Jenny ever again. I swear, I’ll shoot out my own eyeballs.

Before I could make it out of the room and into the washroom to disinfect myself, Jenny was already waking up and saw me.

“Baby, where are you going?” Usually when your girlfriend would ask you that, she’d sound curious and nice; Jenny just sounded bitchy and nosy.

Not bothering to answer her question, I made my way into the washroom and for about twenty minutes, I just stood under the scolding hot water, not actually bothering to wash myself, just...thinking.

After seeing that my skin was too craggy to be normal, I made my way out to see that Jenny had left.

Today was the day for the dreaded bonfire and the day that Echo and Drew would go out on their first date. I don’t know why it was still bothering me and it was slightly pissing me off. Drew’s just a guy who obviously doesn’t give a damn about me, so why am I even bothering to get worked up over this. I shouldn’t.

I’m going to go to this bonfire and have sex with at least three people. Will that solve my problem? Most likely not, but will it make me feel slightly better about myself...most definitely. I know I sound shallow and repulsive, but I just need something...anything...or someone.

After staring at the Connelly’s house for thirty minutes straight, I headed down to my car to head over to pick up Jenny. It was about eight, so Drew had already left for his date about an hour and a half ago, I hoped they were having fun.

Jenny bitched at me the whole way there saying that I don’t pay attention to her and that she had to go to other guys for the love she feels she deserves and that I should feel ashamed of myself. If it wasn’t illegal to throw someone out of a moving car down the highway, she would’ve been long gone.

The entire time we were at the bonfire, Jenny flirted nonstop with Keegan, but I couldn’t find it to do as I said I would.

Sure, girls would constantly throw themselves at me when they saw me just sitting there, but I just couldn’t bring myself to actually do anything about it. Now it seemed like a good idea, but tomorrow morning I’d probably regret it more than I did with Jenny. I wasn’t the type of guy to just take advantage of people like that.

I was quite surprised though; my mind never seemed to wander to Drew and Echo. Maybe because I finally realized that he wasn’t really worth it. He was the first person who ever said they cared about me and being the idiot I am, fell for it, but I shouldn’t dwell on things that’ll just depress me.

Anyway, I was pretty proud of myself that night and even more proud when I was the only sober one still left at the beach where the bonfire was being held.

I managed to sneak into my room that night, trying to avoid dad as much as I possibly could, and actually managed to get a decent night’s sleep. I’m really proud of myself.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

It’s been a week since that dreadful night and things are really looking up for me. Guess what, Jenny finally broke it off with me. She did it right in the middle of the hallway, screaming something like ‘You don’t take care of me’ and ‘You don’t know what I need’. I didn’t care, the only thing I heard was ‘it’s over’ and I was beaming so hard my cheeks hurt after only about two seconds. I ran around the school yelling and kissing everyone’s cheek (teachers included) and landed a week’s detention for reckless behavior and disturbing the peace, but whatever. All I cared about was the fact that I was finally free...and god does freedom taste good.

She’s dating Keegan now and he’s been trying to rub it in my face, but I don’t listen to him, I just congratulate him and walk away. He’ll dump her within the week, I can guarantee it.

Now Echo and Drew are known as the school’s ‘cutest couple’ and I’m proud of them for being so in love. Or at least that’s what I’m telling myself.
I thought I was hiding my raging jealousy so well, until someone pointed it out.

“I know it hurts you to see them together like that.” A voice asked from behind me. I hadn’t realized I was staring at the couple until the person talked.

I didn’t recognize the voice, but when I turned around, I definitely knew the face.

“Uh...hey Gabe, what are you talking about?” I asked, trying to keep as much emotion out of my voice as possible.

“I can see it in your eyes.” His voice was small and he kept his oversized jacket hugged tightly around him, as if he was trying to hide from the world. “The way you look at them like that. I know you like Drew.” Did I really make it that obvious? “You didn’t make it obvious, but I recognize the look very well.” Did he just read my mind? O.o... “No, I didn’t read your mind...you said those out loud.” =_=...oh.

Grabbing hold of one of Gabe’s jacket sleeves (since his hands were too deep inside to find), I pulled him out of the hallway and into an empty corridor.

“Say this to anyone and I send Keegan and Josh out for you.” They were the two who would normally pick on him. I’m pretty sure Josh was the one who sent him to the hospital last time. It was a low blow, seeing how wide Gabe’s eyes became all of a sudden, but word of this could not get out to anyone, especially not Drew.

“I can’t really tell anyone, seeing as I don’t have any friends to tell.” He mumbled, so quietly that I almost missed it.

Oh yeah, no one wanted to be friend with Gabe because he’s gay. It’s not his fault that he’s attracted to guys. Hell, if I could just turn this ‘gay’ thing off, then I would; I’d love to be attracted to women instead of just Drew.

“Sorry man, but no one can know about this, especially not Drew.”

“Why?” He tilted his head to the side, a look of genuine confusion on his face. “It’s not like you guys are friends anyway. Why can’t he know?”

Those words hurt me more than they should’ve. It’s not Gabe’s fault that he doesn’t know that Drew and I used to be friends, or at least, I thought we were friends.

“Is it just because you don’t want the whole school to know that you’re gay?” He said that way too loud for my liking. Slapping a hand over his mouth, I dragged Gabe even deeper down the hall. “Oh, so it is because you don’t want the whole school to know. That’s okay, I was afraid to tell people too, but even though I get beaten up a lot, I don’t feel like I’m hiding a huge part of myself from everyone...unlike half of the people who come to this school.”

Gabe had this childlike air about him. The way he spoke as if he were just trying to figure everything out. He reminded me somewhat of an eight year old. No, that is not me telling you that I am somewhat attracted to him, because I most definitely am not. Not that Gabe’s not attractive or anything, because he is, but I just see him more like an overgrown kid brother or something.

“Well, I have to get home before mom gets mad at me. I’ll see you around Daniel Santon.” With that, Gabe literally skipped away, down the corridor and out of sight. Something told me that I’d be having a serious conversation with that boy some day soon.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

When I got home, just twenty minutes later, I saw none other than Felicity, laying down on my front lawn with a content smile on her face. Something told me she was tanning, or whatever the hell girls do, but why was she doing it on my lawn?

“Felicity...” She didn’t bother opening her eyes; she just let a content sigh escape her lips. “What are you doing?”

“Isn’t it a beautiful day out today?” She smiled, still not opening her eyes. “I just love today. My parents are gone for the week and they left Drew in charge of watching me, but since I don’t like my brother very much, I decided to give the job to you.” She opened her eyes and smiled. “Isn’t that great?” She beamed.

Great? She left me the job of babysitting her and she thinks that’s great? Why?

“Listen Felicity, I don’t know how your parents would take this.” I crossed my arms and tried looking as serious as possible...it didn’t work too well.

“Oh, they don’t have to know because I told Drew all about it. I stay with you during the day and then go home and sleep at night, that’s it. When mom and dad call, Drew just calls you and puts me on three way with mom and dad, so they never have to know.” She smiled, looking extremely clever for her age.

“And your brother’s fine with this?”

She answered my question with another question. One I wasn’t expecting.

“Why don’t you and Drew hang out anymore?” It caught me so off guard that I didn’t have time to stop the surprised/panicked expression that came over my face. “And don’t lie to me and tell me that you two just drifted apart or something. I know it has something to do with that girlfriend of his. Don’t you like her? She seems pretty nice to me.”

Felicity had sat up and was staring up at me with a questioning expression on her face. She also looked somewhat worried.

“I think he misses you. Every time mom and dad try to bring up the question of why you’re never over there anymore, he looks kind of sad and just leaves the room. They stopped asking now. Can you tell me why?”

I was honestly at a loss for words. Felicity looked just a little too innocent to lie to and I couldn’t think of a way to bend the truth so I wouldn’t have to.

“You said it Felicity...we just drifted apart.” I mumbled, automatically turning on my heel and making my way into my house, Felicity hot on my tail.

“See, you got the same look as he did when we asked him. What does it mean?”

“It means that we just aren’t friends anymore.” I opened the door and made my way up the stairs, Felicity not stopping her trail behind me.

“But why? What did he do to you? I know I said that I don’t like Drew very much, but he’s still my brother and I don’t like seeing him sad all the time. I don’t like seeing you sad all the time either.”

Stepping into my bedroom, I sat on the edge of my bed, staring down at my hands. I thought I was over this; apparently I’m wrong.

“We just...weren’t on the same page about some things.” Felicity opened her mouth to ask yet another question, but I cut her off. “Some very grown up things that you wouldn’t understand; enough questions.” She looked deflated for a while, but just bounced right back up.

“Okay then, what do you want to do?”

“It’s Thursday, don’t you have homework or something?” I said, rubbing my temples, this girl is going to be a handful.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Three grueling hours of nonstop girl gossip later, Felicity finally said that it was time she went home and thanked me for making her day better. Since she said that I was still her ‘babysitter’, I was forced to walk her to her house…right next door. Beaming, she slammed the door in my face and then laughed. This is why I don’t want kids.

“Dane?” O.O...

The one voice that has been haunting me for these past two weeks just happens to be the one that decides to talk to me now.

I just turned my back to walk home when I heard the door open. Thinking it was just Felicity,
laughing at me some more, I shook it off as being nothing and continued walking...I should’ve run.

I didn’t want to turn around, in fear of what I would say to him, but then remembered that I’d once reminded myself that he wasn’t worth all the trouble.

“Hey Drew.” I was surprised at how calm my voice sounded. I expected myself to sound weak and broken (like I was on the inside), but I actually sounded strong and confident...yay me! ^-^!!!

“Hey man,” He smiled, making me melt a little. “Haven’t seen you in a while, where’ve you been.” Next door...

“Pff, just here and there, I guess. We’ve both been a little busy.” Avoiding each other. “How’s Echo doing? Haven’t seen her in a while either.” I tried my best to smile, but I can bet that it came out in a grimace.

“She’s good, really good. So you’re actually babysitting my little sister, huh? She start telling you about all the Disney stars yet?” He grinned.

How is this so easy for him? He’s the one who was avoiding me, not the other way around. I guess it really doesn’t mean anything for him.

We talked for a while; well, Drew talked and I tried my best to answer. When we finally said our goodbyes, I was just as miserable as I was the day he told me he was asking Echo out. This could only mean another sleepless night for me.

Talking to Drew reminded me of why I even liked the guy in the first place. He was nice and energetic and weird all at the same time and it just sucked me right back in. It was unhealthy and it had to stop, but how in the hell am I going to that? It felt like I was going through withdrawal. Maybe I really do need to talk to someone. It sure as hell is not going to be Felicity, seeing as she’s only 13, it won’t be any of my friends, since I hate them all. My life is just one big wall of déjà vu. I’ve already had all of these conversations with myself, I already know how I feel about the guy, I already know I can’t talk to anyone (but myself, but that’s not normal). I can’t talk to Jorge about all of this again; he’s already had to face that conversation once, plus, he has his own life, he doesn’t need to be taking his time out of it to listen to my stupid ramblings about things that just aren’t important to him at all.

Well...there is Gabe. I mean, he figured out how I felt about Drew just by looking at me, he knows what it’s like (I think), so why not? Maybe because I don’t know the guy that well, so how can I possibly trust him with something like this. He doesn’t have any friends, so he can’t really tell anyone, but he could always sell me out. Even though I don’t know him, I know that Gabe’s too good of a person for that, plus, he doesn’t like anyone, why would he sell me out to them? Protection? I don’t know.

beep, beep, beep

All the thoughts running through my head must’ve knocked me out last night. The next thing I knew, my alarm clock was blaring in my ears and my dad was trying to knock the door down. This is going to be a bad day.

Apparently last night, my dad got a call from Mr. Lockland, explaining how Jenny had broken up with me that day at school and my dad was furious.

I thought that since I didn’t break up with her, that he wouldn’t care, but apparently he did. Jenny told her dad something about me cheating on her with multiple girls and that she just couldn’t turn a blind eye anymore. My dad obviously bought the whole thing and is now trying to strangle me.

“Do you just hate this family, boy?” He asked, while pinning me to the wall. “I don’t know what the hell your mother and I have ever done to you.” Are you kidding me? Did he not see the position we were in? “We’ve been nothing but good to you, giving you a home, food, clothing, that expensive car in the driveway...” And my circulation, which is being cut off. “Why can’t you just do this one thing for us? Mr. Lockland was ready to sign the business agreement with me and now, he has to ‘think about it’. You are to fix this...today, or you will find yourself out of this house before you can even say sorry.”

He dropped me on the ground, just seconds before I actually blacked out, and walked right out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

Coughing and spluttering on the ground, I managed to turn my head to see that I was already two minutes late for school...crap. He’d get me for that later.

I had too many things on my mind that morning, I couldn’t pay attention to any of my
teachers; I actually smart mouthed one of them, who sent me to the office.

How the hell was I supposed to ‘fix’ things? Did that mean that I’d have to get back together with Jenny? No way in hell was that happening? But what other choice did I possibly have? She wouldn’t take me back anyway, she had Keegan now and they seemed to be doing just fine together. He managed to not get on her nerves everyday. Was I supposed to talk to Mr. Lockland about giving my dad the job even though he thinks I cheated on his daughter? He’d sick his dogs after me. I am beyond screwed.

“Hello Daniel Santon. I don’t know if you realized this, but class is over, you can go to lunch now.” Gabe’s small voice brought me back to reality.

Looking around, I noticed that I was the only person still in the classroom (with Gabe), even the teacher had left.

“Do you mind if I talk to you for a second?” I asked, still thinking about what I was going to do.

Gabe turned around and walked over to the chair right next to me, giving me his undivided attention.

“Is it about Drew?” How the hell...? “I can just kind of tell these things. I hope you’re not thinking about breaking him and Echo up. That would be very sad.”

“I wasn’t thinking about doing something like that.” Okay, so I was, but only for a little while; I’m not that type of guy.

“That’s good; I wouldn’t like to think of you as that type of person. Echo’s really nice, if you were to get to know her. She was the only real friend I’ve ever had and now Drew’s going to see how nice she is.”

Wait, back up...only real friend? Since when were Echo and Gabe friends?

“When the hell were you and Echo friends?”

Gabe actually smiled at the question.

“Echo and I used to be best friends, ever since the second grade.” He smiled, his eyes becoming slightly unfocused as he talked. “Me, her and Sarah, whom you know. We did everything together, but then, in middle school, I guess Sarah didn’t see us as being good enough for her so she went with some popular kids. It was just me and Echo for a bit, but then she left too, to go with Sarah and now it’s just me.”

Gabe didn’t look sad telling me this; he actually looked a little relieved, like he was glad to finally have it off of his chest.

Maybe it’s time for me to do the same.