Let's Keep It A Secret

I was barely eighteen when he left me.

I suppose I should’ve expected it. After all, nothing about our relationship was something the so-called experts liked to call ‘healthy’. I was sixteen, he was twenty. He was a rock star, a heavy drinker, a notorious manwhore with an attitude that preceded his appearance by a mile.

And me? I was just an ordinary kid. Nothing special, just looking for some excitement in a city that was, to me, just as dreary and grey as its residents. I wanted something different, something wild, something interesting.

Oliver Sykes was interesting, all right.

I met him nearly a year after moving to Sheffield, England, from my lifelong home of Tokyo, Japan. Back there I was popular, fashionable, infamously crazy and maybe a bit obnoxious, but I was happy. Back there I did everything right without even trying. Back there I was home.

But Sheffield wasn’t home. And shortly after arriving in England, I realized that it never would be.

I was outlandish. A freak. Everything about me was cause for ridicule – my hair, my eyes, my clothes, and especially my accent. It took me a while to master the letter L, and even then, I couldn’t help but roll my tongue just a bit, just enough to be noticeable. The majority of the seniors had taken to calling me ‘Ling Ling’, a name I had long ago learned to accept, eventually giving up on trying to convince them that, no, I was not from China, I was from Japan, and no, they were not the same thing.

So I ended up alone. Unlike my parents and sister, who all seemed to fit in effortlessly. I tried, too, at first, but got shot down every time. I had resorted to solitude, avoiding everyone, even my own family, at all costs. I was worrying them, I knew I was. But they just didn’t understand. School was torture, weekends were almost painfully boring. There was only one place I felt safe, almost comfortable, in all of Sheffield – the music scene.

That was where I met him.

His band wasn’t as big then, but they were tough and dedicated, and so were their fans. That was really what attracted me to that particular stage at that particular festival, not the sound, not even him, but the small crowd directly in front of the stage acting as if this was the last show they’d ever see. This audience was what made me stop, listening curiously and wondering what about these men could have inspired such devotion.

That was when I saw him.

He was beautiful. Hell, he still was beautiful, with his soft, honey-brown hair and chocolate eyes, his lithe body appearing consumed by hundreds of colorful tattoos.

I thought my heart had stopped that day, and maybe it did. Maybe that’s why love was just another word to me, just another overused, empty sentiment. Or maybe I’m just a cynic.

Even then, however, I knew. I knew that even if he did swing my way, which I was certain he didn’t, that beautiful creature would never be even slightly attracted to someone like me.

So I walked away. Or, rather, tried to.

I didn’t get very far from the stage when I heard a voice calling after me, a smooth but slightly hoarse tone, the words infused with the heavy and rather odd accent that seemed to be the staple of this area of England.

“Kid! Hey, kid! You, with the blond hair!”

I turned reflexively, only to see him running after me, his eyes fixed on mine, white v-neck shirt sticking to his sweaty, decorated chest. I stopped, frowning, and waited for him to approach, completely bewildered as to why he came after me. Who was I to deserve such special treatment? He was a celebrity, after all.

He skidded to a stop in front of me and flashed me a cocky grin, exposing every one of his perfectly white teeth.

“Hey, kid, I saw you in the back over there. You looked pretty bored, ya’ know? You not like us or somethin’?” His sparkling eyes fixed on mine, and I felt myself falling.

“U-uhm, no.” I finally stammered, cursing myself for being so shy all of a sudden, “I just…never heard of you guys, I guess. And I don’t really like getting in the middle of all that stuff anyways.” Lie. I had always had an odd, and often accidentally self-destructive, love for the mosh pit. However, I didn’t particularly want to risk rejection from the only people I’d felt myself with in ages. Since moving here, my self-confidence had taken a severe hit, I suppose you could say.

He gaped at me. “You don’t know Bring Me the Horizon?!”

I shook my head, my bleached blond bangs falling into one makeup-caked eye.

“Well then,” he chuckled, throwing one arm over my shoulders, “I guess I’ll just have to teach you, eh? I’m Oli.” His perfect lips pulled up in a genuine smile.

“M-Miku.” I responded shakily.

That was the beginning of the end.

I found out, shortly thereafter, that Oli did, in fact, swing my way, through one very…interesting night, that quickly spiraled into two, then five, then entire weekends spent with him, drinking ourselves stupid and fucking on his once-spotless couch. There was no talk of ‘love’ there at first, no feelings, just sex. To his parents, to his band, I was just a friend, a kid he’d met at some festival. To my family, however, he was a bad influence, someone to be avoided at all costs, lest he turn their precious ‘straight’ son into more of a freak than he already was.

And slowly but surely, I felt myself falling in love with him.

I should’ve known then that it was doomed. Oli was a celebrity, wild, loud, and slutty, and a shy, introverted kid like me could never hold his interest for long.

But I didn’t think about his fans. His life. His reputation.

I didn’t fucking think.

So that one cold night Oli and I lay on his couch, a half-empty bottle of Jack open on the table in front of us and some bullshit British movie I really didn’t care about playing on the television behind us, I didn’t think twice about telling him I loved him.

And you know what he said?

He said he loved me too.

Even now, I still wonder how I swallowed that. Was I just that desperate for someone, anyone, to care about me that I forced myself to look past the gleam in his eyes to the thin coating of fake sincerity smeared across those three words? Or was I just naïve?

Either way, I had never been so happy. And I thought he was too.

I finally felt loved, felt needed, felt wanted. I felt like I belonged with someone, in someone’s arms. He made me feel like I was worth his love. He made me trust him.

And maybe that’s why I didn’t object when he asked me to keep it a secret. Maybe I secretly feared he’d leave me if I refused. Maybe I was just afraid of my own family’s reaction to the knowledge that their only son was a fag.

Whatever it was, it kept my mouth shut.

Oli was straight. Oli was single. No, no, I was just a friend. Question after question, all answered with an empty smile, my voice dead of emotion. I tried to hide how it hurt, how it chipped away at my all-too-open heart with every lie that passed my lips.

I wondered, sometimes, how long we were going to keep up this charade. Weeks, months, half a year passed before I plucked up the courage to ask him. And he just flashed me that charming little smile and told me soon. Soon.

And somehow, I still didn’t see it. Didn’t see the cruel glint in his eyes, the smirk on his lips, until I was sitting on the side of the road with a bag full of clothes and he was driving off into the sunset. I’m taking you to my place for a while, he’d said. Just bring some clothes and shit, we won’t be going far.

That was the day, he’d told me, that we could finally tell the world about us. About our love.

So I did it. I told them. My mother was the first to react, dropping the dishes she’d been washing onto the floor with a loud clatter and turning to face me.

“W-what?”

I nodded. “Oliver’s my boyfriend.” But her reaction had caused an uneasy stirring in my chest.

My father looked up at me then, hard, flinty eyes peering at me from over his newspaper. “You’re telling us you’re a faggot?”

I flinched at his flat tone. “Uhm…well, if you put it that way…”

“Out.”

I stared at him in disbelief. “What?”

“Get out of my house. I will not have one of…your kind living under my roof.”

The words seemed to drive a stake straight through my heart and into my throat. Unable to form words, I looked desperately to my sister, Megumi, who just stared down at her neatly folded hands, avoiding my eyes.

When Oli arrived a moment later, I just grabbed my bag, taking his hand in mine, and dragged him outside before he could greet my parents. He stuttered objections as I dragged him to the car, throwing myself down into the passenger seat and placing my head in my hands.

“That bad, huh?” He sighed, sliding in beside me.

I nodded, sniffling a bit.

He didn’t say a word, just took my cold, clammy hand in his.

And then I was out on the side of the highway.

And the last thing I thought, as I watched Oli escape from his deeply-buried secrets, from the side of him he’d never wanted to see the light, was 'love is such an ugly word'.