Leave This Blue Neighborhood

I’m standing at John’s and I have no idea how this is going to go. After I got home yesterday he didn’t call me. He didn’t even send me a goodnight text like he does every night. But I’m still here, hoping he just got grounded or something that would give an explanation to my unanswered texts and voicemails.

I take a deep breath and knock timidly on the door. I wait a few seconds before I knock again and the door swings open.

I see John’s face and feel relieved until I see a light bruise on the side of his face and notice his red eyes like he’s been crying all night.

“A-Alex, what are you doing here? My dad said not to come back.” He looks scared. I probably did too. I didn’t like seeing him like this

“I wanted to check on you babe. I wanted to ask how it went yesterday” I put my hand on his cheek.

As soon as my hand made contact with his skin he pushed my arm away “don’t call me that. Don’t call me babe.” He looked away. “You should really go.”

I was really confused now, all I knew was that I didn’t like where this was going. “John, why are you acting like this? Did your dad give you those bruises? Is this all because he caught us?”

“N-no Alex, I just don’t want you here anymore, I don’t want you anymore. You should just leave and not come back like my dad told you.” He was still looking away, not making any eye contact with me whatsoever.

“Just tell me where you got those bruises. I need to know”

“No, you don’t need to know, Alex. This isn’t any of your business so just leave. I don’t want you so why can’t you just leave?” he finally looks up at me and he looks like he could cry at any moment.

“Babe.” I plead, “Just tell me what’s wrong. What did your dad say to you yesterday after I left? What did he do? You can tell me and it’ll all be okay. I’ll make it okay babe, I promise” I wrap my arms around his waist, holding him close to me.

He becomes frustrated with me and shoves me away from him, forcing me to let go of his waist and stumble backward. I’m filled with shock. John has never been like this with me. This isn’t him; I know it isn’t.

“I told you not to call me that, okay!?” He begins to raise his voice at me. “Stop fucking calling me ‘babe’ because I’m not your ‘babe’, not anymore. And my dad has nothing to do with this. I just came to my fucking senses and realized this isn’t who I am! I’m not gay and I don’t want to do this anymore. I don’t be with you anymore! The only thing that you can do to make this ‘okay’ for me is if you just fucking left. My dad and I have already asked you to leave now so I don't get why you can't just fucking go!” He was huffing by the end of his sentence, face red with anger. I still saw the tears threatening to come out of his eyes before I noticed the tears in mine.

“J-John you don’t mean that. I know you don’t” I know I’m probably pushing him but I just couldn’t believe this was happening.

“Don’t tell me I don’t mean it when you don’t know what’s going on in my mind right now. I don’t want you and I want you to leave. I don’t want to see your fucking face anymore.”

I was full on crying at this point. Tears were streaming down my face.

“Well, if that’s what you really want, then I guess I’ll go then.” I look down at my feet, too scared to look at the anger on his face anymore.

“Yes, please. All I want from you is to just leave for good”

That stung, it really did. Those are the last words I would probably ever hear him say to me ever again and I hated it. Without even saying a goodbye, fearing John’s response, I turned away from his front door and started my walk home.

I didn’t see him again until a few months later. I was walking to the store to pick up a few things for my mom. On the way there I knew I would have had to pass John’s neighborhood. I usually didn’t see him on my walks to the store, so I didn’t even think to worry about the chance that I would run into him on my short journey there.

I was wrong not to worry

I saw him walking in the opposite direction I was headed in. I made eye contact with him, unsure how to approach the situation. We kept looking at one other until I broke our staring contest to look at the girl next to him. The girl was completely oblivious to the silent situation between us, probably thinking I was just some random situation.

The girl was talking about something with John and I couldn’t really find out what the conversation was about, but it didn’t really matter.

What did matter was that she was holding his hand and looking at him with the same look I used to have for him. He looked back her with the same amount of adoration as she had for him and then kissed her cheek. He knew I was passing them on this sidewalk. He knew I would have seen that and that it would hurt me, but he did it anyway.

Finally, I passed them. They were out of sight, but now out of mind. I allowed myself to shed a few tears before I got to the store, then decided that it was time to get over this. He obviously had been over it for some time now.