Now, I don’t feel good about it, but I’ve been meeting up with Pete most nights for a few weeks. It’s not a set thing, but sharing a room with Noah has proven challenging. Well, it’s not that I don’t love every second of it, no, I could share a room with him my entire life, but it’s just that I happen to find everything he does so goddamn attractive. I get so turned on that I have to rush out of the room so he doesn’t notice. Though, I don’t think he would think much of it because he seems to be unaware of what he is doing to me.

I’ve never felt this before— this pull towards another. I mean, I’ve felt lust before, but this was like lust on steroids and it only gets stronger the more I’m with him.

One night, as he pulls up his boxers, Pete asks, “You fuck like you’re trying to forget someone.”

“Does that bother you?”

He turns around and tugs my dick and I jolt because of the post-sex sensitivity. “Not at all. We all have people we want to forget.”

“So why bring it up?” It was something Pete and I rarely did. Talk, I mean. I didn’t like him at all and I had a feeling he wasn’t the biggest fan of me either.

“I was just curious why it felt different.”

He walks out of the shed, and I wait a minute before following suit. 

But me hooking up with Pete didn’t mean Noah and I didn’t spend time together. We hang out whenever we have free time. He tells me sad stories about Westford and I listen, trying my hardest not to touch him. I let him make the physical advances because I don’t want to come off like a creep or something like that.

But Noah isn’t such a touchy-feely guy. Yes, there was that one time when he hugged me, but other than that, the only touching we do is casual “bro” stuff like high-fiving. I probably should be thankful for the lack of touching. I would probably have to meet up with Pete more than once a day.

He also tells me about his training and how still no one likes him.

I had told him I thought he belonged to the CCIU and he thought I was crazy.

“But I’m not smart.”

“Bullshit. Besides, it’s not really about how much you know. It’s about instinct and the ability to think quick and logically.”

“You think I can do that?”

“No. I know you can. Trust me, you aren’t CAU and that’s why they hate you. You can rarely defeat someone who can think quicker than you, no matter how skilled physically you are.”

“Perhaps.”

“Perhaps.”

Our conversation always ended like that— incomplete, as if there was something more we should be saying—doing. 

But one day, a Tuesday to be exact, he turns to me and says, “how often were you hooking up with people that this is considered cooling it?” It comes out of nowhere and there’s an obvious agitation in his tone.

“I mean, it’s not really your business, is it?” I don’t mean to sound angry but I am. It’s his fault and now he’s shaming me for it? Of course, he doesn’t know that it’s his fault, but I haven’t been able to think rationally for some time now. 

“I just- it’s just annoying. Why can’t you control yourself?!” For the first time since I’ve meant him, he yells. It sounds like a mixture of anger and sadness. I chalk that up to equal disappointment. How can he—why is he judging me like this? Why is he being this way? It hurts more than I could have expected. Partly because I was disappointed in myself too, but even more so, because I, for some unknown fucking reason, cared more about what he thought than anyone else. And because I was so goddamn hurt, I blurt out the first thing I could think of. “I don’t know, why can’t you make friends on your own?”

And I regretted it the moment I said it because it wasn’t really the meanest thing I could say, but it was the thing I knew would hurt him the most. He had opened up to me, something I’m sure he rarely did, and I threw it back at him.

And by the way his eyes widen, glazed from a build-up of wetness, and the way his mouth shuts into a hard line, lips quivering, I could tell that’s exactly what he was thinking.

“Noah wait-”

I try to talk but he storms off.

“Fuck!” I kicked the ground causing dust to fly everywhere.

I feel my chest burn with hatred. It’s overwhelming to the point where I think I might pass out.

I want to tear out this thing I hate. I want it gone. I want it out.

But the thing about hating yourself is that you can’t do that because the moment you do, you’ll cease being you.

I remember the first time I realized I hated myself. I was twelve, still scrawny and weak. I spent my days watching all these grown boys perform elite trainings and I was just this kid who had nothing. I spent hours looking in the mirror, mouthing the words “I hate you,” until I could say them out loud. I wanted to let myself know that what I saw in the mirror wasn’t something that I liked. It wasn’t what I wanted to be.

So I trained. I did what I was told. I allowed my body to go through the changes everyone goes through. And yet, I still hated myself. Because it wasn’t my physical self that I hated, it was myself—the very essence of me. And that’s not some shit you can move past. You’re stuck with yourself until you die, and who knows, maybe not even then can you escape the confines of you. An eternity of me, the thought terrifies me. 

And then I realized I liked boys and I don’t know whether that made things better or worse. On the one hand, I had a plethora of boys to distract me from my misery. On the other hand, being gay isn’t exactly met with open arms. When I told The General, all he said was, “are you sure?” I said yes and he just nodded and never brought it up again. I guess that was acceptance.

Soon, the entire school knew I was gay because I might have gotten a boner during a fight with a guy I had been crushing on.

Unfortunately, he wasn’t very pleased with the fact that a homosexual was turned on by him. I ended up with a black-eye and an unkind reputation.

But that was earlier. Once I proved myself a worthy opponent- an unmatched competitor, no one cared who I fucked.

Except, maybe I did. Internalized homophobia, I had encountered, was in fact a very real thing. And it was weird because I didn’t think I had any moral objections to it, but I still felt wrong. Though, I guess being in a world where heterosexuality is the norm, it’s impossible to ever feel like you belong.

And maybe that’s also why I was so hurt by Noah. Maybe I felt that there was a twinge of homophobia in accusation. Would he say that if I was out fucking girls? I didn’t really know. Truthfully, I don’t know shit all about him. I just know how he makes me feel.

I walk along the dusty path between the dorms and the dining hall. It’s where Noah and I had been walking. But now, going back to our room felt wrong. I know he wasn’t there because he ran the other direction, but still, it felt…

“I haven’t seen you in a week! What the fuck is up?” Terry had come up from behind me.

“Hey T, sorry, I can’t talk right now?” I turn away from him with the hopes of my emotions not being discovered.

“What happened?” But he knows me far too well.

“I messed up with Noah.”

“Shit. You told him you’re in love with him?”

I whip my head towards him, not caring if my eyes are bloodshot from the possible tears I’ve been holding back. “What the fuck did you just say?” I’m angry now. Furious.

“Woah, nothing. I just asked if you finally-“

I shove him hard enough that he falls to the ground, “You don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.”

“Ten, I didn’t mean-“ whatever he’s about to say is cut off by me kicking him in the gut.

“Don’t you speak about him.” And suddenly I felt like I was defending Noah, when really, Terry hadn’t said anything bad about him. I leave him on the ground and walk back to the room.

When I walk in, it smells like him. My room has always smelled like me and now it smells like him. I breathe in, allowing me to have just this if nothing at all. I begin to strip, thinking it would probably be a good idea to cool off in the shower. But I only get my shirt off when I drift off into thought.

I look at his unmade bed.

I sit in it.

Lie in it.

Hold his blanket over my face, breathing the direct source of his scent in.

When I pull the blanket away, I see that it has tear stains on it. I am crying and I don’t know why.

Well, I do, actually.

When I hurt Terry, I was defending Noah, but not from him. I was defending him from myself. I had done some kind of transference at that moment. I saw Terry as me and all I wanted to do was hurt him. I wanted to- even thinking about it causes the rage to surge through my body.

Over this short period of time, I have become a predator. I had no right to love him. Loving Noah was wrong. It had to be. It must be. Love doesn’t happen like that. Not that fast. Not that…unreciprocated.

I end up falling asleep in his bed, thinking about how much I hate myself for loving him.