My North Star Pt. 03

Feedback encouraged in the comments.

Please be ruthless if you notice a fucked up comma, or italics. : D

Also I am unsure if people prefer smaller individual parts like this or or me to upload a couple chapters together at a time in one bundle.

Trigger/Content Warning:

This story contains themes of religious guilt, emotional repression, family trauma, and queer yearning. It's a slow-burn gay romance with a dumbass himbo and a beautiful femboy. It also explores the internal struggle of growing desire, shame, and forbidden closeness between two best friends.

There are a few homophobic slurs used in specific moments and some veiled references to Domestic Violence.

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Part 3-

Forbidden Fruit

Somewhere West of Atlanta, Georgia, Spring, 2023.

Later in the day on Tuesday, February 14th

The apartment is quiet.

I sit tense on the living room sofa. My bag's tossed beside the door, keys abandoned on the counter.

I don't know how long I've been sitting here.

Anxiety's cold hands creep around my throat as I pull out my phone. A familiar contact appears in my speed dial, and just seeing the name gives me vertigo.

I hover a thumb over the number. My chest tightens.

We haven't spoken in nearly two years. Things... didn't end well.

I still love her, in a way--but nothing's the same. Calling her might ground me, but it would mean betraying everything I have with Stephen.

Unlike with Cindy, there was no dramatic argument or fallout. Just a quiet understanding. The raven-haired boy I share a life with now... he was everything she stood against.

Could I really betray all this? Play at being normal? Live the kind of "safe" life everyone else does?

The screen goes dark in my hand. I see my reflection in the glass--and hate it. Cowardice radiates off me like heat.

I haven't spoken to my mother since graduation.

She expected me to be our family's North Star, then turned her back when we needed direction most. What's the use of a compass if you keep it locked away?

I was meant to be a new beginning--but the kind of change we needed wouldn't have been peaceful. Some truths cut deeper than fists.

My father still haunts the hallways of my mind. That pain was paid in blood.

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Flashback- Somewhere North West of Atlanta, Georgia, Spring, 2021.

Brunch time on Friday, April 23rd

Senior year had blown by and senior skip day snuck up on me. Everyone else planned pranks and parties. I just wanted to stay home, eat cereal, and binge Game of Thrones.

I'd been up the night before, researching rental options near the college Stephen and I had both been accepted into--a house big enough for three.

Around 11ish, I went downstairs to grab a late breakfast. My father was working this morning and my mother drifted through the house like a ghost. I think that she genuinely enjoyed being a house wife to some degree, but needed someone to appreciate her efforts. Definitely not the ungrateful SOB that lived here.

I munched cereal, standing at the counter while she scrubbed the already-clean breakfast dishes. No mess was ever allowed to linger. God forbid the house looked lived in.

I decided to just launch haphazardly into my plan. Graduation was coming up soon and I have no idea when I might get a quieter moment. Hopefully my excitement would smooth over any trepidation.

"Mom, I am going to graduate soon and I am leaving this house."

She paused. Turned. Her eyes filled with something more than fear--resignation. She knew what this conversation was going to be about and already knew the outcome. In my foolishness, I pressed forward.

"I've got some of Grandma's inheritance. We can get a place together. Just us. We don't have to live like this anymore."

Her silence cracked my excitement. The house felt colder.

In that moment, I would have burnt the world down to ash just to see her smile with abandon.

"We could be free, Mom. We could be who we want to be."

I rush excitedly through my explanation. I want her to be... happy.

"Are you... still planning on living with Stephen in college?"

"Yes, but we can get a house big enough to fit all three of us."

"You know your father wouldn't approve of you living with... such a man."

"I don't really care what that dick thinks Mom. I don't want you having to be stuck here with him, while I go off to college."

I could tell that everything was going quite poorly, but soldiered on anyways towards the dying of the light.

"Its ok honey. I'm fine really. I'm... comfortable here."

A whisper. A sledgehammer to my heart.

"Worry about living your life. I want to see you be happy. College should be a time for you to get new experiences and grow as a man. It's not a time to worry about your old mother."

I reached for her. She flinched. That familiar recoil--like a mirror of my own.

"Mom... This is our opportunity. We could be free from him. You don't deserve to live like this anymore Mom..."

"There was never going to be a chance for me, baby." Her eyes glistened. "I'll bear the burden of choosing the wrong man. But I can't let you suffer for my mistake."

She kissed my forehead stiffly. Then turned back to cleaning.

Dinner had to be ready before he got home.

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Back to the present- Tuesday evening, February 14th 2023.

I grip my phone like it's a lifeline.

I've never been back home after graduating. I went and stayed with Stephen for the summer and we moved into our apartment in the weeks before freshman year started.

My father disowned me--claimed I was "shacking up with that queer boy." My mother said nothing.

And somehow, her silence hurt more.

What's worse: being taught pain, or learning how to live with it?

I put my phone down on the coffee table and let it fall asleep. I grab the old bible laying there. My grandmother had given it to me as a part of her will.

I set the phone down and pick up the old Bible my grandmother left me. Inside the cover is a folded paper--worn at the edges but intact.

Stephen's first drawing of me.

He'd given it to me weeks after we became friends, when he still hadn't figured out proportions or shading. He'd drawn me as a superhero.

He told me I was his Superman.

I didn't know then he'd also be my kryptonite.

Time passes. Hours, maybe.

I sit there, holding that drawing like a relic. Wondering if Stephen's going to yell when he gets home. Or hit me with something. Or just stomp off into his room and leave me in my guilt.

I hear boots on the stairs.

The door opens. Shuts.

My bag is kicked aside--his joins it.

There's the familiar crinkle of a plastic bag. Takeout smells with an undercurrent of... Cinnamon?

He peels off his jacket and sweater, then steps into the living room, takeout balanced on his lap as he sits on the coffee table in front of me. The takeout bag balanced delicately on his lap as he looks towards my eyes.

I think you could ask a hundred artists to capture the essence of his eyes and still be left unsatisfied. The emotions in those blue pools swim under the surface like sharks hunting for prey.

"I got your favorite," he says gently. "Thought maybe we could watch something stupid and pretend you didn't yell at me in front of everyone."

There's a soft smile in his voice, but I can tell--he's not over it.

His eyes glance over my face. The drawing clenched in my hands. The disheveled hair. The bags under my eyes. The now awake phone screen still showing my mother's contact.

He puts the food aside and kneels in front of me. Gently pulls my face down to meet his.

I'm scared of what he might see in my eyes, but lord knows I can't resist him.

"What the fuck is going on Michael James Worthington?"

An almost panicked growl erupts from him as he gently shakes my face.

"Don't make me get the paintball gun!"

That pulls a chuckle from me.

Our old deal: lie to each other, get shot in the nuts with a paintball. Guess who's usually the target?

"Michael... Hero... what's going on?"

"Stop that"

"Stop what?"

"Pretending to care."

"What do you mean?"

"Just grab the gun and shoot me. I deserve it."

His hands tighten, pulling my face toward his. My tears come before I can stop them.

No one's ever undone me like this.

Stephen stands, sits beside me, and pulls my head into his lap. His fingers card through my hair, soft and rhythmic.

Cinnamon.

"I'd hate me if I were you," I whisper. "Please. Just go."

"You know I'm not doing that, Hero."

"Don't call me that."

"What are you going to do--spank me?"

His voice turns teasing, playful, feminine... My stupefied look being enough encouragement for Stephen to continue and the mischief in his eyes explodes like fireworks.

"Is Daddy going to punish me for being a naughty little tease?"

I sit bolt upright. Spine stiff. (Just the spine. Shut up.)

A blessed pillow conceals... issues.

My face turns a shade of red visible from orbit. I don't even have words.

Images of a black haired beauty bent over my knee float through the deepest vaults of my mind.

Stephen inches closer on all fours, giggling like a devil in silk.

"Are we having an awakening, Mikey? Need me to go change into that little skirt?"

"I--please stop, Steph."

His grin widens. "You're blushing. You are so easy. I swear."

Making me blush has always been his favorite pastime, ever since the first time I blushed at him in cat ears. My definition of PG is a LOT different than his.

"Why? Are you having some kind of awakening on our couch?"

I don't know what will happen first, the pillow ends up having a hole carved into it, or I choke and die. This is a medical emergency at this point.

"Its okay big man."

He finally retreats to the opposite side of the couch, still smirking.

"I know talking about this stuff makes you uncomfortable. I just wanted to distract you. But seriously--what's going on up there?"

Under his sweater was a near-sheer satin shirt. Collar undone. Pale skin on full display. Hair up in a bun. Blue earrings catching the light.

He's luminous. Otherworldly.

"It's nothing," I mumble.

"Bullshit. Share or I shoot."

"You'd enjoy that."

"You know I would."

I sigh. "I'm sorry for yelling. When you brought up Cindy... I spiraled."

I adjust myself on the couch to fully face him and face the inquisition in his eyes.

"I relived that night and realized how much of a coward I was. How much I still am. I talk big--but I run the second things get hard. I don't know how I'll ever find love like that."

I adjust myself on the couch to fully face him and face the inquisition in his eyes.

I can see his face soften at my admission and he leans closer to watch my expressions.

"Oh, Mikey. I'm sorry I brought that up. But sometimes confronting trauma is how we heal. Maybe if you read one of the books I got you--or, you know, saw a therapist..."

I roll my eyes. He sighs.

"I worry about you. Not your love life, though. You've had bad luck--but someone will see you the way I do. You deserve to be cherished."

I freeze.

"If all else fails... just go gay in a few years. Explore your options."

The silence is thick.

He's watching me. Waiting for a reaction.

My heart pounds.

My hands are sweating so much, they could end the drought in California.

"Okay... maybe we talk more later," he says, smiling.

"I'm going to freshen up. Then we eat and watch a movie."

He hugs me tightly before standing, effortlessly graceful.

I watch him walk away.

Oh father I have sinned.

I am definitely watching the sway of his hips.

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Thanks for reading. : D

Hopefully you want to see Michael get out his own way... It'll happen soon enough

Text your best friend tonight.

-YearningStories <3