EUTR – Will You Go–

Here’s the second short story from my upcoming LGBT+ short story/advice collection, Everything Under The Rainbow! You can find out more about it on my Upcoming Releases page – just click here! Will You Go– covers the rather serious issue of homophobic bullying, specifically in schools, while also shedding light on the difficulties for LGBT+ young people around relationships. Read on to find out how Amber deals with two difficult situations colliding in school in Will You Go–!

Will You Go–

I have a crush on Leah. 

I know, terrible way to start a story, right? But it’s true. That beautiful girl, sitting across from me in the stuffy old school library, is everything. We spend break and lunch together, every day, and we walk home with our hands so close to each other that I have to bite my tongue not to reach out and hold hers. Crazy, right? 

This lunchtime is going to be different. I can feel it. Sure, Miss Instant-Noodle-Hair (not her real name, but Miss Ashton sounds boring in comparison) is looming over us, wandering around the reception desk like a mother duck looking for her little lost ducklings, but that’s fine. There’s some loud Year Nines trying to play cards in the corner, the stakes seeming to be chocolate-based, but that’s fine. Even the Year Sevens screaming at jumpscares from whatever game they’re playing on the library computers doesn’t bother me. 

Not today. Today is different. 

Today I’m going to ask Leah out. 

“You can’t tell me I’m wrong!” Madison’s surprisingly-loud declaration brings me out of my thoughts and brings Miss Instant-Noodle-Hair a little closer. Her eyes seem to watch everyone at once. “There’s literally no evidence against my theory!” 

“There’s also none for your theory,” Leah, a brunette goddess in a tacky, mustard-yellow uniform which even she can’t pull off (it’s impossible–plenty of people have tried to make it look fashionable, to no avail), shakes her head and smiles. That smile… it would light up the room, but the strip electric lights glaring down at us already do that. 

“Exactly! Wait–” 

All three of us laugh, Miss Instant-Noodle-Hair moving on to tell off the Year Nines. For some reason, she seems more concerned with their noise than their obvious gambling, but that’s high school for you. 

Anyway, there’s a small problem with my crush on Leah. Well, I say small, but it’s actually been clawing into my back like a mountain-sized monster for weeks. It’s not that we’re already close friends, or that we’re young and I’m worried about the prospect of having a proper relationship for the first time. No, it’s worse than all of that. 

Leah’s a girl; she’s a wonderful, stunning, intelligent, confident girl. 

But so am I. 

Not the whole ‘stunning’ and ‘confident’ bit, but the ‘girl’ part is very important. I… well, I guess I’m a lesbian, or definitely some sort of girl-loving person. I haven’t got it all figured out yet. But Leah? It’s a mystery. 

Trust me, I’ve tried to work it out. Mentioning pride events just segues us into conversations about the musicians who perform at them. Gay celebrities? Somehow, we end up moving onto the TV shows and movies they’ve been in. I tried bringing up a book with a gay couple in it, only to be lectured on the writing style and plot elements, or something like that.  

I tried to listen. I always do, when she starts talking about things she loves. Seeing her face light up with enthusiasm is amazing. 

“I’m just saying, we both have two eyes, mouths–” Madison starts again, only to be shot down immediately. 

“Have you ever seen a human with gills?” Trying to talk seriously for a moment, Leah holds her hand over her mouth, hiding the smile which I unabashedly adore. 

“That’s beside the point.” 

“That’s the entire point!” 

For some reason, in the laughter break which follows Leah’s exasperated words, I feel fate and destiny take me by the hand. This is it, they whisper, this is it. It’s your moment. I don’t have to ask what the moment is for. It’s been on my mind all lunchtime–all day–all week. All month. 

“Hey, Leah, will you go–” 

Before the last of my adrenaline-fuelled words can pass through my lips, I’m interrupted. Rudely. 

“Lesbos,” he’s past in a moment, a blur of a black non-school-uniform-compliant rain jacket and a curly hair cut. 

A long, long minute passes between us. A minute which drives us closer to next lesson. A minute which I could’ve spent asking Leah out. A minute which some random guy decided to ruin for no reason. Great. Fate and destiny are no longer my best friends. Not that they really were, I guess, but now they’re definitely not. 

“We’re not even lesbians,” Madison sighs, dropping her head on the table between us–the thud alerts Miss Instant-Noodle-Hair, but one of the Year Nines wins a round of cards and his celebrations draw her away, “why are people so stupid?” 

“He thinks he’s funny,” shaking her head, Leah pats Madison’s springy hair softly before looking to me, “you alright, Amber?” 

“Fine,” my reply spits its way through gritted teeth. 

That was my moment. My intertwining of destiny and fat. My decision to risk friendship for love. It was all mine, but he had to steal it for a quick joke. If he thinks three girls hanging out together is some sort of code for being lesbian, he must be horrified by the canteen. 

But I can’t dwell on it. Before Leah can figure out that something is wrong, I force a smile and prompt Madison back into the fish-human-debate, despite not really listening to it before. Something about humans evolving from fish–that’s about as scientific as our friend group gets, I’m afraid. Soon enough, there’s a messy diagram of a fish-human-hybrid which would probably make our biology teacher faint on the table, wriggly lines scribbled on notebook paper with a chewed biro. 

Doing my best to look like I’m studying the recent addition to Madison’s ‘theory’, my mind travels back to that interrupted question. ‘Will you go—’… well, I guess it ended there. Is it some sort of sign from fate and destiny? Have they changed their minds? Or is it some sort of test, to see if I really want to ask Leah out? 

Do I really want to ask Leah out? 

We’re steaming through Year Eleven (far too fast for my liking), getting close to GCSEs and picking colleges. We might get split up. None of us have really thought about it too much. But I have thought about her, for months now. It barely feels like months. Every day blurs into one long daydream of her soft face, the round cheeks and the eyelashes she delicately paints with mascara every morning. Tests and homework fade into the background. TV shows pale in comparison. 

I don’t want to ask her out. I need to. 

“In conclusion, I’m right and everyone else in the world is wrong!” Looking proud of herself, Madison waves the scrappy bit of paper in my face, waking me up once more. I really need to start paying attention to reality. It would make sense to, considering that I have to live in it. “Right, Amber?” 

“I mean, if ‘everyone else in the world is wrong’, then me saying you’re right makes you wrong.” Confusing even myself with that sentence, I smile triumphantly nonetheless. Madison stares at me, cogs turning in her head. 

“I think she’s got you beat,” Leah says, my cheeks heating up before I can flop a sleeve in front of them, “and–oh, great. Guess who’s here.” 

Considering her tone, I really don’t need to. I don’t even look. He won’t say it again. He’s not stupid–well, he might be, but hopefully he’s not that stupid. Fate taps me on the shoulder, but I know the games that supernatural forces play. Destiny tries to whisper in my ear. Ignoring them, I cast my eyes down to the sad creature on Madison’s paper, a rigid, drawn-on grin failing to improve the overall impression of pitifulness. 

“He’s got friends,” Madison murmurs, making me roll my eyes. Of course he does. My day just can’t get any worse, can it? 

Will you go out with me? Fate and destiny are having a laugh. All of sudden, my head is full of the whirling words. I can’t escape. It almost feels like some sort of tug of war, with someone wanting me to ask and another yanking the opportunity away. They give me the words and take away the opportunity. 

Will you go out with me? It lingers on the tip of my tongue, threatening to fall off at any moment and sneak into Leah’s ear. My insides are being torn apart. Ask, don’t ask. Wait, don’t wait. Leave it, do it now. Whoever decided that today would be the day I’d get royally messed with by the entire universe is going to feel my wrath–as soon as I get away from this table, this lunch time and this stupid guy who thinks he’s a comedian. 

With an entourage, of course, because one of him just wasn’t enough. 

“You’re all dirty lesbos, you,” this time, his stupid comment is followed by stupid tittering from his stupid friends, who I really hate right now. Fate and destiny can take a back seat for now; I have stupid Year-whatever-they-ares to deal with. 

This, of course, is a terrible idea, but I started this story terribly so I might as well follow through. 

“WILL YOU GO OUT WITH ME?” 

Not my greatest moment. With just a quick overview, we can see exactly where I went wrong a few seconds ago. See, leaping up in the middle of the library and screaming is a great way to attract the attention of Miss Instant-Noodle-Hair, who is now storming over with a face of pure thunder. Screaming that particular question at a curly-haired boy who just called you and all your friends ‘dirty lesbos’ is a wonderful way to get a lot of confused looks from him and his cronies pretty quickly, before the disgusted expressions and ‘ew’s set in. You know what’s the worst of all, though? 

When the girl you actually wanted to ask out has just been deafened by you, and is now sitting in stunned silence. 

Yeah, it’s funny how a load of terrible things happen in high school. Just ask Madison. She’s always the first to bring up the time I got stuck in a toilet cubicle, finally getting rescued by a PE teacher and a senior member of staff, but not after I inadvertently filled the toilets to bursting with a curious crowd. I’ve got a few about her, though, and Leah too. It’s all equal. At least none of us set the fire alarm off in the pouring rain–that honour (and the undying hatred of absolutely everyone in this school) goes to Will from Year Eight. 

I’m sure everything will be forgotten by the time we’re adults, with jobs and families and whatever else adults have. Well, maybe not Will, but everything else is almost one hundred percent forgettable. 

This, though? I’m not really sure. 

With Miss Instant-Noodle-Hair closing in, I jump up and kick my chair away for good measure. Not-at-all-good-tip, if you decide to suddenly become rebellious and angry, go all out! Never follow that rule. Ever. It’s also called digging a hole for yourself, and it’s not generally looked upon as wise. But I grab my shovel and push everyone out of the way and run outside to dig my hole anyway, because I’ve spent fifteen years on this earth and none of them taught me how to deal with whatever just happened calmly and logically. 

No, my brain just went ‘let’s go’, so we went. 

Cold air and common sense hit me in the face in the corridor. Regret comes, in waves of ‘what have you just done’ and ‘that was so cool’ and ‘you just ruined your entire life’ and ‘let’s do it again’. They’re some pretty choppy waves. 

Kids walk past, not even pretending they’re not staring. I don’t really blame them. My cheeks feel hotter than that tray in cooking class which I forgot just went in the oven for an hour (another funny story Madison loves to tell). There might be tears in my eyes, but they’re not falling down my cheeks. Instead, they’re being a nuisance and clouding my vision. Everything is against me today, it seems. 

My ears don’t even pick up on the library door opening and closing, quietly. Carefully. I don’t hear the gentle footsteps on the corridor. I don’t notice the girl I call a goddess padding up to my side, eyes large and kind and full of some sort of wonder. 

I figure it out when I turn around and nearly have a heart attack at the sight of her. 

“Trying to kill me, sneaking up on me like that?” Mock-angry, I wave a hand around pretending to have more energy than I really do. That altercation took everything out of me. She only smiles. 

“You can’t fool me with that delicate act, not after that,” she gestures towards the library with her head, prompting another gushing of blood into my cheeks, “but I’m glad you can still joke around after that rejection.” 

“I wasn’t trying to ask him out,” I groan, my head hitting the wall behind me, “I don’t even know his name.” 

“You know my name.” 

Is that… is that… 

Is it happening? 

Fate nods. Destiny smirks. This was their plan all along. 

Stupid plan. What’s wrong with a simple, non-embarrassing love story? 

“Leah–Leah,” throat dry, palms clammy, tongue thick, I try to get those crucial words out, “will you go—” no interruption, not this time, just vague crowds of kids drifting past and the x-ray glare of Miss Instant-Noodle-Hair, but she has no power here, “will you go out with me?” 

A smile. A soft hand, interlocking fingers with mine. A nod.  

My goddess has taken me to heaven.

Author’s Note – This is a draft of a to-be-published work. The content may be altered or changed prior to publishing. This is not indicative of the exact content of the published work.

Oskar Leonard