"Lucian, please . . ." Chance tried to stop me from leaving my room, putting a hand on my chest and pushing me away from the door.

I couldn't even look him in the eyes. The rage in my blood was boiling hot. It was taking every ounce of self-control to not lash out at him and make a scene in front of everyone.

But if he wanted to do this, I wasn't going to hold anything back.

"We have been dating for four months," I said, keeping my voice nice and low. "Why the fuck do you think it's a good idea to propose?"

"Because I love you and I know what I want."

"What about what I want?" I said, finally looking into his eyes. I must have struck a chord, because his eyes went shiny with tears. "Yeah, makes you think, doesn't it? I've never brought it up because I know how you are."

"What is that supposed to mean?" he said.

I shook my head in disappointment. It was like talking to a wall. I pushed him aside and ran out of my room, making my way through the packed living room as he yelled at me, but the music was too loud for me to understand what he was shouting. Once I was out of the tight apartment, I made sure I wasn't being followed before taking the elevator down to the ground floor.

It was peaceful when I walked outside. It had long stopped raining and the sky was clear of any ominous clouds. I took the sidewalk and began walking in no particular direction. I followed the moon, set on being happily content wherever it took me as long as it was far from here.

It was hard fighting the anger inside me. I wanted to scream until my lungs shriveled up like a balloon. Why did my life have to be so complicated? For once couldn't it just be like this town? Might as well match the theme, right? But even that was too complicated. I started thinking about my parents and how it would be now if I could speak to them. Would they have been the kind of parents that wanted me to go to them when things got hard? What would they even say to me in this situation?

Oh, who was I fooling? My father bailed when he found out my mom was pregnant and my mother died from an overdose. The only good thing they gave me was life, and that was pushing it.

Dorian was my only true family. That was the reason it was so hard for me to accept that he was leaving.

My mind burst in colors as I reminisced about the first time we ever met, back when his face was round and full of acne, and the only girls he talked to were the anime girls on TV. He had always been so positive about how everyone treated him, not ever letting the horrible things being said bother him. He always said he never did anything about it because a town like this would need more than one person to change its mind. The only time he ever intervened was when it involved me. I couldn't blame him, I did the same. Whenever someone wanted to be racist and act like it wasn't a big deal, I'd get into physical fights trying to defend him. I wasn't the type to lecture people about what was wrong or right, especially when they weren't going to listen. Dorian and I spent a lot of time in detention because we fought for each other.

Now that we were older—and way better looking—we chose what kind of people we wanted to be friends with, even in a small town. Being different wasn't weird, it was normal. Different people lived in every corner of the globe. But what kind of different did you want to be? Someone who bullied others for things out of their control, or someone who made the world worth living in?

The sound of a door slamming shut made me look back suddenly. I sighed long when Chance darted across the road.

"Stop!" he yelled as I continued marching forward.

My legs stopped before my brain decided on what to do. I turned around to face him. "Why can't you leave me alone for even a minute?"

"Tell me the truth," he said. "Do you love me?"

"You make it hard to, Chance."

"Why?" he said quietly. "What am I doing wrong?"

I took a deep breath to prepare for what I was about to tell him, since clearly he was oblivious as hell.

"You forced me to meet your parents after one week together," I said. When he didn't say anything and just listened, I continued. "After two weeks, you asked me to move in with you. A month later? You asked me if I wanted to have kids, and that we should look into it, because your parents could pay for a surrogate. Another month and you were trying to buy me a car. And now you're proposing to me? Who does that, Chance?"

"I—I just really like you," he stammered. "I just wanted to—I just wanted you to be happy."

"Have you ever asked me what I wanted? Have you ever stopped to think that maybe you were going too fast and it was making me uncomfortable?"

"But you never said anything."

"Because I knew that it was who you were. I wasn't going to try to change you. I tried to accept it, but—"

"But what?"

"Chance . . ." This was going to hurt him. I had no other option but to tell him the truth. Enough was enough. "The only reason we started dating is because we're the only gay guys here. I'm not your prince charming. I'm not your other half. I'm not the one."

"That's not fair," he said, his eyes going watery.

"I do love you, Chance. I wouldn't have dated you if I didn't."

"Dated?"

"Chance, I'm sorry."

"Are you breaking up with me?"

It was never my intention to hurt him. He was never going to accept the truth. We dated because we could, because we were the only two people who were gay. It wasn't a coincidence that he developed a crush for me right after he found out I was gay. But did he honestly believe that it was written in the stars? He was manipulative, controlling, and clingy didn't bother me but he took it to another level.

I wasn't going to tell him how our first time having sex was one-sided. He forced himself on me and gave me no choice, even when I didn't want to do it. I tried multiple times to say I wasn't ready to do it, but when he wanted the dick, he fucking got it. I mean, I had my own issues. Sometimes I couldn't say no to people. I was way too chill about things I shouldn't be. And I really did care about Chance, but he wasn't going to find a healthy relationship with me.

"Yeah, I am."

As I brushed past him, walking back to my apartment building, he started crying.

"Please, don't leave me."

Hearing him cry felt like a jab to the heart. I hadn't spent the last four months with him for nothing. I learned a lot of things about him. He wasn't a bad person, not at all. But there were things he needed help with, and in some cases, professional help.

"Chance, just go home," I said, not turning around to look at him.

"There has to be something I can do to fix this," he begged.

"There isn't, go home."

He left me alone when I went back inside my building. My heart was racing badly when I entered the elevator. There was an old woman of short stature in the corner. I noticed she was watching me from the corner of her eyes, tempted to ask why I looked so stressed and ready to jump a bridge, but I wasn't in the mood so I stepped out of the elevator early and took the stairs. I needed time to think anyway.

With no Dorian and no Chance, the only human interaction I had was at my job. I worked as a bartender at a little bar in the middle of town. I served many people from alcoholic men who came in after cheating on their totally naggy wives—as if it was a reward for their brave tolerance—to snobby college kids, to cougars who wanted to pay me to have their way with me for a night. The conversations were crazy, but it was nowhere near fulfilling enough to keep me sane.

When I was back on my floor, I entered my apartment and immediately went to my bedroom, shutting the door behind me and blocking out most of the music. I stripped my clothes off and changed into something more comfortable—I had no intentions on partying the rest of the night. I brought my laptop to my bed and woke it up. As I opened Spotify to listen to my own music, my door opened and I almost breathed fire thinking it was Chance, but it was Dorian.

"Where have you been, mister?" he said.

"Around," I muttered.

He closed my door for some privacy and moved to my desk, taking my chair and dragging it in front of me next to the bed.

"What's wrong?" he asked, sitting down.

"I, uh, broke up with Chance."

He made about ten different facial expressions before he settled on glaring.

"Why?" he asked slowly.

"Because he proposed to me," I said.

"OH! Yeah, that makes sense." He nodded his head approvingly. "Sounds like Chance. Are you okay?"

"Not the best day, if I'm being honest," I said.

He sighed and slouched back on the chair. "Want to stay up all night?"

"You have to drive tomorrow."

"Fine, then I'm sleeping in here with you tonight. I'm gonna cuddle you, and wuddle you, and snuggle you."

"I . . . don't even wanna know what that means."

"How did Chance take it?"

I gave him a deadpan reaction. "You know how he took it."

"At least he didn't tell you he was pregnant."

I snorted. "Funny. If he was a girl, maybe."

"If he was a girl, I'd be the one fucking him."

"Thank you for that vivid image," I said sarcastically.

"From the outside looking in, I saw it coming miles away," he said. "Chance is infatuated with you. No, he is obsessed with you. And you were blind, for the most part."

"I was not," I protested. "I just—"

"Needed a pretty hole to bury all of your insecurities in?"

"First, gross. And second, what the hell, Dorian?"

He raised his hands defense. "Hey! You had four months to break up with him and you didn't. Not my fault you decided to stay in that cringy relationship."

"It was cringy?" I asked.

"The guy was leaving love letters at our front door every week and leaving bouquets of roses. Maybe it's cute the first time, but when four months pass I'd expect a bouquet of chicken nuggets and zero interaction with me for at least twenty-four hours."

"Okay, but I wasn't the one making it cringy."

"You're cringy in your own way, Lucian," he said with a sprinkle of sympathy.

"He's not gonna drop it," I said, ignoring his casual insult.

As Dorian opened his mouth to respond, my door opened for the trillionth time today. It seemed like I needed to put a lock on it, since no one respected my privacy.

I expected Chance to be the one walking in, pretending like I hadn't broken up with him. It was only the girl from earlier who had clung onto Dorian all night. She came in carrying pizza. With the back of her heels, she pushed the door shut. At least everyone knew to close the goddamn door.

"Bought you guys some pizza," she said, walking past us and dropping the food on my desk.

"Thanks, Kendra," Dorian said.

"Why are you guys in here?" she asked, grimacing as her eyes scanned my room like it was a zoo.

"Chilling with my bro, why you ask?" he said.

She sat on his lap and giggled. "The party's out there, silly."

"I'll be out in a minute."

She did a complete turn and faced me, still sitting on Dorian and making me very uncomfortable. I didn't have anything against her. We went to school together. But she chose Dorian's last day to suddenly be friendly and flirty?

"Have you guys ever made out?" she asked out of the blue.

"What?" I asked, squinting my eyes, confused as hell.

"You're gay, right? And bestfriends? So have you?"

"No," Dorian lied.

"Once," I said, grinning at Dorian as his smile faded away.

"Thanks! Thanks a lot!" he said.

"I knew it! The rumor was true."

"RUMOR?" Dorian exclaimed. "What rumor?"

She shrugged her shoulders. "Just that you two were secretly gay."

Dorian jumped up, almost knocking Kendra to the floor, but she only just managed to land on the edge of my bed.

"What the heckie? Why am I finding out about this now?" he said.

Kendra flipped the hair off her face and when a strand got stuck, she puffed her cheeks and blew it to the side.

"It's not a big deal," she said, fixing herself after almost being thrown. "Nobody actually cares."

"Oh, I know," he said, sitting back down. "Lucian is such a cutie."

I crossed my arms.

"Aw, look at him! He's angwe!"

"You can both literally drown in a tub of mayonnaise," I muttered.

"I'm not gay by the way," Dorian told Kendra. "Not one bit."

"I know," she said, a clear smug on her pretty face. "I can tell by the way you were holding me today."

"Can you guys, like, leave?"

Before you fuck each other on my bed . . . in front of me.

"Why don't we leave Lucian alone and go back to the party?" Dorian said, his hand going up to massage her arm.

"Yes, please!"

"I'll talk to you soon, Luc," Dorian said, leaving with an arm around Kendra.

Dorian kept his promise about sleeping in my bed. When the party ended and I got tasked with cleaning most of the mess, Dorian slipped into my bed without me noticing and fell asleep. It wasn't the first time, but it was still weird. I wasn't going to complain, it was my last night with my bestfriend—I would have showered with him if he'd asked.

Okay, not really.

I found it difficult falling asleep. Eventually my eyes closed and I dreamed of waking up in a more colorful world.

____________________________

[Author's Message]: GOSH. You guys are the best and most supportive people EVER. The amount of love you guys gave the first chapter filled my lil empty heart. It meant the world to me,  I hope you know. All the comments, all of you silent readers, thank you for reading and enjoying this story so far. I cannot wait to take you guys through some wild times. The fun will soon begin, I hope you're excited, cause I am. Don't forget to follow me on Twitter, I always post about updates and what's going on. (You can find the link on my profile) <3 much love.