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Josh spent his 17th birthday with his family; he had his driver’s test in the morning (which he surprisingly passed) and went to dinner after school at his favorite restaurant on main street. He drove in the car his parents had said they’d buy him; it was old and probably wouldn’t last him all that long, but he was just glad to have one. He wasn’t going to be one of those kids who complained when most of his friends had to spend the whole summer working for the chance of affording one.
Still, the one thing he wished was that he could spend his birthday with his friends. And that was why, the next day, he had planned to spend the evening of December 3rd with Nate, going nowhere in particular but just driving for the novelty of it all.
Josh couldn’t help but love everything about it; the way he could go wherever he wanted in his car. If he didn’t care as much as he did, he could go far away and never come back. He could make his own path at eighty miles per hour on the interstates, the world he knew in Jersey flying by until he ended up in New York or Pennsylvania or Delaware and then even further. But he wouldn’t go that far; at least, not until he was older. It was just one of those fantasies in his head, the things he imagined doing if he was a bolder person. He suspected Nate would be alright with going where his heart took him, but he wasn’t Nate. Nobody could ever be Nate.
When Josh had picked him up from his house, Nate was waiting on the front steps in an old tie-dye shirt, hair a mess as it always was. It suited him; Josh couldn’t imagine him any differently.
“Nice car.” Nate smiled, getting in the passenger seat. “I don’t think my parents are getting me one.”
“I can always drive you places if you need,” Josh offered, starting the car and pulling out of Nate’s driveway. “And you could always get a summer job.”
“Yeah, I think I’m gonna work at the record store downtown. They hired me last year, so I’m hoping they’ll take me back.”
“You seem like you’d do good working at a record store,” Josh told him, adjusting his jacket; he’d had it for a few years now, and he’d grown enough since then that the sleeves were starting to get short.
“Any way to make it warmer in here?” Nate asked. “It’s freezing.”
Josh shook his head. “I’ve only had this thing for a day but this is the hottest the thing will get. You can have my jacket, if you want; I run hot.”
“You can have it, it’s fine. I’m the one who forgot my jacket,” Nate told him. “If you’re really that worried about me, we can always turn back. We’re not that far out.”
Josh didn’t accept that answer; as soon as they were at a stop sign and there were no cars behind them, he took his racer jacket off and handed it to Nate. “I’ll ask for it back if I get too cold.”
Nate accepted defeat and put the jacket on; despite being slightly too small for Josh, it seemed to fit Nate well, and Josh couldn’t help but love seeing him in it. The brown complimented his eyes, the way they lit up at just about everything and especially when he smiled. It looked good on him; at least, better on him than it did on Josh. He had to admit that Nate looked good in just about everything.
“This is a nice jacket,” Nate remarked. “Where’d you get it?”
Josh shrugged. “Fifteenth birthday present from my dad. Looks nice on you; I had another growth spurt the past year so it doesn’t fit as well as it used to”
“Thanks,” Nate smiled. “Maybe that’s what you get for being so tall.”
“You sound like my dad. He’s always complaining about how I never stop growing and always need new clothes. I just think he doesn’t want to have to buy another varsity jacket; they’re expensive.”
“Yet another perk of not being an athlete.” Nate reached for the car radio, flipping through a few stations mindlessly. “What kind of music do you listen to?”
“I don’t listen to music much,” Josh admitted. “Mostly just whatever my parents put on.”
“You mind if I pick something?” Nate asked.
“Not at all.”
Josh wasn’t really sure where they were going; he was mostly just driving around the neighborhood, staying where it was familiar as Nate continued searching from station to station for something worth listening to.
“What about this?” Nate paused his search for music, the station playing a song Josh recognized but didn’t know the name of. “Elton John.”
“I like it,” Josh told him. “Though I’m sure my mother would die if she knew I was listening to it. She’s… close minded, if you know what I mean. I don’t think my father cares enough about pop culture to mind, though. He only cares about the military and being a good man, whatever that’s supposed to mean.”
“Your mother has no taste, then.” Nate leaned back, watching Josh as he focused on making the left onto Maple Avenue.
“I guess so. You have a curfew?” Josh asked. “I have to be back by eleven.”
Nate shook his head. “My parents don’t really care much about where I go. They ignore me most of the time.”
“Well then, want to go up north a bit? There’s this pizza place in Matawan that’s decent we could hit along the way. Or we could head down to the shore, if you want.”
“Why don’t we get pizza and then see what time it is once we’re done there? If we’re tired, we can go home, but if you want we can stay out later.”
Josh smiled at that; a whole evening, just him and Nate, away from the obligations of his parents and his friends who meant nothing to him. He loved the freedom of it, being able to use all his money from working the summer as a lifeguard on himself and making memories. Here, he could escape. Here, he could talk about whatever he wanted. Here, he could switch lanes whenever he so pleased. He didn’t have to worry about the wrong thoughts or saying something his parents wouldn’t approve of, because they would never know. It was like a weight off his chest as he headed towards the highway, going a few miles per hour over the speed limit in the kind of way that made him feel alive.
As they drove along the parkway, Nate turned up the music, singing at the top of his lungs to each and every song with a confidence Josh admired. He couldn’t help it, not when Nate was in his car and wearing his jacket. Not when he finally felt at home, and it just so happened to involve sitting next to a boy who he could only describe as beautiful no matter how hard he tried.
He hated that he felt that way, singing off-key to some song he only knew the chorus of, but he did. He had known it for a while, but now it was to the point where he couldn’t ignore it. Not when he looked at Nate and could feel himself lighting up at his smile alone, a faint touch lingering for hours after it had happened. He knew this was what he was meant to be feeling for girls, but yet it was Nate that elicited that in him. He liked Nate. He wanted Nate in his life. And he wanted to know what it would be like to lean across the console and kiss him.
But he couldn’t do something like that, because boys like Josh Nichols didn’t kiss other boys. They didn’t even think about kissing other boys. And so instead he kept his eyes on the road ahead and tried not to think about all those feelings that he felt deep in his bones while they reverberated inside him. He could just ignore it. He had to ignore it, if he wanted the future he’d always pictured himself having. He couldn’t be gay and join the military. He couldn’t be gay and tell the truth. And he most certainly couldn’t be gay and still have the love of his parents.
So he lied to himself, because Josh Nichols was not gay and did not wonder what Nate’s lips would feel like on his or what his body would feel like underneath his own.
After about half an hour, they made it to the pizza place; it was small, but Josh remembered going there when they were visiting an uncle who lived in the area. He knew it was good, but he also chose it because it was far away; Josh was much less likely to run into any of the football guys here than he was a five minute drive from the school.
He did a rough job parking, but eventually they made it and sat at a table in the corner with two slices each. It wasn’t all that crowded, but it was still a Friday night, and so as they ate Josh watched people coming in and out to pick up a pizza for their family. Josh used to imagine that one day he would be that guy, and go home to his wife and kids, but now he wasn’t so sure. Hell, he wasn’t even sure he ever truly wanted that, or if it was just what he assumed he had to be. There was a lot he had to be, after all; he was an only child, his parents’ one chance at continuing their family line, and he certainly felt that pressure.
Josh hated that he carried that pressure with him even so far away; he was supposed to be celebrating, focusing on himself and Nate and just having a good time, but he couldn’t. He supposed it was impossible to go seventeen years with the expectation of a certain future and just throw it away like that. He hoped he could at least get rid of it at some point; he didn’t want to spend his whole life confined to his parents’ hopes for him, not when he was just starting to see what life could be outside of it.
“This is actually a decent place,” Nate told him, snapping Josh out of what was becoming a bit of a spiral. “Good choice.”
“My uncle lives in the area, and we always get from here when we visit,” Josh explained. “Not the best pizza I’ve ever had, but to get that we’d have to go all the way into the city.”
“We should, someday,” Nate suggested. “Maybe over the summer. There’s some musical Danny wants to see, and his parents were able to get a handful of tickets for his birthday. It’s in July; I’m sure we could find a way to get you to tag along by then.”
“I don’t think my father would let me go see a musical,” Josh admitted. “He almost didn’t let me go see the play. I think he’s worried I’ll get too interested and not do what he wants me to, but I don’t want to fight it. I don’t mind the idea of joining the military.”
“But is it really what you’d want to do, if your dad wasn’t making you?” Nate asked.
Josh shook his head. “I’d rather go to medical school, but I can do both. If anything, serving will get me out of the house and away from him. I could go far for college, but the military guarantees I’ll be out of here as soon as I graduate. Not that my family’s horrible, but… it’ll be nice to not have to always worry about what he thinks, you know?”
“You can’t let him control your life, Josh. I mean, you’re a great guy. You’ll do well in just about anything, whether or not your dad supports you in it. My parents aren’t too keen on me applying to art school, but I only have one life and I don’t want to waste it on law or business,” Nate told him. “If you build your whole life around him, then what’s it going to look like when he’s gone?”
Josh didn’t have an answer right away, because he hadn’t really thought about it. He craved freedom and a life of his own, but he also knew there were some things he had to do because it was his role as the son. Things he didn’t necessarily enjoy but were his obligations that he had to fulfil. In his family, the military was one of those things. It had been since his grandfather served in World War II, and his father after that. Had he been in any other family, he would be focused on getting into the college of his dreams. But since he was a Nichols, the world had other plans for him. He would sacrifice a few years of his life, and then move on. It was worth it, to get his parents’ approval. To make sure they would think of their son proudly. He only hoped that meeting every other criteria on that list would one day make up for the fact that he was beginning to picture his ideal life with a man by his side.
“He’s just… intimidating,” Josh told Nate. “You can feel it, when he’s disappointed. It’s like he doesn’t care about me anymore when I don’t do what he thinks I should do.”
“He only treats you like his son when he thinks you’re doing a good job?” Josh nodded. “That’s shitty of him.”
Josh shrugged. “Yeah, I know. But he’s also my father, and I can’t change that. I might as well just try my best.”
“I don’t really get caring so much,” Nate admitted. “But I guess what he thinks means a lot to you, huh?”
“It does,” Josh told him. “My family’s traditional. They’ve always told me the most important thing I can do is fit the mold. Hard to break free of that when it’s been drilled into your head since you were five.”
“Just don’t let him get into your head too much, alright? I like you, Josh, and I can’t have some guy who only cares about being a ‘real man’ take you away from me.”
Josh smiled at that; Nate cared. Nate liked him. And he liked the part of him that he was always trying to hide and cover up. Maybe it didn’t mean much, but in Josh’s mind it meant the world. For a moment, a part of him wanted to let his guard down even further, tell Nate about the things he wasn’t even certain of himself. Bring the deepest parts of himself to the surface and lay them out for Nate to see.
But that was too far; he’d only known Nate for three months, and three months meant nothing. Josh had known some of his other friends for a decade now, and he wouldn’t even trust them with the fact that his dreams weren’t necessarily what he said they were. But Nate was easy to trust; easier than anyone Josh had met. It was in his eyes, in his smile, in the way he looked at Josh like he was the only thing in the whole damn universe.
Maybe this was what falling in love felt like; the thought had crossed Josh’s mind a time or two over the past month, but he didn’t let himself consider it. But now, he did. After all, three months often felt like an eternity, and love had strange ways of working. He was a stranger to the concept of butterflies in your stomach and touches that burned, but with Nate he felt like he didn’t have to be. He liked Nate; he couldn’t imagine the school year without him even though that had been reality for most of his life. But now that he had him, he didn’t want to let him go.
So yes, maybe Josh Nichols was falling in love. And maybe he was falling in love with another boy whose eyes were the most captivating thing he had ever seen, a boy who saw things in the world Josh never could have dreamed of. Maybe he wanted to tell this boy everything, to let go of all his fears and watch the walls crumble for the first time.
It was a bad thing, if he was. A dangerous thing. A fight he would most certainly lose because his opponent was the whole damn world.
But if there was one thing the Nichols family didn’t do, it was run away from a battle.