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Love is a funny feeling. On its own it’s great, spectacular even. However, the feeling of love is almost always coupled with the feeling of fear. Because with love comes the fear of losing that love. For Charlie, these two feelings equally consumed his time and occupied his mind. On his good days, he allowed himself to just be happy and in love. But on his bad days he felt a crippling fear that Nick would leave him.
Of course Nick had never even mentioned, or even hinted, that he was unhappy in their relationship. It was simply just Charlie’s anxious mind playing tricks on him. Deep down Charlie knew that his anxiety wasn’t healthy or helpful at all. If he only knew how to switch if off he would. Unfortunately, he hadn’t been able to find that switch button just yet.
Ever since he got assigned a seat next to Nick in form, Nick had lived in Charlie’s mind, thoughts, and heart. Charlie loved being in love with Nick. Loved the butterflies that fluttered around inside his stomach every time Nick kissed him, or put his arms around him, or held his hand. For Christ’s sake, his heart skipped a beat every time Nick introduced him as his boyfriend.
Charlie was someone’s boyfriend. He was Nick Nelson’s boyfriend.
His biggest fear was that someday he’d be Nick’s ex-boyfriend, or even worse, just a guy that Nick dated in school. Nothing but a faint memory, just a guy in Nick’s life.
Whenever Charlie struggled with intrusive thoughts, he’d get this strong pressure over his chest. It crushed him, and it made him feel trapped in his own body and mind. He really wished that he could find that off-button and switch off all the intrusive thoughts that occupied his mind.
Without his intrusive thoughts, he wouldn’t be lying in bed, on a Saturday night, clutching his phone, just waiting for a message from Nick.
Nick was out with Alex and Pete, a couple of friends from the rugby team. They had said that they were going out to eat and then maybe go to the cinema or go bowling after. Pete and Alex were really nice guys, and even if they hadn’t really been the biggest LGBTQ+ allies at first, they had certainly come around and they had even educated themselves about bisexuality and supported Nick’s coming out.
It wasn’t that Charlie wasn’t happy that his boyfriend had such good friends, because he was, it was just that he hadn’t been invited to join them. It was stupid really, Nick should be able to spend time with his friends without Charlie. And Nick hadn’t specifically told Charlie that he couldn’t come, he just hadn’t invited him along.
Nick and Charlie spent almost all of their free time together. They liked it that way. Charlie loved it that way. If it were up to him, they’d be living together already. But he was only 16, and Nick was 17, and they were way too young to be moving in together, but Charlie allowed himself to dream about sharing a flat with Nick. They could share a studio or a one bedroom flat together. Charlie pictured them decorating their place together. Hanging up fairy lights, picking out curtains, and buying a bed together.
Charlie’s mobile phone vibrated and interrupted his dreams about fairy lights and curtains. Charlie immediately looked at the screen. It was just a message from Elle, who wondered if she had left her yellow jacket at Charlie’s place. Charlie quickly fired off a short message back saying that he hadn’t seen her jacket.
He quickly glanced at his phone to check the time. It was almost 11 PM, and still no message from Nick. Charlie bit his lip and tried to ignore the anxiety that started to build inside his body. His legs started twitching, his breathing turned shallower and before he knew it his mind started spinning.
“No, no,” Charlie whispered to himself as he closed his eyes and shook his head. Logically, he knew that Nick’s lack of messaging could mean a number of things: low battery, no signal, or he could just simply be having too much fun to even think about messaging his needy boyfriend.
It was the latter that made Charlie feel overwhelmed with sadness. The house was eerily quiet and dark. Everyone had gone to bed. The darkness and the quietness only made Charlie feel worse. He could feel wetness on his cheeks, and realized that he was crying silently. Still clutching his phone, Charlie turned around in bed and buried his face in his pillow. There was something wrong with him. He should be able to relax and just be happy that Nick was out having a good time with his friends.
It wasn’t that Nick had completely forgotten about him either. No, Nick had sent a few messages throughout the evening, but they had been short, or consisted solely of emojis, mainly smileys. The abundance of smiley faces hadn’t really calmed Charlie’s mind, but he did appreciate the communication.
Suddenly, his phone vibrated against his stomach and it made him shoot up into a sitting position, and he quickly scrambled to find his phone.
I’m outside. The message read, followed by a string of emojis. Charlie turned on his bedside lamp and quietly ran over to the window, and he opened it as quietly and as quickly as he possibly could so that he wouldn’t wake anyone up. His parents loved Nick, but they weren’t exactly fond of him sneaking in in the middle of the night.
Charlie looked out the window, and surely, there he was, his boyfriend. Nick waved and looked adorable as he looked up at Charlie.
Charlie could feel the happiness bubbling up inside of him. He gave Nick a quick nod before he closed the window. After a quick look in the mirror to make sure that there were no tears left in his eyes, he tiptoed down the stairs and opened the door and let his boyfriend in.
“Hi,” Nick murmured and pressed his lips against Charlie’s in a quick kiss.
“Hi,” Charlie smiled. He pulled at the hem of his shirt. There were so many things that he wanted to say. He wanted to tell Nick that he had missed him, but he was afraid that he’d sound too needy and clingy if he did. So instead he just stood there smiling, happy to be re-united with Nick.
“I’m knackered,” Nick laughed and pulled off his sweatshirt.
Charlie nodded. “Do you want something to eat or drink before we go to bed?”
Nick shook his head. “Not really. I’m quite full. We had a proper meal together before we all said our goodbyes.”
“Did you have a good time then?” Charlie asked, and he didn’t add ‘without me’, even though his stupid, anxiety-ridden brain wanted to.
“Yeah,” Nick smiled and grabbed Charlie’s hand.
They walked upstairs together, hand-in-hand, as quietly as they could. Nick accidentally stepped on the floorboard that always creaked, and they immediately stilled in fear, thinking that they had woken up somebody. When they didn’t get a response, they giggled as they tiptoed all the way to Charlie’s bedroom.
Nick had his own toothbrush at Charlie’s. It made Charlie’s heart swoon every time he saw Nick’s red toothbrush next to his own in the plastic cup next to the sink.
Charlie sat on the bathroom floor, waiting patiently as his boyfriend brushed his teeth.
“So what did you do tonight?” Nick asked with the toothbrush still in his mouth.
Charlie shrugged.
“Did you end up going to Tao’s?”
Charlie picked on the small hole in his pyjama shorts. “No, he had plans with his family.”
Tao really did have plans with his family, but Charlie knew that he could’ve joined in on those plans if he wanted to. Tao’s family were very inclusive and friends were always allowed to join in on the family fun. But Charlie hadn’t joined in, he had stayed at home and struggled with his anxiety, but Nick didn’t have to know that. Poor Nick already had to deal with a long list of Charlie’s problems. Nick was constantly worried about Charlie. Nick checked up on Charlie a lot. He made sure that Charlie was eating well, and that he was still going to his therapist appointments and sometimes Charlie caught Nick staring at his arms to see if there were any fresh cuts there. Charlie knew that Nick worried about him a lot.
All the cuts on Charlie’s arms were old and healed, but Nick still traced them with his fingers to make sure that there weren’t any new ones among the old ones.
Nick gurgled and spit one last time, before he turned around to face Charlie. “I thought you were going to Tao’s,” he said quietly as he bit his lip. “I didn’t know that you were going to be home by yourself. If I had known-“
“I’m fine. I spent time with Tori, we played video games and cooked dinner,” Charlie quickly cut in. He couldn’t stand seeing Nick looking so guilty for going out and having fun.
Nick smiled and held out his hand, and Charlie immediately took it. Without a word, Nick pulled up Charlie from the floor.
“Hi,” Charlie smiled when they stood face to face, so close that Charlie could feel Nick’s minty breath as he exhaled.
“Hi,” Nick smiled back.
Charlie let out an involuntary yawn.
“Sleepy?”
“Maybe a little,” Charlie blushed. All the anxiety that he had struggled with the whole evening had mentally and physically drained him.
“Let’s go to bed.”
They went through Charlie’s closet quickly, searching for something for Nick to wear to bed.
“Char, I’ve been looking for this for ages,” Nick whisper-yelled at his boyfriend as he held up a t-shirt with blue stripes. “When did you steal this?” he tried to sound stern as he scolded his boyfriend, but it didn’t come out stern at all.
“What’s yours is mine?” Charlie tried to look innocent. Truth to be told, he had borrowed, not stolen, quite a few items from Nick’s room. Actually, it was just clothes. Charlie liked to wear Nick’s clothes around the house, or to bed, or when he went shopping. School was the only place that Charlie didn’t dare to wear his boyfriend’s clothes. They were already the talk of the school. Everyone knew who they were. If Charlie showed up in one of Nick’s sweaters, he’d just draw more attention to himself.
“Fine, you can have it,” Nick relented and held out the t-shirt to Charlie.
The small gesture warmed Charlie’s heart. Wordlessly, he accepted the t-shirt. Nick changed into sleepwear and they made themselves comfortable in Charlie’s bed. And for the millionth time, Charlie wished that he had a larger bed. Not that he didn’t love sleeping close to Nick, no, he loved that, but he also felt guilty about cramming his large, rugby-boyfriend into a small bed. At one point, Charlie had even asked his parents if he could get a larger bed, but it was safe to say that Jane and Julio Spring weren’t quite fond of that idea. They were aware that their son’s boyfriend sometimes snuck into the house late at night, but they preferred not to think about it.
Nick never complained about Charlie’s narrow bed, of course he didn’t, bless him. But Charlie always made sure to take up as little space as possible so that his boyfriend wouldn’t be too uncomfortable.
“Hmpf,” Nick fluffed the pillow. All of a sudden he stopped his movements. “Char, why is the pillow wet?”
Charlie stilled. He had completely forgotten to swap the pillow case before he had let Nick into his bed. His boyfriend didn’t need to know that he had cried only minutes ago. Anxiety kicked in as Charlie desperately tried to come up with a valid reason why his pillow was wet. “I, uh, I spilled water,” he croaked out the lie that he had just come up with. It was useless though. Nick looked worried, and Charlie could tell that his boyfriend could see right through him.
The lamp on the bedside table was still on, and even though it didn’t provide much light, it provided more than enough light for Charlie to see the sadness in Nick’s eyes.
“Have you been crying?”
Charlie bit his lip and looked down, too nervous to meet his boyfriend’s gaze.
“Could you look at me?” Nick asked and gently lifted Charlie’s chin upward.
“I’m really sorry,” Charlie said quietly. After a fun night out, Nick should be able to just go to bed and relax. The last thing Charlie wanted to do was upsetting his boyfriend.
“Shh,” Nick hushed. “You’re not allowed to say sorry for crying.”
“I’m not even sad anymore,” Charlie assured his boyfriend. “It was all so stupid, really. I promise I’m fine now.”
“Why were you not fine earlier?”
Not wanting to admit the real reason for crying, Charlie just shrugged. “Anxiety,” he mumbled. Technically it wasn’t a lie, but it wasn’t the whole truth either.
“Oh, Char,” Nick immediately pulled in his boyfriend for a warm hug.
Charlie rested his head on Nick’s broad shoulder. “I’m fine now. I promise,” he repeated the words to soothe his boyfriend.
“Char-lie,” Nick stuttered out. “Did you,” he paused, “did you do something?”
Confused, Charlie lifted his head and looked at Nick. What did Nick mean by ‘something’? Then it dawned on him. Nick was asking if Charlie had hurt himself. “No, no, definitely not,” Charlie said and shook his head vehemently. Despite the strong anxiety, he had never once thought about hurting himself.
“Do you promise?” Nick asked quietly.
Charlie’s heart broke when he spotted the wetness in his boyfriend’s eyes. In an instant, he placed his hands on Nick’s cheeks. “I promise,” he said while he looked his boyfriend in the eyes.
Nick nodded, but Charlie could tell that his boyfriend wasn’t fully convinced just yet.
“Can I see your arms?”
The question took Charlie by surprise. Never before had Nick flat out asked if he could check Charlie’s arms for cuts.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked that,” Nick scrunched up his face and shook his head. “The books said not to ask that.”
“The books?”
Nick opened his eyes and looked at Charlie. “I’ve been reading some books about, uh, how to support someone who self-harms,” he admitted in a whisper.
The thought of Nick reading books and educating himself about self-harm in order to provide better support was something that Charlie could barely process. Nick, who hated reading, who barely read the books on the school’s reading list, had gone out and found books about mental health so that he could understand what Charlie had been going to through.
“I don’t deserve y-ou,” Charlie’s voice broke as tears started falling down his face.
Wordlessly, Nick wrapped his arms around his boyfriend once more. For the longest time they just sat there, and held each other, riding out the storm together.
“I don’t want you to worry about me,” Charlie mumbled into Nick’s neck.
Nick pulled back. “I love you. I care about you.”
Hearing his boyfriend declare his love for him always brought a smile to Charlie’s face. “I love you too,” Charlie smiled. “And I can show you my arms,” he added.
Nick instantly shook his head. “”No, you don’t have to. I shouldn’t have asked you to.”
Charlie took a deep breath before he pulled off his t-shirt over his head.
“Char, you really don’t have to,” Nick protested.
For a minute they both sat there, not knowing what to say. After a while Nick laid down and pulled Charlie down with him. They laid there, side-to-side and just looked at each other. Without saying a word, Nick stared tracing heart-patterns on Charlie’s bare chest. Charlie scooted closer to his boyfriend.
“Do you want tell me why you were sad?” Nick asked.
Charlie took a deep breath. “Can I tell you in the morning?” There were so many things he knew that he needed to tell Nick, and they needed to have conversation about his anxiety. It was a conversation that was long overdue. Charlie had come to realize that he couldn’t pretend that he was okay any longer, and he hadn’t been doing a good job at pretending. After all, Nick was still worried that Charlie would harm himself.
With a slight nod, Nick grabbed the comforter and pulled it over them. Being wrapped up in a fluffy comforter made them feel cocooned together in a warm, safe place.
“I love you,” Charlie said, because those three words couldn’t really be said enough. Nick responded by kissing him.