Page 59 of Shadowman
“We’re good…” Luthor murmurs softly to me as we approach my cell, “Right?”
I glance up to find his light green eyes shimmering with concern.
“It’s not weird or anything…?”
“Bro, please.” I wave him off while Jasper opens my cell and I step inside. “I already forgot about it.”
Luthor smiles, and I give him a small one back, waiting until I’m sure he’s out of sight to let it slip off.
He’s so caring. Really,truly, just the best friend in the whole world, to all of us.We don’t deserve him.And for a moment, while I’m pacing around my cell, in the aftermath of a gay threesome I think I might have accidentallystarted, I wonder how he’d react if I told him the truth.
Maybe notallof it, but at least some.
That actually wasn’t my first time sucking a dick, Luthor…
I wasn’t completely straight before I got here. I’m not as ice-cold as I try to make it seem.
I’ve been in love before, I think…
I’ve done things I’m not proud of, but that I really enjoyed doing in the moment, and I think that’s why I keep doing them. Becoming someone else when no one’s looking feels… really fucking good.
Being my true self in the dark is what keeps me from losing my mind.
The thing is, I knowLuthor, of all people, wouldn’t judge me. He doesn’t judge anyone. He’s good like that. Just a supportive, all-around awesome dude who wouldn’t bat an eye if I told him Ithink I’m… somethingelse. Something other than what I’ve been claiming to be.
But it doesn’t matter. Because I can’t tell him.I can’t tell anyone.
They wouldn’t understand, because I barely understand it myself. And it’s no one’s business.
Yea. It’s no one’s goddamn business what I did in the past, or what I choose to do with my free time. Who says friends have to tell each other everything, anyway?? What would that even accomplish?
Ilikehaving secrets. I like keeping them stashed away deep in the hollowed-out cement box of my heart.
Head. In. The. Game.
Plopping down in my bed, I reach behind the mattress, feeling around for my stash spot. I move the big chunk of concrete aside, stuffing my hand into the wall until I feel leather.
Flipping the pages of my journal, looking for the next free page, I stop on my last entry… And the sheerenormityof seeing such intense, staggeringtruthswritten out on paper has my pulse thumping faster and faster, a chill of dreadful excitement creeping up my spine.
These are thingsno oneknows… Things I’d neverdreamof speaking out loud to anyone, not even my best friends. But they’rehere, in this small leather-bound journal that was given to me as a welcome gift.
I still wonder why me… I wonder it every time I hold this book in my hands.
Why would he give this tome, of all people? What is it about me that warranted such a gift? That warranted a giftat all…
I didn’t have to use it. And for a while, I had no desire to. I’ve never been a writer, mainly because I never had a story to tell. But after some time passed—I think around a year or so—I realized that maybe Idohave something to say. A lotof somethings, in fact… Piling up inside me, desperate for an escape.
Maybe that’s why…
Clearly, they won’t be coming out of my mouth.I write in this book because I have to… Otherwise the secrets might eat me alive.
My fingers run over the words on the page. Another secret spilled like droplets of blood…
“Let me touch you,” I growled into his ear.
“No.”
“That wasn’t a request.”
