My Best Friend is Gay
by Victor Thomas
Chapter 16
The remainder of my senior year passed too quickly. Graduation had long been a distant, almost mythical event in the foggy future. I felt like my school years would go on and on forever, but then suddenly the end rushed at me with what seemed the speed of light. One month to graduation seemed to instantly reduce to a single week and then it was my last day at CHS. The day sped past, the bell rang, and that was that.
I didn't think the fact that my high school years were truly over hit me until the graduation ceremony. I walked up to accept my diploma while thinking, no, wait! Stop! This can't be the end! I want to play football next year. I want to sit with the guys at lunch. I want to… but then the principal shook my hand, I accepted my diploma and high school was done.
You would not believe how many photos I posed for in the hour after graduation. There were photos with my family, my teammates, and classmates. There were also photos with Spencer and Becca. Those meant the most to me.
Spencer and I had a combined graduation party at my house. He had a lot more relatives than me, so he made out better on graduation cash. I didn't mind. I loved him like a brother. In another life, perhaps we could have been boyfriends. That's something I would have never thought a few months ago. He was not only my best friend, but knowing him had made me a better person.
Elijah attended our party. Everyone knew he was Spencer's boyfriend and everyone was cool with that. I didn't see my best friend as often after he and Elijah began dating, but I still saw him plenty. I had a feeling we would remain friends our entire lives.
After the party, when everyone had departed, him and I sat eating bologna salad sandwiches, chips and graduation cake. The cake had been decorated with two football players and 'Happy Graduation Spencer and Philip' in green lettering, but now only the right side of one football player remained. Like my high school years, the cake was too soon at it's end.
"I don't want to go to college. I want to go back to high school next year," I said.
"You just want to relive your glory days on the football field," he said.
"I want to relive everything."
"College will be awesome!" he said. "This fall, you and I will be roommates together at Pittsburg State University. It's going to be incredible!"
"What about you and Elijah?" I asked.
"We're going to an open relationship for the summer, and then we're parting ways, as boyfriends, when I leave."
"I'm sorry," I said.
"We want to keep dating, but there is no way that can work," he said. "He plans to attend PSU, but he won't be going there for three more years."
"Damn, we'll be seniors by the time he's a freshman," I said. I guess that's what happens when you rob the cradle."
"I'm really going to miss him," he said.
"Hey, if you're meant to be together, your paths will cross sometime in the future and you can still be friends," I said.
"Yeah," he said, "but you know how the still be friend's thing will probably work out."
"I don't know," I said. "I bet you'll keep in touch. You can console yourself with hot college boys. Are you going to look for a new boyfriend at PSU?"
"I think I'll want to play the field for a while," he said. "I don't want to get attached again too soon."
"Play the field," I said. "That means hooking up with every guy on campus."
"Not every guy, just most of them."
He grinned.
"Slut."
"That's the plan?" he said, grinning.
I laughed.
"How can I insult you when you agree with me?" I asked.
He shrugged.
"I'm going to miss football next fall," I said.
"So, try out for the PSU team," he suggested.
"Yeah right," I said. "I'm good, but we both know I'm not that good."
"You heard Shawn made the team, right?" he asked.
"Yeah, and there's no surprise there," I said.
"Think of that poor bastard," he said. "College practices are probably a hundred times harder than high school practices. While he is busting his ass, you'll be making out with Becca and I'll be hooking up with as many boys as possible."
"You are making not playing sound much better," I said.
"We can go watch the games," he suggested. "That will be far easier."
"You always were a slacker."
He shoved me with his shoulder and smiled.
"You'll see, you'll forget all about high school this August," he said. "You'll be so excited about college you won't even think about it."
"I'm just glad the three of us will be together," I said. "I'm not sure I could handle college without my best friend and my girlfriend."
"You could, but there is no need to think about that," he said. "We have the next four years together. No doubt you'll marry Becca and have tons of kids. I'll be Uncle Spencer, spoil them, teach them dirty words, and turn them into brats."
I laughed. I didn't know what life held for me, but if Spencer and Becca were at my side, I had a feeling I could handle anything.
The End
Voting
This story is part of the 2023 story challenge "Inspired by a Picture: About Number Seven…". The other stories may be found at the challenge home page. Please read them, too. The voting period of 24 March 2023 to 14 April 2023 is when the voting is open. This story may be rated, below, against a set of criteria, and may be rated against other stories on the challenge home page.
The challenge was to write a story inspired by this picture:
The picture is provided here under the doctrine of 'fair use' which is believed to apply. It is not the site's intent to infringe copyright. Copyright owners considering that this does not apply to their work should enter into dialogue with the webmaster by email [for their convenience they may use the submissions email address]. Items where copyright is asserted will either be taken down, or attribution made, at the copyright holder's choice.
Authors deserve your feedback. It's the only payment they get. If you go to the top of the page you will find the author's name. Click that and you can email the author easily.* Please take a few moments, if you liked the story, to say so.
[For those who use webmail, or whose regular email client opens when they want to use webmail instead: Please right click the author's name. A menu will open in which you can copy the email address (it goes directly to your clipboard without having the courtesy of mentioning that to you) to paste into your webmail system (Hotmail, Gmail, Yahoo etc). Each browser is subtly different, each Webmail system is different, or we'd give fuller instructions here. We trust you to know how to use your own system. Note: If the email address pastes or arrives with %40 in the middle, replace that weird set of characters with an @ sign.]
* Some browsers may require a right click instead
