Smoking - Chapter 6
Title:: Smoking
Genre:: Drama
Fandom:: RPS Vam, Villinde, Dugera, Lindunn, others.
Rating:: R
Summary:: A story, reaching back to the beginning like a twisted, curling whisp of smoke from a slow burning fire.
Disclaimer::Most characters are property only of themselves; I own the storyline and the writing. This is a work of ficiton; treat it as such.
Author's Note:: This chapter seems to confuse a lot of people that read it until they read the next chapter. I'll just clear it up now. The first part of it is when Ville and Linde are in 8th grade, after they've started hanging out. The second jumps back in time to 7th grade, before Linde's dad dies. Right. So hopefully that clears things up. :)
Links
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
I remember the first time I realized what was going on between Linde and Kimi as clearly as if it was yesterday. It must have been just a few weeks after I’d found Lily playing guitar like the little virtuoso he was, hidden away in one of the practice rooms during our music lesson. After that, I adopted him into our group of vagabonds and misfits. He’d already been a misfit, but he was a misfit from the misfits. Whilst we were taunted and tortured by the jocks and the preps, Linde - or Barbie, as I’d christened him in the third grade - was in that special group that was subject to torture from all other groups in the school. He was shy and quiet and he looked like a girl, it seems harsh to say it but no wonder he never had any friends. School is a rough place for kids who aren’t cut from the same stuff as everyone else.
Honestly, the only reason I wanted him in our group at that point in time was that I wanted him to play guitar for the band I had brewing at the back of my head. Screw friends, I just wanted the best musicians I could get, shoot for the top. And Linde was the best I’d ever heard.
I remember thinking, that first day when I pulled him over to our table at lunch, how odd it was that he and Kimi were actually speaking. I never expected him to actually say anything. He was so shy, I thought he would just sit there and stare at his food until the bell rang. Maybe I’d have to say something to him, you know, get him going a bit; I never expected him to strike up a conversation with one of my best friends. Kimi was one of the ringleaders, so to speak. He was tall and skinny and he had wavy, shoulder length brown hair, and all the girls thought he was gorgeous. He was. Even I, in my apparently confident heterosexuality, could tell that. I never expected him to even blink at Linde, much less talk to him for the whole period.
It was a few weeks later that I figured out what was actually going on. Linde had become ‘one of us,’ albeit reluctantly. I had taken him under my wing, not let him out of my sight. It sort of became a master and pet relationship. I would sit next to him in classes and at lunch, I’d give anyone who tried to make fun of him a piece of my mind, and once or twice, my fist. I made him come over to my house in attempts to induce him into the world of rock and roll. I was surprised to find out he already knew most of the music, liked it, and could play it. I began to wonder why I had spent so much time ‘hating’ him in the first place.
It was lunchtime. We’d decided to skip it, sit outside instead. Linde had his guitar with him. We sat, a big group of guys and a few girls, around the concrete benches in the playground. Linde was sitting on one of them, absorbed in his guitar. I was on the floor, my head on one of the girls’ lap, watching him play. Everyone else was talking, smoking, and goofing off around us. Migé was flirting as best he could with the girl whose lap I had my head in. No one else cared what Linde was doing. But I did. I cared because when Linde played guitar, he really played, and maybe I was the only one that realized it at that time, but he could make magic with that guitar of his, and he frequently did. When he was playing, he was in a different world. Someone’s cigarette butt landed in his hair; he just shook it out without even knowing what it was, never missing a single beat, a single note. Someone in the group shouted at him; he didn’t hear. I could walk up and shake his shoulders and he wouldn’t miss a second. Watching him, I could just see the musical notes he played swirling around his head, bent over his guitar even though he didn’t really need to look; he knew every inch of it by heart.
I was watching his hands, the strings of the guitar, the musical notes whirling around his head, coming out of the sound-hole, when I noticed Kimi walking over, sitting down next to him. To anyone not really watching, it would have just looked like a normal occurrence, a friend joining the rest of his group. But I was watching, keen-eyed; I saw Kimi’s hand go to the small of his back, saw him lean over to whisper something in Linde’s ear. I saw Linde blush, watched his fingers fumble, heard the millisecond where his tuning went off.
And I was shocked.
I was shocked because I was the only person that I had ever seen get that much of a reaction out of Lily, and it was never by a few quiet words whispered into his ear. It was by total and utter public humiliation, by torture and abuse, taunts and jeers and scoffs. It was never so private, so subtle, so personal. And I was shocked because I’d never even thought that any of my taunts would prove true. I’d never even stopped to consider the fact that Linde might actually be…
“Hey, Gay-Boy, play that song you played the other day!”
“Yeah, Barbie, go on, you know, that one with all the twiddles in it!”
I watched as Linde looked up, asked the people yelling at him which song they meant, more specifically. I watched Kimi as he watched Linde, a small smile on his face. I watched and I was shocked, dumbfounded - confused.
I accidentally caught Linde’s eye as he looked back down towards his guitar, and we stared at each other for a split second that seemed to drag on forever.
It was weird, that split second. It was as if we were talking to each other. It was as if I was asking him, what’s going on? Are you and him…? I mean, do the two of you have …? Are you…? And it was as if he was saying, I don’t know, I don’t know, I’m as confused as you are, maybe? I don’t know what’s happening.
It was as if there was some sort of connection between our minds. And it was really, really odd. I had to shake it off, because it disturbed me so much. When I looked back at him, he was bent over his guitar, his golden hair hanging like a curtain in front of his face, hiding his blush. Kimi was watching him with a predatory glint in his eye, and it all clicked into place. I’d known Kimi fought for the other side, as we used to say, for a while. Most people did. He didn’t keep it a secret. And I could tell that he wanted Linde, that he’d be trying to get him no matter what. And even though I barely knew Linde at all, from that one moment, I knew that Linde was so confused, so helpless, that he would go along with whatever, because he didn’t know how to say no, and because he didn’t know if he wanted it or not.
And I was the only one that knew.
And I could have done something about it.
But as it was… I didn’t. I shrugged it off, shoved it to the back of my mind, and focused back on his fingers again, telling myself that I didn’t really care about him, it was his music I was after. That was all.
----------
“Mikko? Mikko darling, what’s wrong?”
She’d heard him sobbing from the kitchen. His CD had stopped playing. That’s why she’d heard him. He thought he’d put it on repeat, he thought the music would cloak his sobs. But he hadn’t noticed when it had stopped. He was in too much anguish, too much confusion and turmoil to notice. His insides were turning, he felt sick to his stomach, he was so confused, so lost, so…
“Mikko, what’s wrong sweetheart?”
His mother made a small dent on the bed as she sat next to him, her hand resting lightly on his shoulder. He wanted to tell her to get off of him, wanted to yell at her not to touch him - she was pure, sweet, he didn’t want to contaminate her, he didn’t want to get her dirty. That’s what he was, after all. Dirty. That’s what they all said about people like him. Or, people like what he thought he was. Oh, he didn’t know, it hurt his head, he felt sick, what if they were right, what if he was dirty? What if he was sick? What if…
“Mikko, darling, talk to me. Tell me what’s wrong.”
He shook his head into his pillow, trying hard to stop his tears but they wouldn’t stop falling, he couldn’t stop the heaving sobs that wracked his body. This was pathetic. He’d just started 7th grade, surely it wasn’t normal for 7th graders to cry.
“Baby, shhhhh, come on, tell me what’s wrong, maybe I can help.”
He shook his head.
“N-no, n-no you c-can’t,” he sobbed, clutching his pillow. He didn’t want to upset her, disappoint her, make her feel as sick as he did. He didn’t want her to know…
Her heart broke in two to see her baby hurting so much. She wracked her brain to find any sort of clue, any reason to why he might be crying, anything that might have happened to hurt him. She knew he didn’t have many friends, she knew he was bullied, and her blood boiled to think that anybody could make her angel of a child hurt so much. She hated that anyone could not like him; she didn’t understand how people didn’t see what a good boy he was, how sweet and kind and smart and loving… and she wanted to kill whoever made him cry like this. She gathered him up in her arms, prying the pillow away from his grasp, holding him tight against her breast.
“Shh, baby, tell me what’s wrong. Mikko, please.” She ran her hands through his hair, soothingly, trying to get him to calm down; she kissed his head, squeezed him tight, rubbed his back until the sobbing started to slow down and he was simply trembling against her, his tears seeping into her shirt.
“Do you want to tell me what’s wrong, darling?”
“You don’t want to know,” he said, sniffling, squeezing more tears out against her shirt.
“Of course I want to know darling. I want to know what’s hurting you, I want to make it all better.” She kissed his head, ruffling his hair a little bit.
“What if you can’t?” he mumbled into her shirt. She bit back her own tears, pressing her lips to his head again and leaving there, hugging him tight. Her baby shouldn’t be allowed to hurt this much, it shouldn’t be possible, and she had to be able to fix it. She had to. He was her life, she hated seeing him like this.
“If I can’t fix it I can at least try to, Mikko. Just tell me what’s wrong.”
He sniffled for a few more long, heavy seconds, whilst words, explanations, feelings, guilt ran through his head, over and over again.
“W-what… w-what if I was… w-what if I was … d-different?”
“What do you mean sweetheart?”
“W-would you hate me? If I was… if I wasn’t … normal?”
“Mikko, what are you talking about?” And now, tears did fall from her eyes, streaked down her cheeks. How could he think she would ever hate him? What was making him think these awful things? “I could never - never ever hate you sweetheart. I love you so much, Mikko… why would you even think I wouldn’t? What’s wrong?”
He swallowed hard against her shoulder.
“W-what if… w-what if I wasn’t… w-what if… if I was…”
“If you were what darling?” She was expecting his answer to be ‘stupid’, or ‘scared’, or something else, something trivial that any other little boy would worry about. That was all he was, a little boy. He was thirteen years old. He’d barely lived. He didn’t know what the world outside was like, and she was glad for it. She never wanted to see him any different; she wanted him to stay her innocent, angelic golden haired baby for the rest of his life.
“If I was… gay?”
He’d almost swallowed the last word. But she’d heard it loud and clear. And it hit her like a ton of bricks.
He held his breath. He’d felt her stiffen. He started crying again. She hated him now. She hated him and he was disgusting and he’d have to leave now, have to live on the streets or something because she hated him, his dad would hate him, he’d start beating him too, it was all over…
“Oh, Mikko,” she breathed, finally, and wrapped him tighter - if that was possible - in her arms. “Oh darling.” Her tears fell on his gold flaxen head and his soaked into her shirt, and they sat there, clinging to each other, crying softly.
“Sweetheart, that would never make me love you any less. Never. You’re my baby boy, and I’ll always love you. No matter what. You could be… I don’t know, you could grow another head and turn purple and start eating people for breakfast but you’d still be my little boy and I’d still love you.”
He buried his face deep into her chest and started to cry again, clinging to her like he hadn’t clung to her for years on top of years.
She sighed, kissed his head, held him close. She wished, for his sake, that what he’d said wasn’t true. That he wasn’t gay. For his own sake. Because she knew what a hard path that would be for him, how horrible it might be, and she would never, ever wish something like that on her own child.
But if he was… if he was, there was nothing she could or would do against it. Besides swear to be there for him every step of the way, should he need her help.
“Mikko… that wasn’t just a hypothetical question, was it?”
He shook his head, giving a soft sob.
“Are you sure darling? You’re so young… it could just be hormones… it could be a phase or something…”
“No, Äiti… I… I’m pretty sure.” She sighed, gave him a squeeze, put on the best cheerful voice she could muster up.
“Oh well darling. Come on, it’s not all that bad, there are lots of other people who are gay too, you know?”
“But everyone else hates them,” Mikko mumbled. “And they make fun of them, and they hurt them and…”
“Sweetheart, nobody’s life is easy. Nobody is liked by everyone. And people will hurt you no matter who or how you love others. There is no such thing as a perfect person, Mikko, but if there was, you would be it. You are … you are wonderful, and you are special, and don’t let anyone ever tell you otherwise. And if they do, then you shouldn’t care about them.” She tilted his face up from her bosom. “You are who you are, Mikko, and you should be as proud of that as I am.” Kissing both of his cheeks, she smiled at him. “I will always be here for you, no matter what or who you are. You remember that, okay?”
Mikko nodded, sniffling, his eyes red from his salty tears.
“It’ll be okay, sweetheart, you’ll see. Whoever you end up with will be the luckiest man alive, and I plan on being around to threaten him with his life should he treat my little boy like shit.” Mikko smiled at his mother’s face when she swore, and threw his arms around her neck, burying his face in her shoulder again.
She sighed and patted him on the head.
“Äiti… are you going to tell Dad?” Mikko pulled back to look her in the eyes. She sighed, returning his gaze gently.
“Do you want me to?”
“No… he’ll hate me.” Her eyes were the only place that showed the pain she felt at that statement. Because she knew it was true. And she couldn’t lie to him and tell him it wasn’t. She didn’t ever want to lie to her boy, because he deserved better than that.
“I won’t tell him, I promise.” Mikko nodded, kissed her cheek, wiped his cheeks with one last sniffle.
“Are you going to be okay?”
“Yeah…” She smiled at him, tucked his golden hair behind his ears.
“I’m so proud of you, Mikko,” she said. “You are so brave… for admitting that… for telling me… and I know you’re going to be brave about it for the rest of your life.”
Mikko wasn’t so sure he was brave. In fact, he was sure he wasn’t. But he smiled at her, gave her one last hug, before disentangling his lanky limbs from her embrace and looking for his guitar. She smiled as she watched him tune it up, before placing one last kiss on his forehead and getting up to leave him alone with his thoughts and his music, though she did stand outside his door for a while, listening to the song he was playing, tears swimming in her eyes.
Genre:: Drama
Fandom:: RPS Vam, Villinde, Dugera, Lindunn, others.
Rating:: R
Summary:: A story, reaching back to the beginning like a twisted, curling whisp of smoke from a slow burning fire.
Disclaimer::Most characters are property only of themselves; I own the storyline and the writing. This is a work of ficiton; treat it as such.
Author's Note:: This chapter seems to confuse a lot of people that read it until they read the next chapter. I'll just clear it up now. The first part of it is when Ville and Linde are in 8th grade, after they've started hanging out. The second jumps back in time to 7th grade, before Linde's dad dies. Right. So hopefully that clears things up. :)
Links
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
I remember the first time I realized what was going on between Linde and Kimi as clearly as if it was yesterday. It must have been just a few weeks after I’d found Lily playing guitar like the little virtuoso he was, hidden away in one of the practice rooms during our music lesson. After that, I adopted him into our group of vagabonds and misfits. He’d already been a misfit, but he was a misfit from the misfits. Whilst we were taunted and tortured by the jocks and the preps, Linde - or Barbie, as I’d christened him in the third grade - was in that special group that was subject to torture from all other groups in the school. He was shy and quiet and he looked like a girl, it seems harsh to say it but no wonder he never had any friends. School is a rough place for kids who aren’t cut from the same stuff as everyone else.
Honestly, the only reason I wanted him in our group at that point in time was that I wanted him to play guitar for the band I had brewing at the back of my head. Screw friends, I just wanted the best musicians I could get, shoot for the top. And Linde was the best I’d ever heard.
I remember thinking, that first day when I pulled him over to our table at lunch, how odd it was that he and Kimi were actually speaking. I never expected him to actually say anything. He was so shy, I thought he would just sit there and stare at his food until the bell rang. Maybe I’d have to say something to him, you know, get him going a bit; I never expected him to strike up a conversation with one of my best friends. Kimi was one of the ringleaders, so to speak. He was tall and skinny and he had wavy, shoulder length brown hair, and all the girls thought he was gorgeous. He was. Even I, in my apparently confident heterosexuality, could tell that. I never expected him to even blink at Linde, much less talk to him for the whole period.
It was a few weeks later that I figured out what was actually going on. Linde had become ‘one of us,’ albeit reluctantly. I had taken him under my wing, not let him out of my sight. It sort of became a master and pet relationship. I would sit next to him in classes and at lunch, I’d give anyone who tried to make fun of him a piece of my mind, and once or twice, my fist. I made him come over to my house in attempts to induce him into the world of rock and roll. I was surprised to find out he already knew most of the music, liked it, and could play it. I began to wonder why I had spent so much time ‘hating’ him in the first place.
It was lunchtime. We’d decided to skip it, sit outside instead. Linde had his guitar with him. We sat, a big group of guys and a few girls, around the concrete benches in the playground. Linde was sitting on one of them, absorbed in his guitar. I was on the floor, my head on one of the girls’ lap, watching him play. Everyone else was talking, smoking, and goofing off around us. Migé was flirting as best he could with the girl whose lap I had my head in. No one else cared what Linde was doing. But I did. I cared because when Linde played guitar, he really played, and maybe I was the only one that realized it at that time, but he could make magic with that guitar of his, and he frequently did. When he was playing, he was in a different world. Someone’s cigarette butt landed in his hair; he just shook it out without even knowing what it was, never missing a single beat, a single note. Someone in the group shouted at him; he didn’t hear. I could walk up and shake his shoulders and he wouldn’t miss a second. Watching him, I could just see the musical notes he played swirling around his head, bent over his guitar even though he didn’t really need to look; he knew every inch of it by heart.
I was watching his hands, the strings of the guitar, the musical notes whirling around his head, coming out of the sound-hole, when I noticed Kimi walking over, sitting down next to him. To anyone not really watching, it would have just looked like a normal occurrence, a friend joining the rest of his group. But I was watching, keen-eyed; I saw Kimi’s hand go to the small of his back, saw him lean over to whisper something in Linde’s ear. I saw Linde blush, watched his fingers fumble, heard the millisecond where his tuning went off.
And I was shocked.
I was shocked because I was the only person that I had ever seen get that much of a reaction out of Lily, and it was never by a few quiet words whispered into his ear. It was by total and utter public humiliation, by torture and abuse, taunts and jeers and scoffs. It was never so private, so subtle, so personal. And I was shocked because I’d never even thought that any of my taunts would prove true. I’d never even stopped to consider the fact that Linde might actually be…
“Hey, Gay-Boy, play that song you played the other day!”
“Yeah, Barbie, go on, you know, that one with all the twiddles in it!”
I watched as Linde looked up, asked the people yelling at him which song they meant, more specifically. I watched Kimi as he watched Linde, a small smile on his face. I watched and I was shocked, dumbfounded - confused.
I accidentally caught Linde’s eye as he looked back down towards his guitar, and we stared at each other for a split second that seemed to drag on forever.
It was weird, that split second. It was as if we were talking to each other. It was as if I was asking him, what’s going on? Are you and him…? I mean, do the two of you have …? Are you…? And it was as if he was saying, I don’t know, I don’t know, I’m as confused as you are, maybe? I don’t know what’s happening.
It was as if there was some sort of connection between our minds. And it was really, really odd. I had to shake it off, because it disturbed me so much. When I looked back at him, he was bent over his guitar, his golden hair hanging like a curtain in front of his face, hiding his blush. Kimi was watching him with a predatory glint in his eye, and it all clicked into place. I’d known Kimi fought for the other side, as we used to say, for a while. Most people did. He didn’t keep it a secret. And I could tell that he wanted Linde, that he’d be trying to get him no matter what. And even though I barely knew Linde at all, from that one moment, I knew that Linde was so confused, so helpless, that he would go along with whatever, because he didn’t know how to say no, and because he didn’t know if he wanted it or not.
And I was the only one that knew.
And I could have done something about it.
But as it was… I didn’t. I shrugged it off, shoved it to the back of my mind, and focused back on his fingers again, telling myself that I didn’t really care about him, it was his music I was after. That was all.
----------
“Mikko? Mikko darling, what’s wrong?”
She’d heard him sobbing from the kitchen. His CD had stopped playing. That’s why she’d heard him. He thought he’d put it on repeat, he thought the music would cloak his sobs. But he hadn’t noticed when it had stopped. He was in too much anguish, too much confusion and turmoil to notice. His insides were turning, he felt sick to his stomach, he was so confused, so lost, so…
“Mikko, what’s wrong sweetheart?”
His mother made a small dent on the bed as she sat next to him, her hand resting lightly on his shoulder. He wanted to tell her to get off of him, wanted to yell at her not to touch him - she was pure, sweet, he didn’t want to contaminate her, he didn’t want to get her dirty. That’s what he was, after all. Dirty. That’s what they all said about people like him. Or, people like what he thought he was. Oh, he didn’t know, it hurt his head, he felt sick, what if they were right, what if he was dirty? What if he was sick? What if…
“Mikko, darling, talk to me. Tell me what’s wrong.”
He shook his head into his pillow, trying hard to stop his tears but they wouldn’t stop falling, he couldn’t stop the heaving sobs that wracked his body. This was pathetic. He’d just started 7th grade, surely it wasn’t normal for 7th graders to cry.
“Baby, shhhhh, come on, tell me what’s wrong, maybe I can help.”
He shook his head.
“N-no, n-no you c-can’t,” he sobbed, clutching his pillow. He didn’t want to upset her, disappoint her, make her feel as sick as he did. He didn’t want her to know…
Her heart broke in two to see her baby hurting so much. She wracked her brain to find any sort of clue, any reason to why he might be crying, anything that might have happened to hurt him. She knew he didn’t have many friends, she knew he was bullied, and her blood boiled to think that anybody could make her angel of a child hurt so much. She hated that anyone could not like him; she didn’t understand how people didn’t see what a good boy he was, how sweet and kind and smart and loving… and she wanted to kill whoever made him cry like this. She gathered him up in her arms, prying the pillow away from his grasp, holding him tight against her breast.
“Shh, baby, tell me what’s wrong. Mikko, please.” She ran her hands through his hair, soothingly, trying to get him to calm down; she kissed his head, squeezed him tight, rubbed his back until the sobbing started to slow down and he was simply trembling against her, his tears seeping into her shirt.
“Do you want to tell me what’s wrong, darling?”
“You don’t want to know,” he said, sniffling, squeezing more tears out against her shirt.
“Of course I want to know darling. I want to know what’s hurting you, I want to make it all better.” She kissed his head, ruffling his hair a little bit.
“What if you can’t?” he mumbled into her shirt. She bit back her own tears, pressing her lips to his head again and leaving there, hugging him tight. Her baby shouldn’t be allowed to hurt this much, it shouldn’t be possible, and she had to be able to fix it. She had to. He was her life, she hated seeing him like this.
“If I can’t fix it I can at least try to, Mikko. Just tell me what’s wrong.”
He sniffled for a few more long, heavy seconds, whilst words, explanations, feelings, guilt ran through his head, over and over again.
“W-what… w-what if I was… w-what if I was … d-different?”
“What do you mean sweetheart?”
“W-would you hate me? If I was… if I wasn’t … normal?”
“Mikko, what are you talking about?” And now, tears did fall from her eyes, streaked down her cheeks. How could he think she would ever hate him? What was making him think these awful things? “I could never - never ever hate you sweetheart. I love you so much, Mikko… why would you even think I wouldn’t? What’s wrong?”
He swallowed hard against her shoulder.
“W-what if… w-what if I wasn’t… w-what if… if I was…”
“If you were what darling?” She was expecting his answer to be ‘stupid’, or ‘scared’, or something else, something trivial that any other little boy would worry about. That was all he was, a little boy. He was thirteen years old. He’d barely lived. He didn’t know what the world outside was like, and she was glad for it. She never wanted to see him any different; she wanted him to stay her innocent, angelic golden haired baby for the rest of his life.
“If I was… gay?”
He’d almost swallowed the last word. But she’d heard it loud and clear. And it hit her like a ton of bricks.
He held his breath. He’d felt her stiffen. He started crying again. She hated him now. She hated him and he was disgusting and he’d have to leave now, have to live on the streets or something because she hated him, his dad would hate him, he’d start beating him too, it was all over…
“Oh, Mikko,” she breathed, finally, and wrapped him tighter - if that was possible - in her arms. “Oh darling.” Her tears fell on his gold flaxen head and his soaked into her shirt, and they sat there, clinging to each other, crying softly.
“Sweetheart, that would never make me love you any less. Never. You’re my baby boy, and I’ll always love you. No matter what. You could be… I don’t know, you could grow another head and turn purple and start eating people for breakfast but you’d still be my little boy and I’d still love you.”
He buried his face deep into her chest and started to cry again, clinging to her like he hadn’t clung to her for years on top of years.
She sighed, kissed his head, held him close. She wished, for his sake, that what he’d said wasn’t true. That he wasn’t gay. For his own sake. Because she knew what a hard path that would be for him, how horrible it might be, and she would never, ever wish something like that on her own child.
But if he was… if he was, there was nothing she could or would do against it. Besides swear to be there for him every step of the way, should he need her help.
“Mikko… that wasn’t just a hypothetical question, was it?”
He shook his head, giving a soft sob.
“Are you sure darling? You’re so young… it could just be hormones… it could be a phase or something…”
“No, Äiti… I… I’m pretty sure.” She sighed, gave him a squeeze, put on the best cheerful voice she could muster up.
“Oh well darling. Come on, it’s not all that bad, there are lots of other people who are gay too, you know?”
“But everyone else hates them,” Mikko mumbled. “And they make fun of them, and they hurt them and…”
“Sweetheart, nobody’s life is easy. Nobody is liked by everyone. And people will hurt you no matter who or how you love others. There is no such thing as a perfect person, Mikko, but if there was, you would be it. You are … you are wonderful, and you are special, and don’t let anyone ever tell you otherwise. And if they do, then you shouldn’t care about them.” She tilted his face up from her bosom. “You are who you are, Mikko, and you should be as proud of that as I am.” Kissing both of his cheeks, she smiled at him. “I will always be here for you, no matter what or who you are. You remember that, okay?”
Mikko nodded, sniffling, his eyes red from his salty tears.
“It’ll be okay, sweetheart, you’ll see. Whoever you end up with will be the luckiest man alive, and I plan on being around to threaten him with his life should he treat my little boy like shit.” Mikko smiled at his mother’s face when she swore, and threw his arms around her neck, burying his face in her shoulder again.
She sighed and patted him on the head.
“Äiti… are you going to tell Dad?” Mikko pulled back to look her in the eyes. She sighed, returning his gaze gently.
“Do you want me to?”
“No… he’ll hate me.” Her eyes were the only place that showed the pain she felt at that statement. Because she knew it was true. And she couldn’t lie to him and tell him it wasn’t. She didn’t ever want to lie to her boy, because he deserved better than that.
“I won’t tell him, I promise.” Mikko nodded, kissed her cheek, wiped his cheeks with one last sniffle.
“Are you going to be okay?”
“Yeah…” She smiled at him, tucked his golden hair behind his ears.
“I’m so proud of you, Mikko,” she said. “You are so brave… for admitting that… for telling me… and I know you’re going to be brave about it for the rest of your life.”
Mikko wasn’t so sure he was brave. In fact, he was sure he wasn’t. But he smiled at her, gave her one last hug, before disentangling his lanky limbs from her embrace and looking for his guitar. She smiled as she watched him tune it up, before placing one last kiss on his forehead and getting up to leave him alone with his thoughts and his music, though she did stand outside his door for a while, listening to the song he was playing, tears swimming in her eyes.