Set & Jake; first kiss

Observera att mina engelskakunskaper är långt ifrån perfekta, och att jag blev klar med den här delen runt fyra, halv fem, på morgonen. Det kan finnas en hel del stavfel och syftningsfel. Säg gärna till mig om ni hittar något som låter konstigt :3

Jag har också döpt om kategorin till The London Archives. Här hamnar alla mina engelska texter om Set, Jake, och resten av karaktärerna som hör till deras story. 



They met a couple of times. A lot of times, even.
Even though Set had a lot to do with school and chores at home, they somehow found the time to meet at least once a week. In the park, most of the time. When they were at Set’s place and the parents were home Jake only got nervous, so laughingly they had decided that it would be better if they met outside.
But this one time, they happened to be at Jake’s place.
Compared to the Hargreaves’ manor the house was a poor excuse of a home, but Set seemed to like it a lot. It was just a simple, small, yellow house. A house like everyone else’s.
They sat down in Jakes room, on his bed, since he only had one chair. That chair was halfway pushed in under a white, old writing desk, carrying a big pile of clothes.
“I’m sorry my room is a mess”, Jake sighed. He started to pick up some music papers from the floor, but Set hurried to break in.
“No, no it’s ok. I like it.”
“It’s stuff everywhere…” Jake gave him an uncertain glance. The boy lived in a perfectly tidied house. He’d expected someone like Set to crinkle his nose and wonder why they didn’t put things in order. But on the other hand, Set wasn’t the typical spoiled-son-with-a-rich-family. He was so gentle, and open. Hell, he was sure the kid would’ve been happy even if the house had been without a roof.
“It doesn’t matter”, Set smiled. “It’s cozy here.”
“Thank you”, Jake said, smiling lightly. He sat down next to Set again, leaning his hands on his thighs.
Hundreds of thoughts ran through his head. Should he offer something to eat or drink, would they go out soon instead of sitting here, should he ask if he wanted to do something special, like video games, or… anything. Jake scratched his neck. Not that he was nervous anymore, but there was always a kind of pressure when he took somebody home for the first time.
The times they’d met when they were outdoors there had always been something to do. Just strolling through the park, going through every shop in the mall after stuff that could be interesting, anything. In Jakes room there wasn’t much you could do. Except for talking.
“So…” Set started, looking at one of the music sheets on the floor. “You said you played the guitar, right?”
“That’s right.” Jake nodded to the left corner of the room, where a black acoustic guitar hung on the wall. “My favorite.”
“What a beauty”, Set smiled. “You have more than one?”
“Yeah, I still have my first guitar. And a Gibson Les Paul, too. Bought it recently, actually.”
“Oh… I really know nothing about guitars. I just think they’re a grace for the eye to look at, so to say.” Set laughed a little. “It’s a pretty instrument.”
“Indeed.” Jake couldn’t hold back a smile. Set’s way with words, how he expressed himself, it was so cute in some way. “You play the piano, right?”
“Yes, I do.” Set nodded. “Mother taught me when I was just a kid. It’s been something I’ve grown up with. Still learning, too.”
“I saw that huge, black concert piano in the dining room when I was at your place…”
“She’s mine”, Set said with a proud smile.
“Yours?” Jake said, surprised. That concert grand piano looked like it was worth more than his family’s little house.
“Yes. Mother bought it for me when I was just five, so that she could teach me how to play, and so I could take it with me when it was my time to move out”, Set explained. “She would have done the same for Juliet, but she was more fascinated by the violin anyway.”
“I see”, said Jake, still a bit chocked. To think someone had so much money they could buy a concert piano for their five-year-old son. Wow.
“Ridiculously expensive, I know”, Set said with almost an embarrassed smile. “Anyhow…”
“Mm. I wonder what they think of me, by the way.” Jake frowned slightly. “Your parents, I mean.”
“I don’t know…” Set tilted his head slightly to the side, seemed to think about it.
“Not that I’ve said much more than hi and goodbye, but. Anyway. First impressions and such.” Jake cleared his throat. “I mean, I look like quite the douchebag.”
“You don’t”, Set giggled, shaking his head. Then he became more serious. “My parents are quite… narrow-minded. They don’t like anything that’s different.”
“I almost guessed that”, said Jake with a vague smile.
“It’s not like they’re mean or anything”, Set sighed. “If you’re nice to them they’re going to be nice to you. It’s just that they’re quite quick with being prejudicious, and well… I guess they don’t really like anyone. If they’re not as rich and well-mannered as themselves.”
Jake watched Set as he spoke. He spoke in a lower, more serious, voice now. Like the subject was something that bothered him more than he wanted to confess. This all remembered Jake about when they met the first time, in the park. When Set had been upset, with all right, saying sorry over and over even though he had nothing to apologize for.
It felt like that kid carried something too heavy for his own shoulders. It made Jake worry.
“And… you don’t like it?” Jake guessed.
“No, not at all.” Set sighed. “I don’t like them being so narrow-minded. Sometimes it feels like they’re stuck centuries ago, like they’ll never start accepting new things. Different things.”
“Well, that sucks.” Jake glanced at him. It felt like he… meant something with that sentence.
“It does”, Set said, nodding slightly. “Sometimes… it makes it hard for me to love them.”
Jake nodded too. The first impression he’d got from Set’s parents seemed to be accurate. They did look like nice people, but also they looked like that kind of people who said hello with a smile, and then talked a lot of shit about as fast as you’d said goodbye and closed the door behind you. He hadn’t asked Set anything about it though, afraid to hurt him by asking, but now it seemed like most of the things he’d thought was true.
Set’s voice sounded so small and sad when he spoke about it. Like the Hargreaves family wasn’t as perfect as their family photo, and that he took hit by hit in silence. Jake had noticed something before, something vibrating in the air when they came near the subject. That something wasn’t right. They were a lot more near it now than they had been before, and he wanted to know, and help him. He just had to use the right words.
“What is it that they don’t accept?” Jake asked, hoping that it was the right thing to say.
Set squeezed his hand in the other, frowned just a little, and gave his own feet a bothered look.
“I… it’s so much. The way they speak about things, you can hear it in their voice when they don’t like something. It can be anything. The neighbors’ new clothes. If Juliet has a friend that doesn’t behave as they’re used to. They never say it out loud; you can just hear it… seeping, all poisonous, in the back of their mouths.” Set sighed, slowly ran his fingers through his snow white fringe. “It isn’t much that is good enough for them. I’m not.”
“Why wouldn’t you be enough..?”
“I hear it in their voices. When they speak to me.” Set shook his head. “I’m not as proud of being one of the family as they want me to. To be honest I’d like it better being a part of a normal family. I’d like to be a person that no one notices in the street, that no one greets except for when you’re friends. And they just… they’re so disappointed in me, I can’t…”
Jake watched him quietly. Set bit his lip, seemed to be uncertain if he should say more, or if he already had said too much.
“Disappointed?” Jake said, encouraging him to continue. Set needed to get this out of him, it was written all over his face, that he had held it for too long.
“I just…” Set said quietly, leaning forward so that he could rest his head in his hand. “I’m gay. And they hate it.”
Jake didn’t know whether he would smile or sigh, because he felt like doing both. Smile, because he’d understood a long time ago that it had to be that way. That Set was gay. It was something in the way he acted, moved, talked. Everything. He was far from being some kind of wuss, it wasn’t anything like that. It just felt like that boy simply couldn’t be straight.
He wanted to sigh, a deep sigh, because of the anger that built up inside of his chest. Of course it had to be that way. Perfect family, wants a perfect son, but rejects him because; him being gay didn’t fit their picture of perfectness.
“Oh… I’m sorry”, Jake said in a quiet voice.
“I hope I won’t scare you away now”, Set said with a nervous, little laugh. Even though he laughed Jake could hear the fear in his voice.
“God, no. I’m bisexual.” Jake leaned forward, rested his head in his hand in an exact copy of Set’s pose. “A gay boy won’t scare me away.”
Set, who warily had been watching Jake, now seemed to melt in relief. His cheeks flushed pink and quickly he hid his face in both of his hands.
“Oh gosh”, he mumbled. “I was so worried you would chase me out of the house. With torches and pitchforks and everything…”
Jake laughed. The boy was so helplessly cute. Of course he understood that Set had been worried, and the fact that he had to worry was sad, but the part with the torches made Jake crack up.
“No! No way”, he laughed. “I like boys too.”
“To hear that might be… the biggest relief ever”, Set said, embarrassed. “Not that you seemed to be a… you know, hater, but…”
“Don’t worry, I get it.” Jake grinned. “I’ve never had a boyfriend, but I’ve fucked my best friend and he’s a guy, so…”
“Oh…” Set looked up, with eyes widened.
Jake bit his tongue. Shit, he should have said slept with. Or maybe he shouldn’t have mentioned it at all. Just when he was on his way to apologize about his language, Set smiled.
“Uh…” Jake said sheepishly.
“Actually I’ve never been with anyone”, Set said. He seemed even more embarrassed by saying it, but he valiantly ignored his blushing cheeks.
“No one at all?” Jake frowned.
“No…”
“Not even a kiss?”
“No. Or, I kissed a girl in kindergarten once. But she told her friends, and they started laughing at me. Then I started to cry…” Set giggled. “It didn’t go that well.”
“Aw no… poor thing”, Jake said, feeling sorry for him for real. Set just shrugged.
“I was too young to get hurt feelings anyway”, he said with a little smile. Then he turned serious again, thoughtfully biting his lip before he spoke. “I guess my role as the Hargreaves’ son adds up to the fact that I’ve never had anyone. It would be catastrophic if it came out that I had a boyfriend, which is why I never even hoped that I would have anyone. And… I guess other people saw the same family-based problem. So, if there ever was someone who wanted me, I guess they didn’t dare to ask me out.”
“That’s sad”, Jake sighed. “Love is love. People shouldn’t be judged by who they have feelings for.”
“Exactly”, Set said with a small voice.
“I’ve… been with far too many, I guess.” Jake scratched his neck once more. He felt ashamed mentioning it, when Set never even had got the chance to kiss anyone. “I guess I am, was, a slut.”
“Please don’t call yourself that…”
“Mm… I don’t… do that anymore, though.” Jake sighed heavily. The habit of going out, drinking, taking or following a stranger home, had been a part of his destructive period, when he’d stopped caring about everything and nothing. He tried to see it as a closed chapter now.
“That’s good.” Set smiled softly. Jake smiled back.
“Yeah. It is.” He frowned a little, bitterly. “It was stupid. Nothing I’m proud over, at all. I felt like shit and I didn’t handle it the right way. I don’t know if it’s because of that, or if it always has been this way, but… I don’t think I’ve ever been in love. Hell, maybe I’m not capable of falling in love at all.”
“I’m sorry…” Set said quietly.
“Thanks. I just don’t know… But maybe it’s all about time. We’ll see.” Jake shrugged.
It was quiet for a while. Jake felt relief over Set taking the ‘bad news about Jake’ in such a good way.
Set let out a quiet sigh.
“If I just could say one more thing about my parents…” he said in a troubled voice.
“Of course.”
“It’s that… I guess it would have been easier if they threw me out of the house, when I told them. Instead of half-heartedly pretending that they love me for who I am.” Set smiled, a little, sad smile.
Instead of saying anything Jake put an arm around his shoulders, hugged him like that. Not too intimate, in case of it becoming awkward, but still showing that he cared.

After that they talked even more. Set told Jake more specifically about the bullying he’d been through in school, since he’d only mentioned it briefly before. When they already had sunk into such deep subjects, Jake decided to tell Set about his suicide attempt in December, last year. He told him about the depression, the suffocating feeling of being useless, and what had made him cross the border to try the last resort, suicide. He told him about the mental hospital and about the psychologist he had to go see every week, all the way to September this year.
Set had been on the verge of tears at the end of his story.
Jake tried to comfort him by saying that now, almost a year after the attempt, he was glad he failed. Even though he’d been depressed and lost energy and want, it had slowly turned to the better. A bit embarrassed, he had confessed that it had become even better after they’d started to hang out. To his surprise, Set blushed at his words.

Now, the sky was all black, aside from the small, glittering lights of the stars.
They were standing outside the Hargreaves’ manor with scarves tucked around their necks and cheeks pink from the cold winter air. Jake had insisted to follow Set home, instead of letting him walk alone. They had talked much all the other times they’d met, but never as much as today, and never before about such important things. It felt odd, but good.
Both of them now seemed to have trouble saying goodbye.
“When can we meet next time?” Set was the first to ask.
“I’m free almost all the time”, Jake said. “Monday?”
“I think I’m busy…”
“Ah. Tuesday then?”
“I… um, maybe I can send you a text when I’m free?” Set asked. He seemed embarrassed, as always, for being busy.
“Sounds great”, Jake smiled.
“Okay. I should go in, before…” Set’s voice faded out before he completed the sentence. Jake nodded in silence.
He knew that it would be for the better, before Set’s mom called, either angry or worried. But… he didn’t want to let him go. Not just yet.
Set opened his mouth to say something, probably goodbye, but no words came out. Slowly he closed it again, and smiled a little, silly smile. For a moment they only looked at each other.
Jake didn’t know what to do with the growing, almost aching, feeling in his chest. Set’s face in this soft light, his lips. Jake had to swallow. He could admit he’d been watching him in a way he shouldn’t have. He could also admit he felt so much more for this boy than he’d ever thought was possible. He’d felt that way for quite a long time now.
Set’s eyes… Deep brown, beautiful ones. They made things with his mind. Things he should suppress because he knew so well that they were forbidden.
Still, he couldn’t care less.
Jake leaned down, so close that he could hear the small, shaking breath Set took, before their lips met. His lips were as soft as he’d imagined them to be. And he tasted sweet, like candy.
A mitten-covered hand took a hold of Jakes upper arm and Jake smiled into the kiss, knowing he had done the right thing, after all.
Set’s cheeks wore a shade of bright pink when Jake leaned back again. He looked so happy, eyes shining, with a confused but bright smile on his lips.
“You said you were incapable of falling in love..?” Set said quietly, wondering, his big eyes looking up on Jake. Almost as if he was afraid this was some kind of joke. Jake answered his wondering look with a smile.
“I was lying, obviously”, he said.


© Amanda

Postat av: Anna

Galet bra, så söta <3

2013-02-04 @ 21:47:14

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