Kaleidoscope (a Heartstopper fanfiction)

Pirates

Saturday night was movie night with his mum. Nick loved this tradition, pizza and movies, usually. They had similar taste, and they loved to recite the lines of their favourite movies and act out parts the way they had done when he was much smaller. Nick thought his mum worried that he was outgrowing it, but he hoped they continued it for a long time.

She had asked if he wanted to choose the movie, and it occurred to him that maybe this was the way to tell her what was going on with him—if he picked the right movie, then maybe there would be an opportunity somewhere in it to ... explain. Or say something that might be a hint. It bothered him not to speak up to her, but he felt the same fear with her that he did with his friends—how would she react if she found out he wasn't the person she had thought he was?

He looked up "Best lgbt movies", but the options were all so depressing. They liked light-hearted movies for movie night. Not necessarily comedies, but something with a bit of humour to them. Brokeback Mountain just didn't seem like that kind of film.

"Mamma Mia," his mum suggested. Apparently she thought he was taking too long.

"No, we've seen that four times this year already."

"Oh, I don't know, you think of something. I'm going to dish up the pizzas."

He heard her clattering around in the kitchen and kept looking for ideas, but nothing came up that felt appropriate.

When she came back in, she said, "I've got it. Pirates of the Caribbean. It's a classic. What do you think?"

They'd seen Pirates of the Caribbean a lot. It wasn't going to spark any new conversations. Nick sighed, giving up on the idea of talking to her tonight. "Yeah. Sounds good."

The pizzas were long finished by the time they reached the part where Will bandaged Elizabeth's hands. Nick's mum spoke up suddenly. "Do you remember that summer when you were like eleven, we had to watch this every evening?"

"It wasn't every evening."

"It definitely was, because I could quote it word for word by the end of it."

Nick laughed. He could, too. He'd wanted to be a dashing pirate like Will Turner and win the heart of a beautiful woman like Keira Knightley.

As if she could read his thoughts, his mum added, "And I knew it was because you loved Keira Knightley." She patted his arm, smiling at him.

"Mum."

"What? She's a very pretty girl."

"Please stop talking."

Keira Knightley's face appeared on the screen in close-up. She was pretty. Beautiful, in fact. But then the screen shifted to Orlando Bloom's face, and Nick realized he was also beautiful. He looked a little bit like Charlie—or like Charlie might look like grown up. Watching the screen, as the camera shifted from face to face, and both of them made him feel the same way, it occurred to Nick that maybe the reason he had never felt gay was that he wasn't. Maybe he liked both. Maybe ... maybe it was okay to like both.

He was distracted the rest of the movie, watching the two leads, testing himself to see if he found one more attractive than the other, and when the movie was over, he refused his mum's offer of ice cream and hurried up to his room, where he typed "bisexual" into the search field and waited to see what would come up.

Somewhere along the way he found a vlogger who had a whole series titled "The Bisexual Experience". He clicked on it and the first video played.

"I was about fourteen when I realized I was bisexual. I had a best friend at the time, and we were completely inseparable. And one day, we shared a kiss, and I didn't feel weird about it. I didn't feel like it was an odd thing to do. In fact, it felt incredibly right. I always felt like I had these feelings for girls up to that point, but all of a sudden I started having feelings for guys, too. And that's when I realized, I'm bisexual."