#1 in LGBTQ || When Johnny and Jason, the high school football team's two star players, come out on social media as gay lovers, all hell breaks loose in the small Appalachian town of Kenton. Their lives, and those of some of their teammates who come...
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Photo above - Ginny
**
Jason sobbed like a baby for the next five minutes.
I sat there holding him, letting him vent. I knew he'd been troubled about things, but I had no idea it was to such an extent. I was used to his getting crazy angry but I'd never seen him cry. Although he certainly had every reason to be upset and he needed to let it out.
Colt jumped over from the back seat and wedged in against Jason. The dog could sense something was wrong and he growled and whined as he frantically licked Jason's face.
We both sat there comforting Jason until he finally began to quiet down and the sobbing began to ebb.
"Maybe we should be on the down low," I whispered to him, "instead of putting our name up in lights for everyone to see. It's too much, dude. You can't take on the whole world. One man, even the two of us, can't change it."
"Somebody's gotta do it," he groaned into my right pec. "You saved my life the other night when Mark tried to kill us. It was like a miracle the way you did that. We're still alive for a reason. Now I gotta save yours. And ours. And everybody else's like us.
"Don'cha see, Johnny?" he went on, frantic. "Everything's changed. We're not even the same dudes we were a few days ago. Our lives will never be the same. Our futures are up for grabs. And we can never go back. We can't lay low. We gotta jump high and freakin' dance in the end zone because that's what we always did. That's what we do."
"Oh jeez, Jason." I kissed his forehead and Colt shot his tongue over to lick his face too. "C'mon, get real. We're not characters in a Shakespeare play or an Emily Bronte novel. We're just two dudes trying to find our way in the real world."
"Bullshit."
He pushed up and looked at me, his eyes an icy cold blue, the warmth I'd always seen in them now gone. He swiped a fist at the remnant of his tears.
"We're just like them, Johnny. Romeo and Juliet were kids, probably younger than we are. Catherine and Heathcliff, too, when they first fell in love. And they were all fighting a world that didn't accept them and their love for each other. Same the fuck as we are. And I don't want it to goddamn destroy us like it did them."
He grabbed my chin with his hand and kissed me hard and hungrily on the mouth. Then he gripped Colt's collar to hold him down and pushed open the passenger door. "I'm gonna put Colt in the back yard," he grunted. "Go in and get my mom. She wants to come with us. I have to go in back and rearrange the fuck out of myself."
Jason pushed at Colt and the dog jumped out to the driveway, and he followed. I watched him walk around the front of the car to the gate leading into the fenced-in back yard. He opened it and Colt flew in, obviously happy to be home. Then Jason walked in after the dog and closed the gate behind him.
