❦ WINNER OF THE RIVETING WRITING CONTEST ❦
OLIVER IS DYING
With only months left to live at just seventeen, Oliver spends his remaining days of endless tests and debilitating drugs in the St. Andrews paediatrics ward planning his impending funeral...
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The shouting would go on for hours.
I'd sit at the top of the stairs and listen to the screaming matches. Dad would accuse Matt of embarrassing the family with his lifestyle. Matt would yell back that Dad had no place making decisions in his life, especially about who he loves.
I've always known Matt was gay. I knew he was before Dad sent him away. I knew before Nick had pulled me aside one night to tell me he'd seen our brother kissing another boy at the mall. I knew well before word truly got out that Matthew Beauregard was "living in sin".
But I didn't care that Matt liked boys. I didn't care that Matt was in love with Ben Townsend, a really nice boy from a middle class neighborhood with manners as nice as his looks, his hair black as night and eyes like warm milk chocolate.
I'd liked Ben almost as much as Matt did. When he'd come over, it was like having another brother. We all got along with Ben. Nick and I were happy to have him around. And I was happy to see my brother happy with him around, even if he always felt like he had to hide it.
I'd known Matt was gay because he told me. He'd sat me down and said it to my face.
It was after an argument. Matt had gone down the stairs to fight and came back with a bloody lip. I'd taken him into my room and sat him on my bed to clean his wound.
"Maybe you should stop fighting with Dad," my thirteen-year-old self had said meekly.
"Tell him that," Matt had growled under his breath between winces as I'd pressed the antiseptic-dowsed cotton bud to his cut lip.
He'd taken my wrist to lower my hand. He'd taken my hand. I'd watched him lick his lips, and just that gesture had been enough of a sign that he was going to tell me something heavy.
"Frankie, do you know why Dad and I are fighting?" he'd asked me.
"You're doing things he doesn't like," I'd replied, naively when I look back on that answer now.
Matt had rubbed the back of his neck in thought. "Kind of, yeah."
He'd shifted his weight to sit closer to me. "I'm gonna tell you something, Frankie. But I need you to promise me something, okay?"
"O-Okay?"
"I need you to promise me you won't tell anyone what I'm gonna tell you."
It's big asks like that that always make my stomach churn and twist into knots. It's those words that mean a secret is going to be told and spreading it could mean the worse kind of consequences. It's those kinds of promises that mean guilt is attached like a ball and chain. I'd felt all of that when Matt had spoken those words.
"I promise," I'd whispered.
I'd noted the way Matt's shoulders slumped forward, relaxing the tension that had kept them stiff. And my stomach had continued to knot tighter and tighter.
