Swimming Upstream

Chapter 12

I always felt some kind of seasonal depression this time of the year. When I got back to my dorm it was raining heavily which had to be one of the rare occasions it stormed in Southern California.

As I was opening the outside door I could hear sobbing from a dark alcove in the quad courtyard adjacent to my building. I walked over slowly peering inside seeing Jake slumped down on a bench with a bloody lip and a bruise under his right eye.

"Jake?"

He jerked his head up with tears streaming down his face trying to quickly wipe away his tears.

"Ryan, hey," he said sniffling. 

"What are you doing here?" I asked. "And what happened to your face?"

"It's nothing. I just got into a fight. I'm okay."

Jake stood up where I could see he looked more swollen than I thought.

"I have an ice pack up in my room. Let me give it to you."

" Okay"

He slid his hands into his jacket pockets hanging his head low walking beside me. When we reached my room me and Jake were alone assuming Marty hadn't made it back from vacation yet. I always kept a ice packet in my mini fridge for sore muscles just in case after swim practice.

Jake had sat down down on my desk chair where I passed the ice pack and a spare bath towel to dry his hair with.

"Thanks," he said gingerly taking both.

"It must of been some fight."

He applied the ice pack to his eye staying silent.

"What happened?"

"It was my mistake," he said, shaking his head. "I should of never pushed him."

"Who?"

"Andrew."

I suspected what the fight was really about but let Jake continue to talk.

"We were always best friends and when we found out we both got accepted to the same school we were so hyped even being a part of the same fraternity pledge class."

"Start from the beginning."

Jake began to tell how growing up there were occasions where they as he put it had some "youthful sexual experimentation" that has been an ongoing thing to this day. The whites around his eyes looked a little bloodshot red likely from crying.

"Now I've screwed everything up," he said, covering his eyes with his hand.

Did I dare ask him? Even though I was starting to feel a kinship towards him I couldn't.

"This is what I get for being honest with how I feel."

"But he doesn't feel the same way I take it?"

He shook his head with his face still buried now in both hands. He let out a deep sigh lifting his head up.

"I love him, Jake said slightly smiling, shrugging his shoulders."What can I say?"

He looked at me dead set in the eyes.

"You think you could keep a secret?"

"Sure."

"I think I am gay."

I tried to hold my excitement in thankful that I wasn't the only one in the fraternity who was soully into other men. Do I tell him if for no other reason just so he didn't feel so alone? I was divided.

"Does anyone else know?"

"No!" he exclaimed. "And you musn't tell anybody! Understood!"

"Nobody will hear it from me," I said, raising my hand.

"Thanks," Jake said standing up, handing me back the ice pack. "Thanks for the use."

"Would probably be a good idea to get your face treated."

"Thanks."

He extended his hand where I shook his.

"You are a good guy Ryan. Glad to have you part of the frat."

Jake left leaving me blown away and dumb founded. I was even more afraid now feeling it was still best to stay in the closet.