Like a piece of art.

Please.

I stumble out of the room and look around for my mother. The corridors are full of people going to their rooms so I stand on the balls of my feet to see better where she was. When I find her, without losing time, I start to run towards her, I need her to listen to me, to let me explain what happened, to understand me.
"Mom" I scream to get her attention but she keeps walking as if nothing was happening. "Please mom" I beg ignoring the people who look at me.
And then my mother stops her step and confronts me, I do the same thing staying right in front of her face.

Before she gives me a chance to speak, my mother raises her hand and hits it against my cheek, emitting a sound that causes more than one to turn around to see us.
"I'm so disappointed in you, I put you here so I can always have you by my side, so you can follow a good path and forget those silly ideas you have in your head but even that can't stop you. You're a pervert and now you're going to be punished as I know it's going to hurt you more" my mother says with almost lost look and the same tone of voice when she discovered my true self for the first time.

"Please mom, don't do this to me. I'm still me, your son, nothing has changed, the only thing that change is that I'm in love with someone, that for the first time in a long time I feel good with me and what I do. This is not going to change my love for you or my way of being and it shouldn't change for you either" I say, feeling like the knot in my throat grows with every word that comes out of my mouth. My mother looks away for a few seconds.
"This is for your own good, you have to accept it, you have to follow the correct path because I will never accept something like this, I just can't , so say goodbye to that boy because this is his last day at school" and with that she turns again.

"Mom no," this time I can't hold back the tears and I let them fall down my cheeks. I try to grab my mother by her hand but she pulls away from me with contempt.
"Stop making a fool of yourself and go away" his words make my heart tighten with pain and stop my attempt to reach it. This is it, it's all over.
I keep looking for at least five minutes where my mother left before I turned to go back to the room and when I do I meet Jack. He is standing behind me just looking at me and the worry on his face is more than obvious.

"I'm sorry" is the only thing I can think of saying. He agrees without saying a word and approaches me to hug me, at this moment I don't care that the whole school sees us, that they know I'm gay and I'm in love with Jack. At this moment the only thing that interests me is to show Jack all the love I have for him because this may be the last time I see him in a long time or the last time at all.
I wrap my arms around his neck and bury my head on his shoulder, he does the same with my waist, sticking completely to him.

"Everything will be fine" repeats what he told me in the room minutes before everything changes, but this time I don't make fun of it because this time I really want it to be true, I want everything to be fine. "Let's go back to the room" Jack says separating from me, I sit quietly and dry my tears with one of my hands. And then, we began to walk in silence towards our room, with the gaze of all on us.

* * *

We are both in the room in silence, not really knowing what to do or what to think. The only thing we have left is to stay here and wait to know what is going to happen now.

Suddenly the door opens again causing both, Jack and I, to jump out of our places. We look towards the exit and see how Andy enters without even asking permission.
"What happened?" He asks us with his eyes open. "I heard there was a problem with the dean and her son," he says, approaching Jack and sitting on his bed.
Neither of us can say anything for a long time until we hear someone knock on the door of the room. The three of us look at each other waiting for someone to burst in again but nothing happens, so I decide to get up. I open the door and on the other side is Patrick with a leaf in his hand.

"Jack Duff?" he looks inside, I step aside and Jack gets up from his bed. "Pack your things, your parents are on the way" he says and gives him the paper, after that he only moves away from us.
"It's an expulsion letter," Jack says, reading the paper in his hands and I feel my stomach twitch. I look at Andy and he's just as surprised as everyone.
This is really happening. This is definitely the end and for more I wanted to believe that everything would be fine now I know that that is not true, nothing will be fine and maybe never will be.

*************