MUD - An LGBT+ Story

Nothing Else Matters

I sat down on the bed it was comfy and made me instantly relaxed, the bed was up against the wall which had a poster of The Matrix displayed, slightly crookedly, on the side wall was a poster of Pans Labyrinth, it has been a week since we all went to see the film, opposite was the door to the bedroom, which was closed, to the left of the door was a tall slim wardrobe next to a study desk and chair, over the back of the chair was a school tie. The desk was full of papers and books with a large stack of Playstation games which were starting to look like a skyscraper, also there was a laptop with a large TV screen screwed to the wall behind, the walls were painted a light pale blue and the carpet was mainly for kids with brightly coloured shapes on it and there were some clothes scattered in a pile. The bedroom was at the back of the house and through the window you could see the rest of the estate. I sat back on the bed leaning up against the wall but not against the poster, "which game to you wanna play? He said whilst looking at the tower of game boxes "any, you choose" I said as my eyes was still looking around at His room and thought to myself where actually is the playstation? He had a couple of game cases in his hands trying to choose "We will go with Mortal Combat so I can kick your ass!" He teased, I looked to the box he was holding "Brave words, don't be so sure" making sure he wasn't going to get away with this teasing "Haha so the challenge has been accepted" he sounded excited and moving the chair away from the desk to reveal his Playstation which was placed on the floor. Crouching down to put the disk in I could see the top part of his boxers as he stretched, He was wearing a Rolling Stones t-shirt with black Nike shorts with a lime green ear stud and now I know some colourful Jack & Jones boxers. In comparison I was wearing blue jeans and plain pink t-shirt, as he put the disk in the console whirred into action and the screen flicked on. He sat on the floor still showing part of his boxers and navigated through the menus of the game "Right, all set!" And picking up two controllers He sat next to me on His bed, right next to me our arms were touching, my skin tingled and he passed over a controller "you're player two, I've set it up on multiplayer combat just select your character" he explained I have a Playstation as well so do kinda know what to do but it was nice him explaining it to me so let him continue, although I don't have this game at home and just chose the first character "I will go with this one to start with" I confirmed and a few button presses later we were in the game with no clue of the moves or special combinations I was just button mashing as quickly as possible. It was a competitive first round which I won "how did you do this" he laughed and I replied "thought it was going to be easy hey?" And we started the second round, this time he was too good for me "Just though I would let you win the first one so you weren't put off" he teased again and started the deciding round and with both the health meters at critical we knew the next punch or kick would be the winner and jumping to avoid his attack I got the critical hit in then blood trickled down the screen with 'player 2 wins' splashed in big letters, looking over to him "what's this about kicking my ass?" I teased this time and we laughed "Beginners luck" he said with a glint in his eye and reset the game for another match. We carried on playing and we laughed and teased each other throughout, eventually he won 5 matches to 3 which I though was a decent attempt and didn't embarrass myself "You were good! Let's have a break think mum has pizza for us I'll go and get it" and he ran downstairs and I could hear muffled voices from what I though would have most likely been from the kitchen.

Sitting forward on the edge of the bed, this time alone in his room made me think how I'm enjoying hanging out with him and the stupid feelings of agony my emotions went through when deciding whether or not to message him so we could plan to meet. The truth was that after he asked whilst we were waiting for the bus last week my mind was a mixed up mess and knowing how good I am at talking myself out of things I felt pretty pleased that I actually did message, honestly I had the words typed a few days before and kept changing, deleted and moving the words around multiple times before pasting it into the text box closed my eyes and hit send. Pressing send made my stomach jump as if someone was doing karate kicks inside of me, it was like a dull pain of nerves at the pit of my stomach and I just fell onto my bed with emotional exhaustion. This was followed by the tension of waiting for a reply, the self doubt is the most excruciating experience with the multitude of questions and scenarios running through my head, to deflect these feelings I started working on my Art project and began writing and drawing various ideas but it felt like I was trying to run through mud as my emotions sucked me down. The phone vibrated on the desk which made me jump and turned my mouth dry and lifeless, reading his reply through me into a state of panic as he suggested going round to his house, looking back the stress was caused by two factors, first I hadn't actually thought of what we could do when hanging out because there were too many feelings fighting a war in my head and the second factor he did actually want to meet. Due to not being able to think of anything else to do apart from going to the cinema again but thought that would be a lame suggestion so I had no choice but agree to go to his, there was a pause, I took a deep breath and replied.