The Donut Shop ✔️

'H' Stands for 'Harrowing Experiences'

Ethan arrived back home a half-hour later and eased his window open, praying that Hana was able to convince their parents that he was with Tweed and not, in fact, looking at a dead body. He was out of luck when his father greeted him with an expectant face, seated on the mini-Mars on his solar system bedspread. 

He nearly climbed back out the window when he spotted his dad's stern expression, but, with a heave, he finished entering the house and closed the window, standing before his father and awaiting his doomed fate. 

However, instead of raising his voice or throwing things, his dad began chuckling, a soft and low sound that quickly rose to hyena-like cackling. Ethan's look changed from dismay to surprise at his father's sudden outburst.

"I didn't think you were so much like me, Ethan. Believe it or not, I was once a rebel. I snuck out to meet your mom more often than I would like to admit in high school," his dad said. What the hell did Hana tell them? His dad got up from the bed, crossing the room to welcome Ethan.

Ethan grimaced back at his dad, shifting the weight of his feet, uncomfortably. He felt unnerved over the look he received. His father acted as if they harbored the greatest secret like they were both international spies and had just stolen the Mona Lisa. He gave Ethan a firm head nod, paired with a wink, and he turned back to the hall, which was dark. Hana and his mother must have been asleep. 

Still in disbelief that he got off the hook, Ethan sank down on his bed, processing the scene that just unfurled before him like a present being unwrapped. Was that a dream? Was he tired enough to dream with his eyes open? He shook the thought off his mind. 

Still, his mind couldn't stay still, and his thoughts flashed back to Mrs. Heifenmeir. Red... he murdered her in cold blood. Ethan hoped this wasn't true, but it had to be. Mrs. Heifenmeir would never say it, but he knew that she used her time with both him and Tweed as a substitute for her children being there. Mrs. Heifenmeir would've killed to have a moment with her children, and if Red killed her...

Ethan shook his head, refusing to travel there, but as soon as he forced the thoughts and suspicions about Mrs. Heifenmeir out of his brain, he began thinking of someone else, someone with dark brown hair and eyes that drowned Ethan like pools of Nutella. Both of these tainted spools of thoughts were unraveling like a copper wire and running rampant in his brain. As soon as Ethan wrangled one line in, the other came barreling out. 

His mind clouded with thoughts of Oliver when he decided that thinking about the soul stealer and Ethan's confusing feelings would be easier than thinking about Red's true actions. And maybe if Ethan stared long enough into Oliver's dark amber eyes, he would be encapsulated in them like a bug, preserved and frozen in time, not having to think about anything again.

Oliver felt strange to him, and Ethan was also cautious around him. He wasn't very trusting of people... but Oliver felt like someone who he could lean on, someone dependable and warm and like home. 

It wasn't just Oliver, but about what Oliver represented. He was like Ethan's nutcracker, his dynamite, his bottle opener. Oliver had unleashed something within Ethan that he wasn't even aware was there. 

This was the reason Ethan never felt tingly butterflies with any of the girls he had ever tried to date, why he loved the smell of his mom's perfume, and hell, why he listened to Ariana Grande, and not in an ironic way. 

Sitting up in his bed, Ethan inhaled slowly, calming his nerves before, out loud, he admitted what had been weighing on his chest for so long. 

"I'm gay," he whispered. As the words escaped him, it felt like pressure had been relieved from his back. Like he was no longer carrying the weight of a hundred bricks on his shoulders. He just took the first step, but a whole journey laid ahead of him.