11. Chris #3
Then Alex spoke up, quiet but clear. “He’s right.”
Everyone looked at him.
“You know what he’s been through,” Alex said, hands clasped but gaze steady as he stared down his own boyfriend. “We should respect that.”
Charlie scoffed. “Don’t start. He’s not even your friend.”
“No,” Alex said, voice shaking but not stopping. “You always do this. Push and then act like everyone else is the problem.”
“Babe—”
“Don’t,” Alex snapped softly. “I’m tired of you making me feel stupid for caring about stuff.”
The air felt thin. Charlie swore under his breath and grabbed his jacket. “This is ridiculous.”
“Yeah,” Alex said. “It is.” He didn’t get up.
Charlie left, slamming the basement door behind him. For a moment, no one moved.
Alex got up to leave but Chris and Mila reached out in unison to still him.
The music crept back in. Sam handed Alex a drink.
Mila squeezed his knee. Sam bumped Chris’s shoulder.
He smiled, but it felt shakier than before.
He stood slowly and walked to the downstairs loo, closing himself inside and just breathing for a moment.
He opened a new email and typed in Isaiah’s address.
To: isaiah.owens@
From: c_green_run@
Subject: Thnx
Owens,
I just wanted to thank you. I know you put a lot of work into this and I appreciate it. I’ll keep my nose clean like you said and sign back with Carl.
Even if it doesn’t go anywhere, I owe you both that.
Chris, soon to be BSc candidate
He sighed, slumping against the door for a minute, until Sam came to check on him.
When he returned he felt steadier again, like maybe this was it.
Maybe he’d finally turned the page on the worst chapter of his life.
His friends circled him. They talked about classes and modules.
Sam was already planning study dates. Mila offered to proofread essays.
Alex asked genuine questions about environmental science like it mattered.
Hours later, they were still there, a little circle of support that Chris hadn’t realised he had so desperately needed.
Alex was curled into the corner of the couch, eyeliner smudged, looking wrung out, but lighter than Chris had seen him in the short time they’d known each other.
“Sorry your party got intense,” he said. “Charlie’s a dick sometimes.”
Chris shook his head. “You kidding? You don’t have to apologise just cause your boyfriend’s a dick.”
“Possibly not boyfriend anymore.” Alex shrugged. “And the dick in question was nothing to write home about.”
Sam snorted.
“Speaking of significant others,” Mila interjected. “Who were you and your mum talking about earlier?”
Chris groaned, head falling into his hands. “I really thought you’d have forgotten that by now.”
Sam was sprawled across the floor, illuminated by the fairy lights, but he perked up at Mila’s question. Three pairs of eyes stared him down as he tried to figure out how to explain about Quick.
“It’s nothing,” he said. “Just someone I met online.”
Alex leaned in. “Someone special?”
Chris sighed. “As special as someone can be when you haven’t even shared your real name.”
Alex stood, refilling his own glass and then Chris’s before passing the pitcher of cocktails Chris’s mum had made around the room. “Don’t you want to try?”
It was complicated…for both of them. Chris didn’t know how to explain, but the one part he knew his friends would get…well. “Not while my name’s still headline fodder. One step out of line and I’m back in the press—Wales’s great shame. I can’t drag someone into that.”
There was the other thing too, like what if it was too much for him? What if Quick judged him for what he’d done like everyone else? Chris hated how real that possibility was.
Sam grunted. “I hate that.”
“It’s so fucked the way they just dragged you through the mud. Especially now. Will there be a retraction or a statement or anything?” Alex asked. For someone who hadn’t known Chris long, he sure had become a passionate advocate for him.
The air in the room prickled at Chris’s skin, and the music started to run together as his ears pounded.
“There won’t be a retraction. Because I did it.
I did everything they said I did. And I shouldn’t even be getting this opportunity.
Carl did it all, him and his nephew, and I was such a fucking dick to him.
” Tears were threatening to spill from his eyes as he watched his friends, awaiting their silent judgement.
“Oh, Chris.” Mila pulled him into a hug. “You know we don’t care, right?”
Sam nodded. “Yeah, mate. We aren’t here because you can run circles around us. It’s probably your most annoying trait, actually.”
Chris laughed, wet and strangled.
Mila nodded along. “I cheated on my GCSEs and nobody was dragging me in the press.”
“Mila,” Sam gasped, scandalised.
She just shrugged at him. “As if you never.”
Alex was quiet. “Was it all for the Olympics?” he asked. He didn’t sound judgemental, just curious.
Chris shook his head. “No, I… Fuck, I don’t know if I can talk about it yet. Sorry.”