Idiom: [to] beat around the bush (v)
1. To prevaricate and avoid coming to the point; to delay in approaching a situation directly.
Ever since James was little, he wanted to be pretty- he wanted to feel pretty. Whether it was stealing his mother's lipstick out of her drawer and smearing it across his lips or begging his parents to let him grow his hair out, James was always trying to be pretty. Even when his mother scolded him and forced him to put it back in her drawer on his own and apologize, James just wanted to keep the bright red lipstick on his lips for just a little while longer. Because it made him look, and feel, pretty.
His friends would invite him over to play outside on a rainy day, but he would kick and scream and clutch his mother's skirt as hard as he could because he could not be out there in the rain, drenched. Yet as he whimpered and resisted, his mother still drove him eagerly to his friend's house, ignoring her son's desperate protests that I am not going out there; I'll get soaked!
And as his shaggy head of hair dripped with rain water and dirt, he just did not look- or feel- pretty.
Ever since James was little, he felt... out of touch with the rest of the boys his age. Whether it was choosing to play dress up rather than an FPS on Xbox and passionately putting up a fight about it, or it was asking, begging his friends to let him help them fix their hair because their hair was way too flat, James was never able to connect.
One night, when he was over at his best friend Logan's house, James was chasing Logan around with a can of mousse that he stole from his mom, and he would not give up until Logan let him experiment on his hair.
"James, honestly, I don't need- or want- it," Logan reasoned as he jumped up onto his bed, panting as he held his hands up defensively. "...And it's honestly offensive that you think I need it."
James shook the can once and let out a breath. "Come on; just once."
Logan wobbled on his mattress, kneeling down a little to regain his balance. "Nah, man," he shook his head, and there was a long pause as Logan waited for James to say something. "Why are you like this?"
Grunting, James let his hands drop to his sides, the thin can of mousse dangling precariously between his fingers.
"Just thought it'd be fun."
A moment passed, and Logan dropped crisscross-applesauce onto the bed. "Sorry, dude."
Ever since James was young, he needed to vent his emotions (not that that made him particularly feminine in any way), and he cried over a lot of things. A lot. Whether it was one boy commenting on his longer hair or the way he loved braiding his female classmates' hair or the way he was so attached to his friends, and James getting so upset about it, James was a crier- a dramatic.
James loved drama. Acting, gossiping, etcetera. James loved it. And he still loved it when he was crying into his new best friend's shoulder one dreary day of his dreary freshman year.
He loved wrapping his arms around his friend's bony shoulders, and he loved feeling his friend rub his back soothingly because hey, even when James was upset and sobbing into his friend's chest, James loved drama.
By the time he was done reveling in his friend's warmth, James had honestly forgotten why he was crying in the first place. But as Carlos pulled away to look at James' face, James decided to keep the ruse up a while longer.
It was early his Junior year that James realized there was something truly missing in his life. All his life he knew that he always had that empty, unnerving feeling in his chest that he needed something, but he never recognized it fully until he actually started piecing it together. James really wished he could go back and have a real revelation maybe during junior high, but he knew that it was always there.
As he stood in front of his full length mirror, eyeing himself slowly up and down, judging his chest, his hips, his legs, up and down, not knowing why he could never see a single thing he really liked about his body, James really wished he had started his train of thought earlier- maybe before he turned into the seventeen year old he saw in the mirror. He couldn't ever single out a thing he really disliked about his body; he knew he was in good shape, but nothing ever seemed right.
James felt like it was all something that he could see on TV on some guy on some show and think it looked really good on him, but he wouldn't ever want it himself. It was just nice to look at. Like a nice painting or an antique. It was aesthetically pleasing, but he'd never move an inch to bid on it and be able to appreciate it firsthand, and it'd be better with someone else.
The thing was, James was closer to himself than he was anyone else; in fact, he didn't have any friends outside of the internet. Or at least he thought he was close to himself. Sometimes he would wonder if he really, actually knew what he wanted.
It was the first day of the second semester of his junior year when he met him, the golden blonde, Kendall Knight, the knight in shining armor, as he joked when they went around the room sharing something about themselves. He was one of those awkward types, but the kind that could laugh nervously or lean too far back in his chair and make a few people chuckle or grin a little. Not too bad of a comic. James was never good at making people laugh, and when the next turn of the name game was James', he introduced himself as James Diamond, and he wanted to say your Diamond in distress, but he settled with son of the CEO of Diamond Cosmetics, and his turn, as quickly as he wasted it, was gone.
He could feel the knight in shining armor staring at him, and James loved drama, so he looked up, catching a split second of a perched eyebrow and an emerald green eye before realizing just how dumb it was. He blinked and shifted his gaze to the next player, and he just hoped the knight in shining armor would quit staring.
James wished he was never one to be self-conscious, but it was his worst flaw. He could never look or feel too...presentable. So he knew, as he stared blankly at the next classmate telling a meaningless anecdote to a class of friends who had probably already heard the story, his hair was too flat in the front for Knight in Shining Armor to still be staring at him, and he knew his shirt was too baggy on him. Why was he being targeted? Is this what I get for being confused? More confusion?
And he looked back at the lanky golden blonde who had his chin pressed to his propped hand on the table, blinking slowly back at James, studying James, targeting James.
Before James could mouth for him to fuck off, Knight in Shining Armor grinned back, shifting in his chair yet keeping steady eye contact with the boy across the room. James felt way too self aware at that point, knowing that the awkward golden blonde with the emerald eyes and the too-slow and too-steady stare was fully aware that James wanted him to back off, and had full intentions to make him completely and utterly aware of every single thing he needed to fix and add and take away from himself in any possible way. So James settled for holding his gaze, because he loved drama.
James would've been fine with picking himself apart if it meant not having to do it every single day. Just once. One full fucking frontal of all the things he felt the need to change. He could've dealt with one good cleansing. But every single day?
He was actually looking forward to his second semester and his art class, but then Mrs. Price with the toothy grin and the loud heels waved her magic wand and there James was with his new art partner, Mr. Knight in Shining Armor. Shining eyes, his armor, and his weapons, as he sauntered, grinning for sure, towards their shared project table, his eyebrow perched high as he gazed back at James, hair too flat.
And James wished that ever since he was little, he was a charmer, but he wasn't. He was always the charmed, and way too easily. A guy could walk by him on a sidewalk, judging him, making some comment to his friend about his longer hair or his tight shirt, and James would blush. Not because he was embarrassed or angry, but because a cute guy cared enough to point out something about him- something he didn't completely feel the need to change.
James wished there could've been an exception for him there as he stared back at his new art partner and his shining armor eyes, but there wasn't, and he flipped his hair back and tried to tie the hem of his shirt to make it a little less airy.
"Son of the CEO Diamond, right?" Knight in Shining Armor breathed, sounding less confident than he looked, lacking the depth in his voice, standing shorter than James expected, and he felt less self-aware.
James shifted to act more casual, responding with a short "right," and letting out a long breath.
James decided then that it's easy to set an early impression based on looks, yet it's so hard to contemplate the idea that someone else could do the same right back, and he smoothed his hair down.
Kendall Knight in Shining Armor was less of a charmer than he looked. But he was smug, James had to give him that. It seemed like arrogance and complacence were the attributes to beat. Especially as Mr. Shining Armor spent most of his art time singing to himself- although James would beg to differ about the to himself part, since he usually sang loud enough to rattle James' brain in his skull enough that he felt like giving a good middle finger to the ridiculous idea that art class would have been good for him- and making senseless modifications to their partner projects without a single word to James. Needless to say, Mr. Knight in Shining Armor's Diamond in distress could slay his own dragon without any armor or a Knight to protect him, at that point.
Knight had a certain modus operandi, a certain agenda, that James found both intriguing and futile- the kinds of habits and rituals James also found that he went through on the day-to-day without even noticing it.
The way the messy blonde would sweep his eyes across the room precisely once every day before taking a seat next to James, give everyone a once-over like he honestly had something to say. But he was always quiet careful monotone in his 5'11, six foot glory and a light colored cardigan and pastel colored wristbands. Armor had the kind of look that said "I woke up exactly ten minutes ago, but I have a good reason", but it just turned out that he slept in. Every single day. Truly effortless.
And the way the boney hands, shining eyes, once-over kind of guy spent the good part of the class lowkey trying to part his hair as well as he could, when about fifteen minutes in, James would clench his jaw and side-eye his partner's fidgeting, letting out a long breath to just somehow, some fucking way tell the blonde that his efforts were in vain. But, by the end of it, Knight had a good ten-year-old-ready-to-go-to-church look to his hair.
How about the way Mr. Charmer liked to use his shining eyes, shining armor, to burn a nice round hole in the side of James' head, James knowing, fucking knowing Kendall Knight just loved using his emerald eyes to judge James? Because James knew Mr. Shining Armor's eyes glittered every time James would turn to glare down at the table in chagrin, exasperation, aversion whenever the blonde would bump his foot again James' leg under the table when he moved his leg under James' side of the table to cross his legs. Or when shining teeth, shining shields, offered a sarcastic, flirty, cheeky smile whenever Diamond in distress didn't look the same.
And the way James had no fucking idea why he liked all of it- the hair, the shining armor eyes, the too-much not-enough effort, the contact, the pestering. It was all so fucking charming, and James had no idea why.
The same, tall blonde, grey cardigan, messy hair, shifty eyes, walking in and observing with one quick, precise glance, and sitting down. He looks him up and down, James could tell in his peripheral vision, and leans back slightly in his chair, uses his feet to scrape the chair back, across the floor, plants his feet and pulls himself back to the table.
That was precisely how James' mind worked then, watching every move of a hopeless vain sarcastic Knight in Shining Armor. There were a billion of those titles, James had decided, but this one could not be one well deserved, and he had determined that he could strip Kendall of the title as he side-eyed Kendall Knight pushing his fringe back and holding it there, repeating the movement out of desperation.
James sighed louder than he intended, and Kendall's eyes gleamed, and he cracked a smile.
"What?" James finally asked, well, stated, as it resembled more of a statement than a question, and he tilted his head toward his partner, not enough to show him he actually wanted to talk, but enough that he expected an answer.
Kendall Knight tutted, letting out a breath of laughter more to himself than James, and remained quiet.
"What is it?" Diamond was burning a little too much in his head, and he did that full frontal of a fidgeting Knight. It looked better on the messy blonde, shining eyes, awkward height.
Repressing a wide grin, Kendall blinked and shot his glittering emerald eyes in James' direction, raising an eyebrow. "I could ask you the same," the blonde finally jested as James opened his mouth to quire him again. "Since you're so... bothered." And Kendall smiled a cheeky smile, and James could taste it, the sweet taste of regret and dread; Kendall deserved that title.
James bit his lip, his previous grin morphing into a thin line of uncertainty at the messy blonde's indiscernible remark, and his own imperceptible feelings. For once in his disconcerting and apprehensive life, James found himself not wanting to openly feel whatever he was feeling for the... knight in shining armor, and he deserved the title. Wrenching his eyes away from the confused and seemingly uncertain brunette, Kendall swept his eyes across the room again, and his hands moved back up to mess with his hair.
As James tilted his head down to peer inconspicuously at the fidgety boy beside him, he shut his eyes hard, wishing he hadn't been paired up with such an...anomaly.
Thanks for reading my first chapter of my first story on this account!
The first thing I want to clear up is that I am NOT insinuating that the attributes I have given James are in any way inherently gay or feminine or weak or making him anything other than normal. I myself am transgender, and I know how harsh stereotyping and gendering things based upon simple characteristics can be. These are attributes that I am using to help give depth to James' character, and they are in no way meant to generalize the LGBTQIA+ community or femininity in itself.
THERE ARE OTHER WAYS TO REALIZE THINGS ABOUT YOURSELF BEYOND WHAT I HAVE ILLUMINATED IN THIS STORY FOR JAMES. Please remember that. I am not trans/homophobic or misogynistic.
Sensitive topics.
Anyway, this is a new account I made since I can't seem to leave the BTR fandom. My older account is Falling for Kames, but all the writing is really bad, honestly.
Please favorite or leave a review!
-Matty