By the time had finished his story, my mom's mouth was hanging open and her eyes were wide.
"That's an outrage!" she exclaimed. "Please tell me that that boy went to jail!"
"He was suspended," Finny responded, looking like my mom was frightening him a bit.
"I should call the school and complain about this!" she nearly shouted. "If you were my son, you know I would."
I halfway agreed with her. No one should have gotten away with hurting my Finny. Suspension was clearly not enough to take care of him. Ollie needed to pay for what he had done to my Finny. No one should have ever hurt him and I was going to make sure that no one ever did.
But, when did I start thinking of Finny as mine?
After my mom had finished with her rants, Finny went home. I wanted him to stay longer, but he said something about track practice that he had missed, and making up for it at his house before it got too dark.
I found my yearbook again and stared at the pictures of him. He was so perfect and attractive. I wanted nothing more in the world for him to love me back. Or at least to know that I had these feelings. It was so hard to keep the feelings all to myself, and risk telling them and having my social life ruined. No one at our school was gay, as far as I knew. If they were, they were too ashamed to tell. And, with good reason, I suppose. It was the kind of thing that could make or break a person at our school.
Maybe I should have broken the cycle and let everyone know. I had to at least tell Finny. He wouldn't be too mad, although I might have gotten mad a few years back if he had confessed something like that to me. How could I have ever not realized what I had?
The next day, I arrived about five minutes before the bell in art class. I didn't see Finny, so I tried to act like I didn't notice him missing. That satisfaction didn't last for long, however.
"Hey, Gene," a boy named Seth interrupted my thoughts, "did you hear about Finny getting in that fight?"
"Yeah," I replied. Wait...Seth was on the football team...
"Man, I was so mad at Ollie, so me and the rest of the guys tackled him," he explained.
"Yeah, I heard about that," I said. "Thanks for doing that. Who knows what Ollie could've been capable of...wait a minute!" I stared at him. "Weren't you suspended?"
"Uh-huh," he answered, casually, "starting next week."
"Did everyone's suspension start next week?" I demanded, practically jumping at him.
He looked at me blankly for a minute. "As far as I know.."
"That means Ollie is here today!" I cried.
"Ah, I doubt it," Seth said, disagreeing. "He's probably too embarrassed."
"I've gotta go find Finny!" I exclaimed, running out of the classroom.
"Gene Forrester!" Ms. Stephen called after me. "You had better not be late!"
I ignored her and raced to my locker. No one was there. Well, there was a girl there that I used to like who was talking to this other girl, but the point remains: Finny wasn't there.
I then ran up the stairs to Finny's locker. There wasn't even anyone in the hallway in that part of the building.
I hated having to resort to it, but I decided to look by Ollie's locker. I peered around the corner. As I had feared, Ollie was there. He was shoving some books roughly into his locker. Did I need to talk to him? COULD I talk to him after what he had done?
I slowly walked and came to a stop beside him. He looked at me with a look of anger that soon turned to shock when he realized who I was.
"Gene?" he questioned, his voice sounding weak.
I glared at him. "Why?" I asked him simply.
"Because you and Finny are always together!" he burst out. "And I'm sick- SICK of it! You don't even want me or anyone else as a friend. You never even gave me a chance. You always ignore me no matter what I do! I guess it has to be something to do with Finny before you'll pay attention to me!"
Had I caused all of this? Was it actually my fault? I had never noticed it, but who would? How often had I turned Ollie down because I wanted to go do something with Finny instead? Was I responsible for all this pain? For all this chaos? For the suspension of half of the football team and three of the cheerleaders?
It was so overwhelming. I didn't know what to do. So, I did the first thing I thought of. "I'm sorry," I apologized. "I mean, I-god, Ollie, I'm so sorry.." It seemed that I had been apologizing a lot lately. Was it really necessary?
I was so absorbed in my train of thought that I didn't notice Ollie coming closer toward me. Before I knew what was happening, he grabbed me around the shoulders and hugged me, sobbing lightly. I didn't want to hurt his feelings, so I put a hand over his shoulder and patted it.
"I'm sorry!" he wailed. "I never set out to hurt him or you...I was so miserable for such a long time...please don't hate me, Gene!"
Amidst all of Ollie's sorrow, I felt a strong urge to be holding Finny like that. If only Finny would confide his deepest distresses in me. I had never known him to be much of a divulger. He was much more of a confidante to me and every life that he had touched. He was so beautiful and so much better than me.