Far From Home - Chapter 35: Chapter 35

The First Week of December
"Who you texting, your girlfriend?" Kris's shoulder bumped into his own as Jake ferociously typed away on his keyboard.
"Don't have a girlfriend." He grumbled as he did his best to ignore her.
Is it an emergency? I'm not really in a quiet space right now.
His message went to read as soon as it was delivered. The roar of the dinner crowd at the dining hall was only slightly-less annoying than usual given that a quarter of the campus was filing out for winter break, but that didn't make it any less bearable for the phone call that his sister had attempted minutes ago. He narrowed his eyes on the gray bubbles in the bottom corner as she typed away.
don't worry about it ig
"What do you think Jake's type is?" Camilla mumbled through a bite of a sandwich as if he couldn't hear her talking right across from him.
If Nat wouldn't have been out of town for a game, she might have laughed at all of them for assuming they were even having a 'girlfriend' talk. But Camilla, Kris, and Rose seemed utterly oblivious to Jake's orientation, or his lack of interest in any of the conversations that had to do with finding him a partner to begin with.
You okay?
like you fucking care
Jake's heart sank as he read the message, but he tried not to let his obvious disappointment read on his face for the rest of the table to see.
"I'd bet money he's into blondes. Blonde hair, short as fuck, loves her Bible..." Kris started listing off a set of traits that sounded too familiar to be accidental.
Riley, what's wrong? Are you okay?
Fuck. He better not have touched her. I'll fucking kill him.
It shouldn't have been Jake's first thought, but it was far too realistic to be his last.
"Oh, right. You know, I think I know someone like that..." Camilla purposefully elbowed the blonde beside her.
i'm fine
it'd be nice if you called me back sometime
Sorry. I will this weekend, k?
sure
"You guys never stay out of his business..." Rose whispered in his defense, not even worrying about her own.
I will, I promise.
you said that last month
Jake winced. Fuck, did I? Sorry.
I'll talk to you this weekend for however long you want okay? I'm just a little stressed out right now.
okay
Okay.
He didn't need to send that last message, but a part of him felt inclined to do it anyway. Jake could tell his sister was annoyed, but it was likely a front for something deeper than that. Stress was a word that had been on his radar for months now, but he guessed it was probably on hers too. It hadn't been right to leave her alone, but he just hadn't had the time or energy to listen to anything that had to do with home. He hoped maybe Katherine had been helping her out, even if she couldn't say some of what she needed to to her best friend.
"Alright Jakey." Kris elbowed him. "Let's hear it."
"Hear what?" He mumbled from behind his phone.
"What's your type?" Camilla answered for her.
Jake set his phone down on his table as he took a deep breath to clear his mind away from his sister. He watched Rose watch him to interject like she always had when things got too personal, but he shot her a look that he was fine and she seemed to keep her mouth shut after finding that the question wasn't out of Jake's comfort zone. In fact, he thought he might even have some fun with it.
"Dark hair, green eyes, around the same height..." He shrugged with that. "Name that starts with a 'c' and ends with an 'r'."
Camilla grinned as she leaned forward into the table. "That's oddly specific."
Jake smirked back, but he couldn't help it. He loved seeing the look on Camilla's face when she finally found something interesting enough to devote her attention to.
"Isn't it?"
"Who is she?" Kris mumbled through the water bottle she had pressed to her lips.
Even Rose seemed a little intrigued to know the answer. She had her head leaned over—just slightly—in thought as a smile graced her lips with enough curious emotion for Jake to feel comfortable in. If he had captured the curiosity of the one who never asked invasive questions, he at least owed her the answer.
"Connor Morgan." He shrugged like it wasn't going to send Kris spiraling.
And he was absolutely right. She grabbed ahold of his arm as she started choking on her water bottle, slamming it down on the table to try to catch her breath. Jake grinned as he watched her struggle, knowing that he had, once again, been able to surprise her when not very many other people could. Even Camilla was a little shocked, her mouth left agape as she squinted at him like she was trying to figure him out all over again. Rose was the only one who didn't seem too fazed by it—settling with a calm smile as she watched Kris losing her shit in front of her.
"No–" Kris got out in a wheezy breath that made Jake laugh.
"Yes."
The younger Dobovic twin loosened her grip on his arm as she coughed for the last time.
"You've gotta be fucking joking... I'm literally friends with him, and he didn't even tell me."
Jake shrugged. "He's a private person."
"Wait, we're talking about that Connor?" Camilla's jaw nearly dropped.
"Right?!" Kris gestured her hand out to her best friend across the table.
"Do I know him?" Rose finally commented with a cheery smile that cut through her housemates' surprise like a light in the dark.
"Um," Jake rubbed his hand out on the back of his neck. "He was at the Halloween party. The one in the kitchen with us when you were doing shots..."
"Ohhhh." She nodded.
"I call bullshit." Kris grumbled. "Connor hates everyone, how the fuck did you end up getting on his good side?"
"We went to high school together."
"No fucking way... you're the ex-boyfriend?"
Hm. Something about it all felt eerily reminiscent of Ricky's reaction, but Jake was taking it a lot better with the girls than Connor had with his roommate.
"Yes, and?"
"Damn, I really got his type down with Ryan then."
Ah, so The Asshole has a name.
"Mmm." Jake hummed in minor annoyance he hoped wasn't painstakingly obvious.
He didn't need a reminder of how unreasonable his jealousy was when it made him snarky with the only person in the world he didn't want to piss off.
"Everything I've said before still stands." Camilla leaned back, but she looked just as engaged in the conversation as she did before. "I still think you're kinky."
"Shut the hell up." Jake smiled as he shook his head.
Somehow hearing Camilla throw those remarks at him didn't hit as hard as they did when they had come from Aaron's mouth instead. The fact that she was just a notch above a stranger made it a lot easier to take her commentary with a grain of salt compared to someone who had known him since he was in diapers.
"Hey, just because you're queer doesn't mean you're not still into that shit."
Queer.
Mmm... fuck.
Jake's smile dropped as he tried to blink through what he was thinking. What was he thinking? He thought for a moment it might have been set out to insult him, but with the lingering smile on Camilla's face like she hadn't even said it and the way her eyes held nothing resembling malice, Jake didn't know how to comprehend the word had come from her mouth. The last time he had heard it, it came from his father—an angry, rash insult thrown at him before he dealt with one of the worst nights of his life. No one had ever used that word in a context Jake was comfortable with, and it was nothing short of jarring to see it thrown out in such a positive connotation now.
He swallowed down a deep bubbling fear that struck too close to home and stared out the window for an escape.
"Can you... not use that word?" He mumbled to the glass, hoping maybe only Camilla would hear him.
"Which one?" Camilla raised a brow at him.
Jake looked back to her as if it would give her the answer, but she was no Connor Morgan, and she undoubtedly could not read his mind. He still couldn't bring himself to say it. Back home where the word was thrown around like a bottle of whiskey with his father's friends, he made a silent promise to himself that he never would. They would say it whether he wanted to or not, but he wouldn't let himself add to any of that perpetual homophobia he spent years trying to tune out.
"Queer." Rose mumbled to her—so softly Jake thought she might have been trying to avoid him hearing it.
But he did. And he nodded to let her know she was right.
"Sorry." Camilla gave one of those apologies only Rose could coax out of her. "That's how Blake identifies, I just kinda thought it was a good word when you didn't know exactly how to place someone's sexuality..."
"It can be." The blonde beside her spoke with her soft voice. "For others it's been used in not-so-nice contexts."
Jake didn't know how she understood, but the compassionate smile that just barely formed on her lips was a sign she knew it too well too.
How do you know that?
"I'm asexual." Rose seemed to see the ponder of his stare. "There's been some times I've been told I'm not..." She stopped to consider Jake's reaction. "Queer enough... to be part of the community."
Jake should have been surprised, but he wasn't. Everything about Rose's character had pointed towards her being some sort of sex-repulsed, but Jake had just figured it was religious abstinence, not her sexual identity. It made a lot more sense as he thought about it, and so he gave her a gentle nod to acknowledge her rare bout of sharing.
"I didn't know that." Camilla seemed to visibly soften as she looked over to her housemate.
"It was never relevant."
"I think I might be demisexual." Jake whispered under his breath for the first time ever.
He didn't know why he felt compelled to say it, but it had been weighing on his mind for a while now, and if anyone was going to help him work through it, it would be Rose. Granted, in front of Camilla and Kris wouldn't have been how he would have imagined a talk like this going, but it still felt comfortable enough to admit. Rose had started their conversation of sharing, it was almost too easy to join in with his own truths too.
"Or maybe not... I don't know..." He stuttered. "I'm trying to figure it out."
"That's okay." Rose nodded. "You don't have to know all the time."
It was a rare occasion that Camilla and Kris ever stayed silent—in fact, Jake didn't know if he'd ever seen them so quiet—but today they sat back and let them talk it out without daring to interrupt.
"I just... I thought I was gay since I was like fourteen, and even that took a lot of thought. It's... really hard to think about it in any other way, you know?"
Why am I telling you this?
The honesty was an impulsive and risky move, but despite it all, he didn't feel compelled to stop.
"You could be homoromantic." She suggested. "It's totally valid to say you're still gay even if you're demi."
Jake glanced at her. "Really?"
"I think so."
Okay. Okay, maybe this won't be so bad.
"Are you attracted to Connor?" Kris asked from beside him, but even though it seemed genuine, it didn't save her a nasty glare from Rose to shut up.
She surrendered her hands up to the smaller housemate. "I'm serious, I'm trying to help him!"
"Yeah." Jake answered for her mercy. "It's hard not to be."
"No objections there." Camilla sighed.
"Have you ever been attracted to anyone else?" Rose tried to pull the conversation back to its roots.
"Well, like... not really..."
Had he fawned over a young Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert Downey Jr. at least once in his life? Yeah, who hadn't? But, did he ever feel sexually attracted to them? No, it was... something different. He liked the way people looked. He noticed aesthetics more than he noticed people's bodies. He often found himself taking inventory of people's appearance in the categories of hair, eyes, and what kind of clothes they wore most often, not how muscular they seemed, pondering how big their bulge might be, or letting his mind wander off into indecent imagery of what they would look like without those clothes on. The only person who ever tied him up in such frustrating thought was Connor, and even then it wasn't persistent and uncalled for in the way Hunter often talked about girls that passed by their lunch table. Connor was different.
"Not in that way, no."
"Well then, you might be right." She shrugged. "And if you're not, that's okay too."
Yeah... okay, yeah.
He smiled—small and gentle, just for himself to feel.
At the end of the day, he didn't have to have answers for everything. Often it felt like the end of the world when he couldn't immediately solve each problem, something as little as the interaction he had with a professor in class weighing on his mind until he went to sleep. Overthinking was his specialty, but the more he talked about the things he got caught up on, the more they seemed to go away. Connor had helped with that tremendously, but he would be lying to say that Aaron hadn't too. The events of the summer had brought them closer together than ever. A pre-Connor Jake never could have imagined talking to his best friend about any number of the things on his mind including—but not limited to—his family, his fears, what to do on a date, or how he felt about anything under the sun. Struggling with Connor helped him open up in a way he was so grateful for, even if it initially hurt like hell.
It was good, Jake thought, to be so free to be himself with someone he had originally feared to lose. Losing Hunter may have hurt, but it was more the pain of his own rage eating him alive than mourning the loss of something real. Perhaps it had been real though. Perhaps losing Hunter was as real as losing Connor, but Jake was too pissed off to let it sink in like the fear of losing Aaron had. He was in a much better place now that he had come to grow into the relationships he had—the ones worth keeping and the ones he needed to cut off. At the time, cutting off Hunter had been necessary for survival, but now Jake figured he might be able to forgive him if only he could manage to put his ego aside for one minute to ask for it.
Maybe, just maybe, Jake thought he would reach out to him.
Maybe he could spend his winter break trying to fix something instead of running away from it.