All
in the Name of Friendship
Part 1
By: Elizabeth Smith
Zelgadis Greywyrds walked into the bar. Truth, he wasn’t supposed to be here,
especially not the night before a big test. Lina would probably have his hide
for it as soon as he got back, too. Oh well. He wanted to go out and do
something. He was sick of being cooped up studying for exams.
Zelgadis Greywyrds, seventeen years old. Last year he’d gotten kicked out of his house with no money, no job, and the clothes on his back. His parents had refused to even let him take his stuffed wolf from when he was in kindergarten. He wondered what they’d done with it. Maybe they’d burned it.
Why did thy kick him out? Well, I could tell you he’d commited some heinous crime and gotten off for it. His parents, thinking this was evil incarnate, had tried to punish him as severely as they could. I could tell you that he had killed a woman, raped a child, shot the president.
I could tell you a lot of things. But I’m not. I just wanted to use that last paragraph to use up space and pad this story.
You see, Zelgadis had always known he was a bit…. Different. You already know where I’m going with this, don’t you? Okay, I’m going to skip the formalities of telling you about his only having female friends and not liking sports and all that other stuff. Not that those necessarily make someone like this, or that all people like this are like that. But stereotypes are stereotypes…
Zelgadis liked boys.
Not in a chummy, we’re buds way, but in a hmm… you look really nice in that tank top…
No, I mean really nice…
But he also liked girls.
No, not in the chummy, we’re buds way, but in the hmmm… you look really nice in that tank top….
No, I mean really nice…
So he wasn’t quite sure what he was. Confused would be putting it lightly.
So, like any teenaged boy who isn’t like the normal teenaged boys, he’d gone to talk to his father.
Oops, mistake number one.
Dad blew up and began throwing girls at him. Okay, he liked girls, too, so this wasn’t really a problem. But he still liked looking at certain boys he knew, too…
So he’d talked to his mother, hoping for a more logical approach. Oops, mistake number two.
Mom had gone into hysterics. She’d started crying that her son was a freak, and what had she messed up on raising him this way?
Hmm. Raise a kid’s self-image, why dontcha?
So he’d kept quiet. But one day, he’d come across a nice book talking about things like this. Well, this was a really backwater little hick town. How the hell had he gotten a book like that?
Enter Lina Inverse.
Zel had known Lina since they were really little. They were inseparable. If one of them needed help, there was the other one. If you said something about one, the other was there to beat the crap out of you. They went everywhere together, did everything together.
But Zelgadis saw how his parents had reacted and had kept quiet on this one subject. He didn’t want to loose his best friend.
And so she never knew.
But how did she get the book to him? Ahhh.
Well, you see, Lina was an avid reader. She liked to know everything. Her library was huge, an unthought of room full of books, instead of the usual five that most people down there had.
So of course she would have a book like that. Lina was… different too. No, she liked boys, and only boys, but that didn’t mean she was normal. She wasn’t like the rest of the girls. She didn’t think about nothing BUT boys. And she liked to read. This made her a freak.
Anyway, Zelgadis was browsing her library when he came upon the book.
And he read.
And he confronted his parents about it, demanding to know why they seemed to think something natural was pure evil.
Oops. Third mistake.
This had escalated. He’d been called names before, but never with so much venom.
Then they’d kicked him out.
This was the day before summer vacation started.
Zelgadis went the only place he could think of; Lina. He was afraid she might be angry at him…
But she wasn’t. she was completely understanding, supportive, and, well, his best friend. Then she’d gone to ask her parents if they’d let him stay with them.
Oops. Fourth mistake.
Her parents blew up, too. No, they would not have a freak living in THEIR house. What would the neigbors say? He was a sick, disgusting, twisted thing and they didn’t want anything to do with him. Lina had defended him.
No, she didn’t get kicked out. She’d walked out.
So mainly, now they were living together far from little hick town. They were still in high school, seniors, in fact. And tomorrow was midterms.
Zelgadis had a dance test and a Spanish test tomorrow.
He was bored off his ass.
So he’d sneaked out of the apartment and had wandered downtown for about an hour. Lina wasn’t home, Lina was almost never home. She had so many things to do to get enough money to finance her doctorate. Sure, she had amazing talent and was brilliant, but she was both female and was living on her own. She wasn’t likely to have an easy time getting the money. And on top f that, her grades and records had to be outstanding. So she was probably working, if not working on yet another project.
So he had no one to tell him not to.
And he’d come across a nightclub. It was a pretty famous nightclub. Called the rouge, it was a regular place for all those people who weren’t exactly in the social range of impeccable. Gays, lesbians, and bisexuals galore.
Of course, you were supposed to be over eighteen…
But then, little things like that had never bothered Zelgadis. What bothered him was what Lina was going to do to him if she found out he wasn’t studying.
He didn’t see why she cared. She was talented, smart, perfect. She had so much ahead of her. Zelgadis, even if he shone as much as she did, would never have anything. He’d have to pretend his whole life to be anything other than a janitor or something. Either that or a musician. But Lina was adamant about it. She couldn’t support him forever, he knew that, but he really didn’t see the point of an education when all the jobs would fire him the second they found out about his tendencies. Anyway, to sum up; Zel was at a gay bar because he was bored and tired of studying. Interesting, hmm? Add that to the fact that he was supposed to be straight, and we get a whole barrel of fun.
Huh? What’s The soccer team doing here?
Val sat at the table with the rest of the team, fidgeting. He didn’t really
want to be here. But the moment the team found out he was gay, they’d dragged
him here. He loved them all, he really did, which was why he told them, but now
they’d seemed to make it their life duty to get him a man. Great. He didn’t
like this, not at all…
Especially not the fact that There were some really nice looking boys around here.. and Val was getting uncomfortable. Telling your team you’re gay is one thing. It took almost everything he had to pull up the courage. But acting on that in front of them….
And he was floored by the boy who walked in. He was a bit on the short side, but not there yet. Built lightly but muscled, he had purplish hair that swept over his eyes and made them stand out all the more. The eyes were startling blue sapphires, almost too large for his face. He was pretty, almost too pretty for any male to be, and had the look of someone who obsessed easily. And pretty. Very pretty. Oh god was he ever pretty. Very pretty. Very very very…
Val was speechless. The coment he was making to one of his friends trailed off as he stared. They all turned and looked.
“Ah,” Gourry said cheerfully, “So that’s your type, is it?”
Oh god, they were all looking at him. Damn, damn, damn , damn. They were
probably here on an initiation thing for the freshmen….he was going to get
busted, the thing back home was going to happen all over again….
Shit.
And Lina was going to KILL him…
If she ever found the parts.
Zelgadis quickly turned away and sat down. Maybe they wouldn’t recognize him. He was low key in school, so….
“Well? Are you just going to sit there?” Zangulus asked, grinning widely.
“Or are you going to say hi?”
Val sat there staring. God, he had a nice back….
“Hello? Val? You awake?” Gourry nudged Val n the ribs. “Go tell him you’re interested!”
Val managed to shake himself awake. “I can’t do that!” He hissed nervously.
“Why not?”
“Would you do that to a girl?”
“Yeah.”
“never mind…”
Zangulus shrugged. “What’s the likeliness of seeing him again if you don’t? You haven’t anything to lose.”
“Well…”
“Go!”
Zel heard someone behind him. Great. They’d recognized him. Lina was going to
killlll hiimmmmm.…
“Um… excuse me. May I sit here?”
Zel turned at the nervous voice and almost fell over. Star of the soccer team, green tinted hair that never would listen to hair gel stuck up in a way that was thankfully in style at the time. Beautiful shoulders, yellow eyes, a voice that could make you just melt…
Damn damn damn damn damn. His mouth wasn’t working, and he couldn’t help staring. Why did they have to send Val to torture him? The one guy in the school he had a crush on and OBVIOUSLY would never get a chance with. Yay. Zelgadis sunk down n his chair and rested his head on the tabletop.
“Go away. I don’t feel in the mood to get ridiculed right now.”
“W-what?”
“I said, I don’t feel like having a muscle-brained jock laughing my face and call me a fag at the time being. I don’t know why the school soccer team is in here he same night as I happen to be, but I’d rather not be part of a freshman initiation ceremony, okay?” Zelgadis glared at him.
Val stuttered. “It’s not like that! I—“
“Whatever. Just forget I saw you here, okay? I’m going home so I can see the lawn before a big ol’ cross gets burned into it, okay?” Zelgadis stood.
“Please?” Zelgadis turned back around to see a very red Val, with big, puppy dog eyes. Zelgadis crumbled.
“Would you like to…dance?”