Drums Of The City Rain

The evening was pleasant, a cool summer’s night, the sky was clear and the stars were out, it was almost like a scene from a movie. Mikey and I walked through the streets in comfortable anticipatory silence, I was slightly ahead, conscious of the fact we needed to get to the station in plenty of time to top up our travelcards and in case the train was early but I kept glancing back to check he was keeping up. I could tell his anxiety levels were high, it was dark and along some roads there were gangs of teenagers being obnoxious but none seemed interested in us. It took about 20minutes before I saw the red sign for the station lit up by the streetlights.
“Stay close bro” I murmured pausing so he could catch up. It was a Friday night and I knew the train and the station would be full of people going to and from parties, likely intoxicated. We walked in and there were a few groups of people chatting, louder than they probably realised. I kept a look out for our parents or anyone who may know them. Now was the riskiest time, if they popped up right then we would be dead. I went over to the machine and topped up mine and Mikey’s travelcards with what I hoped was enough for the journey. I still had some money left over from that scratchcard, about £15 and a bunch of coins we had found lost in both our rooms. Checking the departure boards, I saw our train was due to leave in 4mins from Platform 2. We darted through the barriers and ran down the stairs to the platform, struggling with the suitcase. As we sat down, the train pulled up and I breathed a sigh of relief as we stepped on. Now we were safe, there was no chance of bumping into the rents. Finding two free seats next to eachother Mikey sat down and I put the suitcase on the luggage rack above us.
“Alright?” I asked as I sat next to him, aware of the fact he hadn’t said a word since we left the house.
“Yeah, just- I don’t know” He mumbled.
“Its alright” I reassured “I understand but think about it, we are never gonna see our birthing stick and hole owners again, this is the start of something Mikey for the first time ever I know everything is about to be okay” I wrapped my arms around him, grinning at the reality of the situation. As I pulled away he rested his head on my shoulder and brought his knees up to his chest. After a few moments, I could feel the train begin moving and my stomach flipped. Mikey tensed and I gave his shoulder a reassuring squeeze and he relaxed. I considered listening to some music but my earphones were in the suitcase and I wasn’t gonna start pulling that out. I looked up and down the carriage, it was pretty empty. At the end there were a group of middle aged women absolutely shitfaced, a hen do I guessed. There was a man on his own looking relatively smart staring out the window and many pairs of people relatively sober seeming but all dressed up, on their way out I guessed. In front of us were a young man and a women, not much older than me, kissing and a second women in the seat directly in front of us clearly third wheeling.
I stared at the posters, reading them to distract myself from some of the worries starting to form in my mind. I became aware of the fact Mikey was feeling heavy on me, his breathing had slowed and his eyes were shut. I felt awkward as the couple in from of us’s makeout session was becoming more and more passionate, I fully expected them to start fucking eachother right there.
“Disgusting aren’t they?” the woman third wheeling, suddenly piped up with a chuckle, looking back between the seats at me.
“Yeah” I agreed, giggling nervously. She had big brown eyes and hair cut short and dyed bright blue.
“Lucky, your little friend is asleep, he looks far too young and innocent for this shit” She laughed.
“Yeah, he’s my brother he’s 13” I informed her.
“Oh wow, what’s he doing out at this time?” She asked, sounding slightly concerned.
“Well if you want the truth, we’re actually running away from home” I admitted. She nodded understandingly letting out an ‘ah’ sound.
“You got somewhere safe to go?” She checked.
“Yeah, my friend has a spare room” I explained.
“Okay, good” She smiled.
“Anyway, where are you off to?” I tried to make conversation.
“My girlfriend’s throwing a house party” She told me.
“Girlfriend?” I questioned, accidentally.
“Yes. I’m a lesbian. Problem?” She muttered, sounding defensive.
“No no no, I’m actually bi- well no I- I don’t know” I stuttered.
“Ohh, what are you kinda confused?” she enquired, nodding encouragingly.
“I don’t think I like guys a-and I don’t think I like girls, just the thought of kissing or, ya know, neither of them do anything for me?” I explain “I mean obviously one day I want to meet someone like a companion, someone for me to look after and to look after me”
“Maybe you’re asexual?” She suggested.
“Asexual?” I repeated.
“Yeah, it means you don’t feel sexual attraction. And you could also be aromantic which means you don’t feel romantic attraction. There’s also gray a which means you only feel sexual attraction sometimes or not very regularly and there’s demisexual which means you only feel sexual attraction after you’ve built an emotional relationship. And the same for romantic attraction. It’s a spectrum” She explained. I sat with my mouth hanging open. This was literally me.
“I- that’s me” I breathed. “Well I think I’m completely asexual, sex slightly repulses me- well I do er m-masturbate actually. I don’t know about the rest.”
“No that’s cool, loads of completely asexual folks do, do you experience romantic attraction?” She asked.
“I don’t know? A little I guess” I answered.
“Well maybe you’re gray romantic” She suggested. I thought for a moment. Yes that sounded about right. I nodded. “And who would you experience romantic attraction to? Anyone? Guys? Girls? Both?”
“A-anyone I think”
“So maybe you’re gray-panromantic asexual? That means you don’t feel sexual attraction but sometimes you feel a little bit of romantic attraction to any gender.”
I grinned. That was literally me. All the years of confusion, solved right there.
“Yes” I beamed in disbelief “Thank you so much!?”
“No problem” She shot me a smile and turned back to talk to her friends.
I spent the rest of the 40minute journey repeating that phrase over and over again in my mind. Gray-panromantic asexual. I had so many questions I was aching to ask but I didn’t want to disturb the woman again, she was now chatting with her pals as if she hadn’t just made my life suddenly make a ton of sense, so I’d have to google it later. I wondered if this meant there were lots of people like me, I mean how did a stranger know all those terms? Maybe it was relatively common in the lgbt community. My train of thought was suddenly interrupted by an announcement informing us we would shortly be arriving at our stop.
“Mikey” I hissed gently lifting him off me. His eyes opened and he tensed remembering the situation “Its okay we’re almost here”. I stood up and took our suitcase off the luggage rack overhead. Just then the train grounded to a halt and I could see the platform outside through the window. I headed towards the door gesturing to Mikey to follow, which he did. As we stepped off the woman I’d been talking to followed closely behind.
“Good luck to you both yeah?” she smiled.
“Thanks” I replied awkwardly “And thanks for like um helping me get things a lot clearer. I appreciate it so much”
“No problem- gotta go!” she smirked and ran off in the other direction to catch her friends before we started walking towards the stairs.
“What was that about?” Mikey questioned once the unnamed woman was out of earshot.
“We chatted while you were asleep” I stated.
“Ooh chatted or chatted?” he teased excitedly “I ship you both”.
“No no no Mikey not like that she’s a lesbian and I- I’m” I started.
“You are?”
“Gray-panromantic asexual” I announced proudly “that means I don’t feel sexual attraction but I do feel a little bit of romantic attraction but very rarely to any gender”
“Awesome” Mikey nodded “Shit, sorry for teasing you about crushes and stuff, I had no idea”
“Its fine” I smiled.
“So where did all this suddenly come from?” he enquired. “Well it’s what me and that woman were chatting about” I explained.
“Ohh right” he nodded.
We reached the massive flight of stairs and I realised this was going to be a bit of a struggle with the suitcase. Mikey helped me and together we dragged it up, a step at the time, this whole ‘let’s conserve Mikey’s energy’ idea going kinda out the window. Once we got to the top and went through the barrier I looked around. This station was massive, much bigger than I expected, like some kinda of shopping center although most of the shops were shut because of the time. There was a hum of people, some groups all shitfaced but a lot of people surprisingly sober just going about their lives.
“Toilets!” Mikey gasped suddenly, pointing to a sign. I fucking knew this would happen, we needed to catch the tube as soon as possible but they came every 2 minutes so I reluctantly followed him to the bathroom. I waited outside hoping there was no one dodgy in there and scanned the station. I spotted the sign for the underground and breathed a sigh of relief, I was beginning to panic when I couldn’t see it, worried we were somehow at the wrong station or something. I also checked the time on my phone, 11:13pm. We were pretty much on schedule. Moments later, my brother appeared and we dashed towards the underground. As we reached the barriers I stopped to take a look at the map. The stop we needed was 4 stops northbound on the northern line. Scanning our travelcards, we went through the barrier and stepped onto the escalator. We really should have been rushing but I was not prepared to try and run down the escalator with this suitcase. Once we reached the bottom, I checked the sign and we turned left onto the platform, fortunately, a train had pulled up seconds before so we hopped on right away, the doors shutting just behind us.
We sat in two of quite a few free seats, it was pretty empty but the people there were pretty rowdy. There were a group of hammered middle aged men chanting something indecipherable and a woman who had thrown up right before we got on board, the foul stench choking the entire carriage. There were friends sat down having loud slurred conversations and a few teenagers playing shitty tinny music far too loud. I could feel Mikey’s breathing speed up slightly and him press against me, this was not a good environment, I just hoped he wouldn’t have a full blown panic attack right there. I squeezed his arm and hummed quietly, assuring him it would be okay under my breath here and there, hoping it would somehow relax him. The next stop both the teenagers and the drunk men got off, leaving the carriage much quieter and Mikey a little bit calmer.
As we reached our stop I noticed his breathing had returned to a normal rate but he was still incredibly tense. I picked up the case and he sheepishly stood up, practically hiding behind me. The doors opened and we hopped onto the platform, glad to be no longer inhaling a strangers vomit. Mikey slipped his hand into mine and I could feel my heart pounding as we made our way out of the station. We were there, just a short walk to go, there was no going back now.

Notes

oo excitement
also i just wanna clarify im p british n ur probs p american so sorry if this is like another language to u. I live in london but this fic is kinda just set in generic city, none in particular, but obvs its gonna have londoney themes eg the tube just bc thats what i know. I did change a few things like I called oyster cards travelcards n stuff to make it a bit more generic tho u have no idea how tempted i was to slip in a cheeky nando's. But yeah in case u didnt know the tube is basically the informal name for the london underground which is london's subway or metro or whatever.
Also gerard has a name for his sexuality!!

Also my anxiety is rlly bad rn so im not in school again n im having like some like psychiatric assessments for other stuff n they're gonna put me on meds which is worrying but if it helps then whatevs. This kinda means in the near future i'll probably be updating more often bc i have a lot of time n emotion on my hands.

Anyway thanks for reading plz comment n stuff like genuinely
Have a lovely day :)

Megan x
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