At 18, Ian is lost, searching - on the border to a place where nothing is clear, where the pressures of who you are force you into a whiteout.
Love is against the rules... so you don't think about it - you fill in the time with larger ideas.
Writer’s note
I wanted to write about a boy that is trapped. No matter which way he turns, it's the wrong way. Maybe he can find a way out by ditching his mind wherever he can. Or maybe that just happens in the natural course of things when you can't get free. I'm not sure if I have met this particular boy anywhere along the way but I know he's out there. He's not going to make a lot of noise, is all. It could be that he just slips past and you didn't realize what was going on.
Impossible love drives a boy off for a school that trains priests - where he meets a boy he can't turn away from. With a little luck, no one will uncover how Ian feels - including the boy he falls for. Ian hides the truth from himself, too, but the problem hounds him - what do you do when you find the Midwestern boy that you weren't supposed to find?
Passage at Amazon A Particular Friendship
The beginning of the story…
TWO PEOPLE, both of them disturbing, stood in Ian's doorway. It was bad enough that Father Rowe, the college president, was one of them. The other was a good-looking boy that Ian didn't want to meet.
The boy could have been a student. But in that case, Ian, an 18-year-old freshman himself, would have seen him on campus. And if he had seen him, he would not have forgotten him.
This boy was the one.
Luckily, there was no history of walks with him in the wheat fields, no series of long conversations to find out who he was. Besides, Ian was no good at that stuff, the stuff of making it personal, which apparently you had to do if you wanted someone.
"Ian," Father said, "this is Luke Hawthorne. He's a senior at the local high school."
"Hi," Ian said. He wanted to touch him, so he extended his hand.
Luke shook it.
Ian was grateful that the warmth lasted several seconds.
"Luke," Father said, "you and your parents are more than welcome to stop by my office. The door is always open."
The words sounded like a bit of a preamble but they weren't. Father was out the door, having closed it behind him. Ian was standing there looking at Luke.
"Have a seat," he said.
Luke took the chair and Ian took the bed. None of that one-on-one stuff applied because Luke was not a student at the college. Plus it was Father who brought him here, then left. Ian fluffed up a pillow but did nothing with it.
"How do you like it here so far?" he said, a standard line that would go nowhere, though he could find one that was worse.
"It's okay," Luke said.
"What makes you want to be a priest?"
"My parents."
You could see the rebellion far below the surface of those brown eyes, which were earthen only in color. They may even have rolled at the question, as if it was something an adult would ask. Ian sat up, kind of resenting the kid in his room, a kid who didn't seem to like him whether he wanted him to or not.
"You don't want any part of this," Ian said, "do you?"
"No."
"Well, I do have a test to study for." Ian swung his legs off the bed and his feet hit the floor as if he had shoes on. "I'll answer any question you've got but it kind of looks like you don't have any."
"Not really," Luke said.
He somehow made Ian's chair look uncomfortable, which it wasn't. In fact, Ian could have been a very good host if the kid would have let him. But none of that seemed possible now. Even when boys like this came to your room, they were still out of reach.