He was giving me an odd look by the end of my story. “You hurt his feelings, Cam.”
I hadn’t expected that response. “By offering to have sex with him?”
“By telling him that you wanted to have a one-night stand and move on. The fact that he turned down no strings attached sex says that he likes you a lot,” Kyle said.
“He wants me to be his girlfriend, but I can’t deal with that.”
“Why not?” Kyle asked.
“Look at how miserable you were when Scott broke up with you. I don’t want anyone to have that kind of power over me.” I had never told this to anyone before.
“The reason he broke up with me was because I was keeping him a secret. You’re the only one who knew about him, but all his friends knew about me. We even went to a few dances at his school. He felt like he wasn’t important to me. Guys don’t talk about it, but we have feelings too. I hate to break it to you, Cam, but avoiding relationships isn’t going to make you immune to love.”
I wasn’t following him on that one. “What do you mean? I need to be part of a couple to be in love.”
Kyle shook his head. “It doesn’t always work that way. Just because you’re not dating Jake doesn’t mean you don’t have feelings for him. He has feelings for you even though you’re not his girlfriend.”
“I don’t have any feelings for him,” I said confidently. “It’s just physical attraction.”
“You didn’t even know you were attracted to him, so who knows what other feelings you have for him? Why don’t you go out with him and see what happens?” Kyle suggested.
I was determined to do things my way. My plan now was to ignore all my thoughts about Jake until they went away. Now that he wasn’t trying to get my attention, it would be easy to avoid him.
Chapter 6
Kyle and I had to postpone our sleepover again, because I had to come home to cover for Connor. It was his last night sleeping over his girlfriend’s house, and I couldn’t expect Jake to stay at our house alone. Kyle said that he would be fine as long as I was at the dance. This was his first time bringing a date, and our friends were curious about who it was. Kyle had decided not to say anything and just let them see for themselves. They didn’t know that he was coming out of the closet tonight. I hadn’t been to a school dance since elementary school, and the only reason I was going now was to support Kyle.
“Are you nervous?” I asked him the day before the dance.
“A little,” he admitted. “But I’ve decided that I’d rather lose all my other friends than lose Scott again.”
I couldn’t believe that they would drop him just like that. Most of us had been friends since elementary school, so I thought that our bond was too strong to be broken. Sure, they would be surprised, but I was confident that they would accept his sexual orientation after the shock wore off.
Kyle was dismayed at what I had chosen to wear to the dance. “Why don’t you come out too, Cam? I don’t know what would shock them more, me being gay or you being a girl.”
“Ha! Ha! Very funny.” I looked down at the black boy’s track pants and black t-shirt I was modeling for Kyle. “Who cares what I wear? I’m only going because of you.”
“No wonder Jake doesn’t want to have sex with you,” Kyle said.
I rolled my eyes. Jake was actually driving me to the dance and had assured me that this wasn’t a date. “It’s stupid to drive separately when we’re going to the same place.”
“Won’t your date mind?” Why had I asked him that? I sounded like one of those pathetic girls fishing for information.
“I don’t have a date,” he said with a pointed look at me. “Kyle told me about tonight, and I told him I’d be there.”
“He did? I thought you didn’t like him.” The last exchange I’d seen between them hadn’t been very friendly.
“He’d just offered to teach you how to give him a blow job, so I wasn’t thinking straight. I realized after that he was just kidding.”
I smiled. “He’s joking about eighty percent of the time, but tonight is serious. That’s very nice of you to show moral support.”
“Yeah, well I guess we better get ready.” He went off into Connor’s room and closed the door.
After much pleading from Kyle, I had agreed to wear my hair down for the dance. “It’ll take some of the attention off me,” he’d joked.
I tried to remember how long it had been since my friends had seen it down. I had it up in a ponytail ninety percent of the time so it wouldn’t be in my way for all the physical activities I engaged in. I wasn’t really sure why I didn’t just cut my hair short. It sure did make me look more girly, even without any makeup, which I didn’t own and wouldn’t have known how to apply anyway. For some inexplicable reason, I went into Mom’s room and sprayed on some of her perfume. It didn’t take me any longer to get ready than Jake. Fortunately, this was a casual dance. Jake, however, had opted to wear dress pants and a dark blue short-sleeved dress shirt.
He grinned when he saw me. “I like it!”
Then he impulsively pulled me to stand in front of the hallway mirror beside him. As I gazed at our reflections, I noticed how much lighter his brown hair was than mine. Jake looked so good that I couldn’t understand what he saw in me. Okay, my hair looked pretty enough to be used in one of those commercials on TV, but that was arguably my best feature. Jake was gorgeous from head to toe. I knew exactly what kind of body was under those clothes. Oh, not again! I had to stop thinking about that.
“What’s wrong, Cam?” He was watching my reflection in the mirror.
“I want you to kiss me again,” I blurted without thinking.
In an instant, he had spun around and brought his lips crashing down on mine. My passion ignited instantaneously too, and I couldn’t get close enough to him fast enough. I grabbed onto his shoulders and swung my legs up around his waist so I could be level with his face and get deeper into his kiss. He leaned me up against the wall as his tongue tangled with mine. My hands were in his hair as his hands gripped my hips while he pressed himself into me. I heard myself moan for the first time ever. It felt so good that I didn’t want it to stop.
Jake groaned and pulled his mouth away from mine. The look in his blue eyes sent a thrill through me. All I could do was cling to his shoulders and take shallow breaths. He extricated himself from me and set me down while he backed up and leaned against the wall across from me. He closed his eyes as he took his own shallow breaths, but I couldn’t look away from him as I sagged against the wall behind me.
“Why’d you stop?” I knew that he had been enjoying it just as much as I had.
His eyes were still a darker shade of blue than usual as they snapped open to look at me. “The dance.” He cleared his throat. “Let’s go.”
I followed him downstairs and out to his car. My mind wasn’t on the dance but on what would happen after we got back to the empty house. Would we have sex? There had been a charged atmosphere between us all week. My plan to ignore him hadn’t worked out too well. Instead of dissipating, my attraction to him seemed to be increasing with each passing day.
The looks he sent my way weren’t helping either. We had been doing our homework at the
kitchen table after dinner one evening. I had been concentrating on figuring out a math problem when I happened to glance across at Jake. His eyes were on my mouth as I chewed on my nail. My hand slowly dropped to the table as Jake met my gaze. The way he was looking at me made me think that he was going to kiss me, but he gathered his books and left the kitchen.
The following night, Jake happened to walk out of Connor’s room as I stepped out of the bathroom in my towel. Our eyes met across the hallway, and then his gaze slowly traveled down my body. His eyes seemed to be burning a trail along all my nerve endings as they reached my feet and started back up my body. By the time his gaze returned to my face, my heart was racing wildly.
I clutched at my towel as I took the steps to my room. Jake took a f
ew steps toward me, and I stopped at the entrance to my room and waited to see if he would follow me to my bed. He must have seen the question in my eyes, because he stopped and shook his head. It took me a long time to fall asleep that night.
Now that he had kissed me again, I was hoping that he had changed his mind about having sex with me so that we could finally put an end to the attraction between us. We were among the first people to get to the dance, but Kyle and Scott were already there.
Kyle didn’t want to make an entrance but just casually introduce Scott as his date when the rest of the guys arrived with their dates. They were all polite about meeting Scott, but I could tell that they were shocked. Their dates seemed to take it in stride, but didn’t seem to know what to make of me. A few of my friends did double takes when they saw me. They shot curious glances at me and Jake, who remained by my side the whole time.
Everything went well until Chad met Scott. He stared at Kyle. “You’re queer?”
My hackles rose. “He’s gay.”
Chad sneered at me. “Figures you’d stick up for him. You’re probably a lesbian.”
I was pissed at his attitude, but I kept my voice even. “So what if I am? How does that change our friendship?”
“I’m not gonna be friends with a bunch of queers.” He turned to Kyle. “You shouldn’t even be allowed in the boys’ bathroom, you freak.”
“Don’t worry, Chad. You’re not my type,” Kyle said.
“How can you act like this?” I demanded. “You’ve been friends with us for two years.” Chad was the newest member of our group.
He turned his attention to me as his embarrassed date looked on. “It’s a shame, Cam. You’re actually kind of pretty. Too bad Kyle’s the one who likes dick.”
So, yeah, I punched him in the nose. He hadn’t had a chance to recover from that before Jake hit him in the jaw and knocked him on his ass. Then he pulled me into one hell of a kiss. “Not that it’s really any of your business, Chad, but she’s not a lesbian. That still doesn’t mean that you would ever have a chance with her.”
The three of us got kicked out of the dance for fighting on school property. Chad protested that he hadn’t done anything, but the teachers who were chaperoning the dance said that the principal would sort that all out on Monday. I didn’t care that I had gotten in trouble.
I had lost a friend tonight, but I decided that he hadn’t been a real friend in the first place. He had shown an ugly side that I had never seen before. Jake, however, had come through for me and Kyle, even though he had kissed me in front of everyone. I would ponder the significance of that later. Right now, my mind was on what would happen once we got back to my house.
Chapter 7
I launched myself at Jake as soon as he shut the front door. Even in his surprise, his reflexes were perfect as he caught me and supported my weight with his hands under my rear while I wrapped my legs around him. He made some kind of startled sound before I pressed my lips to his. Then we were kissing as passionately as we had before the dance. We somehow made it over to the couch, and he leaned over and deposited me onto it.
Then he sat down beside me. “We have to talk.”
I didn’t want to stop to talk, so I distracted him by straddling his lap. He managed to say my name once before I kissed him again. I had initiated the kiss, but Jake quickly became the aggressor as he tangled his hand in my hair and hungrily explored my mouth with his own.
When he stopped to take in air, I yanked my shirt up over my head. I wanted to keep the momentum going so he wouldn’t have time to change his mind. The fact that I was wearing a sports bra instead of some lacy Victoria’s Secret number didn’t stop Jake’s eyes from roaming there. I always bought sports bras that flattened my chest as much as possible, because I didn’t want to feel any bouncing while I was running around. Now the material felt constricting, and I moved to take it off.
“Don’t.” Jake had grabbed my hands, and his blue eyes were burning into mine. He let go of my hands and grasped me by the waist to lift me off his lap and set me back on the couch beside him. He leaned back and closed his eyes.
I slouched back in disappointment and wondered if lingerie would have enticed him into giving me what I wanted. I had literally thrown myself at him, and he had still rejected me. There was no doubt that he wanted me, because I could still see the proof of his arousal against his pants. Why was he being so stubborn about this?
“Do you like me, Cam?”
My eyes flitted back up to his face as I ran my hand suggestively up his thigh. “I thought that was obvious.”
His own hand shot out to stop the progression of my hand. “I know you like my body, but do you like me?”
I considered the question. “I know I said that I hated you when I got mad, but I don’t. You’re still a good friend to me and Connor. Thanks for keeping me company this week. That was sweet of you, even though I can take care of myself.”
“This week was...difficult. You don’t know how many times I had to stop myself from waking you up and...” There was a look in his eyes that sent a delicious shiver through me.
“Why did you stop yourself?” I asked softly, trying not to disturb the mood.
He took a moment to compose himself. “I wanted to wait until we were going out awhile before I told you how I feel.” When he caught my gaze again, his eyes were just as intense, but in a different way. “I’ve always liked you, Cam. Always.”
“I liked you too,” I said, unsure of where he was going with this.
“You don’t understand.” He sounded frustrated with me.
“You’re right. I don’t understand. I want you, and you want me. What’s the problem?”
“I want more than that with you, Cam.” He took my hand as he spoke. “Kyle told me that you’re afraid to be in a relationship, but you have nothing to be afraid of with me. My feelings for you haven’t changed in all this time.” A hint of his sexy smile made an appearance. “Well, except in a certain way. I never thought about you naked when we were kids.”
I instinctively pressed my advantage. “You can do more than just think about me naked,” I offered.
He stunned me by how well he could read me. “This is not a game, Cam. I’m not your opponent.”
I dropped my attempt to seduce him and turned to anger instead. “Kyle had no right to tell you my business.”
“Stop avoiding the issue, Cam. This is not about Kyle. It’s about me and you. I want to know how you feel about me. We can work through everything else if I know that you like me as much as I like you.”
Something like panic overwhelmed me, and I tore my hand from his and stood up in a sudden need to put distance between us. “What do you want me to say?”
He regarded me in silence as the fire faded from his eyes. “You don’t have to say it, Cam. I thought things would be different when I saw that you were attracted to me. I guess I was just fooling myself.”
I couldn’t stand to see his bleak expression. “Jake—”
“No, it’s okay. You can’t help how you feel.” His eyes took on a look I didn’t like as they swept over my body. The appraisal was cold this time. “I’ll take you up on your offer someday, Cam. I just need some time to get over you first.”
He stood up and went upstairs without saying anything else. Not knowing why I was so upset, I stood there fighting back tears until I got myself under control. Then I went upstairs to get ready for bed. Sleep wouldn’t come, and I tossed and turned until I heard Mom come upstairs and start running the water in the bathroom.
I waited for a while after everything was quiet and I was sure she had gone to bed. Then I quietly slipped out of my room and down the hall to ease open the door to Connor’s room. The moonlight streaming in through the window revealed an empty bed. I went downstairs to look outside and saw that Jake’s car was already gone.
Chapter 8
Jake didn’t make an appearance at our house the rest of the weekend. Connor was in a good mood
Saturday morning when he returned from his girlfriend’s house. He went to crash in his room, so he ended up sleeping in just like any other weekend. I was glad that Mom had a date that evening, because it was difficult enough trying to hide my bad mood during lunch and dinner.
She was pleasantly surprised to hear that I had attended the school dance. “Was it a date?”
“No,” I snapped. She glanced at me sharply, so I told her about getting kicked out and about the meeting with the principal that awaited me on Monday.
“I don’t condone violence, but I can see how you lost your temper. That must have been awful for Kyle,” Mom said.
Connor was delighted. “Too bad I missed that. I’m surprised Jake didn’t tell me about it.”
“Did you talk to him today?” I asked casually. Connor obviously hadn’t heard about what else had happened at the dance, or he would have said something about it to me.
“Yeah, he said he had family stuff to do tonight.” Connor shrugged.
“I’m sure they missed him all week,” Mom said. “It was a good week for leftovers here,” she sighed. “That boy can cook. He’s going to make a great husband for some lucky girl.” She smiled at me. “I know my cooking can’t compare to Jake’s, but it’s not that bad. You could at least take a few bites.”
Damn! She had noticed. “I’m just not hungry.”
“How are you not hungry? You hardly touched your food at lunch.”
Did she have to see everything? “I had a big breakfast,” I lied.
I thought that was the end of it until she asked me to keep her company while she got ready for her date. “So, you really like this guy, huh?”
I was startled by her question. “What?”
“I know all the signs. You can’t eat. You can’t sleep.” She answered my stunned expression. “Yeah, Cam, I can see how exhausted you look today.”
“I was just upset about how Chad treated Kyle.”
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