College Threeway
Bareback University Book 3
Angel Lovecox
Contents
College Threeway
Bonus Novelette: Straight Into His Arms
About the Author
Copyright © 2017 by Angel Lovecox
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
College Threeway
1
Geoff
“Hi,” Geoff Sander stood uncertainly in the doorway of his new room. It was his first day of college and he found himself looking at a tall, built guy wearing a Tommy Hilfiger shirt. He cleared his throat.
The guy looked up. “Oh. Hi.”
He had a lazy smile, one that could have graced a sports magazine. Brown hair with a slight wave, deep-set hazel eyes. He stood and sauntered to the door, still smiling.
“I'm Leighton. Leighton Rockwell. Pleased to meet you.” He held out his hand, still grinning.
Geoff blinked. He knew guys like Leighton, much the same way that he knew neutron stars. Mysterious, distant and unreachable; everything he knew about either topic was strictly second-hand.
“Hi,” he said awkwardly. “I'm Geoff Sander. Um, nice to meet you.”
They shook hands.
“Well, Geoff. Feel free. Make yourself at home,” Leighton said, his back to Geoff. The back in question was the fittest, leanest back Geoff had ever seen. He felt something strange in his body and looked hastily away.
“The bed on this side is mine,” Leighton continued. “You can have whichever of the others you want.”
Geoff blinked. This Leighton's attitude was a little surprising. He had easily assumed the right to dispense resources, as if he owned the dormitory, simply because he had just arrived there before him. Geoff shrugged. Rich guys...they're all the same.
Not that he had experienced many of them, that was: his circles at school had focused on the debating team, the top performers in class. While some of them were undoubtedly also rich, none of them had been the kind of playboy-ish, good-at-sports, I-stepped-out-of-a-movie kind of guys. The kind of guy Leighton appeared to be.
Geoff shook himself and reached for his suitcase. He chose the bed near the window. It had a good view and seemed the most peaceful. Here, he would be woken by birds singing, and not by the sound of someone's laptop left on the desk all night. The third bed in the room was pressed up in the corner near two of the three desks.
“Are we expecting someone else?” Geoff asked. He was already opening his suitcases, looking for the essentials. His laptop. His new jeans. His shower caddy. A shower would be perfect. The drive down to campus had been long and emotional and all he wanted was to take a long shower and relax a bit.
“Uh...yeah,” Leighton replied. He did not look up from whatever he was doing on his laptop. “A guy called Alexander Morgan,” he said.
“Oh.”
“I don't know when he's arriving,” Leighton said, stretching expansively. “People could be arriving all day, I guess.”
“I guess,” Geoff agreed. He opened his other case and started unpacking his clothes. He went over to the closets, looking inside.
“The shelves on the left are mine...” Leighton said, again without looking up. “You can use some of the hanging space, of course, and the shelves on the right. When Alex arrives he can have that closet over there.” He pointed to a smaller wardrobe in the corner, half the size of the one he and Geoff were sharing.
“Sounds good,” Geoff shrugged easily. Again, he was surprised by how Leighton simply took over. He was, apparently, used to having things his way.
Not that it bothers me, Geoff thought peaceably. As long as the guy wasn’t a bully or too nosey, he was fine with it.
He started hanging up his clothes in the wardrobe. He glanced at the neat piles of Leighton's clothes and felt a sudden stab of insecurity. All his clothes were branded: Hilfiger, Klein, Dior.
Oh, my. Geoff looked at his armful of tee-shirts with slogans from different camps, unbranded shirts and one blue suit—used at many debates in his last year—and wished very badly that he could go and hide. Not that he looked bad; he knew what suited him and he liked his own sense of style. I am just going to have to show I can look as good, he thought, then grinned at his own combative streak.
When he had finished packing, he sat down heavily on the bed. He was tired.
“You planning to go out for lunch?” Leighton asked as they both sat in their own silence.
“I was thinking about what to do,” Geoff said, feeling a sudden pleasure. That was the first sign of friendship Leighton had actually shown, the first hint of some character behind the bland, smooth person he presented to everyone.
“Well, maybe we can hang out here until twelve-thirty, and then if our room-mate hasn't arrived, we can head into town. There are some nice places to eat around.” he jerked his head to the side to indicate town.
“You know the place?”
“Kind of. I arrived two days ago with my parents. Stayed in a nearby hotel. They kind of wanted to check the place, meet people...you know. Parents.” he rolled his eyes.
Geoff laughed. “I know. I suppose it's caring, but...” he made a face.
They both chuckled.
Ten minutes passed in checking emails.
“Okay,” Leighton said briskly. “It's twelve thirty and Mr. Morgan hasn't turned up. What would you say to Thai?”
Geoff blinked. “Okay.”
“I'd better get changed,” Leighton said amicably. He shrugged out of his shirt and wandered across the room to the cupboard. Geoff stared. Stop it, He reprimanded himself. This is a phase. You should have gotten over it. What would anyone say if they knew about this? He winced. He had never seen anyone as stunning as Leighton. He forced himself to turn around and look out of the window.
“Uh...have you seen my deodorant?” Leighton called from the depths of his shirt. He was pulling it on over his head. Geoff turned to look and then wished he hadn't. A heat flooded his body seeing those rippling abs, that trim body...
“No,” he said in a somewhat strangled voice. “I haven't.”
“Okay,” Leighton said. He stood up, grinning, tee-shirt on. “What's the matter?”
Geoff stared at him. Leighton stared back. He started to smile, a slight bemused grin.
At that moment someone knocked on the lintel.
“Hey.”
They both turned around. They both stared.
A young man of their own age stood there. A young man with longish black hair with a pale green streak proudly marking one side, a nose-stud and black clothes. He had pale skin and a thin, clever face.
“Hi,” Leighton managed, recovering his manners first. Geoff was still staring.
“Hi,” the guy said again. “I'm Alex. Looks like I'm assigned to this room too.”
Geoff wasn’t sure what he felt. The surprise at Alex's appearance was in fierce competition with the hilarity of the expression Leighton had. Leighton looked somewhere between fear and horror.
“Hi, Alex,” Geoff said quickly, seeing how off-balance his friend was. “I'm Geoff.”
“Hey.”
Alex came forward and shook hands with Geoff. He glanced at Leighton, who had still not recovered completely.
“I'll sleep here.”
Leighton and Geoff looked at each other. The newcomer had mov
ed his cases to the third bed, and was seating himself on it with a self-contained air.
Geoff was not sure whether to laugh or be afraid. Alex proceeded to totally ignore them, summarily unpacking his things without a second word. He assumed the small cupboard as his right and put his clothes away.
Then he took out his laptop, put on a headset and to all intents and purpose left the room.
Leighton and Geoff had not recovered their composure and were still staring at him. Eventually, Leighton turned to Geoff.
“Lunch?” he shrugged.
Geoff went and tapped Alex on the shoulder. Alex, whose eyes were by this time closed, opened them. He glared.
“Would you mind not disturbing me?” he asked curtly. “I'm zoned out.”
Geoff stood back. “Okay,” he said, feeling a little offended. “I just wanted to ask you if you wanted to join us. We're out for lunch.”
He turned to Alex, but Alex wasn’t listening. He had his headset back on and his eyes had shut.
Leighton and Geoff looked at each other again.
“Are you coming?”
“Okay.”
The two of them got their things and headed out through the door.
Lunch ended up being tense. Geoff met some friends of Leighton’s. All of them seemed to come from the same background, they were all here to do law or Pol. Sci., and they were all so different to Geoff that he felt awkward.
When lunch finally ended he fled back to his room. Alex was still there.
Feeling miserable and confused, Geoff collected his things and headed out to the park. Sitting on the bench, breathing the fresh air, Geoff tried to compose himself somewhat. All I want is to study biology, he told himself. But now that he was sharing a room with the ultimate rich kid and Mr. Rebellious, he felt somewhat less confident in the future. How was he ever going to concentrate with those two around? He sighed. He would just have to make it work.
2
Leighton
“Alex?”
Leighton called it. Alex was fast asleep. Geoff had already left, he had morning class. Leighton had woken to hear him heading downstairs early. Trust him to be early, he thought with a small grin. Geoff was Nerd in person, but he liked him.
“Alex?” Leighton repeated. He shook the prone form. He was feeling a little worried. It was almost ten o' clock and Alex, after arriving late—around 2 am—had been lying more-or-less in the same position for the last few hours. Leighton had woken, showered and dressed and not noticed him move.
When he bent over to shake him again, Alex suddenly shot upright. The dark eyes opened and he glared at Leighton.
“What's with you?” he said crossly. “I'm awake. My head's just aching. Would you mind not speaking so loudly? And the sun's hurting my eyes.” he complained, shielding himself from the bright glare.
Leighton blinked. “Sorry, man,” he said, feeling bad as Alex, gritting his teeth, hauled himself from the bed and began to tuck in the covers carefully. “I thought you were, like, dead or something. You were so still.”
Alex gave him a scathing look. “You never seen someone sleep before?”
Leighton looked at him. “I...” He was not sure how to answer that. Yes, of course he had seen people sleeping. It sounded like a challenge. He recovered quickly. “Not everyone sleeps so deeply,” he said defensively. “That’s was why I worried.”
“It's called a power-nap,” Alex said with a look of sorrow, as if Leighton was missing out by never having heard of one.
Leighton turned away. Alex was shrugging on his tattered bathrobe. He gathered it about him with injured dignity and picked up his caddy before heading off.
When he had gone, Leighton sat down heavily on the chair. He should read through the notes before going to class he decided; his first class of the day was at eleven, which gave him time to grab a late breakfast and then head over. He wondered if Alex would join him for breakfast.
As his thoughts drifted to Alex, he couldn't help a grin. They had been sharing a room for a week and, despite his initial shock, Leighton could not help the fact that he’d started to like the guy.
He's weird, he thought. But he's a good weird. And along with the weirdness there was something he admired. Alex was unashamedly weird. He broke rules without even thinking about them and exuded a kind of cool authority that Leighton himself had never seen before.
Makes me realize that I've spent most of my life conforming, he thought, surprised.
Leighton was daring in his own way, but to live like Alex did—so far outside the bounds of convention that convention probably wasn't on his radar—was inconceivable.
It was not just the way he dressed, which was outrageous, or the outlandish hair and self-contained attitude. It was all of them together. He simply did not care what people thought.
Leighton sighed. He wished he could be like that. All his life he had spent so much time thinking about what people thought: his father and mother, his family, their friends. It was staggering to realize how much of what he chose was shaped by whether or not they would approve.
How much of himself had he lost, because of that? He wondered. One thing he knew he had lost was his chance to be honest with himself.
He was attracted to guys. He always had been.
He dated girls—the kind of girls he met at parties with his family and their acquaintances—but even though some of them had clearly wanted to take things further, Leighton never had. He just didn't feel like that. He liked girls, he respected them. But they didn't make him feel the way he felt about guys.
As he thought about it, Alex came back into the room.
“You seen my hair gel?” he asked.
“No,” Leighton said frankly.
“Well, somebody has,” Alex said, rummaging around in his suitcase. “Because it's missing.”
Leighton laughed. “I'm sure you just left it somewhere, Alex.”
“Maybe,” Alex said. He was looking under the desk, making a pantomime of the search. Leighton, watching him, could not help but notice the easy poise with which he moved. “Maybe not,” he added, triumphantly finding the tin of styling gum. It was on the desk.
As Alex styled his hair, studying it critically, his back to Leighton, he found himself wondering about Alex. So far, they had not really talked much to each other. It was not just because of the lack of time—Alex was studying art and graphic design and seemed to have classes at odd hours compared to Leighton's schedule—it was also how contained he was. He never really let on about anything. Except if someone made him mad. Then he was voluble.
I wonder about him. They didn't know where he came from, if he had siblings, where he lived. As Alex replaced the nose-stud and gave his reflection an appraisal, Leighton felt the urge to ask him for lunch.
“Alex?”
“Yes?” Alex asked. Alex always looked a bit like a Gothic cartoon figure, his hair gelled so that it framed his face in a soft wave on the one side but hung in ragged black strands down the other. He was starting to look past the outlandishness and actually liked it.
“I was wondering...” Leighton said, clearing his throat. “I have class until one p.m. After that I planned to go to the Golden Orb for lunch.” It was the local Thai restaurant; a bit on the expensive side, but very good.
“Okay,” Alex shrugged. “I might be late. Have class until one-thirty but maybe I can duck out early...it's prac. stuff.” He looked down at his things, making sure he had everything he needed before he left for class. “Thanks,” he said then. He was looking at Leighton and looked surprised.
“Sure,” Leighton said, feeling surprised himself. He was pleased Alex had agreed. And the depth of how pleased he was surprised him in itself. I didn't know how much I wanted to talk to him, Leighton thought.
Alex was interesting. He was like nobody Leighton knew.
As Leighton left, he found himself wondering if Alex was non-conformist in every way—more specifically, if he had any interest in men. He had a suspi
cion that Alex was not straight...it was too early to tell, but he had certainly never seen him so much as look at a girl. But then again, he was very self-contained. Part of Leighton hoped he would one day find out. If nothing else, Alex and his nonconformity were encouraging him to explore who he truly was. And that was something he had not done for too long.
3
Alex
“Geoff?”
It was evening. Alex was sitting on his bed, reading his notes. He was having trouble. The basics of digital image processing was bothering him. They had been doing the course for just over a week, but he already felt left behind. It was all about signals and systems and stats and it was stuff he had never even heard of, much less expected to find lurking in his first course. He needed someone to refresh his mind.
Geoff will probably know about this, he thought happily. He is a nerd, after all.
Alex was surprised that he thought that fondly. He was not someone who was used to nerds: he certainly wasn't one, and at high-school he had been a loner, preferring the people he met out of school, in clubs or in night-spots, to the ones he met at school.
Geoff might be a nerd, Alex decided, but he's pretty cool, in a weird way. Geoff proudly wore shirts with the Periodic Table on them, had discussions about the Big Bang and spent his afternoons studying. He was unashamedly nerdy, and that had a kind of coolness Alex liked. And, he had to admit, the guy was not bad to look at either, with his lopsided smile and his pale eyes. And he was more built than he pretended, too, Alex thought, feeling a tingle of pleasure as he remembered Geoff's lean body without a shirt on.
Now, he stood and went over to where Geoff sat at his desk, writing carefully.
“Geoff,” he called, more loudly this time.
“Uh?” Geoff snapped round, looking surprised. “Oh, sorry Alex. I was thinking. Did you call me?”
College Threeway: A First Time Gay Romance (Bareback University) Page 1