by Beth Bolden
“You know I did too,” Colin said softly.
Nick raised his eyes towards Colin’s. He swore he saw the moment Nick decided to stop fighting the chemistry between them. Colin hadn’t been sure why he was, but all he cared about in that moment was that he’d stopped. Colin took a step closer. Nick tilted his head and Colin’s hand gently cupped his waist.
The air was cool for Florida, but it felt thick and muggy between them, like Colin was trying to paddle through it. He moved slowly, making sure Nick was a hundred percent with him. He closed his eyes at the last moment, and leaned the last bit of distance. Their lips brushed, softly, chastely.
“I’ve wanted to do that since the first time I saw you,” Nick confessed when they broke apart. Colin’s lips felt swollen and sensitive, like they’d been stung by a bee. He wanted more – as much as Nick would give him.
“For me, it was the conference call. You looked so annoyed that I’d forgotten who you were,” Colin admitted. “And so hot.”
Nick looked smug. “Do I still need to remind you who I am?”
Colin’s arms tightened around Nick’s waist and back, his fingers tracing the supple strength of his muscles. “No,” he said simply, and leaned in again, kissing him more firmly and with a lot more confidence. Nick’s fingers circled his collar and swept into his hair, digging into his scalp, pulling him tighter against him.
They kissed for a long, drawn-out minute. It was softer and sweeter than Colin had imagined it might be, more achingly vulnerable than he’d dreamt. There were glimmers of heat, tiny nibbles on Colin’s bottom lip, Colin’s tongue teasing Nick’s lips.
Colin could have deepened the kiss, but Nick seemed okay with how it was, and Colin, who’d never felt his lack of experience so keenly, didn’t push any harder or faster.
“God, you’re gorgeous,” Colin said when they finally broke apart and Nick’s eyes fluttered open. He’d thought it so many times since they’d met, and he’d stifled it every single time. Suddenly it seemed very important to finally say out loud.
Nick laughed, and he sounded happier and freer than Colin could remember. “Okay, Dr. Model."
Nick woke again with a pounding heart, a damp hairline, and that all-too-familiar, dank, foreboding sweeping through his whole body in nauseating waves.
Rolling over, he stared up at the dark ceiling and tried to catch his breath. He rarely had the nightmares two nights in a row, but since coming to Florida, he’d had them several times in a week. So much for the object of his affection magically curing him.
He could stay in bed, or he could venture downstairs again and risk having Colin discover that the nightmares were more serious than he’d let on.
Reaching over for his phone, he held it in his hand, debating for a long moment. He could call Mary. But she’d said, if you don’t feel like you have anyone else to talk to. And he still had people he could reach out to. Calling Mary felt like admitting he was out of options, that he had let the nightmares own him, instead of the other way around.
Nick unlocked his phone and quickly typed out a text to Jemma. It was still fairly early on the west coast; she might still be awake. And bonus, she was the only one at Five Points who knew he was still dreaming about Rio.
He lay there for a few minutes, anticipating her answer, and trying to decide what he could do to distract himself if she didn’t respond. He could still theoretically go downstairs. He’d just have to be extra quiet. He was trying to decide when there was a soft tap on his door.
Nick glanced over at his dark phone in betrayal. “She didn’t, she wouldn’t,” he muttered, as he swung his feet out of bed and threw a shirt on. He pulled the door open and wasn’t surprised at all to see Colin standing there, looking sheepish.
“Sorry,” he said. “But Jemma said...”
Nick was really going to want to know what Jemma said at some point, but right now there were more important things to discuss. Like reassuring Colin that he wasn’t a complete fucking mess who needed his hand held through the night.
“I’m fine,” Nick snapped.
Colin reached out and brushed his hand hesitantly over his brow, no doubt feeling the sweat along his hairline. “You don’t have to be fine.”
He shouldn’t have, but he sort of sagged into Colin’s touch. Colin must have expected it, because he didn’t shift at all, just took his weight and held him up, firm and unmovable. Colin’s other hand smoothed down his back in reassuring strokes.
“I’m sorry,” Nick huffed out breathlessly, stuck between extreme embarrassment that Colin was seeing him like this, and intense relief that he wouldn’t have to figure out how to tell him. Because at some point, it was sort of inevitable that they’d end up sharing a bed and Nick already had Colin pegged as a cuddler.
Colin pulled back a fraction but didn’t move his hands, one cradling his back, the other his cheek. “Don’t be,” he insisted.
But they couldn’t stay in this doorway forever, and Nick refused to invite Colin to his bed for the first time when he was a fucking wreck over a nightmare, so he said, “Can we go downstairs? Being outside, that helped.”
Nick could feel Colin’s smile, even in the darkness. Somehow, he’d become so attuned to him, he could picture every miniscule adjustment to his expressions. The days of the cardboard cutout felt very far away.
“I’ve got something even better that I think you’ll like,” Colin said, and proceeded to pull him even tighter against him, supporting nearly all of his weight. Nick nearly argued that he wasn’t an invalid, thank you very much, but then as he put up a hand to Colin’s back to steady himself, he realized that Colin wasn’t wearing a shirt. And the truth was, he was absolutely willing to look a little weaker if he could keep touching all this gorgeous skin.
It wasn’t something to be proud of, but Nick couldn’t work up even a smidgen of shame.
Colin took them down the hall to his own room, and Nick was just about to protest when they passed the bed right by. Lifting his hand off Nick’s back, he pulled open one of the large sliding doors that led to the upstairs terrace and ushered them outside.
The edge of the terrace was glassed in, and Nick gently pulled away and grasped the glass railing. One breath, then another, and his lungs were nearly working normally.
“I feel stupid asking this,” Colin said, “but I feel like I have to. Are you really sure you’re okay?”
Nick glanced over wryly to where Colin had come to stand next to him. “If I said yes, would you believe me?”
“Probably not.”
“But you’re still asking.”
Colin huffed in frustration. Nick wanted to reach up and smooth out the wrinkle between his brows. He didn’t, because he was still a little afraid of what might happen if they kept touching. His foundations had rocked at their kiss earlier tonight, and they still hadn’t settled. Nick wasn’t sure they ever would –or if he really wanted them to.
“All right,” Colin finally said, plopping down on a chair, and swinging his feet over the side. Nick glanced back and saw he was staring at him steadily, a determined look on his face. “If what it takes for you to share is for me to share first, I’d be happy to tell you everything you want to know.”
Nick couldn’t help the tension that suddenly ratcheted through him. He wasn’t doing this to get a good story out of Colin. Not even to get the truth out of Colin. He opened his mouth to protest, but Colin started talking anyway and didn’t seem particularly interested in stopping.
“When I was thirteen, one of my friend’s older brothers came home from college, and liked to walk around without a shirt on, probably stupidly trying to get a tan in Alaska. In Alaska. But that was enough to finally make me acknowledge what I’d tried to ignore for years – that I probably wasn’t normal. I didn’t really like girls. I felt drawn to boys instead. And then the next year, the little brother hit a growth spurt and I decided he was just as cute. Maybe cuter.”
“Colin…” Nick interrupted, pained and
struggling.
“Shut up,” Colin insisted calmly. “I want to tell you this. I should have told you this probably a long-ass time ago, I just didn’t. Which was dumb. So, I’m going to tell you now. And when I’m done you can either tell me about Rio, or not. It’s your choice.”
Nick gripped the edge of the glass, but the smooth finish refused to bite harder into his palms. He might have even welcomed the pain; that thought scared him. “Okay.”
“Anyway, the little brother. His name was Dylan. He played football with me, and it didn’t take very long for me to figure out that he was staring at the floor, too, when we were in the locker room.” Colin paused, and Nick could feel the bitterness in the air. It scorched his tongue as he breathed it in, remembering his own years growing up gay and terrified. “Dylan,” Colin finally continued softly, “he knew but he…well…he hadn’t quite come to grips with it yet. I think, I do think he liked me. The way I liked him. We kissed a few times. Enough for me to know, a hundred percent for sure. But by our sophomore year, I was being recruited by colleges, and so was he, and he told me we had to quit. Nobody could find out.”
Nick wanted to cry at the crack in Colin’s voice, but he swallowed hard. If Colin could tell him this story, then he could listen.
“So for the next two years, I focused on football. I decided to go to Oregon. I couldn’t bring myself to go so far from home, even though everyone thought I should go to an SEC school.”
Nick remembered those conversations. He’d already been on the sports journalism track in school, and a lot of people had been surprised by where Colin O’Connor had declared. But Nick really hadn’t been. Why would a born and raised Alaska boy want to go to Alabama or Florida or Texas? He’d want somewhere familiar.
“I went to college believing with as much certainty that you ever have about these things that I was gay. I’d never really been attracted to a woman before. Then my first college class, I walked in, and Jemma smiled at me. And suddenly, that wasn’t true anymore.”
He’d known. Nick told himself he’d guessed and that he’d practically known, but it still felt like a shock to hear Colin confess that he’d been in love with Jemma.
“Of course,” Colin said wryly, “she wasn’t interested in me that way. Ironic, that. We became friends instead. But that was when I really began to understand what being bisexual meant. It’s mostly theoretical, but I’m pretty sure I’m mostly into men. Occasionally into women.” He took a deep breath. “And now you know everything. Though I’m sure some of it you already knew.”
“I suspected about Jemma,” Nick confessed. “Not at first. But when she came back from Rio, after meeting Gabe, a lot of things made sense.”
“You don’t…I don’t know…think less of me for loving her?”
Nick’s head snapped towards Colin. “No, never. I don’t care if you like women, too. That doesn’t bother me. If I liked women, I’d probably be into Jemma, too, and then we’d both be fucked, because she’s in love with Gabriel.”
Colin laughed, a painfully dry chuckle. “I’m not in love with Jemma anymore. In case you were wondering.”
“I wasn’t.” Nick walked over and leaned over where Colin was sitting. He brushed a kiss on the crown on his head.
“Good.” Colin tipped his head back and their lips met again, soft and gentle. Innocent almost, even though Nick knew his own feelings didn’t really strike him as particularly innocent.
Though with Colin’s story of his romantic relationships, maybe that made a little more sense.
Nick pulled back and knew it was his turn to share, even if his own story was more embarrassing than anything else.
“I would tell you about Rio, but there honestly isn’t much to tell. I was dumb. I did something people told me not to do – repeatedly. Jemma, especially, will probably tell you that if you ever bring it up. But I thought I was bigger and stronger and invincible, I guess. I never thought something bad might happen. Not to me. I remember the flash of the knife. I remember a lot of blood. I remember Gabe’s face over mine in the hospital. I don’t remember much else. I don’t like telling the story because it’s not very special or heroic. Some stupid white person being stupid. That’s all. My therapist tells me the dreams will fade in time, and they have, sort of.”
“Doesn’t seem that way,” Colin said reproachfully.
Nick shrugged. “For some reason, you mess me up. And maybe all that...” Nick flapped his arms, “churning, I guess, brings it back up. I hadn’t had one in months before I came here.”
“I’m sorry.” Colin sounded so perfectly apologetic, Nick wanted to slap him.
“Don’t be sorry. It’s a good sort of churning, the dreams notwithstanding.”
Colin gazed up at him with a bright grin. “For me, too.”
Nick leaned in and kissed him again, a little hotter, a little firmer this time, slipping his tongue against Colin’s bottom lip with more insistent determination.
It wasn’t until he sensed Colin’s hesitation that what had been flirting around the edges of his brain hit Nick straight on in the face.
Colin had mentioned only two romantic interests: Dylan, who practically nothing had happened with, and then Jemma, who nothing had happened with.
“Wait,” Nick gasped, breath suddenly uneven. “I mean, there were others, right? You went and experimented and you didn’t...wait did you? For Jemma?”
Of course Colin had waited for Jemma. As soon as the question was out of his mouth, Nick was embarrassed at how stupid it was. Like he hadn’t been paying attention at all. When he had, just not to the right things.
Colin sighed. “One of the first lessons I learned was people talk about athletes. Everyone wants to share every tiny thing they know. It makes them feel special, to know someone they think is special. It’s why I stopped telling people things. But to answer your question, no...I didn’t experiment. And I was in love with Jemma, of course I waited for her. Even after I knew she wouldn’t…I loved her. I didn’t want anyone else.”
“Oh, god,” Nick exhaled unsteadily, suddenly and inexplicably turned on by this new realization. “You’re a virgin.”
“Don’t say it like it’s a curse,” Colin said, embarrassment rife in his tone. “I have a little bit of experience.”
It wasn’t a curse, of course it wasn’t a curse. It was just…insanely, stupidly hot. Nick could barely wrap his exploding brain around the concept that he could be the first in every way it counted. Colin O’Connor, who everyone tried to get a piece of, but nobody ever had. And Colin wanted him, that much was clear, he just wasn’t sure how to go about it.
Nick knew exactly how to, in a lot of variations. He could teach Colin everything. It would probably ruin Nick for everyone else, but he wasn’t sure that hadn’t already happened.
Reaching down, he tangled his fingers in Colin’s. It was dark outside, the barest light illuminating Colin’s face, but there was a hopeful shine in his eyes, even in the shadow. “Would you like some more?”
Colin’s voice was soft like velvet. “With you?”
“Yes.”
Nick could barely breathe as Colin’s fingers shook a little against his. It took everything he had, but he didn’t open his mouth again, and instead let the silence spin out. He didn’t try to whip out a laundry list of reasons why he would be great at initiating Colin into the realm of sexual experience. He knew how aware Colin was of their chemistry together. They’d be good together, even if he didn’t know a thing. Which was probably one of the reasons why Colin had been flirting so diligently with him.
He’d wanted this, but he’d not known how to ask.
“I...” Colin stumbled, and it was one of the few times since Nick had met him that he seemed genuinely uncertain. “I...do...I just...”
“It’s okay,” Nick said, wrapping his arms around Colin’s broad shoulders and squeezing tight. “We can take it slow, I promise. There’s nothing to be nervous about.”
“Really?” Colin se
emed surprised and Nick rolled his eyes.
“Really. As slow as you want. But I draw the line at kissing. I’d like to kiss you. A lot more, if I’m being honest.”
Nick felt Colin’s smile bloom against his chest. “I’d like that,” he said, his voice muffled by the cotton of Nick’s t-shirt.
“We can even Netflix and chill, if you want,” Nick teased.
Colin let out a sound that sounded suspiciously like a giggle. It was endearing and adorable and Nick was gone on this man. Like possibly never recover from, shout to the heavens, dance down Main Street, gone.
“You realize I’m going to have to thank Jemma now,” Colin pointed out. “She told me to come find you.”
Nick had a feeling that Jemma’s motives were not as altruistic as Colin supposed. After all, it seemed she and Gabe had a bet going. He wondered if she’d won, and then realized that he didn’t give a shit. He was the real winner.
If Nick had expected things to change that night, they didn’t.
He and Colin continued to orbit each other, the circles getting smaller with the kiss and then Nick’s offer, but not merging completely.
They’d watched the sun rise, cuddled together on the lounger, but then Colin had gotten up and with only a lingering brush of his fingers on Nick’s shoulder, went to go work out. Nick wasn’t a masochist or a professional football player, and so he went back to bed. Alone.
Even though he was bone tired from two nights of interrupted sleep, he’d had trouble falling asleep. The offer he’d proposed to Colin had run through his head in all its variations, and finally he’d drifted off, but his sleep was unsettled.
He’d not woken ‘til noon, and stumbled downstairs to find Colin gone. “Meetings,” the note on the fridge read, “there’s food in me.”
Opening the fridge, Nick had foregone the sandwich fixings and had reheated leftover pizza instead. After a quick shower, he took his laptop outside, telling himself it was too nice of a day to stay inside.