Anna Martin's First Love Box Set: Signs - Bright Young Things - Five Times My Best Friend Kissed Me

by Anna Martin

  The picture showed Evan and his mom cheek to cheek, both with their lips puckered as they blew a kiss to the camera. He’d gone through three photo albums before he found it, the perfect image to recreate. The photographer, whoever she’d been, had zoomed in close enough that none of the background was visible. Just Evan, blond-haired and chubby cheeked, looking too much like his mother.

  It worked well in charcoals. Since he’d only brought the bare minimum in supplies home with him, it had to be charcoal and a page from his sketchpad.

  Working like this, sitting on the floor with his feet stretched out in front of him, had given Evan a crick in his back, and he reached up until he felt his spine pop. The mug of hot chocolate had grown cold at his hip, and he decided not to drink the thick, marshmallow-y mess.

  He checked his phone, noted that there wasn’t any message from Cael, and decided he wasn’t surprised. Cael’s family made more of a big deal of the holiday than Evan’s did. He’d spend far longer bouncing from one family party to another. It sounded nice, but Evan had grown to appreciate the calm quiet of Christmases at home with his mom.

  A key rattled in the front door, and Evan was halfway to his feet when he heard his mom call out.

  “Honey, can you come help with these groceries?”

  “Let me find shoes,” he called back, sliding the half-finished drawing under the couch where his mom wouldn’t see it.

  There were heavy boots next to the door, and he needed them. The snow had decided to fall in earnest now, covering the front yard in at least an inch of sparkling white.

  “You know the stores are only closed for one day, right?” he teased, hauling two bags into his arms and carefully making his way back to the house. “I don’t think we’re about to suffer a national shortage of canned pineapple.”

  “Shut up, Evan,” his mom grouched. “I need that for the ham.”

  Evan laughed, loving her, and went back for the last of the bags.

  By the time he got back to the kitchen, boots kicked off again, his mom was unpacking the bags and lining things up on the counter. Evan picked up a bottle of red wine and turned it over in his hand to read the back.

  “And you can put that down. Don’t think I don’t know how old you are, Evan King.”

  “I was just looking,” he said innocently. “Are you going to make mulled wine?”

  “I’m going to try to.”

  “Sounds good to me.”

  She stepped back, surveying the entirely full counter with hands braced on her hips.

  “Oh, shit.”

  “What?”

  “I forgot raisins.”

  “What the hell were you going to do with raisins?” Evan laughed.

  “Bake them into something? I don’t know. Stop sassing me.”

  Evan laughed harder and pulled her into a one-armed hug. “Love you, Mom.”

  “Love you too. Oh, I ran into Linda McCarren at the store. She asked if you were going to Katie’s party.”

  “Oh.”

  “Yeah, oh.” His mom started peeling off her outside layers, gloves and hat and scarf and jacket, then bundled them away in the hallway closet. “Why didn’t you mention it? You know I don’t mind if you go.”

  Evan sighed and set the wine back down on the counter, leaning back against it. “I don’t know.”

  “Is it because you’re worried about what people are going to say?”

  “No,” Evan said petulantly, looking at the scuffed linoleum floor.

  “Listen to me, Evan King.” This was her “scary mom” voice, the one Evan had been pretty terrified of most of his life. “These are your friends. Your friends. You don’t have to hide from them. They’re not going to care.”

  “But what if they do?”

  She marched over and pulled him into a ferocious hug. “Then call me, and I’ll come get you. No one is going to make my son feel unwelcome because of who he loves. You’re a wonderful, brave man. And you’re going to that party. You understand me?”

  “But—”

  “No buts.”

  “I came home to spend time with you,” he protested, making sure the words came out quick enough that she couldn’t argue. “Not to get home and immediately go out and spend time with other people.”

  “I’ve got you for all of Christmas,” she said and reached up to take his cheeks in her hands. “Go and see your friends. Scott will be there.”

  Evan gave a soft laugh and relented, knowing he wasn’t going to win this argument. “Okay.”

  “Good.”

  “Love you.”

  “Love you too. Wear that nice flannel shirt. The green one. It brings out your eyes.”

  “I have a boyfriend,” Evan said, teasing her.

  “That doesn’t mean you should stop making an effort.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Good boy. You can help me put all of this away.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  She went to swat him around the head for his sass, but Evan was expecting it and ducked out of the way, grabbing a tub of ice cream to take to the freezer.

  By seven, the snow had stopped falling, and most of what had stuck had turned to thick sludge. Evan hated driving when the roads were so slick, not that he had much of a choice. Katie’s parents lived on the other side of town, and there was no way Evan was going to cycle when it was so cold out.

  He’d dressed, as he’d been told to, in a long-sleeved white tee and his green flannel shirt, dark blue jeans and his boots, and had styled his hair so it fell back from his face. He wasn’t particularly fashionable, not like Scott, who always looked like he was ready to walk an MTV red carpet.

  Katie’s family owned a big, shiny new house that also looked like something that belonged on MTV. Evan had been here only once before, for the party she’d thrown after prom. The memories that alcohol hadn’t stolen from that night were a little patchy, though he still remembered where he needed to get to.

  From the outside, things were pretty quiet. A few cars were parked on the drive, several more lining the street, and apart from all the lights both inside and outside the house making it look lit up like a Christmas tree, things seemed calm.

  Of course, that changed once Evan got inside.

  Music was playing, not the obnoxious rotation of overly cheery seasonal pop hits he’d grown accustomed to, but the dirty hip-hop he only now remembered Katie loved. The family room looked packed, though a quick scan of the crowd didn’t reveal Katie’s familiar blonde head, so he went to the kitchen instead.

  “Evan!”

  He turned quickly, only just managing to catch the armful of girl.

  “Hi,” he laughed, hugging Katie tightly and breathing in her cinnamon-sweet smell. “How are you?”

  “Awesome. It’s good to see you.”

  “You too.”

  Katie slipped her hand in Evan’s and walked with him through to the kitchen.

  “You got half the neighborhood here?” he teased.

  Katie rolled her eyes. “I know. It’s mostly my brother’s friends, though. He’s back from college too, and apparently they’re doing the whole reunion thing.”

  “Is that not what we’re doing?”

  “Huh.” She stopped short. “I guess so.” After a second, she shrugged and tugged Evan’s hand to make him follow. “Most of us are downstairs. Andy is here. Did you see him yet?”

  “I only just arrived.”

  “Let me get you a drink.”

  “I’m driving,” Evan said, holding up both hands.

  Katie pouted. “One beer? Or someone made mulled cider if you’d prefer that.”

  “I’ll take a cider.”

  She poured him a glass of the rich, spicy hot cider that was being kept warm in a huge soup pot on the stove. Evan wrapped his hands around it, appreciating the warmth, then followed her downstairs.

  It was almost a relief to see a room full of people he knew.

  There was hugging and backslapping and a lot of lau
ghing, and Evan was forced to admit his mother had been right. These were his friends, and his sexuality apparently made no difference to them. It was a relief.

  Despite trying very hard not to look, Evan couldn’t help but notice Scott wasn’t in the basement room that Katie’s parents had turned into a cozy den. He tried not to hide his disappointment and took a seat on a low, squashy sofa, strangely pleased when Katie deposited herself on his lap. He accepted her with a laugh, wrapping his arm around her waist. It was different now he was out. There wasn’t the same pressure to act “straight” while trying not to lead girls on, just in case they got the wrong idea.

  About half an hour later, someone tapped Evan’s shoulder while he was refilling his glass of cider—that Katie had promised him wasn’t alcoholic. He turned sharply, then felt his face flush as he laughed.

  “Evan fucking King.”

  “Hey, Captain.”

  Evan set his glass down so he could accept Scott’s ferocious hug. His best friend was wearing a worn black leather jacket, which smelled of the cold, and a thick wool scarf around his neck. His cheeks were cold too, suggesting he’d only just arrived, and Evan settled into the hug. They weren’t likely to break it any time soon.

  “Fuck, I missed you,” Scott said. His voice sounded a little gruff.

  “I missed you too.” Evan pulled away first, immediately missing the warmth of Scott’s chest against his own. “How are you?”

  “Good, man. I just got here.”

  “Well yeah. I guessed that.”

  “Back in town, I meant,” Scott said with a laugh. “My mom isn’t expecting me until tomorrow, so she won’t be mad that I’m not at home.”

  “Jeez. Where have you been?”

  “Well, I spent the past couple of days driving back from fucking Wisconsin.”

  Evan gave a sympathetic wince. “Should have gone to ECU like some sensible people you know.”

  Scott just punched his arm.

  “Want a beer?” Evan offered.

  “Fuck, yeah.”

  He fixed both their drinks and led Scott back down to the basement. Evan couldn’t help but stare and feel more than a little possessive as his friends went through the same hug-and-back-slap routine Evan had experienced. After Scott finally shed his jacket and added it to the pile growing in a corner of the room, he took a seat next to Evan and clinked his beer bottle to Evan’s glass.

  “So. How the fuck have you been, man? You worked all fucking summer.”

  “Yeah.” He made the word an apology and winced. “Sorry. I needed the money.”

  Scott nodded. “I ended up working in a pizza joint on the boardwalk.”

  “Andy get you a job?”

  “Yes,” Scott laughed. “The tips were pretty good, though, even if I did go home every night feeling like I was covered in grease.”

  “Well, at least you weren’t covered in kids.”

  “You worked at a summer camp, right?”

  Evan nodded and took another sip of the cider. It was amazing. Katie had always been good at mixing drinks. “Yeah. Just outside Fredericksburg, way out in the middle of fucking nowhere. Like you said, though, it paid well, so I can’t complain.”

  Katie came over and plopped down on Scott’s lap. Evan had to bite back a grimace of jealousy, remembering vividly the last time he’d seen the two of them together like this. The fact that Katie seemed to like sitting on other people’s laps didn’t matter.

  Whatever.

  “What were you doing at camp?” she asked. Her lips were painted dark red for the holidays, matching her nails and the turtleneck she was wearing over a short black skirt. “Just herding kids, or….”

  “No, I got a job as an art teacher,” Evan said. “It was all right, actually. You remember Ms. Martinez? She recommended me.”

  “Oh, awesome,” Katie said.

  It had been, Evan supposed. They’d given him his own classroom that looked out over the lake, plus a seemingly endless supply of art materials. The camp’s administration was fairly laid-back, so he could set his own curriculum for the summer. The younger kids went home with macaroni landscapes and pinecone mobiles, the older kids with their first attempts at painting landscapes.

  Evan had time in between his classes to work on his portfolio, concentrating on capturing the fine expanse of nature around him. He would always be more comfortable with abstract work, or portraits if he was going for realism, but the opportunity to capture some of his home state had been too good to miss.

  “I think I’d take kids over another year at the pizza place,” Scott mused.

  “You say that now. The reality is far different to what you’re thinking.”

  “Oh?”

  Evan rolled his eyes. “I had groups of up to twenty kids that I was supervising on my own. The time they spent with me was time their regular counselors got to nap. Or call home, whatever. It was their downtime. So I didn’t have any help. There’s always a few kids who don’t want to do whatever I set them. Then there’s the overachievers who are frustrated they can’t draw like fucking Da Vinci when they’ve never put in any effort to being good, and my personal favorite—the ones you have to watch carefully because otherwise you’ll find them in the corner eating paste.”

  Scott threw his head back and laughed. “Shit, man. How long were you there?”

  “Ten weeks!”

  “Wow,” Katie said sympathetically.

  “Yeah. It was fine, though, I suppose.”

  “Are you going to do it again next summer?”

  Evan nodded. “They’ve already asked me to go back. I probably will. They pay really well. I work on the weekends teaching a few watercolor classes at a seniors’ center close to campus. Both jobs combined should keep me out of having to work retail or in fast food for the rest of my college career.”

  “Damn,” Scott said. “Wish I could do that.”

  “Your parents are paying your way through your whole degree, asshole,” Evan said, punching him in the arm.

  “Yeah, but I still don’t know what I actually want to do with my life.”

  “You’ll figure it out,” Katie told him. “At least you know now what you don’t want to do, right, Evan?”

  “It’s such a shame,” Evan said, mocking him. “You had such a glittering career as a pizza delivery boy ahead of you.”

  “You’re such a dick.”

  “Douche.”

  It was like no time at all had passed.

  After a couple of hours, the party downstairs started to gravitate up. Scott’s former football teammates seemed very interested in Katie’s brother’s female friends, and the girls, for their part, seemed fairly interested in Katie’s brother. It was a win-win situation.

  In a bigger crowd of people, especially ones he didn’t know, Evan felt himself closing in again. He was a little tired, it was getting late, and his instinct was to lope off without anyone noticing. But Scott was there.

  “Hey,” Scott said, leaning in to murmur close to Evan’s ear. “I’ve got some weed. You want to smoke? I already checked with Katie, and she said it was fine, just to take it back downstairs and crack a window.”

  Evan snorted. “Okay. Sure.”

  It was far more comforting to be back in the gloomy coziness of the basement. The open window let in a curl of cold air that cut invitingly through the muggy heat of the room. It took a few minutes for Scott to assemble the joint. Evan walked around the room, looking at the various family photos that hung on the walls. Apparently this was where Katie’s parents hid all the annual school pictures of their kids. He rounded back to the couch when Scott lit the joint.

  “So,” Scott said, leaning back on a sofa and kicking his feet up onto the table in front of them. “What have you been up to this year? I heard you came out.”

  Evan huffed a humorless laugh. “Yeah.”

  “You could have told me first.”

  “What…. What?”

  “You heard me,” Scott said. He looked ove
r, and Evan’s stomach twisted at the hurt expression on his face. “It would have been nice to hear it from you, rather than my mom.”

  “Scott… we kissed. I kissed you. I thought you knew.”

  “No.” Scott took another long drag on the blunt. “I kissed you. Then you ran away.”

  “I walked back into the house to see you making out with Katie fucking McCarren,” Evan said, the words bursting out of him like they’d been contained for too long. They probably had.

  “That definitely didn’t happen.”

  “It fucking did,” Evan said. He shifted on the couch so he could look over at Scott properly. “I went and got water. Then you were in your family room with her on your lap.”

  “Jesus,” Scott said with a sigh. “I barely remember that.”

  “Yeah, well.” Evan sighed as he slumped back in his chair. “That was a long time ago now.”

  “She was asking me if there was anywhere she could go hook up with someone,” Scott said. He looked up at the low ceiling. “I told her to take Tom’s room, since I was pretty sure you weren’t going to be sleeping in there. I didn’t tell her that. I just told her to take the room.”

  “You were…. What were you thinking?”

  “I dunno.” Scott shrugged. “I just wanted to find some space with you. Where we weren’t likely to get walked in on. Then I spent thirty minutes tearing my fucking house apart trying to find you before someone said you’d left. I thought I’d fucked it all up. Our friendship, everything. Then when we saw each other at school, it was like nothing happened.”

  “We were stupid.”

  “Yeah. Anyway. Long time ago.”

  “Yeah,” Evan said, thinking maybe it wasn’t so long ago after all.

  “So, you seeing anyone?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Really?”

  “Yep.” Evan took the blunt as Scott passed it over and inhaled deeply. “His name’s Cael. He’s a second year at ECU.”

  “Oh. What’s he like?”

  Evan wriggled to get his phone out of the back pocket of his jeans, flipped it open, then pulled up a picture of the two of them together.