by Neve Wilder
We sat at one of the tables scarfing sandwiches and talking randomly about classes and how we’d chosen the U in the first place (me: scholarship, strong Greek presence. Him: the caliber of the structural engineering program). It struck me as odd that we’d never really hung out before, that I’d hardly paid him any attention at all when he’d moved in, and now I couldn’t stop seeing him. He wasn’t a huge talker, and really neither was I, but he was cool. Laconic and funny in a dry way that I found really fucking sexy. Most of the girls I’d dated were cute. Like that was their trademark. Cute little nose wrinkles. Giggles. Sassy smacks. Of course there were other girls out there who didn’t do those things, but I mostly seemed to gravitate toward and attract cute. Eric was about as far from cute as a person could get.
“So did you, like, come out as bi? Do people do that?” I asked, poking through my chips.
Eric chuckled and set down his sandwich, then swiped his palms over his thighs. “I told my mom and stepdad, yeah, when I was seventeen, I think. My friends already knew.”
“How?”
“How?” He tilted his head at me, a smile ghosting over his lips. “Probably because I was seeing both a guy and a girl at the time.”
“Like, all together?”
Eric shook his head. “Separate. They both knew about each other, though. They were cool with it.”
“Jesus. Your friends must’ve been way kinkier than mine. That shit wouldn’t have flown.”
“Lack of high school hallways cut down on the bullshit social politics some. But the people who mattered didn’t give a shit, you know?”
I didn’t. I wasn’t sure if I knew anyone who wouldn’t care about that. But maybe I was wrong.
“How’d you know I was…” I paused. What the fuck was I? I was bi, I guess, by default. “How’d you know I’d be down to…”
He shrugged. “I didn’t. Not for sure. I guess it was the way you looked at me in the kitchen that morning after I busted in on you.”
“Like I was completely embarrassed?”
His gaze flickered up to meet mine. “No. Like you were curious and didn’t want to be.”
“Seems kinda risky, though, doesn’t it?”
“With great risk comes great reward,” he teased. “Isn’t that the saying?”
“So I’m something like a blue-ribbon prize, then, right? The jock who switches teams. Or plays both fields?” I meant it as a joke, but Eric’s expression became guarded.
“Maybe you’re still a risk.”
“Then maybe you should keep your eye on the prize.”
“Maybe.” He balled up his sandwich wrapper and tossed it on the tray along with mine as I stood and picked it up.
Outside, I stuffed my hands in my hoodie as we trudged toward home.
“You going home for Thanksgiving, I guess?”
“Yep.” I peered at him sidelong for the question. “You?”
“Not sure. Depends on where my mom will be. She doesn’t know yet.”
“You could come home with me if you don’t have anywhere else to go. It’s only an hour away.” I said it off the cuff, but damn how the idea bloomed inside me: having days and days of just Eric outside of our crowded house, outside of the frat and homework. I bit the inside of my cheek, nearly drawing blood, because…what the fuck was I thinking? This was dangerously close to a…I mean, hadn’t I just put the total kibosh on going home with Ashley months before? And now I was seriously inviting Eric home with me?
Eric turned his head to look me over. “Thanks, but I’m good. Also, if you’re gonna give an invitation, it’s usually better received if you’re not glaring when you give it. Pro tip for the future.” He laughed, seeming unperturbed.
Was I glaring? Yeah, the tightness of my forehead said I was. “I wasn’t meaning to. Just thinking is all.”
“Overanalyzing. Don’t, though. Even if it’s sexy as hell watching how it makes the muscles on your jaw flutter.”
He widened his eyes and waggled his brows at me suggestively.
I trailed up our front steps after him and sent a kick into his ass as he flung the front door open. He tripped over the stoop and shot a look back at me. When I gave him an innocent grin, he bared his teeth.
Jesse lifted his hand in a lazy wave from the couch as we entered. Mark rose slowly from the lounger nearby, fixing us both with a glower that had my smile sliding from my face like sludge down a window. I’d never seen him so angry. My skin prickled, some kind of prescient sensation making my stomach drop.
“You missed chapter,” he said. “Again.”
“Got caught up at the gym.” I tried to keep it light, but Mark wasn’t having it.
“We need to talk.”
“All right, so talk.” I dropped my bag by the couch and folded my arms over my chest, instantly defensive.
Eric shot a quick look at me as Mark shook his head. “Not here.” He thumbed over his shoulder toward the kitchen.
Jesse glanced up from his controller in surprise, looking between the three of us curiously, but kept quiet. I shrugged one shoulder at him as if to say, who knows?
“You too,” Mark said to Eric.
Oh fuck. Ohhhh fuck. I felt the color draining from my face, my limbs growing heavy as Mark led the way through the kitchen and out the back door, me trailing behind Eric, who twisted a hawk-eyed look over his shoulder at me before catching the door in his hand and holding it open for me.
Outside, Eric folded his arms over his chest, staring down Mark, who waited for the door to close before turning to me and speaking. “What you missed in chapter was that the director of Merriweather Gardens called this morning, mad as hell about two guys sneaking behind the ropes into their fucking offices. What the fuck, dude? They got both of you on camera, and they want money for the cleanup and damage to the office.”
I tried to speak and couldn’t. My heart had left my chest and was now trying to beat its way out of my throat. I was certain Mark would see it throbbing there. I sucked in a breath and tried again. Fuck, I was in no way ready for this, but what the hell else was I going to do? I’d been a willing participant. “It’s load of bullshit, the damage part. We were…we were—there are cameras in the offices?”
Mark glared at me. “They saw you on the hallway cams, but it was obviously you two. He shared the screencaps with us.”
Eric cut a swift look aside to me before taking over. “We were just doing some blow, for fuck’s sake. And you can leave Nate out of it because it was my idea anyway. They want some money, what the fuck ever. I’ll pay it.”
“‘Just doing some blow’ in the executive’s office? Jesus Christ, couldn’t you have just gone to the fucking bathroom and snorted lines in a stall like every-fucking-one else? Is this what the hell has been wrong with you lately, dude?” Mark narrowed his eyes at me. “Please don’t be another Cam Jeffers, man—I don’t want to see you kicked out or in rehab.”
“I’m not a coke addict, you dick. I’ll pay the bill. It’s fine.” I dragged my hands down my cheeks and chuckled, a little hysterical. It definitely wasn’t funny, but fuck, there was an absurdist catch-22 factor involved. I’d just been standing there about to out myself. Completely unready to do so since I had no idea what was going on between me and Eric and I still wasn’t entirely sure where I stood on the whole issue of my sexuality. Mostly I felt like I was sliding around on some slippery surface I’d spent years convinced was solid ground. But maybe it was time to have that conversation with Eric. And sooner rather than later.
Mark glared at me. “Yeah? I’m glad you find this funny. The guy who called? He was talking about pressing charges.”
“Stop.” Eric’s voice was quiet but firm. “Nate…” I didn’t miss the warning tone in the way he said my name, but he trailed off and leveled his gaze back on Mark. “I already told you it was my idea. I’m the one who went up there first. It was my coke. I’ll pay for the damage, like I already said, and if they want to charge anyone, they’ll charge me. Can we ca
ll this fucking done, now? I’ve got a paper due tomorrow.”
Mark looked between us, his brows tightly knit and a scowl on his face as he wet his lower lip. His gaze lingered on me the longest, and I felt it like a punch in the gut. Guilt sprang up in me at the faint note of sadness I thought I detected behind the anger in his eyes. Had we really grown apart that fast?
“Yeah,” he said finally. “It’s done. Just make sure you get your fucking story straight in case you need it, because both of you are fucking standing in front of me lying, and I don’t know what you’re hiding, but Nate, if it’s…” He clenched his fists and shook his head. “Just figure your shit out. And I swear to God if you’re becoming a Cam, I’ll kick your ass.”
Cam had been in our pledge class, and he and Mark had been really tight. But not tight enough that he’d known about the drug habit Cam had formed. None of us had. He’d kept it completely under wraps until Mark was the one to discover him OD’d in his room at the frat house. It’d fucked with all of us, but Mark most of all. Cam’s parents had come and whisked him away like he’d never been there at all. No one had heard from him since. Not even Mark, I didn’t think.
Mark stormed back inside, letting the door slam behind him. Eric pinched the bridge of his nose, then turned and brushed past me on the way to the door before I caught him by the arm and yanked him back. “What the fuck was that?”
“Me saving your ass? Or did that not come through clearly?”
I gritted my teeth. “Don’t ever fucking speak for me again. You want to order me around while we’re messing around, fine, but don’t mistake that for permission to act on my behalf. I don’t need a savior.”
“Yeah? Were you getting ready to tell him how far I had my dick up your ass an hour ago?”
“I was…” I faltered. “I don’t know. Yeah, maybe?” The uncertainty bled out in my tone. Because I wasn’t fucking ready. I wasn’t ready to say shit to anyone, and I liked what Eric and I had going on just the way it was.
“Yeah, that sounds about right.” An arctic chill fell over his features, and he rocked a step back, looking up at the sky and drawing a breath that he let out slowly. “And you think the school will want to keep paying your scholarship if you get charged with something, huh?”
I felt the air sail from my chest all at once. My scholarship should have been the first thing I thought of. Instead it’d been Eric.
“That’s what I thought,” he said softly, taking my hesitation as an answer.
I leaned back against the side of the house, a million thoughts reeling through my head. “This is…this is…” I wasn’t sure how to fill in the gap. Something was fucking wrong with me. I was being cavalier, skipping out on duties to my fraternity, putting my scholarship in jeopardy. For what? But as I lifted my gaze to meet Eric’s, I knew.
I knew.
And I needed to tell him. Even if he didn’t want to hear it.
But his next words caught me in my side like a thousand fishhooks and dragged across my chest.
“This is sideways, that’s what. And it stops now,” he said evenly.
I straightened abruptly from my lean. “What the fuck does that mean?”
“Exactly what you think it does.”
“You’re just going to make that decision for us?”
“There is no us. There’s never been an us.”
“That’s bullshit and you know it.” There might not have been an “us” in technical terms, but the way we’d been last night and today, that we’d planned on hanging out again tonight…that was more than fucking nothing.
Eric gave a sharp shake of his head. “There’s you and there’s me, and as it turns out, maybe I’m not as comfortable putting you at risk as I thought I was.”
“So that’s it, then, easy as that? You’re not comfortable ‘putting me at risk’? What a load of horseshit, dude.” I had to laugh at his audacity, but it was a laugh that came out serrated with my bitterness at how he could turn on a dime.
I felt my molars grinding with the intensity of my stare. Eric didn’t say anything, just maintained that impassive fucking fortress of an expression, but I didn’t buy it, and instead found the whole situation maddening beyond belief. Every muscle in my body felt taut, coiled for release, begging for it. And this time not for what Eric could give me. I’d gotten in a few scuffles before. Mostly on the field in football or drunk at bars, but never in my life had I wanted to hit someone as badly as I did at that moment. And for as shitty as I felt about that, I think mostly I was driven by the desire to force a break in that walled-off gaze he’d aimed at me.
“Do it if it’ll make you feel better.” There was nothing in his tone that was cajoling or challenging. It wasn’t a taunt, just plain-spoken acceptance. The words held the same passivity written over his face.
I let out a sound of exasperation and gave up. “Fuck you, Eric, you obstinate dick.”
He turned away to walk back inside the house, leaving me out on the porch.
How did he fucking do that? How’d he just stand there and turn it off like that? Unbelievable.
I dropped down onto the stoop and stared out into the alley beyond our yard, trying to think logically. What had I expected anyway? It’d been about fooling around from the get-go. And what Eric had said made sense: I was risking some shit with our antics that maybe I shouldn’t be, considering my position. But shit, I craved it now, and I really wanted to make that all his fault instead of my own. But it wasn’t. Not really.
Maybe it was for the best. It’d begun as an experiment, and hadn’t we done enough that I should have the conclusion blazoned on my brain undoubtedly? I liked dick. Or, at the least, I liked some dick. Now I knew for sure and could move on.
It was just fooling around.
I said it over and over again to myself, but the words refused to sink in; they just sat on the surface of my brain with nowhere to go because all the dark recesses of me were already filled with him.
Ansel was slicing plastic wrap from a pizza when I came back inside while Jesse stood at the stove, twisting the knob to set the oven timer.
Ansel glanced up at me. “Want some? It’s meat lovers.”
Fucking perfect.
“Maybe, I dunno. I ate a late lunch,” I answered vaguely, aware that Jesse was staring at me.
“Everything cool?” he asked. “Mark seemed pretty pissed.”
I hedged before sighing and giving in. “Eric and I were doing some blow at the fund-raiser thing last night. In one of the offices. They found out and were pissed. Called the frat. Want money for some bullshit damages that didn’t happen.” At least I didn’t think they had. Now that I had more time to think about it, I wasn’t sure. I guess we could’ve scratched the desk or something, but it wasn’t like we’d broken anything.
Jesse’s brows bunched up in a fierce furrow as he leaned back against the stove, still staring. “You…were doing blow with Eric. You do coke?”
“Not often, Jesus, but yeah, sometimes. I was fucking bored.” I needed to get out of there. I hated fucking lying, and yet lying was all I seemed to be doing lately. Jesse’s gaze bored into me like I was a goddamn alien with two heads. I noticed that his disbelief was weighted heavily on me, not Eric, which made me kinda wonder… What the fuck ever. That wasn’t the point. None of this was.
I reached into the fridge for a beer and took it with me, calling over my shoulder, “Never mind about the pizza. I’ll probably grab something out.” I had no desire to sit around with Jesse and Ansel if Jesse was going to keep looking at me like that.
I cracked the beer on the stairs, had guzzled half by the time I got into my room, and spent the next half hour staring uncomprehendingly at my philosophy homework, not in the mood to get fucking ponderous about esoteric shit when I couldn’t even logic my way out of a simple cause-and-effect problem. So when Mark texted me, I was glad for the distraction.
Mark: Bunch of the guys are on way to Pfeiffer’s
Mark: Strongly
suggest you make an appearance
I showered and shaved, avoiding glancing at Eric’s stuff because it made me think about how I’d been ready to stick my nose in his toiletry kit a month back. Lame.
I didn’t knock when I stood in front of his door, just turned the knob like I had the night before and let myself in. Eric sat propped up on his bedspread, the lamp on his nightstand on, a textbook open and resting on the tops of his thighs. I shut the door quietly behind me and leaned against it with my hands behind my back, palms pressing into the cool wood surface. My gaze traveled the room, making a stop at those bridges he’d built, drawn again to the precision and finesse of the construction. On one wall, he had a framed poster of Dali with his famously askew mustache. Atop the dresser were a couple of framed photographs of his family I’d never paid attention to before. Him with his mom and stepdad. And another, him with a man I guessed was his dad. Both of them smiling the same smile, Eric’s chin tipped up as he squinted against the sunlight that fell across them.
I thought I’d come in here with more to say, but as I looked back to Eric, his gaze unwavering upon me, I no longer knew what it was. My whole body felt fatigued, as if with muscle exhaustion, like I’d gone too hard in the gym or I was coming down with the flu. It wasn’t either of those things, but maybe I could pretend for a while.
“You’ll get over it,” he said, surprising me that he’d spoken at all.
I sucked at my lower lip and nodded as I lied again. “Yeah, probably so. But will you?”
It was a shot in the dark, because with Eric, for every certainty I felt about him, a hundred other doubts popped up. He shifted constantly, even in my own mind, and maybe I just didn’t have enough experience to pinpoint the dynamics the way a guy like him could, no landmarks I could rely on. But a flicker of regret passed through his eyes. Or maybe it was hurt.
Whichever it was was enough.
I didn’t wait for an answer that wouldn’t come, but turned and walked out.