Date: Sun, 20 Mar 2022 09:24:17 -0700
From: Jonothan Wolf <jwolf24450@gmail.com>
Subject: English Year Chapter 30

**Standard disclaimer applies. This is based on actual events, although
names, places, and descriptions have changed to protect the identities of
the living. Don't read if you shouldn't because you're under 18 or live in
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My mind went blank as I wrapped my arm around Nick's neck, and pulled
him into my bedroom. I pulled my door shut behind us, and in a moment of
pure instinct, I pushed Nick against my door, kissed him as hard as I
could, and pressed my body against his.

I heard him moan as I felt his entire body vibrate against mine, the two
of us driving each other crazy as we continued drawing ourselves closer
and closer together.

"Ouch," he said softly, pushing me back. I stopped suddenly, hesitated,
and looked him in the eye.

"Doorknob," he smiled, clutching his back. I smiled back at him, and as
he lifted his arms, I reached for the bottom of his green elf tunic.

The reveal of Nick Person's chiseled body was halted when his one size
too small tunic got caught in his own elbow. I had to turn Nick all the
way around in order to twist the fabric out of his arms before he turned
to face me. He had a grin on his face that made the effort instantly
worth it.

"Okay," I sighed, winded by the exercise involved in undressing what
had to be Santa's sexiest elf.

I took a moment to survey what stood before me. Nick Person's body was
ridiculously chiseled; that was an undisputed fact. His stomach was
completely flat with four small abs ridging through, all culminating in
the classic runner's V that led down to his torso. I took a step towards
Nick, draped my arm around his shoulder, and traced one hand down the
side of his body.

And that's when he giggled.

"What's wrong?" I asked, taking a step back.

"Nothing, I'm just... I'm extremely ticklish right there I guess. I
just..." he laughed again. I watched his face contort as he bent over
laughing, apparently from the ghost of where my hand had massaged him
earlier. "I'm sorry. Okay.... I'm sorry."

He shook his head, shaking the fit of laughter out of himself, and as he
stood tall to face me, I took another moment to eye him up and down.

Even in those ridiculous green tights he'd worn for his costume, Nick
was a sight to see. Part of me couldn't wait to ravage his perfect body,
while another part of me didn't want to even start. It was like looking
at a plate of food at a 5-star restaurant... where to even begin?

"Where were we?" Nick whispered sexily, stepping towards me, slowly
lowering his lips to meet my lips. And that's when I felt his foot come
down on top of mine.

"Oh fuck," I shouted, jumping back and grabbing my foot. I hopped
twice, and could feel myself losing balance before Nick caught me.

"Are you okay?" he asked with the concern of someone who knew he was
fucking things up. I bit my bottom lip to stop from crying out again, and
instead lowered my leg to the ground and turned to face Nick. I tilted my
head as I tried to ignore the shooting pain in the top of my foot.

"We're sucking at this," I observed. Nick smiled. If I thought that I
was going to get rid of him by giving up that easy, I was completely
wrong. He took a step towards me and slowly began unbuttoning my shirt.

His eyes penetrated me, not letting my gaze go as they did, and in that
moment, I felt like everything would be okay.

"Are we the kind of guys that let a little mishap slow us down?" Nick
asked, his voice low and sultry. Every ounce of his West Virginia slur
came through when he was trying to be sexy, and I can't think of a sound
that's ever made me quite so horny.

"I certainly hope not," I replied, licking my bottom lip and letting
Nick pull me into his chest. From the second our bodies touched, I knew
that all I needed to do was clear my head and focus on the specimen in
front of me.

Nick Persons was hot, that couldn't be denied. And if I had any hope of
clearing the British stained cobwebs out of my brain, I needed to focus
on the hotness that was right there, undressing me slowly and kissing me
deeply.

And that's exactly what I did.

Fuck that text message, I thought, as I tore Nick's tights down and
revealed what had to have been the most significant cock I'd ever seen
in my entire life. It curved slightly to the right, mesmerizing me as I
wrapped my hand around it. Nick tensed up firmly from head to toe as I
gave his dick a squeeze, and before he could even moan from my touch, he
bit my bottom lip ever so slightly, driving a tingling sensation down my
entire spine.

It was at that point that all bets were off. I dug my fingers into
Nick's shoulders and pulled him towards the bed with me. Like two
dancers finding our rhythm, Nick crawled on top of me, used his knees to
spread my legs wide, and slid our pelvises together. The choreography was
far from perfect, and at one point I had to scoot his knee out from
poking my ass too hard, but the commitment to trying was there, and as I
ran my hands up and down his rock hard abs, I realized that that
commitment was well appreciated.

I noticed as Nick and I continued to make out that the only time things
got awkward was when I wasn't fully engaged. When I wondered where my
phone was or if it would vibrate again or what the text message from the
Brit had meant in its entirety, I felt myself giving only half a mind of
passion to Nick.

But when I let that go, when Nick pulled me back into the moment with his
tongue, and his hands, and his abs, and his slightly curved cock that
rubbed against mine, when I let myself feel what was right on top of me,
everything was magical.

And so I made the conscious decision, the concerted effort, to let my
phone go, and only pay attention to one vibration for the rest of the
night: the vibration of Nick Person's tongue against mine.

Our tenacity began to pay off when Nick knelt in front of me and peeled
off my slacks. He did so with the grace that I'd expected out of someone
so handsome, and when he slid back down into the nook created by my
spread legs and our cocks rubbed against each other's, I knew that I'd
made the right choice to ignore my phone and focus on the easy road.

That choice was reaffirmed with every glide of Nick's body, every moan
in my ear, every swipe of his tongue perfectly pressed against the most
sensitive nerve in my neck. At one point, Nick lifted my arm, breathed in
deep, and licked the side of my ribcage, up my underarm, and back to my
shoulder, before pulling my rolling head back to meet my lips, and
letting me taste the salty sweetness of my skin against his tongue.

It took a while to get me there, but when I did, I melted under his
touch,

"Are you ready?" Nick asked, his drawl pulling me back to reality. For
a second, I'd let myself slip, wondering if me lying under Nick
Persons' body was some sort of a dream. I watched as the six foot tall
Sigma Chi lithely stood up from my bed and asked where I kept my condoms.

"In the drawer," I panted, winded from all of the kissing. I pointed to
the desk where my laptop and books rested. He fished around until he
pulled out a pre-lubed rubber, and then turned to me with a wicked smile.

"You mean you didn't keep any hidden away in your elf tights?" I
asked, watching him tear through the wrapping like a man on a mission.

"You saw what I was hiding in those tights," he replied with a smirk.
"Was there room for anything else?"

I smiled, sat up and ran my hands firmly across his chest as he unrolled
the condom onto his cock. Part of me wanted to question his assumption
that he would top me, but in that moment, feeling as vulnerable as I did,
I decided not to. I wanted to escape my mind, and if that meant taking
every inch of Nick's impressive dick inside of me, that was exactly what
I was going to do.

And so with no objection, and with my hands careful not to tickle his
sensitive side anymore, I held Nick firmly against my chest as he spread
my legs further and slowly lowered himself inside of me.

There are two kinds of attractive guys in the world: the kind of guy that
grows up attractive, is used to being admired, and develops into a rather
lazy lover. And then there's the kind of guy that grows into his looks,
has to work hard for admiration while he's in his teens, and grows up to
be an attentive, caring lover. The former expects approval while the
latter still craves it, and therefore does everything he can to earn the
admiration, and orgasm, of his partner.

Nick Persons fell firmly in the latter camp. From the second he slid into
me, I could tell he was acclimating himself with my reactions, making
sure that I was comfortable, and enjoying his maneuvers. He went in
slowly, and only pushed in further as I arched my back and dug my nails
deeper into his shoulders.

He held his dick in me about an inch to start, and with his ever limber
torso leaning down, he planted a mind numbing kiss against my lips. When
I say that his tongue had the power to erase every cloud in my mind, I
mean just that. Not only did I forget the pain of his girth stretching me
open, but I also forgot the pain of Pete breaking my heart twenty-four
hours prior as if it had never happened.

When Nick could feel my body relax, he pressed in further, filling me up
even deeper. It was like he could read my body like a book, and just as
soon as I got used to feeling him inside of me, he turned a page and
pushed in further. He was patient, without being passive. He was in tune
with how I felt without resorting to the ever dreadful phrase: "How does
that feel?"

After a few minutes of relaxing under his touch, I wondered how much more
of his dick I could take inside of me. Every time I felt like he'd
pushed into me as far as he could go, another inch slipped in, stretching
me out wider and probing me even deeper.

And then with a final sigh, I finally felt his balls slap against me, and
I knew that I'd taken everything in. I exhaled, kissed him softly, and
then pulled my head back to look him in the eye. Nick smiled down at me
as if I'd accomplished something great; and before I could react, he
retreated, pulled out until only the head was left in me, and then firmly
thrust back inside.

"Oh holy fuck," I exhaled, digging my fingers into his shoulder and
breathing into his ear. I wasn't in control of anything. Not my mind, or
my body. In that moment, Nick did everything I needed him to do: he made
me let go.

To say that the sex with Nick Persons was perfect would be an
overstatement. There was something about him that understood rhythm, but
in trying to creating a continuous motion in and out of me, sometimes
Nick would falter... hesitate. There were times when I expected him to
slide all the way back in and fuck me gently, but instead, he'd pop out
of me, fumble, and then pull himself together. It was almost like I made
him nervous in the same way that he made me nervous, only he was the
hunk, and I was just Corbin Crowley.

It was those imperfections, however, that softened me to Nick and allowed
me to relax. He stopped being Nick Persons, Sigma Chi from West Virginia,
and became a guy that was giving me a decent lay. The jolts and the
nibbles, the inconsistencies in his thrusts could have been distracting,
but instead they drew me in to him, endeared me to him. They humanized a
guy that was up until then nine and a half inches away from perfection.

Nick continued to pulse in and out of me, ridding me of any of the stress
I'd felt throughout that day. With every plunge of his cock inside of
me, he pushed everything that had happened with Pete further and further
away. And for a second, while I moaned into his ear, I wondered if that
was what I wanted.

There was a text on my phone that said the words I'd been waiting to
hear from Pete for months. They were within arm's reach. But the fact
that I had no clue what they meant rendered those words meaningless. They
were simply words, strung together with no discernible purpose.

I've been unfair to you. I love you. Let's talk.

From anyone else, I would have sworn that was the most straightforward
statement, but from Pete, from hot and cold Peter Davis, those words
could have just as easily been a piss off as they were a come-on. I'd
wanted those words, I'd begged him for them, but I couldn't help but
wonder if they'd expired on me. Were those particular words too little,
too late? Was I fucking Nick to escape the words or because I feared the
words?

I shook my head, sweat beads falling into my hair, and decided that all I
could do was finish, enjoy myself, and deal with Pete and his cryptic
text messages at a later time.

Inside of me at that very moment, ready to expel himself all over me, was
a guy that liked me. A guy that had made it clear that there were no
mixed messages. A guy that had only one message for me; and that message
came loud and clear across my chest as I heaved, stroked my cock, and
came with him.

"Oh my god," Nick collapsed beside me. We were both glistening with a
mixture of sweat and cum. My chest rose and fell to meet his, and both of
our breathing was shallow. I turned my head to look at him, smiling at
him. I pulled his face in for a quick kiss, unable to do any more until I
caught my breath.

"Wow," Nick said again, his reaction to fucking me bringing me even
higher than I'd been before. He draped his arm across my chest. "That
was incredible, Crowley."

I didn't know what to say. Part of me was still distracted, reeling, but
part of me had just come with a guy that was everything I'd been asking
for on paper.

"That was beyond," I replied, turning to him, and smiling again.

I'm not sure how long Nick and I lay there panting in each other's arms
before we fell asleep. I do know that when I woke up, Nick Persons, was
sitting on my desk chair wearing one of my old Colleyville Tennis
t-shirts and holding a cup of coffee.

I opened my eyes, unsure what I was seeing in that moment. It took a
second for me to remember everything that had happened last night, from
running into Nick, to pulling him up to my room, to the awkward start of
hooking up with him, to finally finding our groove and falling asleep. It
all seemed so surreal.

And yet he was sitting right there. He hadn't gotten up and crawled home
in the middle of the night, or done the walk of shame in one of my
sweatshirts that morning. He'd put my shirt on, gotten us coffee, and
had come up to wait for me to wake up.

"Good morning, Crowley," he said softly, extending a cup of coffee
towards me. It was in one of the off white mugs that our house mom left
out for us in the morning, so I knew that Nick had gone to our basement
kitchen to fetch it.

"I wasn't sure how you liked your coffee, so I got you a buffet of
condiments, if you'll look right here."

I looked at my desk behind him to see milk in a small plastic cup, every
kind of sugar that we kept in our pantry, and two different flavors of
pop tarts. He presented them like Vanna White presenting the winning
clue, and I couldn't help but smile.

"You're here... this morning," I grogged, sitting up, tucking my
morning wood in, and facing Nick.

"You thought I was going to sketch off? I prefer to do my stride of
pride mid-afternoon, you know?" he replied. "That way I could just as
easily be walking home from the library."

I smiled as I breathed into my coffee.

"Unless you want me to leave, in which case I will. I just thought we
could hang out for a little while... so I don't feel so cheap about last
night," he had a smirk across his face and I raised an eyebrow.

"Shut up, Nick," I replied. "I'm just not too used to guys spending
the night, that's all."

It was a vulnerable thing to say, but in the moment, I didn't even think
about it. Something about having him there softened my guard, lowered it,
and I felt safe.

"Would it be cheesy of me to tell you to get used to it?"

I smiled at Nick, still unsure of what to make of the whole situation. I
felt like there was something that hadn't crossed my mind yet that
morning. There was something that I was missing, that I hadn't put
together yet. I looked across my bed at Nick, shifted in my seat, and
tried to make myself comfortable as he watched me readjust.

And then I saw it, lying there next to my pillow. My telephone. And I
remembered why I had mixed feelings about what had happened last night.
Every part of me wanted to let go and enjoy a guy that had stuck around,
that wanted to hang out in the morning, and that had brought me coffee
with every variety of condiment that I could possibly need.

But then a sliver of me wanted Nick to leave so that I could get on my
phone, and see what the Brit had meant by his text last night. I felt
Nick watching me process everything, and I instantly let out a sigh.

"You seem distracted," he said. He stood up, and I noticed that he was
wearing my sweat pants as well as my shirt. My clothes fit him tightly,
and watching him move in them reminded me of just how sexy his body was
underneath that fabric.

I watched as Nick pulled up behind me in my bed and grabbed my shoulders
with his strong arms. He kneaded them firmly, forcing me to relax as I
breathed into my hot coffee.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"Not particularly."

"Does it have anything to do with you yelling at me the other night?
Which, you never sent that text to apologize for acting petty and
dramatic, by the way."

I took a deep breath, and let out a single chuckle.

"Let's just say that it's heavier than I'd like to discuss with you
after our first night."

"Okay," Nick exhaled behind me. "But can I take a moment to
acknowledge that you just promised me a second night?"

"What?" I asked, turning my head.

"I mean, at least one more night. You called what we did yesterday our
first night, so... I'm just going to assume that you mean we're bound
for a second."

"You know what they say about guys who assume, right?" I asked coyly,
trying to keep the mood light. Nick had gone out of his way to make me
feel comfortable after last night, and I owed him the satisfaction of
playing along.

Besides, flirting with Nick Persons came easy. We'd been doing it for
years, and unbeknownst to me, it meant more to him than I could have
imagined. There was a calming quality to having him there, and I almost
forgot about the phone that was sitting next me that was itching to be
checked.

"What do they say?"

"That when you assume, you make an ass out of you and me." I turned my
head to look back at him. He chuckled, smiled, and kissed me on the lips.
It was a quick peck, but even then, sitting in my bedroom with just the
two of us, it meant so much.

I remember thinking that this is what a relationship should be like.
Should. There was the chemistry, the banter, the familiarity that made me
comfortable enough to sit there in between Nick's legs and talk to him,
morning breath and all. There wasn't the uncertainty about how he felt,
the rush to get home before curfew, the tensing of his entire body when I
leaned into him. There wasn't the difficulty of my other two
relationships, if I could even call them that.

And then I remember thinking that if things could be this easy, why did I
still find myself looking at my phone, wondering what from last night was
still hidden inside.

"I mean, didn't you assume some things about me too?" Nick asked,
jolting me out of my pensiveness.

"Huh?"

"Assuming? You made your own assumptions about me, didn't you
Crowley?"

"What do you mean?"

"When you came barreling in here the other night, you assumed that I was
straight. One of those straight guys that gets off on toying with your
emotions. Pretty presumptive on your part."

I shrugged and stretched my neck, unsure how to answer him. He
immediately grabbed my neck with three fingers and slowly massaged a kink
I didn't even know was there.

"I guess you're right," I replied. "But seriously, how did I miss the
boat on knowing that Nick Persons spoke fluent fag?"

"Beats me. I mean, I've been trying to flirt with you pretty
consistently since I was a freshman last year. I just always thought that
you weren't interested."

I let out a soft chuckle and continued to revel in the feeling of his
hands against my neck. I thought back to every single one of my and
Nick's interactions since we met a year ago, and while there had always
been something there, I had never placed that something in the sexual
category.

"I guess I thought that the Corbin Crowley, author of The Signature on
the back page of The Founder was someone that you wanted but never got.
It'd be like meeting Bradley Cooper and him not going home with you.
Disappointing but not altogether surprising."

"He's pretty fucking hot."

"That he is, Crowley."

"Are you calling me a regulation hottie, Nick Persons?" I asked,
smiling beside myself.

"I might be," Nick replied, bending into me and planting a firm kiss on
my lips. This time I didn't retreat with a neck roll. I let him kiss me.
I let him take me away. I let someone want me for a just a few more
seconds.

"Okay, I get that," I replied, leaning forward and putting my cup of
coffee on my desk. "I might've been the local celebrity with the column
in the paper, but you were the funny, charming, confident freshman. That
could've bought you quite a bit a whole lot sooner."

"I guess my mom was right about good things coming to those who wait,"
Nick shrugged behind me. I felt awkward realizing that Nick had seriously
crushed on me for over a year and I was just now putting the dots
together. I'd been that oblivious in all of our interaction that I
hadn't even realized that his flirting was something more. Part of it
flattered me to no end, and part of it made me blush to consider.

"Still," I continued "Nothing ever happened with you and me until now;
why have I not heard a single rumor about you and anyone else?"

"I don't know," he sighed. "I'm pretty good about keeping it my
pants, I guess."

And that's when it hit me. For Nick, fun wasn't the moments that two
guys were holding each other, inside of one another, making love to the
other. Fun was this: sitting together, sharing stories, laughing
together. His way of showing me he liked me didn't involve jumping my
bones in the basement of Sigma Chi. It was inviting me up to his room to
listen to the latest songs he'd downloaded, or handing me a drink that
no one else had access to.

Our ideals of what built a relationship were different. For me, love had
to hurt. It had to be complicated. It needed to involve a chase,
something you could pine over. Something you could write a weekly column
about. For Nick, it was much simpler.

"I should probably get up and do some work," I stretched, putting my
cup of coffee on my desk, and then sitting back down in the same position
that I had just vacated.

"It doesn't feel like you're all that interested in getting up," Nick
observed. He took his hands that had been on my shoulders and gently ran
them down my chest, pulled me in, and kissed the back of my neck. It
mesmerized me that this was the same guy that couldn't take his shirt
off without elbowing me in the chest. But it was, and I was enjoying
myself for the first time in a very long time.

"Here," he said, sitting up, standing over me, and pulling my laptop to
the bed where we sat. He crossed his legs around me and pulled himself in
close, putting the laptop on my lap, but controlling it from behind me.
"Let me show you something."

I watched him navigate to the start screen on my computer.

"What's your password?"

"I'm not telling you." I faced Nick to see him raising an eyebrow and
giving me a look. "I'm really not telling you."

"Oh, come on. What is it?"

"Swear you won't judge me. I've had this password since I was twelve
years old."

"On my honor, no judgment."

He raised an eyebrow.

"Aguilera88."

"As in... Christina Aguilera?" I could hear the judgment in his voice,
and my head dropped as he typed in the letters. "You're kidding,
right?"

"It logged you in, didn't it?"

"Well thank the Lord Jesus our God that I was sent here this morning to
show you this. If nothing else happens between us, at least I was able to
leave you with a better taste in music."

"Harsh," I replied, aware of what my computer password revealed about
me. In my defense, Aguilera88 had been my very first AIM password, and
I'd used it for everything ever since. I watched Nick as he got online
and quickly downloaded a song titled in a language I couldn't recognize.

"What is this?" I asked as he waited for the download to finish, me
nestled perfectly in his legs.

"Just listen."

I felt Nick stretch comfortably behind me, spooning me perfectly, and
wrapping his legs around me like that was exactly where they belonged. I
started to think about how perfectly our bodies fit together as I easily
moved into his nook. The music played softly at the beginning, just
strings at first. After about four measures, with Nick's chin rested on
my shoulder and his chest pressed firmly on my back, I heard the swell of
woodwind instruments as clearly as I felt his chest rise and fall against
me. I recognized a clarinet and a bassoon, I thought. Mixed with the
simple floating melody of the strings, the music lifted, almost off the
speakers of my laptop, and into the air like clouds high in the sky. I
closed my eyes and allowed myself to get carried away by the sound,
allowed myself to float into the air with it.

I remember hearing a percussive beat, a heavy one, and with it, I felt
Nick's fingernails trail up the inside of my knee. It was the first time
I connected his hand movements with the crescendos and decrescendos of
the music. As the intensity of the sounds picked up again, I felt his
hand travel up the inside of my thigh, moving the fabric of my sheets
with them. I let out a sigh, and in perfect harmony, Nick and I exhaled
together.

From that moment, I knew it was over. The music continued to build, and
without much more than his hands gently rubbing me, his left across my
chest, and his right inside my legs, I felt myself fall deeper and deeper
into Nick's spell.

I'd never felt the way that he made me feel, admittedly. It was like he
was forcing me out of my comfort zone, not taking no for an answer. For a
guy who was barely knocking on twenty years old, he knew how to impart
whatever feeling he wanted onto someone else like a pro who had been
doing this kind of thing forever.

As I sat there, moving with him, moving with the melody of the song, I
felt myself slipping past the point of using him for a rebound to the
point where I could have seen more Sunday mornings like this is in my
future.

It took only a second, a measure, a beat for me to go through a million
thoughts at once. Was this what it was all about? Was this the kind of
connection that people were searching for? Was this the kind of chemistry
that kept poets up late at night? Was this what I was looking for in all
of the wrong places, thrown into my bed from the unlikeliest of sources?

Was this happiness?

I felt Nick's hand graze the base of my shaft, and in that split second,
I decided to allow myself to do something I hadn't done since I'd
stepped foot on campus for that junior year and met Pete Davis... I
allowed myself to feel.

It wasn't an uncontrolled emotion. It wasn't me begging for an
assurance that wasn't there. It wasn't me wanting for a guy whose
affections lay hidden away in the closets of his heart. It was me
suppressing my desire for him, my love for him, in an attempt to save
face.

I chose to feel. I allowed myself that right. I let myself go and enjoy
the feeling of Nick's hands on my body, the music floating around us,
his cock pressing against me, and his heart beating on the other side of
mine. I chose to do what felt right at the moment, and no text message on
the other side of the bed, a million miles away from where Nick and I
sat, could come between that feeling.

And it wasn't until I woke up from an orgasm induced nap with Nick
Persons pretzeled in my bed, that my choice to feel evaporated and my
irrational desire to check my phone returned.

"What did you think of that?" Nick asked me softly as I stretched out
of bed, waking him up in the process. I wasn't sure how long we'd
slept, but from the sunlight pouring through my windows, I knew it was
well into the afternoon.

"The sex or the song?" I turned and faced him.

"Both."

"I prefer my songs with lyrics," I smiled critically, thinking back to
how easily Nick had used the movements of the orchestra to dictate the
movements of his dick deep inside of me, bringing me to the brink of
orgasm time and time again, before we both climaxed with the final
crescendo of a song I didn't know. "But other than that, I have no
complaints."

Nick looked into my eyes and read me. I'm not sure what he saw, or what
he felt, but after a second of looking at me, he sat up in my bed,
revealing the entire length of his body as he pulled back my sheet and
stretched like a cat.

"I should leave," he sighed. I watched him stand up and pick up the
pair of my shorts he'd been wearing all morning.

"Do you mind if I borrow these?" he asked, putting them on before I had
a chance to answer.

"Only if you promise to bring them back," I said, trying my hardest to
remain in the moment while watching the guy who had just made me feel all
morning get dressed and leave. Part of me didn't want him to go. Part of
me wanted to explore this new side of Nick's and my relationship. Part
of me wanted to continue bathing in our undeniable chemistry. Part of me
wanted to continue forgetting and keep on feeling.

But a bigger part of me couldn't wait for him to be gone so that I could
check my phone, and go back to obsessing over everything Pete had sent.

I'm sure it was that part that Nick had seen in my eyes, and like a
houseguest who realizes they've overstayed their welcome, no matter how
pleasant the visit, I was glad to see Nick pick up his things and go.

"I will bring these shorts back to you. Or next time you can come to
Sigma Chi yourself and pick them up."

Without hesitation, and the confidence of someone who was secure in his
sexuality, Nick bent down and kissed me goodbye.

"Better than Dorian, isn't it?" he asked, licking his lips after
letting go of mine. I feigned a shrug as I sat up in my bed.

"Eh... kissed one Persons, kissed them all."

Nick raised an eyebrow, pretending to be offended by the comparison to
his brother.

"You're a heartbreaker, Crowley. I'll see you later."

I watched his lithe, sexy frame exit my room, and it wasn't more than a
second before I threw off my covers and sat up in my bed.

The first thing I did when I picked up my phone was check the time. It
was after four, and I was in dangerous territory of pissing my entire day
away. The next thing I did was reread the text message that Pete had sent
the night before; the text message that had sent me spiraling into
Nick's arms.

I've been thinking a lot about last night. I've been unfair to you. I
love you. Let's talk. --Pete

I read each sentence, one phrase at a time.

I've been thinking a lot about last night: meaning our kiss. Meaning
everything that had led up to our kiss. Meaning everything that Pete had
done to encourage a kiss from me. He had been thinking a lot about those
actions, my reactions, and what had happened after. He had been thinking
over and over, the way I thought about our every single interaction. He
had been thinking about last night, I thought. It was about fucking time
he did some thinking.

I've been unfair to you: That phrase, isolated from the rest, was
probably the most loaded in the entire text message. Unfair how? I
thought. In leading me on? Was he finally taking responsibility for my
feelings towards him? Was he admitting that I wasn't a crazy person for
falling in love with him? Of course he'd been unfair. He'd encouraged
me to let my heart go one artery at a time, and then as soon as I did,
every time that I did, he pulled back and made me doubt everything we'd
been through.

Unfair was an understatement, I thought. But at least he was admitting
that there was a fairness there that had been breached.

I love you: This is where my mind went reeling. I love you. I love you
like a brother? I love you as a friend? I love you like a lover? How many
ways was there to love someone, I thought? A million. People loved books,
pets, parents, friends... our hearts were filled with love for millions of
things around us.

To me, wanting to read deeply into his words, I decided that there was a
preposition missing from Pete's meaning. I had told him before that I
was in love with him.

In. Love.

There was a huge difference, I thought between loving someone and being
in love with them. Did he love me? Or was he in love with me? I stared at
my phone trying my hardest to make that distinction and every time I
thought I knew what he meant, I realized I had no fucking clue.

Let's talk: the only portion of the message that was straightforward. We
needed to talk. That much was clear. We needed to talk sober, and we
needed to talk soon. I needed to know what every other phrase in that
message meant before it tortured the living shit out of me.

Let's talk. Absolutely, I thought. And just as I came to the realization
that talking was the only way I'd figure out what the rest of his words
meant, I got irrationally afraid, and decided to spend some more time
analyzing the first three phrases instead of going to him and actually
talking about them.

I knew that a talk with Pete would be final. I'd either hear what I had
been waiting for all semester, or I would leave disappointed, with a
certainty that Pete's initial reaction to my kiss was his final
reaction. I would leave either hopeful or hopeless. All in, or with
nothing at all.

I wasn't ready for that talk, I thought. But it was a talk that needed
to happen. It was a talk that had needed to happen for a while, and if I
planned on dragging a guy like Nick through the wringer because of my
obsession with Pete, I needed to have that talk as soon as possible.

And so at 5:07 on that Sunday afternoon, after sitting in bed analyzing
four phrases for over an hour, I replied to Pete's text message.

To Pete: Got your text. You're right. Let's talk.

I put my phone down and waited.

I leaned over towards my laptop and clicked open my iTunes, and pressed
play on shuffle, and then I laid back down and waited.

I lay there listening to song after song on my iTunes, waiting for a
vibration next to my left hand. I knew that finals began in less than a
week, but to study would have been futile. I knew that I could analyze
his text message a thousand more times, but if we were set to have the
talk, then what was the point? I could have laid there and reminisced
about a perfect night with a perfect Sigma Chi, but how would that have
been productive? I could have plotted and schemed more ways to take over
my own fraternity, but in my distractions, I was uninspired.

And so I just waited. I didn't do anything else but listen and wait.

And then a song came on that jolted me out of my near coma. I heard the
first chords of Kelly Clarkson's Beautiful Disaster, and I remember
thinking that I loved the song. It was simple, and underrated, personal
and honest. But as I listened closely, I couldn't help but think that
the lyrics were pulled straight out of my current situation.

He's as damned as he seems. More heaven than a heart could hold. And if
I try to save him, my whole world could cave in, and it just ain't
right.

I sat up and immediately pushed repeat. My mind connected with every
lyric and I needed to hear the song again.

I don't know what he's after... but he's so beautiful. Such a beautiful
disaster.

I'm not sure when the first tear fell down my cheek, but I remember
listening to that song over and over, wondering how a situation that felt
so uniquely mine could be so universal. It was almost like the melody was
speaking directly to me, narrating my every feeling.

He's magic and myth. As strong as what I believe. A tragedy with more
damage than a soul should see.

It was like the lyrics and the melody had both been pulled from my brain,
and every word I'd thought about the Brit over the course of the last
five months was being played back in the key of A minor.

Do I try to change him? So hard not to blame him...

As I sat there waiting for Pete to respond, I asked myself that question
over and over. Should I try to change him? Should I try to be the
catalyst that drives him out of the closet? And what if he wasn't gay...
what if this whole thing, these mixed feelings, what if they were just
about me?

I must have listened to that song a dozen times in a row before I finally
felt it. My hand jolted and tensed up when I felt the vibration rock my
entire bed, and within a split second, I'd grabbed my phone and I read
the message.

To Corbin: I'm in the library basement by your carrel. Come over.

I read the message and took a deep breath. I couldn't very well go to
the library in the same clothes I'd had on after fucking with Nick
Persons all afternoon, so I took a quick shower, put on a clean pair of
jeans, a t-shirt, and my Abercrombie and Fitch zip up sweater, a pair of
boots, and a beanie. I listened to Beautiful Disaster two more times
while getting dressed, letting the lyrics sink into me again.

I don't know... I don't know what he's after. But he's so beautiful...
such a beautiful disaster. And if I could hold on through the tears and
the laughter, would we be beautiful, or just a beautiful disaster?

As I walked towards the library, I resigned myself to the fact that this
talk was happening, and there was nothing else I could do to postpone it.
I needed the clarity straight from Pete's mouth, or else I would have
driven myself crazy all week trying to figure it out. It was better this
way, I thought, as I got closer to the building. Even if things went a
completely different way. It was better this way.

A beautiful disaster.

"Hey," I whispered when I reached the bottom floor of the library,
turned the two corners to the left, and saw Pete sitting on a couch
directly in front of the row where my carrel was. It was almost like
he'd set up camp there for the day, with a pile of books, notebooks, and
at least three cups of dining hall to-go coffee strewn about. It made me
think he was hoping I would come to my carrel to study, and that I'd
find him sitting there, ready to talk.

I've been thinking a lot about last night. I've been unfair to you. I
love you. Let's talk. -Pete

"Hey," he stretched, standing up to meet me. My hands were lodged
deeply in my pockets, and as I stopped about five feet away from where
Pete stood, I asked myself if everything was worth what I was about to
put myself through.

"How was your day?" he asked nonchalantly, breezy, like there wasn't a
text message sized lump lodged directly in my windpipe.

"Not bad, considering," I replied, tilting my head. I tried my best to
remain even, in control. There were a million ways my emotions could have
pulled me, and so the only thing I could do to avoid a colossal meltdown
was to stay as even keel as possible.

"Want to go outside and talk? I'm not sure the studiers down here would
appreciate us making noise."

"Whatever you think is best," I answered. I kept my hands as far in my
sweater as possible and followed Pete outside. The evening air was cold
but still. With no wind, it didn't feel quite as cold, and so I didn't
object as Pete led me to the coliseum style seating that faced
Gentleman's Green from the bottom of the hill where the library was
built.

"So you got my text message," he began.

"I read it, yeah," I answered, implying that I had seen the words, but
was yet to understand the meaning.

When Pete didn't say anything, waiting for me to start I presumed, I
pursed my lips and shrugged. What did he want me to say? What was I
supposed to ask? How was the talk supposed to go?

"What'd you think?" he asked finally, crossing his arms over his
chest.

"Honestly, Pete, I don't know what to think. It's like a yo-yo with
you. Do I have YoYoJam stamped across my forehead?"

"You don't," he squinted, as if he was actually trying to read the
yo-yo company's name physically stamped on my forehead.

"Two days ago it was `Corbin, I don't love you.' Yesterday, it was
the exact opposite. What am I supposed to do with that?"

There was another long pause. This time, I wasn't going to speak. This
wasn't going to be a talk in which I aired out my feelings and Pete sat
there like a member of the Coldstream Guard on a coffee break. He wasn't
getting off that easy. I didn't care how uncomfortable it got for him.
He'd asked me to talk, and so I waited for him to talk.

"Look, I don't know a lot of things about this. And I don't know why I
said what I said on Friday, and I did what I did last night. I just... I
don't. But I do know that when I'm around you, I feel ways that
aren't... that are... I feel ways that are new for me, and I don't know
where to file or sort those feelings."

I looked at Pete, watching the steam from his voice waft into the air. I
let his words sink in for a second. It was the closest he'd ever come to
admitting he had any sort of feelings for me. But even in his vague
admission, there wasn't any assurance. There were still uncertainties.
Uncertainties had led me to do what I did on Friday night. Uncertainties
would always lead me to make the wrong decision when it came to the Brit.

And so I skipped past uncertainties and asked Pete the tough question
that had floated through my mind a million times since I read his
message.

"Do you love me?" I asked. I watched his left eye squint just a little.
It wasn't quite a twitch, but it was more than a casual spasm. It was
big enough that I could see it, and I knew he was searching for his words
carefully.

"I don't know."

"Do you want to date me?" I asked, giving him no time to rationalize
his answer.

"I don't know."

I marveled at his honesty. That must have taken guts, considering where
the two of us had come from in the months that we'd known each other.

But we still hadn't gotten anywhere. "I don't know" was still too
vague for me. Too noncommittal. A month ago, I would have taken his
answer straight to the bank and held on to the hope of a possibility. But
after that hope had failed me time and time again, I needed more than "I
don't know" from Pete.

"You don't know?" I shook my head. "And if you don't know, who
does?"

I let the word linger on my tongue. I didn't mean it as an attack, but I
felt the bite of my words escaping my lips with a little more crispness
than I anticipated.

"Because I certainly don't know how you feel. I think I know, and then
you completely change things around on me. But I do know when I'm being
manipulated, Pete. And you did it when you went to DC, and you did it
last night. And so if you don't know if you love me, and if you don't
know if you would date me, and if you don't even know if you could date
a guy or not, then who the fuck knows? Because I don't know; and if you
don't know, and I don't know, then who does?"

I felt my voice crack, and I felt a tear go down my face. I tried to stop
it by looking up quickly, but it was too late. I sniffed in, and when
Pete didn't respond to what I'd said, I swiped the tear from my cheek
and continued.

"Let me tell you what I do know, Pete. I know that I have feelings for
you. And I know that you want to have feelings for me too because you
think that that's what you're supposed to do. That because I have
feelings for you, and because you think you might possibly maybe like me
in some way, that you're supposed to have feelings for me in return. And
I know that it's killing you inside because you're not sure what your
feelings mean; I know that. But I know that I can't change you. I can't
force you; I can't make you into someone you're not, or that you're
not ready to be, just to be with me. I can't do that. I know that you
could try, and you probably would for me, I get that. I know that. But I
know that eventually you'll want something different. Eventually, I
won't be enough. Eventually, you will wonder why you changed your life
for me. I know that, Pete. I also know that I can survive you right now.
I've done it before, and I can do it again. I know that. But I know for
a fact that if I fall any deeper than I already am, if you give me any
more hope than you already have, I know that I won't survive you then.
I... I... I know that this is supposed to be easier than it is. And I know
that some things are meant to be fought for. But I know that if I keep
fighting for you, I will lose. And if I lose... I just... I know that I
can't afford to lose."

By the time I was done talking, tears were rolling down my face. I felt
heat under my skin, embarrassed for losing myself in front of him, but
relieved for sharing my honesty. After hours of agonizing, I summed up
how I felt in a minute long soliloquy that would have made Emily Bronte
proud.

I felt Pete's arm around me, and I shook as he held me. I don't know
how long we sat like that, and I don't know if it was only my crying
that was causing our shoulders to shake, but I knew that Pete had to have
been as emotional as I was on some level.

After a few minutes, the shaking stopped. The crying stopped, and I
regained my composure. Pete let go of my shoulder, and I looked at him
with blood shot eyes.

"So what now?" he asked me, squinting his eyes like he was trying to
hold back tears of his own.

This was the part I wasn't sure of. I had spewed out all of the things I
knew to be true, but where Pete and I went from that moment was one thing
I didn't know. It was one thing I couldn't predict, or rationalize. It
was one thing I couldn't make a decision on. And so without thinking,
without trying to know, I answered with the first thing that came to
mind.

"So now you figure yourself out," I sighed, releasing myself from him.
"You figure out the kind of life you want to live, and the kind of man
that you want to be, and if that decision leads you back here and these
feelings are still what they are, then we go from there."

"And if they aren't?"

I looked him in the eye. Neither of us moved as we contemplated the
possibility that Pete and I could eventually live a life that didn't
include one another. We had done it for twenty years, I thought in an
attempt to keep me from considering the real possibility.

"If they aren't, then it was never meant to be, was it?" I chewed the
words slowly, afraid of how final they sounded. But they weren't final,
I decided. If Pete ever came back to me with a certainty, with a
willingness to try beyond the up and down he'd put me through before, I
would have dropped everything to be with him. I knew that for a fact. I
didn't say it; I couldn't bring myself to say that much to him, but I
knew that if it ever came down to Pete and someone else, he would
unequivocally win out.

And so with that conversation, with that resolution between the Brit and
me, we said our goodbyes. He went back to the library to study, and I
went back to my house to try and get some much needed work done before I
fell too far behind.

Armed with a clarity I hadn't felt in months, I decided to focus my
efforts on things I could control: exams in less than a week, rush in
less than a month, and the second semester of the school year that was
proving to be the year that would change my life forever.

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