After School Activities (10 page)

compared it to the awkward feeling I still felt around Kai in public.

Adam sat down at our table. For a second I thought Kai’s eyes were

going to pop out of their sockets. He cleared his throat loudly, but if Adam

noticed, he gave no sign. “Hey,” Adam said to me, continuing to ignore

the strange looks my friends were giving him. “I was thinking, maybe—”

“Why are you sitting here,” Kai burst in belligerently. “The jock

table is over there. You know, the one with all the other idiots.”

Adam gave him a slow, sidelong look. It wasn’t hostile or threatening,

just a look. Nonetheless Kai shifted his shoulders, uncomfortable with the

scrutiny. “Malachi,” Adam said, as though musing. “Didn’t you shit your

pants on a field trip in the fifth grade?”

Mel shrieked with laughter. “I
remember
that!” It had been shortly

after she moved here. Kai had been trying to lift large rocks at the state

park in some pathetic attempt to impress her.

Kai’s face had turned some kind of purple. “What’s your point?”

“Oh, nothing.” Adam said casually, in between bites of his burger.

“Just that maybe you should be nicer to people, especially when they still

have certain pictures lying around their house.”

“There are
pictures
of that? Oh my
God
, you
have
to bring them!”

And just like that, Adam had won Mel over. She and Adam began going

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back and forth, doing their best to imitate the look on Kai’s face that day.

Even Kai eventually gave in, did an impression of his ten-year-old self,

which caused Mel to dissolve into a fit of helpless laughter at how perfectly he was able to recapture the exact expression, a mix of shock,

embarrassment, and the fervent hope that he would wake up from the

nightmare his life had suddenly become. All in all, it was fun having Adam

around. I started to feel the tension drain from my shoulders. Maybe this

wouldn’t be a disaster.

Adam looked over at me and smiled his most dazzling smile,

dimples and all. Under the table, he reached out and grabbed my hand,

twining our fingers where no one could see. My heart caught in my throat

at the unexpected gesture of affection. I must have had some kind of look

on my face, ’cause Adam’s smile grew wider, and he winked at me.

I could get used to this.

AFTER LUNCH, I brought my tray over to the garbage cans to dump

my trash. Adam had left a while back to meet up with his friends, and

Mel and Kai were still reminiscing about the various embarrassing

things we had all done in elementary school. It turned out Mel had

quite a trove of stories from her old school too. Though really, they

could all be made up, not like we knew the kids she mentioned to check

if the stories were true. Hilarious nonetheless.

“Dude, what were you doing sitting at that queer’s table today? You

switching teams on us?” The voice was Will Davis, one of Adam’s most

obnoxious friends. It came from around the corner, right outside of the

lunchroom in the hall.

It was Adam who responded. “Fuck no! You know I hate that

faggot.”

“That’s not what it looked like to us. Looked like you were having a

great time with your new boyfriend and his troupe of drama outcasts….”

As quietly as possible, so they wouldn’t notice me, I cleaned off my

tray, put it in the bin with the others, and made my way back to my table. I

didn’t want to hear Will spew his vitriolic bullshit anymore, and I

especially didn’t want to hear how Adam was going to respond to it. I

wasn’t mad, honest! It’s kind of what I had expected. His friends were

assholes, he had always cultivated that faux macho façade, and he was

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obviously so deep in the closet he’d gotten on a first name basis with the

mothballs and forgotten shoes. Besides, by all accounts, it seemed as

though he really liked me, and I know firsthand how difficult it can be to

come to terms with your sexuality. Even with the supportive friends and

family I had, which Adam clearly lacked. So no, not mad.

But, I don’t know… I guess there had been some kind of hope. Of

what? I wasn’t sure exactly. I tried not to let myself feel disappointed, and especially not sad. And I was almost successful, until it was Kai who was

smiling, calling to me from across the lunchroom, and I was faced anew

with my dilemma—straight guy who is comfortable with liking me, and a

gay one who isn’t.

I WAS pacing nervously as Kai shut the door to my bedroom. I heard the

door click as he locked it, but it didn’t register. I was too caught up in my thoughts.

“Listen,” I said, finally getting up the courage to begin. “Something

pretty big happened, and I kinda need to talk to you—”

Kai cut me off. “Something big is about to happen.” With a

mischievous grin, he pushed me back onto the bed and got on his knees in

front of me. “I’ve been practicing on a Fudgsicle,” he said with a wink.

“No, I’m serious. There’s something I need to work out and….” Kai

had gotten my pants unbuttoned and pulled them down to my ankles.

“Wait, you what?” And just like that, Kai swallowed my dick.

I was about to stop him. But when I opened my mouth with every

intention of telling him to stop, Adam’s voice flashed through my mind.

You know I hate that faggot.
There was even a bit of an echo, as though my subconscious were trying for dramatic effect. And my protests died

unspoken. Why was I supposed to care about that asshole again? In that

moment, I couldn’t remember a single reason.

In my defense, I wasn’t thinking too clearly because—and I feel this

bears repeating—Kai was sucking my dick.
Kai
was
sucking my dick!

So, the only words I managed were moaned. “Fuck yeah.”

My cock came out of Kai’s mouth with an audible pop. “Mmmm,”

he said. “Penisy. Strangely not terrible.” He licked my shaft from base to

tip. “Kind of prefer the Fudgsicle, though.” He laughed and took me back

in his mouth.

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After School Activities

It was really happening. With Adam completely out of my mind, I

marveled in the moment. Kai was sucking my dick. In all our sexual

encounters to date, it was mostly with me on the giving and him on the

receiving end, and it never seemed to mean as much to him as it did to me.

I’d suck his dick, and he’d give me a halfhearted hand job. I’d get hard

simply by looking at him while he tended to giggle at the sight of me.

Even when I fucked him, he had been passive and somehow left me

feeling as emotionally necessary as a dildo.

But now he was sucking my dick. This wasn’t a hand job between

buddies; this was something more. And if Kai wanted something more

from me, to be more than just friends….

Movement from the corner of my eye caught my attention. I turned

my head, saw someone standing outside the window. It was Adam. He

was staring at me, at my hard dick, at Kai. His face was rage. No, his face

was pain. No, his face was gone.

I stared at the empty window, a conflicting tumult of emotions

raging inside of me. “What’s wrong? Am I that bad?” Kai was looking up

at me with a sardonic grin, lazily stroking my cock with his hand.

Suddenly, the full import of everything that had happened hit me. Of

what exactly we had been doing. There was something I had to know.

“Stand up.” Kai’s eyebrows furrowed at the emotion in my voice, but he

did what I said. “Take off your clothes.”

“Oooo, feisty, are we?” He pulled his shirt over his head and dropped

his pants with an excited quickness. His cock was soft, I couldn’t help but

notice; I always got hard from giving him a blow job.

“Shut up,” I said. I grabbed him, thrust our bodies together, and

kissed him hard.

I was panting when I eventually pulled away. Kai had his signature

dopey grin on his face. “What did you feel?” I asked him.

“A lot of tongue,” Kai quipped.

“Fuck.”

Kai’s eyebrows furrowed. “What? Not funny?”

“I felt fire, burning in my gut and spreading outward. I felt electricity

on every inch of my skin that touched yours. I felt….” Things I had felt

with Adam, only he had felt them as well. And now that was ruined too.

I realized I had been yelling. I brought my voice back under control.

“I’m falling in love with you, and you will never reciprocate.” I grabbed

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his clothes from off the floor and threw them at him. “You need to go.

Now. And we can’t hang out for a while.”

“But I….” I could see him struggling to be understanding. “Okay,”

he said finally. He put on his clothes and opened my door. He paused

outside in the hall. “Earlier, you said there was something you needed to

talk to me about…?”

I couldn’t have kept the bite out of my voice if I had tried. And I

didn’t try. “It’s a little late now to start caring about my feelings, don’t you think?” I slammed the door in his face, but not before I saw the look of

hurt painted there.

For what seemed a very long while, I leaned against the door,

listening to Kai in the hall beyond, just standing there. I was waiting,

though I had no idea for what. I wasn’t dumb enough to expect him to

bang on the door, protesting his love, and take me in his arms to my bed.

Or maybe I really was that stupid. Eventually I heard Kai’s steps retreating

down the hall and the sound of the front door slamming.

I slid down the door until I was sitting on the floor. I wondered

distantly if I should be crying. Instead, I stared out my window, thinking

not of the pain I was in, but rather the pain I had caused.

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After School Activities

CHAPTER NINE

SCHOOL BECAME an exercise in misery after that. Of course there would

be no explaining anything to Mel. Kai was still my best friend. I needed

space to sort my feelings out, and I wasn’t about to go sharing secrets that

weren’t entirely mine. Luckily, in first period math, I showed up late

enough that the only available desk was on the opposite side of the room

from Mel and Kai. Unfortunately, there was no such luck in biology. The

second I stepped in the door, Kai looked at me expectantly and Mel

waved. She had no reason yet to suspect anything was amiss. Well, she

would in about two seconds.

The only other table with open seats was one populated almost

exclusively by cheerleaders. I stepped up to them and asked if I could sit

there, ignoring the sight of Mel across the room, eyebrows climbing

straight off her forehead.

It was Charlotte who responded. “Sure!” she said with her usual

unrestrained enthusiasm and cheerfulness. Charlotte was the undeniable

queen of the cheer squad, and James P. Hogan’s girlfriend to boot. Which

I always wanted to hate her for, but I couldn’t ’cause she was just as nice

as James P. Hogan himself, and they were obviously all perfect and meant

to be and shit. Unfortunately.

So I sat down, trying not to look as hopelessly out of place as I felt.

From the corner of my eye, I saw Mel glaring at Kai, her mouth moving

rapidly—an obvious interrogation. Kai looked sullen. I felt a pang of

regret but angrily pushed it aside. It was his fault all this was happening.

He started it, not me, and didn’t even pause to think how it might affect

me. Affect us.

With a start I realized that the cheer diva sitting next to me was

staring, eyes narrowed.

“You’re a gay, right?” Her name was Tiffany, I was pretty sure.

I had no idea how to respond. Most of the rest of the girls had

dropped their conversations to scrutinize me as well. I looked to Charlotte

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Dirk Hunter

for help, but she was jotting something down in her notebook, apparently

oblivious to my plight.

“Um, yes?”

“Oh. My. God,” she squealed, along with the rest of my impromptu

audience. “It’s a dream come true! Quick, tell Amanda what a skank she

looks in that top.”

The particularly busty blond across the table scoffed in indignation.

“Oh, bitch, you did
not
just say that!”

“Who do you think is the hottest guy in school?” another girl asked.

“Um….” I wasn’t about to tell the truth. Charlotte was paying

attention now, drawn in by the squealing chorus. Luckily I was saved from

answering when Tiffany made a fashion magazine materialize seemingly

out of nowhere and began asking my opinion on practically every shoe in

there. And no small amount of dresses either.

AS SOON as the bell rang, announcing the end of class, I rushed out of the

room. That was another advantage to sitting at the cheerleaders’ table: it

was right next to the door. I could get out before Mel or Kai had the

chance to catch up with me.

“Hey, Dylan, wait up.”

I flinched. There went my hasty exit. But at least it wasn’t Mel’s

voice. Instead it was Charlotte, which was a huge surprise. I hadn’t

realized she even knew my name.

“Sorry about Tiffany and all them,” she said, falling in beside me.

“Their hearts are in the right place, I promise. They have always wanted a

GBFF.” She saw the look on my face and clarified. “A gay best friend