Screwups (5 page)

Paul blinked at him in bewilderment. “I told you to tell me when you got below ten hit points.”

“Sorry, I forgot.”

Paul groaned and threw his hands up in the air. “Well, now you’re
dead
,” he snapped, clearly disgusted. “You just screwed up your intro. You’ll have to roll a new character.”

“What?” Jake had been getting into the game, sort of. Once he’d more or less figured out which dice were for what kind of roll, it had started to get fun. But now that went completely out the window. He couldn’t believe they’d kill him off so quickly. Had they just asked him to play for target practice? “That’s bullshit! I thought I was supposed to be playing
with
you! You didn’t tell me you were gonna kill me off!”

“I didn’t
want
to kill you off,” Paul protested. “You let your hit points go negative.
Really
negative.”

“Because everybody attacked me.”

“Of course we attacked you,” Eva said patiently. “You were trying to kill Kareth in his sleep.”

“Because Paul made me!”

“Just role-play it,” Danny said.

Jake glared at him. “How the hell…. Fine!” He stood up and clutched his stomach. Then he toppled dramatically to the floor and sprawled out on the ugly brown-and-white striped lounge carpet, his head lolling to the side, eyes closed and tongue hanging out.

Danny, Eva, and Wallace all laughed—Paul, Jake was rapidly learning, had little sense of humor. Danny said, “Very dramatic, but I meant all of us.” He turned to Paul. “There’s got to be a way we can save him.”

“We’d want to question him,” Eva pointed out.

Paul grumbled but responded, “Fine. The barbarian assassin
appears
to be dead. What do you want to do?”

“I cast Cure Light Wounds on him,” Wallace/Hastur announced.

“‘Light Wounds,’” Paul muttered sarcastically.

Technically, Cure Light Wounds was supposed to be useless on a dead man, and Paul refused to allow the party to drag Jake/Berengar to a temple for resurrection, claiming the nearest one was two days’ journey away and the idea of them going to that much trouble for someone who’d tried to kill one of them was ludicrous. But he allowed the healing spell to bring Berengar’s hit points above negative five—unconscious and bleeding, but not dead—so they could spend another day at the tavern nursing him back to health.

Jake took his seat again beside Danny, and when he was finally allowed to regain consciousness, he told everyone, “Thanks!”

“Stay in character,” Eva admonished him.

“Um… thanketh ye… kind sirs.”

He saw Danny trying not to laugh, his gray eyes regarding him with amusement, but it was Eva who asked, “Is your character a Chaucer pilgrim?”

“Not that I’m aware of.”

“You can speak normal English,” she said with a smile. “Just try not to sound too… I don’t know. Colloquial. Try not to use too much slang.”

Danny clamped a hand on Jake’s shoulder and said, “You’ll get the hang of it, my friend.”

In that moment, the ribbing and Paul’s anal obsession with doing things by the rules ceased to matter. All that mattered was that Danny had called him “friend.”

A
FTER
THE
game wrapped up, Danny went to sit down at the piano and began to play Debussy’s
The Sunken Cathedral
. Jake hung back, while the others collected all their dice and character sheets and drifted off to other parts of the dorm. Then he approached Danny and said, “I’m sorry if I ruined the game.”

Danny stopped playing, regarding him in surprise. “Why do you think you ruined the game?”

“Paul seemed pretty pissed at me.”

“No, he wasn’t,” Danny assured him. “Trust me. He gets like that with all of us when we do things that fuck with his campaigns. He’ll forget all about it in an hour.”

Jake didn’t look convinced. “I was pretty bad.”

“I thought you were very entertaining,” Danny said truthfully, smiling at him. “And you seemed to be picking it up toward the end. Didn’t you have a good time?”

“I guess so. I mean, yeah, it was fun when I didn’t feel like I was holding everybody back.”

“You weren’t holding us back. It’s not like we’ve never had a new player join us before.”

Jake nodded, though Danny wasn’t sure if he was buying it. Jake really hadn’t been that bad, and Danny had been pleased he was willing to try it. Hopefully, he’d play again next weekend.

Jake glanced at the piano and asked, “Could you play that loon one again?”

“You mean this one?” Danny began to play
Clair de lune
and Jake smiled, nodding.

It was sweet, the way Jake listened to the music so intently, as if he’d never heard anything quite so wonderful. He alternated between watching Danny’s hands and watching the way the piano hammers struck the strings over the exposed soundboard of the baby grand.

Then they were interrupted by the lounge door opening and Mark walking in with some textbooks in hand. It wouldn’t have been a big deal—students came into the lounge all the time—except that Mark seldom entered a room without drawing attention to himself. Today was no exception.

“Thank God the
gamers
are finally out of here!” He put as much contempt into the word “gamers” as he could manage.

Danny immediately stopped playing, and Jake’s face clouded over. As far as Danny knew, Jake hadn’t had the displeasure of meeting Mark, so he said, “Jake, this is my old roommate, Mark.”

Jake nodded and said, “Hey” to Mark, but he seemed more reserved than usual. Perhaps he’d heard rumors around the dorm about how much tension there had been between the two last year.

“So you’re the new roommate,” Mark said. He flopped down on one of the garish blue couches without extending his hand. He was a good-looking guy in his own way—tall, with blond hair, baby-blue eyes, and a disarming smile—but his sarcasm generally put people off pretty quickly. “I’m glad he found someone… compatible.”

There was something in the tone of his voice that Danny didn’t like. Clearly, Jake sensed it too, because he narrowed his eyes and asked, “What do you mean ‘compatible’?”

“You’re into all that D&D shit, aren’t you?”

Jake glanced at Danny, as if trying to sort out whether telling the truth would jeopardize their budding friendship. Danny rescued him by saying, “No, he’s not. He just decided to try it today.”

Mark snorted. “Careful, Jake. That’s the equivalent of ‘first base’ for gamers. You’ll be using dice as sex toys by the end of the month.” He looked thoughtful for a moment and then added, “Of course, if you’re already up to naked humping, it’s probably a little late to warn you about
that
.”

Danny had expected Sonny or one of the students who’d been in the hall to spread that around the dorm, and he’d prepared himself for it. But from the way Jake blushed, it was obvious he was embarrassed.

“We were just horsing around,” Jake said.

“As long as you keep it in your room.”

Danny could see the muscles in Jake’s cheek twitch as he clenched his jaw reflexively. Then he took a breath and said to both Danny and Mark, “I’ve got some homework to do.” Without another word, he turned and left the lounge.

“See you,” Mark said to his retreating back, opening one of his textbooks.

Wishing he could slap Mark for being such a dick, Danny began playing again—Andrew Lloyd Webber show tunes, because he knew Mark hated them. When Mark asked, “Do you mind?” and waved his textbook in the air, Danny ignored him and kept on playing.

J
AKE
COULDN
’
T
stop thinking about what Mark had said all day. He’d trusted Danny not to blab about Jake getting a hard-on when they were lying together, and as far as he knew, Danny hadn’t. But of course Sonny had seen them, as had whoever else managed to see into the room past Sonny. It wasn’t surprising that it was all over the dorm. But still, Jake had managed to avoid thinking about it too much, until now.

He was gay. He’d known that since… well, maybe not when everything blew up with Tom Langois, but he’d figured it out not long after that—on those evenings when he’d sat in his room, watching Tom walking by the house, longing to call him inside. And the longing had only gotten worse when Jake’s father threatened to take out a restraining order. Tom hadn’t come by anymore, and Jake was too frightened of his father and his brothers to try to contact him. He knew then that the longing he felt was for far more than just a lost friend.

But he’d never told anybody. Not even when he went away to college. He hadn’t had any friends he could trust those first couple of years. Hell, he’d never even slept with a man. Rubbing up against Danny was the closest he’d ever come to having sex.

He admired Danny’s ability to be so casual about it. They hadn’t talked about it, but Jake gathered that he’d been out since sometime in high school. Everyone in the dorm knew and all his friends knew. Did his parents? Maybe. How awesome would it be to have everyone know and still be able to go to college and live there? After the way Jake’s dad had reacted to Tom coming out, Jake knew he’d never accept having a gay son. They’d already had a huge blowup over the phone, when Jake told him about transferring to Eaton House.

“What the fuck are you doing, moving in with a bunch of
art fags
?” his father had bellowed at him.

It had taken Jake the better part of two hours to calm him down and convince him that Jake wouldn’t slack off on his studies. What would he do if he found out Jake was actually living with a gay student? His father didn’t often get violent, but he wasn’t above backhanding his sons. Jake was about an even match for him now, physically. Not that he’d ever dare hit back, but at least he was no longer terrified of the guy. On the other hand, his two older brothers would just love an excuse to pummel him, and they were both still bigger than he was.

Worse than the threat of physical violence, though, was the likelihood that his father would yank his financial support. Jake didn’t qualify for federal loans, since his father made a good amount of money. And from what he’d heard, even if his father refused to pay for his education, the federal government would still look at his father’s income and say, “Sorry, kid.” He might be able to get some grants. His grades were pretty good. Really good, in fact. But would he be able to get enough grant money to stay in school and live on campus? He doubted it.

If the gay rumors just circulated around the dorm, maybe Jake could live with that. It might even be kind of cool. Would it be possible to be out in the dorm without word of it getting back to his family? It was an intriguing idea. His brothers were already out of school and working, so there really wasn’t any way things could get back to them. And the administration wouldn’t report anything like that to his father, would they?

Maybe I could come out to Danny. Just to start with.

If Danny was cool about it—and Jake was sure he would be—then Jake could work his way up to telling the rest of the dorm. In all likelihood, Danny already knew. How many straight men got boners when they wrestled with other guys? Well, maybe more than wanted to admit it, but still… there had been
looks
between them.
He probably even knows I’m attracted to him.

Jake made up his mind to tell him. That night.

But later, as they both stripped naked for bed, he lost his nerve. Every time he tried to open his mouth to bring it up, the butterflies in his stomach flew up his esophagus and choked him. He half expected to spit out a wing. So when Danny climbed into bed and shut off his light, Jake just said good night and did the same.

He lay there for over an hour, unable to sleep and thinking about what would happen if he told Danny he was gay too. Would they end up having sex? Just the thought of what it might be like to kiss Danny made him instantly hard. From there, his thoughts strayed to the feel of Danny’s naked chest against his when he’d wrapped his arms around him. He’d never realized how much body heat another man put out. It had been almost scalding.

Jake hadn’t jerked off in weeks. In Christensen, he’d been able to relieve the pressure now and then, blowing a load down the shower drain. But that wasn’t an option in Eaton House—not with the curtain half open. He’d thought about doing it in bed, while Danny was in class, but so far whenever he’d been in the mood, he’d only had a few minutes to get to class himself.

Now, he cautiously found his dick under the covers and gripped the hardened shaft in his hand. Danny was already breathing deeply and steadily. He tended to fall asleep fast. If he was quiet, Jake should be able to get off without Danny waking up. So he slowly stroked himself, mouth clamped tight against the possibility of an escaping moan, as his hand settled into a quiet rhythmic rustling under the sheets.

D
ANNY
WOKE
to the sound of a guy jerking off. It was very quiet, but unmistakable. Every guy who’d ever tried to masturbate in the dark without being heard knew that sound. And Danny was instantly turned on by it.

He’d wondered if Jake was finding time to jerk off. The guy seemed so uptight, Danny hadn’t been certain he ever did it. It had been easy enough for Danny. Jake snored. Not too bad, but enough so that Danny could rub one out without being heard above it. And he would know if Jake woke up. But Jake didn’t seem to be aware that Danny had woken up now.

He debated making some kind of noise. Was it more ethical to alert him that he was no longer “alone,” or to pretend not to notice so Jake could get some relief? If Danny had been straight, he probably would have just let it go, let Jake have some fun, and pretend not to hear. Probably straight guys in dorms did that all the time. But the fact was, Danny was gay, and listening to Jake was giving him a raging hard-on of his own. That made staying quiet and continuing to listen feel kind of creepy. Still, knowing Jake, the guy would shit himself if Danny tried to talk to him right now.