Crosscurrents - 20. Breaker Zone

When it finally happened, it came from an unlikely source.

It was a Sunday in mid-October. Earlier that afternoon we'd lost a double-overtime heartbreaker--on penalty kicks--against our main rival in the conference. I was pissed off because I hadn't played well, and I didn't want to go back to my dorm room. Halfway through the game Coach Miller had benched me, and he'd sent in my roommate Trey to replace me. Coach had recruited midfielders heavily the previous spring, so we were crowded at that position; that meant the freshman midfielders always had to compete with each other for playing time. I'd pretty much started every game, and Trey was constantly bitching and moaning to me about it, giving me his in-depth analysis concerning why he should be starting instead of me.

He'd played great after Coach pulled me. He scored twice; even though we'd lost, he was happy. I wasn't interested in hearing him gloat after the game. I was walking back toward the dorms, wondering who I could hang out with until I got my head right so I wouldn't have to talk to him. I'd cleared out of the locker room without showering; I had no intention of giving anyone the opportunity to rip on me for my performance. I figured I'd hang out in the dorm lobby and watch a little TV until I was fit to be with people.

I'd just reached the front steps when I heard someone call out to me from behind.

"Sucks, don't it?"

It was Dean. I shut my eyes for a minute and took a deep breath. Lord, give me patience.

I turned around and bumped knuckles with him, struggling past my foul mood in an effort to be sociable. "Fuckin' blows goats is what it does."

He laughed. "Dude. You were blowin' goats."

"Well, thanks, Coach," I said, scowling. "Because I'm too stupid to know without you tellin' me."

"You probably lost the game for us. You turned it over for crucial plays five times. Two of those led to scores. You stunk it up out there."

Dean was a junior; I was somewhat obligated to take this shit from him. And aside from that, he was right. Still, I didn't like it.

"Anything else you need to share with me?"

"Nah, that was enough, don'tcha think?" I tried to be irritated as he said that, but Dean's grin rarely made "irritated" possible.

He clapped a hand on my shoulder. "Happens to all of us. You were overdue. Don't let it get to ya." He pulled the front door open and motioned me inside. "I gotta get some class notes from The Wiz." David Wizner was the head resident of my dorm. "Then I'm goin' home. Why don't you come over? I'm guessin' you're not exactly in the mood to be with your roomie. We can hang and play some Sixty-Four. I got FIFA World Cup '98 and I suck. It'll make you feel better to whup my ass all over the field. And I got a fridge fulla beer."

I had a Nintendo 64 too, and I'd practiced plenty on FIFA World Cup. Dean lived a short walk off campus, and the offer was tempting. It beat spending time with the guy who got me benched. "Sounds good to me, long as I don't have to talk to your damn roommates," I said. "I'm not feelin' real social." Alex Whitmore thought he was a comedian on the order of Chris Farley, and Miguel da Silva, our hotshot Brazilian forward, was just plain annoying.

"Not a problem," he replied. "I just called Alex. He's over at his woman's place; he'll prolly spend the night there, like always. And Mikey was going to the library after he showered up. He said he'd be there 'til they threw him out, so unless you're planning on staying 'til two in the morning, you won't even have to see 'em, let alone talk to 'em."

"I'm in," I said, turning toward my hallway. "When you're done with The Wiz, come get me. I gotta shower."

"Naw, man," he said, frowning. "I don't wanna hang around for that. This'll only take a minute. Just grab some shit to change into. You can shower at my place. But hurry up."

When I got to my room, I grabbed some clothes and stuffed them into my gym bag; Trey wasn't back yet. Then I met Dean on the front steps.

----------

At college, "a fridge fulla beer" usually meant Coors Light or some other swill, but Dean had two cases of Negra Modelo. I'd never had any before and was seriously impressed by it.

By sunset, we'd both showered and changed. I'd put on a pair of blue Umbro soccer shorts and a white T-shirt; he'd dressed in jeans and a polo shirt. I'd been kicking ass and taking names at FIFA, and we were through a couple of pizzas and about a six-pack each when Dean put down his controller, turned to me out of the blue, and deadpanned, "So what's it like to be hot for guys? When you like dick, is it the same as when you like pussy?"

My heart fell into the pit of my stomach. This kind of shit had come up in joking ways every now and then in the locker room since the team had found out about Kyle…and about me. But this was a one-on-one, and something about Dean's facial expression belied the laugh that followed his question. He'd been one of the guys who'd originally voted to boot Kyle off the team, and I wasn't expecting this from him. I didn't need a damn confrontation over my sexuality tonight.

I couldn't think of what to say, and he wasn't helping me. We stared at each other for a few seconds. Neither of us spoke.

I got no clue from looking at his face. I didn't know if he really wanted to know something, or if he was just trying to give me a hard time, or if he was looking to throw down a lot of moral talk about how depraved I was. But his silence was exasperating me.

I finally said, "I can take bullshit as good as the next guy, but if you're fuckin' with me, I'm not in the mood, so maybe I should just go."

He reached under the TV stand and grabbed the soccer ball that was lying there. As he talked he passed it back and forth from one hand to the other, a study in nonchalance. "I'm not fuckin' with you, Andy," he said. "Don't get so fuckin' defensive. I don't care about your...what you like and what you don't. I just thought maybe you could...could tell me a little more about it since it's just the two of us. I never talked to a guy who...well, you know. I'm interested. I mean...not interested, okay? I just wanted to know more. I wasn't trying to give you a hard time."

As I tried to work out how to respond, he kept fidgeting with the ball, looking at me expectantly. I stared back, not saying anything.

Fear and self-loathing hadn't served me well in the past year, and here in college I'd resolved to put those behind me. One of the ways I'd begun to deal with my own bisexuality was to wonder about how many "guys like me" were out there who could have similar feelings. I figured that if what my dad had told me about himself was true, there were a lot more guys than most people realized who'd at least thought about it. And not just gay or bi guys.

After all, hadn't Matt...

I pushed the thought away and looked at Dean. Consciously, I hadn't considered actually testing my suspicions about “straight” guys. Even though my lingering feelings about Matt had effectively blunted my intent to hook up with a guy, I was still determined somewhere along the line to try being with a guy again. But when I thought about that, I'd always assumed I'd be getting with a gay guy. I wasn't originally out to convince the entire population of straight guys that they'd enjoy dick.

But it had made me angry to see Shane's reaction to Kyle, and several of the other guys seemed less-than-enthusiastic about having him on our team. I wondered to myself how many of those guys were subconsciously protesting something internal. And somewhere in that mix, I'd concluded that I could probably put some guys in a position that demonstrated that they and I weren't so different after all.

And all of a sudden that evening, I decided that I'd start with Dean.

I motioned him up from the floor by the TV, where we were sitting, and over to the sofa. I had an idea. I had a couple of ideas, actually, but how they played out depended on what happened next. "Okay," I said, as we sat down on the sofa. "Are you asking me a serious question you want a serious answer for?"

He looked at me intently and said, "I guess 'serious' is too strong a word...but I'm not fuckin' with you. Guys talk about queer shit all the time, but never anything real. I mean it's all about saying 'that's gay,' or calling someone a faggot. I don't know many haters like Shane, but still, you know how everybody has to be puttin' on their game, makin' sure everyone knows they play for the approved team. So you never really know what goes on in people's heads, or even what's out there...you know what I'm sayin'?"

He paused for a minute; it seemed to me he was trying to figure out what to say next.

"There's just...well, there's just shit that I'd like to know," he said calmly. "And it's just you and me here, and I figured you could be straight with me and I could be straight with you...I mean...well, no pun intended." He laughed a little, but it wasn't an "I'm-fucking-around" laugh; it was a nervous laugh.

I began to calculate how to play this out. "I'm gonna take you at your word," I told him. "But I don't think I can explain it in words so much. Maybe I can think you through it."

"What do you mean?" he asked.

"Just cooperate with me here, okay?"

"Depends," he said. "I'm asking: What do you mean?"

"Well," I said, "If you're really asking and not just makin' fun of me, I gotta tell you that it's not an answer I can give you in words, not really. It's not about concepts. It's about how things feel to me. I could talk about it all day and not get close to the reality of it. But maybe there's another way. I don't know, really: You could be wired so different from me that there's no way you could get it. But if you mean it, let's give it a shot."

He said, "This sounds way too serious, and also it sounds like you're trying to get me to do shit with you."

"I'm only trying to get you to a place where your question could be answered," I said. "Hell, I don't know how to do that, but I do know that talkin' about it like it was calculus or history won't do it. I think you have to think about yourself and how you react to things. Especially sexual things. You know how physicists sometimes have to do thought-experiments because the empirical approach doesn't always work with quantum mechanics?"

"You're talking to a physics major, asshole," he said.

"Right," I said. "Okay, so think of this as a thought-experiment...you're gonna be reflecting on your own sensations and reactions and comparing them to what I've told you about mine. But it won't be entirely a thought-experiment; you do have some empirical data out there to help you…" I grinned and rubbed my hands over my chest. "My body, and your experience of it. Can't get more empirical than that."

He smirked. "So you are trying to get me to do shit with you."

"Nope," I said, "not necessarily. Bail any time you want. It's just you and me here, like you said; and I was mainly talking about getting you to concentrate on some physical things...not necessarily sexual things...and thinking about how you react to those things. I think to answer your question you have to be able to relate to what it is that catches my attention with guys. I figure most people, if you gave 'em the opportunity, could do that partway, because when I respond to guys that way, it's sort of the same ballpark as what attracts you and me to women. Visuals, touch, stuff like that. So if we walk you through what I have in mind, you might could kind of get it, if you'll give your fuckin' hang-ups a rest long enough to see what you see and feel what you feel; and then thinking about that...you know, reflecting on it...could fill in the rest for you."

His brow furrowed for a minute. Then he grinned. "Jesus, freshman," he said. "That's about the most nerdy overthinking about sex I ever heard from a soccer player! Somebody might actually think you have a brain on you.”

"Yep. Somebody might," I replied.

“And all because you want to see if you can get me horizontal with you,” he laughed.

“Hey, I could rock your world vertical,” I said with a wicked smile.

He blushed furiously, then laughed at his embarrassment. "I'm sure you think you could,” he said, “but what I was gonna say was this: The most fucked-up thing about it is that I actually understood what the hell you meant...and believe it or not, it actually kind of is like a thought-experiment."

He paused, considered things for a moment, and finally said, "Okay, Einstein. I'm a willing subject."

"You're not the subject," I said. "You're the observer."

"Who's the subject, then?"

I thought for a minute. "Well, I guess you're the subject and the observer."

He shrugged. "Either way, I'm not doing gay shit with you."

The hell you aren't, I thought. But I shook my head. "I'm not asking you to do anything you don't want to do."

"Okay, then," he answered. "I'm good with it. But no gay shit."

"You just said that; I get it, already," I snapped, irritated. "And if you're talkin' about me pullin' fast moves on you without your consent, I told you I wouldn't do it. But c'mon, Dean. You asked me about liking guys, for fucksake. So I guess there's gonna be some 'gay shit' about it. How could there not be?"

"You know what I mean, Andy," he said. "I'm not sucking your dick."

"Did I say I was gonna try to get you to suck my dick?"

He looked uncomfortable. "What do you want me to do, then?"

"Will you just trust me?" I said. "I already told you, you can stop at any time.”

He sighed, and grinned, and said, "Okay. Do It. Whatever."

All right," I said. "Here goes." I stopped for a few moments to think. "Do this first," I began. "Lie back here on the couch. Close your eyes. Think about sex with a girl."

"You better not get me doin' too much of that," he said. "I got no girlfriend and I haven't been on a date in three weeks."

"That'll just enhance your visualizing abilities," I said, smiling. "Now think about your latest jerk-off fantasy girl. Tell me what you think of when you think of her."

He leaned his head back against the couch, closed his eyes, and started free-associating. "Soft. Tender. Sooooo fuckin' sweet. Curves. Delicate. Wet. Hot. Sooooo fuckin' pretty and sexy."

He opened his eyes and looked at me with a questioning grin.

I thought for a minute. The beer made it difficult for me to get clarity. But he'd opened this door, and regardless of what he was expecting, I had some expectations of my own.

I stripped off my shirt and dropped it onto the floor. "Now look at me."

Dean gulped audibly. "Okay."

I frowned. He was too uptight. This wasn't gonna work. "Dean," I said, "Dude. Just you and me, right? Now quit acting all nervous and fuckin' look at me, and think about what you see."

He took a deep breath again, made a visible attempt to relax, and scanned my upper body. After a moment, he said, "Okay, you're kinda ripped. Big deal. What's your point?"

"My point is, you're not gonna get my point unless you stop bein' a pussy and cooperate with me here. Don't panic, man, I'm not gonna get bisexual cooties on you. Now close your fuckin' eyes again and think about something else for me."

He sighed. "Okay."

"Think about touching a woman," I said.

"It's been so long ago I can't remember," he joked. Then he closed his eyes and appeared to concentrate on the matter. After a few moments, he opened them again and said, "Okay, so what?"

I moved closer to him. "Now squeeze my shoulders."

"Say what?"

"I'm not kidding," I said. "Put your hands on my shoulders and squeeze."

He hesitated. "That's what I'm talkin' about, Sharpe. I'm not doin' that shit."

"Squeezing my shoulders is queer?"

He shook his head. "Look, I just brought up this whole deal...I mean, I just asked you a question. I asked you what it felt like to like guys. I wasn't hittin' on you. I don't get with guys."

"I'm not askin' you to get with me," I said. "But why'd you ask the question if you didn't want an answer?"

"Feelin' you up isn't an answer," he quipped.

"Whatever," I said. "But how did you learn about soccer? Did you study a book? Did you listen to someone tell you about it? What did you do?"

He started to answer, then stopped and muttered, "Fuck you."

I smirked at him and said, "Maybe on the second date, babe." Before he had a chance to freak out, I moved past it and said, "You know I'm right. Physical shit--sports, sex--it's about bodies, not just minds. You don't get it from a book. I figured I could help you see firsthand. Doesn't mean you're gonna get all horny, moron. But you admitted I got a decent form. So already you know the difference between a guy looking good and not. I'm saying, go with what you know and build on that." I frowned at him, and my voice took on a hint of frost: “You really want to know what it's like for me to like guys? What I like about them? Or were you just tryin' to score a laugh at my expense?"

The look on his face was one of a guy who'd been cornered. "I told you. I wasn't trying to fuck with you," he said quietly.

A minute passed. Finally he said, "If I do it, you won't tell anybody, right?"

I rolled my eyes. "Jesus fuckin' Christ, ya big baby," I responded angrily, "I'm not tellin' you to suck my cock. Just feel the texture of my skin, feel the muscles. And think about the difference. You know what I mean. The sensations of touching a girl's skin over against the sensations of touching mine. Strictly gathering data here; nothing dicey whatsoever."

"I can't believe I'm even thinking about doing this," he said, still staring at my chest.

I shrugged. "Okay, just forget it." I got off the couch, picked up my shirt, and reached for my gym bag. "I think I better go, man. I'll catch you tomorrow."

"Wait," he said, standing up.

"I'm sorry,” he said. “It was weird. But the only reason I asked....I don't know, man, I know I'm not gay or even bi, but everybody thinks weird kinky shit sometimes. I wondered what made you decide.”

He added, quietly, “I wondered if it was like stuff that goes through my head once in a while. I wondered why you decided one thing about yourself and I decided another thing about myself."

I put down my bag and sat back down. "Are you saying you think you're bi?"

The defenses came up with a vengeance. "No," he shouted. "Get that through your thick fuckin' skull, okay? I just wanna know why you are."

He went to the refrigerator, grabbed another beer, and then sat down beside me. "I'm sorry, man. It just makes me nervous, okay? And all I'm saying is that it's not like a guy doesn't think weird shit every now and then. Like I said. And you seem normal like everybody else, and I just wondered if the difference was you just did something different mentally with the crazy shit that goes through all our heads sometimes."

"I wasn't trying to come on to you," I lied. "But I still think what I had in mind would help you understand what I like about guys. I mean, you know, in that way. Even if it didn't turn you on."

He sat motionless, looking me over. After a while he nodded, hesitantly.

He reached over and put his hands on my shoulders.

Squeezing lightly at first, then more deeply, he closed his eyes as he kneaded the muscles.

After a while, he pulled back from me and opened his eyes. I ignored his deer-in-the-headlights expression. "Okay," I said, "stand up with me."

We stood up. "Put your hands around one of my biceps," I said. He swallowed hard and squeezed my left bicep while I flexed it. I heard him mutter "damn" under his breath.

"Okay, now put your hands on my chest, and feel my chest and abs."

He backed away and said, "No, man, that's enough of this shit. I get the general..."

"Do it," I ordered, interrupting him.

Reluctantly, slowly, he moved toward me and put a hand on each pec. He let his fingers knead my pecs lightly. After a half a minute or so, he began moving his hands up and down my torso. I closed my eyes and let myself enjoy the sensation.

A couple of fingertips of his right hand brushed over my left nipple as he traced down toward my abs and back up again. My breath caught, and my dick throbbed, in response. He let his fingers travel up and down my chest and abs a couple of times, first with one hand, then the other, each time becoming more deliberate about feeling my nipples. After the third pass or so, he took the thumb and middle finger of his right hand and squeezed my nipple gently, rolling it between two fingers. I moaned, and his breathing began to get deeper and heavier.

Trance-like, he knelt down in front of me, letting his hands move up and down the ridges of my abs. As he made his way lower, his fingers rubbed back and forth over the trail of hair below my belly button.

He reached the waistband of my soccer shorts. Absently, he started to tug the waistband down about a quarter inch. Reflexively, I thrust my hips forward a little, causing my now-hard cock to push against his wrist.

That broke the spell for both of us. He pulled his hands off me as if he'd just touched a hot stove.

"Okay, I'm done with this bullshit," he said, violently. He jumped up and backed away from me.

Over the last few minutes, the effect of the beer had attenuated some, and I was starting to feel uneasy about this crazy idea myself. I cocked my head back toward the sofa, signaling for us to move back to it. As we walked back over and sat down, I couldn't help noticing the stunned expression on his face.

----------

I was about to ask him what he'd learned, when he said, "What the fuck did you do that for?"

"Hey," I answered. "You were the guy feeling me up. So don't be talking like I was doing shit."

"Quit fuckin' with my head," he said emphatically, as he stood up and began pacing the floor. "I just thought...goddammit, I just asked you a simple question. You told me you weren't gonna fuck with me. I trusted you and decided to go along with your stupid shit, and then you..."

I didn't let him finish. "I did what? Like you got a mouthful of cum or something? Why the hell are you so pissed off?"

He didn't answer.

I scowled at him and started putting my shirt back on.

He could tell I was annoyed with him, and when he sat down next to me, I could hear it in his voice. "Damn, Sharpe," he said. "I'm sorry. I wasn't accusing you of anything. It's just that I...dude, I've never felt on a guy like that. It was just weird, you know?" He looked down for a moment, then said, "It was...it was definitely different."

I waited for him to say something else. Finally, he added, "I mean, it didn't turn me on or anything. It's just...You won't tell anybody, will ya?"

The pleading in his eyes pissed me off, but I kept my cool.

"I already told you," I reminded him. "Of course not. But if it didn't turn you on, why would it matter? It was all innocent, right?"

"Well, yeah," he said. "But it might raise some eyebrows."

I raised mine at him. "So tell me. What did you learn?"

He furrowed his brow. "What did I learn about what?"

"Well, first of all, I guess, what's the difference between a guy's body and a girl's?"

He relaxed some. "Shit," he said, chuckling, "I coulda told you that without having you make me give you the full-body workover."

"Okay, but you free-associated before about a girl's body. Now free-associate about mine."

"Ugly," he said. "Skinny." He broke out the grin again.

"You lying sack o' shit," I said, punching him. "No kidding this time, do the same kind of word-association."

"I don't know, man. Anyway, we all got similar builds on the team. You and me, not that much different."

"That's not what I asked," I said.

Exasperated, he replied, "Okay, what did you ask?"

"Set the bullshit aside," I said, "and tell me what came into your head. You say on the team we're all similar in our bodies. Makes sense; we all follow the same workout routine. Now ask yourself, why do you work out? What do you want from your own body when you work on it? And what did you notice in mine?"

"Hard," he said. "Not just your dick, although I caught that too," he said with a wink and a smile. Then his face grew serious, and he said, "I don't know, Andy. What do you want me to say? It's not like I can give a few paragraphs about 'Sharpe's amazing body,' " he said, frowning.

"I didn't ask you to write a damn paper," I said. "Just word-associate like you did about women's bodies. What words come to your head?"

"I dunno," he said. "Maybe 'strong.' Or how about 'tough'? That make you feel studly?"

I laughed.

"Also 'defined,' he continued. " 'Confident,' maybe. That's what I want to get from my workouts. That's what I...I mean, you know, that's what I noticed with you."

"Confident? My body's 'confident'?"

"I don't know, man," he stammered. "It's just what came to me."

"None of those words you said about women, though, right? No 'sweet'? No 'soft curves'? No 'delicate'? No 'tender'? But you liked it anyway?"

"I didn't say I liked it," he said, looking away.

----------

You learn a few things when you devote time and energy and brainpower to the art of seduction. You learn about the various nuances of interest, and desire, and ambivalence, and incipient guilt, and you learn how to watch those wrestle with each other in the facial expressions, in the body language, of the one you're after. You learn when to press your advantage and when to let the other person have a little slack.

I'd never gone into "sexual conquest" mode with a guy before. In the one sexual encounter I'd had with a guy, I had been so completely vulnerable, so devoid of calculation or manipulation, it couldn't possibly serve as a reference point.

But as I put Dean through his paces feeling my muscles, I began almost unconsciously to look for clues and cues in his face, in his gestures, his tone of voice, his body language; just the way I did when I was looking for an advantage with a woman. The cold, calculating, using part of me had decided that tonight was the night, and that Dean was the man who'd take me a little farther down my road.

That he was semi-hostile made it all the more compelling.

I looked him in the eye and said, "So, if my body did turn you on--which, of course, it didn't--what would turn you on about it?"

"It didn't turn me on," he said. "I wanna be real clear on that right now."

"Right. You didn't like it."

"No," he said, "I didn't say that."

"So you do like my body," I said.

"No, I don't," he said. "I mean...I...you're tight, and..." he blushed furiously. "Goddammit, you're fuckin' with my head again. Your body doesn't turn me on, okay? But I got eyes...and I mean, I could even feel the things that are attractive about it. I never did that with a guy before. You keep in shape. We all do. It wasn't a turn-off. I didn't dislike it." He glared at me. "And I swear if you quote me you're dead meat."

I laughed. "All right, then. Just so we're clear--if you didn't dislike my body, and if you could see the things that are attractive about it, then in some sense you like my body, right?"

"Asshole," he muttered.

I kept the pressure on. "Was it unpleasant to touch me? Be honest."

"It wasn't pleasant, it wasn't unpleasant, it was okay, okay? I liked how firm and tight you are. There; ya happy?" He glared at me.

"So, when I tell you that I'm attracted to guys and girls, do you get sort of what I mean?"

"I think so," he replied, rolling his eyes. "Or let's say I can admit to appreciating those qualities on you."

I let those words hang in the air for a minute before I pushed. Then, flashing him a seductive grin, I said, "So what would it take for you to let me feel you up like that?"

He stared hard at me, then looked up at the clock.

Swallowing hard, he looked into my eyes and said quietly, "Not much."

He tore his eyes away from mine and looked toward the window as he asked, "Would you...I...would you do more?"

----------

I felt my dick spasm once in response. "I...I was yankin' your chain, Dean. I didn't expect...I mean...Are you fucking kidding me?"

I couldn't believe how easy it had been.

His eyes, wide with astonishment and fear, locked onto mine. "Okay, look...never mind, I'm sorry I brought it up," he said.

"No, man, don't be," I replied, rushing to reassure him. "I just...I mean, I don't get it; this whole time you've been all 'don't fuck with my head, I'm not bi, I never said I liked your body.' And you were the one talking that day about how fucked up Kyle is and all afraid he'd hit on you."

"I've already told you I'm sorry about that, Andy, what the fuck more do you want from me? Shane just kinda got me on a roll that day," he said. "I don't hate Kyle. He and I are good."

"I know," I admitted.

He continued. "I'm not gay. I'm not even like you--bi, or whatever. But I guess it doesn't gross me out. And what you just made me do..."

I broke in on those words. "What I made you do?"

"Naw, I didn't mean it like that," he said. "I meant, what we just did...I see your point. Your body, it's....it's okay. I can see what would be...like, what would be attractive. And look, man, I haven't gotten any in so long I'm just fuckin' horny. And no offense, man, but I'm thinking you're bound to give head better than any girl. I mean, you got the equipment, you'd know how to make it feel good."

"Why would I take offense at that?" I asked, bristling. Seduction or no, I wasn't going to take any condescension from him. "Is it a bad thing? And what's it to you, anyway?"

"Dammit, Andy, I didn't mean it like that," he said. "I'm trying to do this right, man, give me a break; this is totally new to me and pretty damn unexpected. You got me a little off-balance with this whole thing. When I asked you about how it was to like guys, it's not like I wanted anything...but then, when I got to feelin' on you, the thought crossed through my head that you wanted me to make a move. At first I thought, 'no way,' but then it hit me: what harm would it do, just once? I mean, I thought it's what you were up to. I just misread you, man; I thought you were maybe...maybe up for something. I wasn't gonna think of you like a slut either way. I'm sorry."

He was right. I was being too touchy about it, and now I was sending out some mixed signals myself. I guess I still had some distance to go.

I smiled at him. In response, a little expression of relief crept over his face.

I strode over to him and began lifting up his shirt.

He didn't push me away.

"Don't be," I said, grinning and tossing his shirt aside.

"What?"

"Don't be sorry," I said. "I'm not."

He stood facing me, his arms crossed at his chest. Waiting to see what came next.

I told him, "You asked if I'd do 'more.' "

I put a hand on his shoulder and asked, "Did you mean it?"

He stared into my eyes for a minute, then looked down at the floor and said, "Yeah. I meant it."

I smiled. "Okay, then. Here's my answer…"

He looked back up at me.

"I'll do all the 'more' you want, man," I told him. "I'll fuckin' drain you dry, if you want it."

I watched him swallow hard.

"Jesus," he whispered.

----------

The adrenaline was pounding through my system. My dick was steel. And, bravado notwithstanding, I was scared as hell: This would be my first time doing something like this since...

Since...

A trickle of sadness made its way through me and quickly dissipated.

Then The Voice--the one that always tries to give me the third degree, keep me honest with myself--spoke for the first time since I'd set foot on campus.

You're pretty proud of yourself and your little plan, aren't you, studboy? But slow down and think about who this guy is. You wanna be doin' this?

It hit me: Dean could very well react the way I'd mistakenly believed Matt had reacted. In the moment, he might go with this but then resent me later for seducing him. What would happen if Dean got buyer's remorse? Beyond that, there was a pecking-order thing to consider. We got along pretty well, but Dean was definitely the kind of guy who kept tabs on where his buds were, in relation to him, in that pecking order.

The Voice laughed at this one. As if you're not?

Ouch. But all the more reason I had to be careful with this. Dean already considered himself a little better than me by virtue of his seniority. And it wasn't as though I hadn't manipulated him a little into this place. I had fucked with his head some, taken advantage of some vulnerability and trust he'd risked with me. Anyway, regardless of the things he'd just said, he hadn't been too cool about Kyle when Kyle outed himself. If I gave him head, would he think of me as someone who had "become his cocksucker," giving him the right to treat me like some sub-male dick-whore? There was no way I'd let that happen.

I sat there, considering all this as I looked at him. It was apparent that my silence was making him uneasy. "Fuck, Andy, you gotta be the one to take the lead here; I...this is kinda freakin' me out."

"I'm having second thoughts," I said. "How you gonna treat me afterward? We gotta be on the same soccer team, for at least two years."

Frustration was starting to show on his face. "I promise...I fuckin' swear. It'll be fine. How could I give you shit? Dammit, I just had my hands all over you, everywhere but where it counts. That's pretty fuckin' suspect. Somebody else watchin' it would think so, anyway. So it's not like I got room to rip on you. You got me up for this, man; you gotta finish it."

I looked down at his jeans; he was telling the truth.

I wasn't sure, though. "You don't think it's sick? Five minutes ago you weren't havin' any of it, and we both know what you said about Kyle."

He frowned. "How many times you gonna make me apologize for that? I'm sorry about Kyle, man. I told you, I was just fuckin' around. If it makes any difference to you, I've told Shane I think he's full of shit for the way he's being about Kyle."

I crossed my arms and continued to stare at him. After a moment or two he said, "Okay, I understand what you're saying. It's a risk for you too. But dude, you're right. I'm the one who brought it up. I...I'm curious." He blushed deeply. "All right. I'll admit it. I'm not gonna lie, I think on some level I wanted something to happen. I'm straight, Sharpe, but dammit, I did... I wanted something to happen. Maybe not when I asked you over here, but kind of as we were sittin' here, and, I dunno, even, like, when you came out of the shower...I already had it in the back of my head. I mean, I know I protested, and told you I didn't wanna do sex stuff. But I think maybe…or what I'm tryin' to say is that on some level, I hoped you'd....well, it's just, see, I thought it would be safe and I could trust you to..."

Before he'd had a chance to finish, I said, "You can trust me. That's not the issue, Dean. The issue is whether or not I can trust you. I mean, I don't give a shit who you tell, if you got the balls to tell someone. But I do give a shit how you treat me after."

We stared at each other silently for a minute.

"There's a way you can show me," I said, keeping my eyes locked on his. "A way you can show me you won't think you're better than me afterward."

I sat down next to him. From the look of consternation that swept across his face, I could tell he understood immediately.

"Fuck," he muttered to himself. He stood up and walked over to his window, looking out as he had before.

I waited as he wrestled with himself. He turned and looked at the clock on the wall again. Then he turned to me, smiled nervously, and said, "Okay. But I do you first, because after I get mine, I might not have the nerve to go through with it."

"Then you just bought yourself a top-shelf blowjob, my man," I laughed.

Taking a deep breath, he said, "Okay...I don't know what I'm doin' here...you gotta walk me through it."

You're in. Showtime, kid, the Voice said. Think you can handle this?

I'd spent some time already thinking about the whole issue of sex with guys and how I wanted it to happen. I wasn't going to settle for some fully-clothed quickie that both of us would find easy to deny. There'd been too much denial of this part of me already, and in any case, the quicker it went by and the more spur-of-the-moment it seemed, the easier it would be for Dean to turn it against me later with a claim that he was horny and drunk, or that I came on to him when he was horny and drunk.

"I'll do that," I replied, "if you promise to trust me through this whole thing, okay?"

"Well...okay," he said.

"First of all, I got some ground rules. We're not gonna just whip 'em out and blast off as quick as we can. This has gotta be sex, Dean, not just a fuckin' blowjob from a queer. When this is over, it's gonna be something you participated in, you know what I mean?"

He sighed. "I get it. Look, if we're gonna do this, let's stop talking about it and just do it, okay?"

"Okay," I said. "The first thing is, we gotta get naked."

"Completely?"

"I'm not doin' this halfway," I said. "So come over here and undress me."

"Why me?"

"Don't you trust me?"

"Yeah," he said, "but you can fuckin' undress yourself, can't you?"

"Look, dude," I said. "If there's one thing I know it's that ninety percent of sex is in the head. You've heard me say how I think a lot of people could go there if they'd admit it to themselves?"

"Yeah. So?"

I stood up. "If you got the balls to try this once with me, I wanna make it as good for both of us as I can. And to do that you need to get into the mindset of you're about to have sex with me, not just 'we traded blowjobs.' It's not just about dicks, it's about the whole thing. That's why the 'naked' part. And I like to be undressed by the person I'm gettin' with."

"That's what I was afraid of," he said uneasily. "But what-the-hell-ever." He walked back toward me until he was right in front of me.

"One other thing," I said. "If you're gonna freak out on me or get all tentative or squeamish, let's not even do it. You go this far, you gotta get yourself into it the best you can. I mean, it's just blowjobs, but I'm not just a dick with a life-support system attached, and you're not either. Do you know what I'm talkin' about?"

"Yeah," he said, smiling. "We gotta be into it if we're gonna do it."

"Yep."

"Fine. But I got a condition, too," he said.

"What's that?"

"No kissing above the neck."

"No worries, man," I said. "Why would I want to kiss an ugly face like yours?"

"I dunno," he smirked;"you seem to want to suck an ugly dick like mine." He laughed, and then looked at me and nodded. The hesitancy in his body-language vanished. "I'm in," he said. "All the way."

He gestured toward his bedroom. "Come on," he said. "On the off-chance my roommates show up, we don't need to be doin' gay shit in the living room."

----------
 

He shut the bedroom door behind us. "Sit down on my bed," he told me.

I did, and he kneeled down at my feet and started untying my shoes.

The deliberateness--the tenderness--with which he untied my shoes and slipped them off was maddening. Once he had my shoes off, he shocked me by gently stroking the sides and soles of my feet through the cotton fabric of the socks.

The sensation was amazing; I closed my eyes, inhaled deeply, and then breathed out slowly. Astonishment must have been written all over my face, because he looked up at me and grinned. "Told you," he said.

"What?"

"All the way in," he said with a smirk.

He took off my socks the same way he took off my shoes. Tenderly, excruciatingly slowly, brushing his fingers lightly up and down my feet after he'd bared them. A shiver went up my spine; my shorts began to feel uncomfortably tight.

He stood up and reached for my t-shirt. I raised my arms as he pulled it over my head and let it drop to the floor. Then he looked at me, smiled, and pushed me firmly downward until I was lying on my back.

He gave my chest a good visual going-over, then leaned over slightly and put his hands on my thighs. Just then the uncertainty must have grabbed hold again. "Fuck," he whispered, shaking his head back and forth. "Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck." The last one was spoken full voice. "I can't believe I'm doin' this."

"You don't have to do it," I said, giving him an opportunity to back out.

Our eyes had a brief, wordless conversation. He raised his eyebrows and shrugged. Then he grabbed at the waistband of my Umbros and tugged them down. I lifted my hips as he slid them off my legs; he tossed them to the floor on top of my t-shirt.

He sat down on the bed next to me. My interest in the proceedings was obvious, even through the cotton fabric of my boxer briefs.

"Joe Boxer," he said. "Figures." Grabbing the logo-bearing waistband and pulling it slightly away from my stomach, he then let it snap back.

I laughed. "What do you mean?"

"Oh, nothing," he replied. "I'm just talking off the top of my head, saying whatever shit comes out. I think I'm just stalling or something. So..."

Slowly, tentatively, he put a hand on my crotch. "Damn," he said quietly. He took a finger and traced down, then back up, the length of my cock. Toward the top of the upstroke my entire body shuddered in response; he chuckled.

I pulled myself to a sitting position. "I want you in front of me," I said, and stood up.

"I bet you do," he said as he kneeled down in front of me and got eye-level with my midsection.

He took a deep breath and pulled the boxer briefs down to my knees. I lifted my right leg a little, pushed the shorts to the floor with my foot, and stepped out of them.

"Oh fuck; oh shit," he whispered to himself again, staring at my erect penis. I pulled the slightly-retracted foreskin back the rest of the way. A drop of precum spilled from the tip and dribbled a few inches down the length of my cock.

"Wow. You get that all the time?"

"Yeah," I answered. "Don't you?"

"Only when I'm just about done," he said.

He reached for my dick, but I pushed his hand away and said, "Now you."

He looked at me and frowned. "You want me undressed for this part?"

"I want us both undressed the whole time we're doin' this," I replied.

He stood up and backed away from me a little. "Why?"

"You're beautiful," I said.

He winced a little. "You mean I'm hot. I ain't fuckin' beautiful."

"Call it what you want," I said. "I wasn't calling you a woman." I flexed a bicep and squeezed it. "Remember?"

"Right," he laughed. "I remember. 'Strong.' 'Confident.' That shit. Jesus, me and my big mouth."

I said, "You're all those things. I wanna see that."

"No, you just wanna see my cock," he sneered.

"That too," I said, grinning.

"But can't we just wait until it's my turn to..."

"No," I said.

"But I might...I mean, what if..." His voice trailed off as he looked away.

"What if what?"

"What if I get hard while I'm...while I'm suckin' your dick?"

I grinned and said, "Well, then I'll definitely feel flattered."

He shook his head. "But I don't...I mean, I'm not like that..."

Something about this felt familiar. Not in a good way. I blew past it, though, and said, "Okay, you're not. So then why are you worried about getting hard?"

"I fuckin' get hard just thinking about the word 'sex.' And this is definitely a sexual situation, I don't care if it's gay."

"Then it doesn't matter," I said. "Anyway, I'm gonna see you hard when I'm blowing you; what's the big deal?."

"That's when you're blowing me, when you're makin' it feel good. It's supposed to get hard then. It's not supposed to get hard when I'm doin' you, and I don't want you thinking..."

I flashed him my most evil smile. "Are you hard now?"

"Yeah," he said.

"And what's been goin' on? I been suckin' on you yet? Nope; in fact, you been runnin' your finger across my dick and lookin' it in the eye. So as far as what I'd be thinking if you got hard doin' stuff to me, I'd say that hoss done left the barn. Anyway, what happened to 'all the way in' while you were undressing me? You lose your nerve?"

His face flushed, and after a few moments, he rolled his eyes and said, "Whatever; you want me stripped down while I do ya, you got it. But you gotta undress me too. That's your power thing and I get to have it the other way too."

"Gladly," I said.

"Just fuckin' hurry up," he said.

"Okay," I told him. "Stand right where you are and don't move."

I walked around him and stood behind him, moving in until my body was touching his. I leaned in a little and spoke quietly in his ear, "I promise you're gonna love this. I guarantee what I'll do for you is gonna make up for any grossout factor you experience keeping your end of the deal." I put my hands on his shoulders and began massaging them.

The heat from my breath in his ear must have given him a shiver. He pulled away and turned to face me. "I guess it's not gonna be no grossout factor. Jesus. This feels weird as shit and I'm sorry, it is freakin' me out some...but I'm fuckin' hard as a rock. I promise, I'll get into it. I was ready, you know? Then I started thinking about sucking your dick, and I...it freaked me out a little. Just give me a minute, okay?"

"Sure," I said.

"Your hands on my shoulders; that felt good," he said. "Gimme some more of that."

He turned his back to me again. I put my hands on his shoulders and kneaded them. Made love to them with my hands, actually. He was so beautiful, and my ache for him was amping up by the minute.

I reached around to his front side and began unbuttoning his shirt; then I pulled it up over his head and took it off him. I massaged his shoulders for a while, dizzy with desire for him. I smiled to myself when I heard his breathing slow and deepen.

The feeling of his bare skin was one of silky-smooth joy. Something I'd been needing for a long, long, time was now literally in my hands. Without thinking, I leaned in and kissed a shoulder.

He tensed slightly. Realizing what I'd done, I said, "Sorry."

"It's fine," he said. "Anyway, it was below the neck." He chuckled a little. In response I began covering his shoulders with gentle kisses, occasionally stopping to suck on his neck a little. I breathed heavily, sensually, into his ears. "I want you so much," I whispered.

"Feels so fuckin' good," he moaned. "Keep going."

I worked on his shoulders a while longer, then pulled him into me, his denim-covered butt mashing into my hard cock.

I ran my fingers over his nipples; he exhaled raggedly. "Aww, fuck…"

My hands explored his tight pecs, my fingers tracing circles around his nipples, which by now were standing up and asking for attention. His breathing deepened, and occasionally I heard him whimper.

Gradually, I moved my hands down to his abs, feeling the cut lines and the velvet hardness of the muscles. I pulled him tighter in to me, pressing my dick against the material covering his ass. I rubbed my dick up and down the divide that his ass-crack made in the jeans. He pushed back into me, encouraging me to dry-hump him. I couldn't believe how completely into-it he'd gotten.

I pulled my midsection away from his and moved my arms from his chest to his backside. I let my fingers trace up and down his back briefly; then I slid my hands down over his ass, squeezing firmly.

It was time.

I reached back around his waist and began unbuckling his belt. I pulled it loose from his jeans, tossed it to the floor, and unbuttoned his jeans.

After I'd pushed them down his legs, he stepped out of them and turned to face me.

I could tell he'd gotten his mojo back; he stood before me, tall, certain, almost defiant. Hands down by his sides; shoulders broad and erect. Proud, and staring into my eyes, utterly unafraid.

My eyes drank in his sleek, graceful lines, his taut musculature. By now all he had on was in a pair of white A&F boxers with blue vertical stripes. The insistent presence underneath was pushing the fly into obscene prominence.

Eyes drilling into mine the whole time, he hooked his thumbs under the waistband and pushed the shorts to mid-thigh. Then he bent down and pushed them past his knees. They fell the rest of the way to the floor; he stepped out of them, kicked them aside, and walked a few steps closer. His eyes flashed with calm, confident expectancy. And something more.

Something like anger, but not.

It hit me: It was hunger. Hunger in wait.

I thought of a lion striding across the African veldt, surveying his domain; claiming it.

For a moment I forgot to breathe. He was beautiful. Powerful. Dangerous. And well past ambivalence.

"Touch me," he said. It sounded like an order.

I put my hands on his shoulders; he looked into my eyes and leaned in. I raised a questioning eyebrow, but he just nodded and moved in closer.

Our lips met gently. Sweetly. The softness of his lips and tenderness of the moment had me totally captivated.

He put his hands on the back of my head and opened his mouth against mine. Reflexively, I opened my own mouth. His tongue thrust into my mouth, searching for mine.

I was stunned. "What about 'no kissing above the neck'?"

He nearly spat the reply out, as his stare collided with mine: "Fuck that. I can deal. I want to."

He put his mouth on me again and French-kissed me assertively--almost violently--for a full three minutes. I couldn't stop; I was in the red zone.

For a while our tongues thrust hard against each other; then he let me settle into something a little more gentle and infinitely more sexy: With my mouth still hard against his, I began stroking his tongue gently with mine, feeling its shape and texture. He responded by letting my tongue take the lead, allowing me intimate access to this part of him in a way that had me completely stoned on him.

I was in an entirely new place here. Never before had I ever made love to someone's tongue. I explored the top and bottom of it with mine, swirling around it, tasting his tongue with mine, taking full advantage of the vulnerability he'd shown me. As I got more and more deeply into it, I felt layers of emotional defenses fall away.

After several minutes, I pulled my mouth away from his and went back to kissing his lips. Between kisses I'd pull back and look into his eyes just to see the smile they seemed to radiate.

Finally I kissed him one more time. Then I backed away a little. I was getting too excited; I didn't want to finish off early from a bunch of kisses, and my dick was threatening to. Beyond that, I was a little concerned that we'd crossed his previously-set boundary, regardless of his own seeming willingness to.

I smiled at him, hoping to get an indication that we hadn't pushed it too far with the kisses. I didn't have to worry: He said quietly, "That…that was unbelievable."

"Yeah," I replied. "I had to stop, though. I was getting too close…and you still have a job to do."

He raised his eyebrows, sighed deeply, and said, "Yeah. Okay. I'm good with it: Can't be any more queer than that just was. And hell, I liked that, so…"

Just before he sank to his knees, he said, "You tell anyone about this and you'll regret the day you ever met me."

I nodded as he put his hands on my ass and pulled me into his face.

Everything seemed to move in slow-motion as I watched his tongue reach toward the tip of my dick and collect the precum that had pooled there. He licked his lips and rubbed them together, coating them with my lube; then he licked them again. Smiling wickedly, he said, "Tastes like mine."

"You've tasted your precum?"

He shrugged. "Hasn't everybody?"

He took my dick in his hand, appraising it, pulling it downward to gauge the resistance, and letting it spring back up. It slapped me in the belly with an audible snap; we laughed. He took it in his hands again and gently pulled the foreskin up over the exposed head.

He let go and watched; my dick stayed hooded. Then he grasped me again and pulled the foreskin back down. I closed my eyes and let the sensations wash over me.

"That's pretty cool," he said. "It stays pretty much where you leave it. Does it always skin back when you're hard?"

"Usually," I said. "Eventually."

He pulled the foreskin back up over the head of my dick, and in a fluid motion, lowered his face to it and put it in his mouth. I groaned as he circled his tongue around it, took it out of his mouth and looked at it, unsheathed it again, and put it back into his mouth.

Gradually he began moving up and down on me. He seemed to know just how to push the right buttons. "Jesus, Dean," I moaned. "Fuck, that's good."

The heat rose as we got into it. I had my hands in his hair, caressing his head as he sucked on me. I tried to let him control the action, tried to keep from grabbing his head and pushing him into me with my hands, but things got pretty intense, and a couple of times I got a little more forceful with him than I'd meant. He didn't protest, though; as I held his head, pushing myself into him, I was surprised at how willing he seemed to take me deep. Pretty amazing for a straight boy, I thought. But Dean never did anything halfway on the field either.

We began to settle into each other's rhythms. I felt the lust radiate off me in waves. Once in a while he took me out of his mouth and began licking my balls. At one point he even lowered his mouth down and moved under my balls, licking and kissing me underneath until he was nearly at my hole. That wasn't a line he wanted to cross, though, so he moved back and swallowed my dick again.

The pleasure, the sensation, the frenzy of coupling like this, was sending me rapidly toward the inevitable conclusion. Just as I was rounding the bend, he pulled his mouth off me. "You gettin' close?"

I could only whimper. I figured he was done. I grabbed myself and started humping my fist, but he pushed my hand away. "I'm in for the full deal. I expect the same." Before I had a chance to say anything, he'd put me back in his mouth.

I couldn't control it any longer; I put my hands on his head again, gripped hard, and began full-out fucking his face. Finally, with a growl, I pushed deep into his mouth and exploded.

I went white-blind for a second, and the room seemed to disappear. The dizziness, the ecstasy took over, and I was flooded with love for this beautiful soccerboy. As the white goo emptied out of my dick into his mouth, my neural circuits got imprinted with incredible--and permanent--feelings of tenderness and regard for my teammate.

The whole time my dick spasmed out its orgasm, he let me stay in his mouth. Finally, when the last shudder had passed, I pulled out and fell back onto his bed.

He'd kept from swallowing. I watched as he ran into his bathroom and spit into the sink, then filled a glass with water. He took a swig, rinsed, and spit again. He looked at me sheepishly as he walked back over. He sat down next to me and said, "I'm sorry, man; no offense, okay? But that was gross."

I laughed at him. He looked hurt when I did. "I tried, dude," he said.

"No worries, man," I said. "I didn't even expect you to let me finish in your mouth. That was amazing!"

He blushed. "You know, it wasn't too bad. I could kinda get into it; I liked makin' you feel good. That was pretty awesome. The whole thing was kinda sexy. And holy shit, when I felt you swell up in my mouth? That was pretty fuckin' hot. But the cum, man: That just made it too real. I was not up for that. I'm sorry."

"Don't be stupid," I said. "It's like I said: You got me off. And in your mouth. Jesus, Dean. I..."

I couldn't finish; the tenderness I felt for him in that moment took me away, as an earlier image--no, an experience--seared its way out of my memory and across my consciousness:

Exploding deep into Matt loving him so desperately so peacefully oh God I

My body jerked a little, startled. Scared.

Dean was looking at me, eyebrows raised. "You okay?"

I took a few deep breaths.

"Yeah."

I was quiet for a while. I waited for my head and heart to settle down.

I wonder if I'll ever be free of him.

I shook it off, sat up, and said, "We're not done here, are we?"

He grinned.

----------

The second act was as good as the first.

These things stay with me:

The smell of his skin.

The feel of his warm cum blasting into my mouth; the taste as I swallowed it.

The touch of his hands on my shoulders, in my hair. The way he caressed my head as I sucked him.

The energy that hummed in him, radiated out of him.

And the way he kissed me on the cheek after I'd stood up from swallowing the last drop of him.

After he'd gotten his nut we lay in his bed together naked. He snuggled up next to me, his dick against my ass. We fell asleep briefly.

We got up and got dressed, went out into the living area. I got ready to leave. Just as I'd grabbed my gym bag, he said softly, "Hey. I think...I need to say something, okay?"

I looked at him without responding, and sat down on the couch with him.

He met my eyes with his, and said, "Andy..."

"I won't tell anybody," I said.

"I know," he said. "I wasn't gonna say that."

He seemed to be searching for the words. "It was good. I didn't like all of it, but...Thing is, see...oh, man, how do I..."

He blushed. "It was you."

I looked at him, trying to understand.

"I got off, yeah. And now I see what you meant. Or, I don't know, I think I know the answer to my original question."

I waited for him to find some words.

"It didn't change what I know about myself. But it was good. And, well...you..."

He shrugged his shoulders, sighed, scratched his head. "I felt good. About you. And I don't really get it. But I don't care. I liked it anyway. I just wanted to tell you."

We stood up together. I put my hand out to him, but he grabbed for me, pulled me into him, and gave me a quick hug and a slap on the shoulder. "This was a one-time deal. But you and me...I got your back any time, man," he said as he released me.

I smiled weakly, trying to ignore the way the words reverberated down the halls of my past. "You're all right, Dean," I said.

Awkward seconds ticked by as I tried to still my mind and memory. I wasn't successful.

Finally, I stood up. "I gotta go," I said hesitantly.

He walked me to the door. "Okay."

And then he pulled me back into him and kissed me one final time. A sweet, romantic kiss on the lips.

Then he got back into "tough-guy" character. "Okay, that's all I got for ya," he said. "Remember it, 'cause none of it's happening again."

"I know," I grinned. "And it's fine. I just want to say, and don't take this the wrong way…it was really beautiful, Dean."

He looked at me for a moment, debating what he'd say, I inferred from the look of his face.

Then he replied, "Yeah; it was."

"See you later," I said.

"Yep, he said. "And I'm serious, Sharpe. This changes nothing between us. We're good as we ever were. Maybe even better," he grinned.

"Thanks," I said. And this time, unlike the last time, I believed it.

About that last time: If only I'd…

I pushed the thought away. I walked out the door and jogged back to my dorm, thinking about Dean.

But not only about Dean.