D for Dylan - 10. Chapter Ten

“Aaahh! Aaah! Oh fuck! Fu-u-u-uck!..” I moaned.

“Oh baby… Hold on! Ooohh! Ooohh shit! Aaahhh!” Jake echoed.

I didn’t even have to picture what I looked like. Embarrassingly enough, a large mirror on the wardrobe cabinet standing beside the bed left absolutely nothing to imagination. He held me firmly by the waist, his dark skin glowing in the moonlight, strong hands leaving bruises on my skin as he kept me down on all fours and forced our bodies to join and disjoin. I was drenched in sweat, face puffy and red, eyes glistening, heavy droplets spraying from wet, springy curls on my head. I saw tears running down my cheeks, thin snot streaming from flaring nostrils. It looked fucking ugly, but it felt incredible. My hands dug into the sheets, twisting them at full strength, turning my knuckles white, as I was powering through a poisonous concoction of pleasure and pain.

He was good at it. I’ve never done it, but I could still tell. He massaged my back, rubbed the crevice of my neck, leaned forward to wrap me in a warm embrace as he gave me a break to adjust. I felt him deep inside, throbbing and hard. He kissed me, his hands clawed firmly into my waist as I bent back to meet his lips. We lost balance, fell on the sheets and he picked up where he left off, pushing up on his fists and slamming our lower bodies into the mattress.

Jake was strong and enduring, he rocked my fucking core, pulverized it to the ground, demonstrating his darkest side he so masterfully hid from everyone. Williams-junior turned out to be positively ruthless in bed, taking control and putting me through an absolutely shocking experience. At times, I felt like I was his sex doll - he’d grab me in a chokehold and fuck the shit out of me, harder than in any fucked-up porn I’ve seen online. At other times, he was razor focused on driving me to heaven, adjusting his angles and depth, carefully studying my responses, reading my twitching lips and rolling eyes, my gaping mouth and gasping breaths. I felt like he could look into my head, see straight through my soul.

“Aaaahh! Ahhh fu-u-u-uck!.. Jake! Jaaaake!”

I couldn’t shut up. He flipped me around, mounted me and I lost my breath from dense body contact. His muscular arms gripped me in a vice, my legs sprung on his lower back, fingers dug into his shoulder blades. I almost lost my mind. Despite what I anticipated, despite his more than respectable size, it wasn’t that painful. I wasn’t sure if this was due to how much time and care he took to prep me, if it was his extraordinary set of skills, or maybe I was simply a natural at this, but I was surprisingly comfortable with anal sex. More so, I came like a faucet, minutes into it.

Yeah, in the hindsight, I could now see why people acted suspicious towards quiet kind-hearted guys like him. Every bit of excitement Jake Williams seemingly failed to provide in real life and our relationship, he certainly made up for in bed. With interest.

“So how was it?” asked Elle, as we chewed on the soggy fries in cafeteria.

She was so curious that she kept stuffing her face with oily potatoes she once so ardently hated. I felt the warmth radiating off my face, as it slowly turned every shade of red on the palette.

“That good?!” she gasped.

I choked.

“What are you guys talking about?” asked her unsuspecting boyfriend, as he joined us and placed his tray on the table.

“You’re missing the juice, Pete! Dylan finally got Eiffel-towered!” she exclaimed.

I choked again and started coughing, Pete’s eyes were shifting between me and Elle and the poor guy just didn’t know what to say.

“I think I forgot ketchup!” he exclaimed. “Anybody wants ketchup?”

“Is that why you skipped school yesterday?”

“I thought you got drunk!” Pete slipped in, with his foot over the bench.

“I didn’t! I don’t drink!”

“Go tell that to Jason Wu’s mom, you almost puked all over her Persian rugs at the party.” Elle moaned. “Besides, what’s the big deal? It’s not like you guys fucked for two days straight!”

My treacherous cough reflex kicked in again and I had to stand up, drawing everyone’s attention to our table.

“Holy fuck, you did!” she gasped, with a genuinely shocked O-face that I haven't seen on her in a while.

“I am not participating in this conversation.” I uttered diplomatically, gathering my food and preparing to leave.

“Like hell you aren’t!” she ordered with a fist tap next to my tray. “Sit down!”

I’m ashamed to admit that I felt too scared to go against her. She gently took my hand and gave me a look of a librarian, receiving a long-overdue book from someone who doubtfully even read it.

“You need…” she spoke. “…to tell me everything.”

“Elle, I…”

“I’m listening.”

“Well, I don’t know what to… I mean yeah, we… We…”

“Don’t be such a prude!”

“Jesus Christ we fucked!” I yelled, a tad bit louder than I anticipated.

A deafening silence fell upon the busy cafeteria. The eyes of at least 40 students were suddenly all fixed on me. I let out a silly chuckle to dissipate the tension, but more than likely, it only made me seem like an idiot.

“I’m sure nobody heard-” Elle started whispering.

“Good for you, Moore!” Tyler McCormick shouted out with a cat-call whistle.

A few laughters waved through the crowd, from every table but one. The freshly laminated floors next to Liam’s table were hit with mustard and nuggets, as he pushed off his tray and stormed out of the cafeteria, shifting everyone’s attention to his flabbergasted girlfriend. Jess was visibly distressed. A rare look of sobering disbelief and confusion lingered on her face for a few protracted moments, she glanced at the double doors through which her boyfriend had just publicly abandoned her, and then her gaze moved to the table she rarely graced with her attention these days. Ours.

I felt very awkward, looking her in the eyes.

Jessica What’s-Her-Last-Name must’ve been one of the most sinister people I’ve got pleasure of meeting in my life. Every time we interacted, she gave me genuine chills. I don’t think she was ever openly hostile towards me, most likely because she never really perceived me as a threat. A few years back, when Liam moved on from Trish to Veronica, Jess spread out rumors that she fucked her way through the entire football team and was now a walking chupacabra of venereal diseases, including, but not limited to chlamydia and hepatitis C. The rumors got very bad, Liam dumped her, her own girlfriends turned their backs on her and she became a victim of slut-shaming and all kinds of cyber-bullying. People called her a slut, splashed her with red paint, wrote nasty shit all over her lockers and on the mirrors in the girl’s bathroom. At some point, she wasn’t holding much of a reputation around the school anymore, but it never stopped Jess from hounding her relentlessly. One night, we all woke up to a notification on our phones - it appeared that a certain someone convinced one of the brainless jocks on the varsity team to leak their sex tape online. Jess never really denied orchestrating that stunt. Veronica never stepped her foot back into the school again. There were rumors that she and her parents moved out of the city, but they turned out to be false. Her sex tape became a hit, her family had troubles taking it down and three months later, driven to the edge of insanity, poor Veronica shot herself in the head with her father’s gun. Miraculously, she survived for over a month and died later in the ICU from complications of pneumonia. Her parents filed lawsuit with the school, the DA’s office even launched an official investigation, but the whole thing was quickly swept under the rug a few weeks later. I could only guess that the rich and powerful of this world were not very keen on bad press surrounding the institution their precious kids attended.

Yes, Jessica was evil enough to cause inferiority complex in antichrist, if she wasn’t the one herself. If she ever felt remorse for what she’s done, she certainly never showed it. A few months later, Liam Henderson was choking her pussy with his big fat cock, and there wasn’t much of a competition she faced anymore. Partly because she was filthy rich and stunningly gorgeous, of course, but that cold dread she instilled upon the onlooker’s soul with a single glance, I’m sure, wasn’t superfluous.

I never really wanted to get caught in her radar, but if life ever taught me anything, a big shiny target on the back of my head was now pretty easy to spot.

The rest of the day was pretty uneventful. I gave Elle everything she needed to know to continue to function, I managed to ace my algebra test, despite ditching the studies, and it felt nice to see an empty spot where Liam’s Camaro was typically parked outside. I found it funny that people were still too scared to occupy his spot.

I never really thought that losing virginity held much of a pivotal power over the course of one’s life. I certainly wasn’t expecting it to change anything about mine. I was glad to admit that I was wrong, though.

Greasy jokes aside, something did shift in me after spending a two-night sex marathon with my 6’2” black boyfriend, and it had nothing to do with my rearranged anatomy. Somehow, I felt significantly less uptight. It was weirdly noticeable, I was able to relax more, was much less anxious, and felt a bit more confident. The confidence, in particular, felt brand new. Insecurities that held me in a cocoon for multiple years, have eased up even more, letting go almost completely.

I thought about my recent experiences too. On the night of the party I briefly felt like I did in my early years of high school. The very concept of a human crowd paying me any emotion other than aversion was foreign to me. Only now I started to realize what their looks were all about. It wasn’t because they understood metabolism of glucose in a diabetic, but rather because of how I started to perceive myself. Begrudgingly, I began to accept the fact that there was, perhaps, something special about me. Something I myself was blind to. Something that has now drawn people to our table during lunch and made some kids comfortable opening up to me about their personal struggles and weird rashes on their butt. Something that might’ve explained how I managed to attract such a funny, handsome and sexy guy like Jake.

Losing virginity might’ve been helpful in winding down and re-discovering myself, but I’d be lying if what happened in the pool shower the preceding day had nothing to do with it. Despite being comical and nonsensical, the reality of knowing that Liam fucking Henderson felt like he was in love with me, was both hilarious and world-shifting. In a way, this served as the final blow, shattering my preconceptions about feeling inferior, to anyone. It was all a big fat lie. The very person torturing me for years, was now in love with me. I was still bursting out laughing at the thought, sitting at chemistry or trig. Teachers were giving me concerned looks, but the stupid smile refused to leave my face. Obviously he knew nothing about love, and what he thought he felt was farthest from it, but I simply couldn’t deny what I saw. He wanted me. He actually wanted to fuck me. At the very least, I somehow triggered that physiological response in him, which was downright shocking, knowing him for as long as I did.

Times like these made me think that God was real. Liam Henderson, served with a truly poetic justice. I had no clue how I managed to hijack the firewall of his sexual orientation, but it felt nice and empowering to know, which in turn, helped me move on from what was holding me back. The senior year was almost over, and getting out of high school with much less anxiety was not a bad set up.

By the end of the next week, cherries blossomed on the front yard of the school. Sunshine, bright green grass and warm weather charged everyone around with a great mood. Gone were gloomy winter days and Bostonians thoroughly enjoyed it’s most refreshing time of the year.

“Everybody’s so fucking racist in here.” Pete complained, as we walked in a chain through the Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts.

“Isn’t that a stereotype?” I asked.

“Yeah sure,” Elle sighed. “As if you haven’t lived here for 18 years.”

“I think it’s like that everywhere, no?”

“Dude, you’re biased,” Pete said. “Your boyfriend is like, mega-rich.”

“Who said anything about Jake?”

“Well, have you talked to him about that? He might have more insight.” Elle mentioned.

“I spoke to his mom. It was pretty bad when she was younger, but she said it’s getting better now.” I said.

“And I’m sure it has nothing to do with the fact that she’s a cardiologist and her husband is an IT mogul.”

“She seems pretty down to earth, Elle.”

“I know, but…” she uttered. “Alright, I don’t know what to say, I feel like I’m being inappropriate discussing your black boyfriend in the context of racism in Boston.”

“Have you ever been appropriate?” asked Pete.

“I will grab that statue and shove the pointy end in your ass.” she threatened, glancing at the small bronze figurine to our left.

“You guys are too violent.” I frowned.

It’s been a week since Liam Henderson last showed his face at school. Having lost their king, minions were scattered and lost, spreading the rumors and trying to gauge a reasonable explanation for his absence. They came up with theories about sports-related injuries, a ski trip to Aspen, a spontaneous getaway to Europe for his favorite raves at Ibiza. The only person that seemed to have known what was actually happening, was Jessica. At the very least, that’s what I thought. She spent disturbing amounts of time carefully studying me throughout the day. I caught her stares in the hallways and cafeteria, she was watching me during classes. Nobody else noted, including my friends, but I could tell she was onto something.

My suspicions were confirmed on Friday afternoon, when she arrived at our table, unannounced.

“You guys mind if I sit here?” she asked, sucking on the orange juice through a straw.

All of us picked up on her expensive perfume, her perfect make up contrasted with boring faces of common sheep sitting around, sharp designer clothes were tailor-fitted without a single stray fold. She was spotless and perfectly stunning. It felt a bit surreal, sitting next to her this up close. Somehow, despite an absolute lack of any respect on my part, I still felt like I was in the presence of a celebrity.

“I’m gonna ask you both to leave,” she spoke softly to Peter and Elle, offering them a gentle smile.

They looked at me, not knowing what to do.

“This could be interesting.” I said, nodding in approval.

“We’ll be close by.” Elle whispered, brushing my shoulder as they picked up their food and left.

After they walked off, she took a few moments to start our conversation. I could see she was almost trying to intimidate me with her look. It seemed a bit foolish.

“To what do I owe such pleasure, if I may ask?” I started.

“You may.” Jess casually replied, stretching and demonstrating disgust about the cleanliness of the chair she was sitting on. “What is going on between you and my boyfriend?”

My heart almost skipped a beat. I never took her for a particularly shrewd person.

“What do you mean?” I asked, shrugging my shoulders.

“Don’t play coy with me, Dylan,” she yawned. “He’s skipping classes, I can’t get a hold of him for a week. Something is going on.”

“And why should I know?”

“I’ve been asking myself the same question.”

I let out a labored breath, full of indifference and slight annoyance.

“Look, I have no clue where he is, but I don’t think you should be with him, Jess.” I said, blatantly. “Don’t get me wrong, I think you two make a perfect couple, but even someone like you doesn’t deserve to be around that asshole.”

“What an interesting opinion,” she murmured, wrapping her lips around the straw. “Can you elaborate?”

“Not really. Consider this a friendly advice.”

“And what do you think will persuade me to accept your advice?”

“If everything I think of you is true, I don’t know if anything will.” I said. “Do you remember Trish? Trish Collins.”

“Was that one of his girlfriends?”

“Yes. They started dating back when we used to be friends. I don’t think you were here yet.” I explained.

She pursed her lips in a conceited chuckle and glanced down at her perfectly manicured nails.

“She was a lot like you. Very opinionated and bitchy. Very good at edging him too, much of the fighting between us was the result of her work, I think. That girl was something else, honestly. I will admit, she caught me off guard.”

“Does this story have an end? I’m getting bored,” she said.

“It took her one dead dad and a lost family fortune to sober up and realize how much of an asshole he was to her.” I said. “ I would hate for you to go through the same.”

“Spare me a fucking cautionary tale, I’m not interested,” Jess spat out in frank irritation. “I eat bitches like her for breakfast.”

Oh boy, I thought. Here we go…

“I’m not gonna waste much of your time.” she said. “I know he wanted something from you. He kept looking at you like a weirdo and you two spoke a few times. I need to know what’s going on.”

“I don’t think you’d want to know.” I said.

“Listen to me, you little fag,” she smiled, leaning forward. “This is entertaining, but I’m losing my patience.”

I raised my eyebrow at her. For a moment I pondered outing Liam, but decided against it. He was going to have to talk to her about this himself.

“Tell me what’s going on. He’s ignoring my calls, I know he’s fucking someone, I’m not an idiot. Who is she?”

“Jesus, have you seen yourself in the mirror? How the fuck can someone like you feel insecure?” I chuckled. “Regardless, if you suspect something, speak to your fucking boyfriend. I don’t want to get involved. Now excuse me, I have to-”

“You stay where you are, you little shit.” she warned with an icy cold voice. “Perhaps, I haven’t made myself clear. You wouldn’t want me as your enemy, Dylan. Trust me.”

“Why? You’ll leak my sex tape and drive me to suicide?” I asked. “Your friends have trained me pretty well. Takes a lot to scare me now.”

“You think?” she asked, leaning back on the chair and crossing her legs.

I felt breeze on my back from the heaviness of her gaze. I wondered, for a second, if Liam picked his girlfriends from the same factory in Hell.

“You have a little sister, don’t you?” she uttered, wiping her nails with a microfiber cloth she pulled from the pocket on her jacket. “Sarah, is it?”

My heart sank. What was she talking about? How did she…

“What a precious little thing...” she kept on, pulling out her iPhone from the Hermès purse. “She’s in the preschool, isn’t she? What was it… Bright Scholars at Campbell Avenue?”

She flipped the phone and showed me her pictures. They couldn’t have been more than two days old. I recognized her ponytail, I helped her comb it yesterday morning.

“What the fuck...” I glared.

“I’m not gonna say anything about getting her kicked out…” Jess said. “I mean I can, obviously… It’s not that difficult to find out who runs that place. No. I don’t think that will be enough to scare someone like you. Coz you’re just so… fearless.”

“What are you sayi-”

“I’m gonna get your little sister killed, instead.” she said, with a smile on her face.

I forgot how to breathe. Petrified, I lost touch with reality and felt like I couldn’t move. My hands started shaking, heart bottomed down to my guts.

“This…” I exhaled, getting dizzy, feeling hot sweat forming on my forehead. “This isn’t funny…”

“Who said I was joking?” she asked.

“I…” I couldn’t feel anything, couldn’t formulate my thoughts into words. “You…”

“You don’t really know much about us, do you?” she smiled. “Silly, silly boy.”

I glanced at Elle. She gave me a worried look, noticing how blood rushed out of my face.

“You’re so worried about Liam…” she uttered, smiling effortlessly, as if she didn’t just threaten to murder my little sister. “If I were you, I’d listen to your own advice.”

“What… What do you mean…” I stuttered.

“At the very least, my boyfriend hasn’t killed anyone yet.” she uttered, with some disappointment in her voice. “Unlike yours.”

She was bluffing. She was fucking bluffing…

“I think you should get off your self-righteous horse, and start looking around.” she offered. “You might stumble across some interesting things.”

I finally managed to raise my eyes to meet hers.

“You wanna know what’s up with your boyfriend?” I whispered, leaning forward.

Intrigued, she followed my lead, narrowing our distance.

“Why don’t you take a closer look at his new tattoo?” I whispered. “All you have to do is focus on your left, next time he shoves his twelve inch cock down your fucking throat.”

The ringing in my ears stopped suddenly, contrary to how slowly it was building up. Elle jumped in, halting our conversation and serving as a lightning rod. The amount of tension around our cafeteria table was strong enough to raise hair at the backs of our scalps.

“Have a great day,” Jess said warmheartedly, standing up. “Nice chat, by the way! We should do it again.”

“Anytime.” I hissed.

A single cold tear fell down my eye as soon as she left the room.

“What happened? What did she say? Dylan?” Elle asked, shaking my stunned self back into reality.

I don’t remember what happened next. I wasn’t really talking. I sat through Spanish and failed the test, because I couldn’t scribble a single thing on the sheet. I refused the car ride and walked home, getting there by late evening. I don’t remember where I was and what took me so long. The only thing I did remember, was the blood-curdling fear, bounding me in ropes. All of the things she said, popping up again and again, drawing context to the things I’ve seen and heard over the last few months.

“That guy you’re dating… He’s not who you think he is.”

I was dealing with people that wielded obscene amounts of wealth, power and connections. They all seemed to know each other, and I was the only one left in the dark. The fragments of conversation between Liam and Jake on the night of the party…

“..Do you think he’s so fucking dumb?…He’ll figure it out!..”

My legs were carrying me towards the house, as my mind refused to clump those pieces together. Why did Jake have a gun in his trunk? How did he know Liam? How did Jess know him? What did she mean, ‘You don’t know anything about us…’

What the fuck was going on?

As I’ve made it home, a shape of an unfamiliar car appeared on our driveway. It surfaced in my vision almost like a mirage in the desert. It was too expensive to belong to any of our relatives or friends. I glanced inside, the luxury Napa leather interiors were left empty, and a small purse was sitting on the passenger seat.

“Mom?” I called carefully, coming in.

I was too exhausted to draw any meaning to what I saw. Helen was sitting on the chair, behind our small kitchen table, with Liam’s mom, Emma, beside her. I stood there, motionless, not knowing what to do, or how to feel. Pain and a sucking emptiness of my hollowed out soul crushed me from within, and the final icing on what this terrible fucking day had in store for me, was this.

“Dylan?” mom said, standing up, allowing the light from the ceiling to illuminate her face.

She was wiping her tears. I knew that look. Knew painfully well, what it meant.

“Mom?” I whispered, barely audibly.

My voice cracked, a shallow pitch broke through it. Why was Emma in our house? Why was my mother crying? Why did she have that look on her face?

Did somebody die?

“M-mom?..” I asked, voice breaking into tears. “W-what happened?..”

Liam was missing from the school for a week. Nobody knew where he was.

Did he… Did I…

“Honey, come here…” mom spoke, spreading her arms, offering me a hug.

Emma wiped her face from tears and turned around, looking at me. I haven’t seen her for years. I’ve missed her…

“Emma…” I whispered, walking towards her. “Where’s Liam? What’s going on?..”

My hands were shaking, lips trembling as heavy legs carried me to the kitchen.

“He’s okay, honey…” she said, stepping into the light.

I gasped. She had bruises on her face. Her upper lip was lacerated, she had a black eye. Some of the skin breaks on her lower chin were stitched-up.

“Oh my God…” I exhaled, pulling her into a tearful hug.