The List - 14. Chapter 14: Dalton

Specimen’s Name: Dalton

Height: 6’0

Build: 160, slender

Age: 20, junior

Occupation: Student (Business Major)

Dimensions: 7’’ cut

Kyle’s words were accompanied by a face that looked like it had been distraught. I thought about forgiving him right then and there, but it definitely wasn’t that simple.

“That doesn’t change anything,” I said stubbornly, even though I’d already decided that it did, in fact, change everything. This was more than just a dramatic move on his part to get back together with me. This was life altering. He was getting out of an organization that had chosen him, not vice versa. He was going to have to explain his brother, and probably his father, how I’d come into his life and created a wedge between him and the all-powerful Sigmas, used to getting what they wanted. This didn’t change anything; it changed everything.

“Are you kidding?” Kyle asked, as if he couldn’t believe it himself. “I’m picking you, Cooper. Over everything I’ve been working for, for two years, I’m picking you. How does that not change anything?”

“Okay, okay,” I said, trying to calm Kyle down. He’d raised his voice into an almost yell at that point. “I mean, okay, it changes things, sort of. But it doesn’t change what you did.” I paused. When he didn’t say anything, I added. “I’m not just gonna run back into your arms, Kyle. You broke my trust, and you’ll have to earn it back.”

“And how do I go about doing that, sir?” he asked me. I couldn’t believe that in a couple of days, I’d forgotten how great it felt to hear Kyle call me ‘sir’.

“I don’t know what to tell you.”

He got up and said okay. He looked less dejected than he did when I’d first seen him. When he left my room that night, there was a possibility for us, and I guess that gave him hope.

I woke up on Thursday feeling better than I had all week long. I did well on the history quiz I’d missed on Tuesday when I was still swimming in self-pity. When I was headed to my theater appreciation class, mouthing Angels in America to myself like a madman, I got two text messages before I got to the theater hall.

From David: Break a leg today, killer. P.S. McKinney asked me to help him grade final monologues today, so don’t freak out when you see me sitting in the back.

From Riley: You owe me when you Ace that monologue. Dinner tonight?

I smiled when I got David’s text message. This felt like a good sign. Even though I was supposed to be in the group that presented on Tuesday, maybe David would give me a good review and I’d end up doing better than just scraping by in theater (I was seriously annoyed by the fact that this stupid ‘bird’ course could potentially drop my GPA). When I got Riley’s text, as I was opening the door to the building, I actually stopped to smile and read it. The thought of a casual ‘coffee date’ with him tonight excited me. I adjusted my excitement and went in to recite my monologue.

I’d anticipated having to do my final performance in front of the whole class of about thirty students. Instead, the professor had it set up like an audition reading. The thirteen students who had done their monologues on Tuesday had been divided into groups of two and three. They sat in the back of the green room behind David and Professor McKinney, who sat at a table with a lamp and scribbling pads. Everyone else was scribbling on legal pads. The room was dark when I walked in except for a spotlight in the center. In effect, we were ‘auditioning’ for the role we’d memorized and our grade was a reflection on how well prepared we were and how we took David and McKinney’s notes.

The 16 of us who were in group two waited in the dressing rooms downstairs for a work study to call us up one by one. Everyone mouthed their pieces to themselves as we all stewed together— McKinney’s biggest pet peeve we’d learned all term was when students didn’t have their pieces memorized word for word. During the two-partner scene unit, one girl forgot a line, stopped, started sweating, and then picked it up two lines later. She failed that unit.

When the work study, a cute little girl named Jen, came and got me, I walked into the green room with confidence. For some reason, working with Riley and knowing that David would be there gave me a swagger that I didn’t have in my earlier recitals.

“Mr. Carpenter,” McKinney said when I walked in. “I’m glad to see you’re feeling better. You may begin whenever you’re ready.”

I remembered from our master class in the beginning of the term that you were always supposed to start by stating your name and age, taking a pause and then going into your piece. I did just that and breezed through the monologue, picturing myself standing in Riley’s room and talking down to him from his “stage.”

“Very nice,” McKinney said in his overly effected voice. He turned and whispered something to David. I saw David get up and as he walked towards me, McKinney said, “I’ve given David some instructions. I want you two to go out, take two minutes while we switch focus groups, and then come back and do the monologue again.”

For a split second, I thought I was totally fucked. I could see my final grade plummeting before me, meaning I’d probably get a C in the class, meaning my GPA would probably be less than the 3.7 I’d hoped for.

“You did amazing,” David said to me when we got out into the hallway. “It was really good and emotional.” And then he leaned in close to me and whispered, “And kind of sexy.”

Sexy was the last thing I’d thought my monologue was, but maybe thinking about Riley had added a different spin to it.

“So why does McKinney want you to work with me on it?” I asked, my panic subsiding a little bit.

“Because he thinks you were really good,” David said. “He wants to push you even further. So you know what the play is about, right?”

“Yeah,” I said. Of course I did, I’d written the character and plot summary for my final grade.

“Ok. So McKinney wants you to say the speech to one person, not a room full. Really look someone in the eye and recite the speech. Talk to me like I’m Louis and I left you and you’re frustrated and really focus the monologue so that it’s to me. Affect me,” he said, winking at me. I remembered how good it had felt to affect him three months ago and smiled back at him.

I took a deep breath and thought about the monologue and how I could focus it. The whole premise— that Prior had been through this huge ordeal with AIDS and Louis leaving him and yet even though he could acknowledge that it could be worse, he wanted more for himself. He was selfish, but in a way, weren’t we all?

Embracing the new assignment, I went in, whispered for David to follow my lead, and then got on the floor. David sat down next to me, and I put my hand on the inside of his thigh. I looked at him and began saying the monologue directly to him. I didn’t even pay attention to the fact that McKinney and two other students were watching us.

When I got to the end of the monologue, I realized that I was crying. I wiped my eye, blinked at David, and in an act of sheer spontaneity, kissed him softly. I could tell that David was shocked at the kiss, but a second in, he cupped my face in his hand and I felt him kiss me back.

After a solid twenty seconds of making out with David in front of my teacher and with a tear running down my cheek, I let go of his lips and wiped away the tear and looked at McKinney. I didn’t need for him to tell me with anything other than the smirk on his face that I had just aced Theater Appreciation.

“That was incredible back there,” David said to me as we were walking back to the main campus after McKinney dismissed the class with Holiday wishes and a dramatic speech.

“Thanks,” I replied. I still didn’t know where the performance had come from, but the last time I did the monologue, saying it to someone I respected, like David, and the whole time thinking about someone I loved, like Kyle, it all just made sense.

“What do you say to you and I going to my place and celebrating your A minus in McKinney’s class?” David asked with a wicked glisten in his eye.

“You’re joking,” I said, ecstatic. “An A minus? There’s no way.”

“I have it on good authority that there is definitely a way,” David said. He cocked his head to the side as if to ask if I was up for a celebration or not.

“Let’s go celebrate,” I replied, agreeing in the spirit of getting over Kyle. We picked up our step, and four minutes later, our bodies were warming up in David’s apartment.

Neither of us wasted any time when we got inside his studio. He locked the door behind me and I immediately turned around and pinned him to it. In the months since we’d hooked up, I must have picked up a trick or two because as soon as I kissed him against the door, David let out an “Oh yeah,” and smiled into my lips.

He pushed me roughly back to his mattress that was lying on the floor and a second later, he was on top of me. As soon as I felt David’s pecker grinding alongside mine, separated by two layers of impossibly tight denim, I remembered how big he was. When we hooked up at the beginning of the year, I hadn’t really taken notice because all we did was make out and jack each other off. I’d been around the rodeo multiple times at this point, and I was more than certain that being fucked by David was on the agenda— at least for the next twenty minutes.

As I was sliding his pants off, sucking at his tongue and pulling his face into mine by the back of his head, I felt a vibration in my pants.

“Ignore it,” David purred. He sat up, undid my belt buckle roughly and pulled my pants down passed my ankles. As I was kicking my jeans off, I felt my pocket vibrate again.

“Let me check that,” I said, sitting up. Who would be texting me twice in a row?

“Make it quick,” David said, lying down next to me as I sat up to reach my phone. He’d already started breathing heavy and he was playing with his cock through his boxer briefs.

From Kyle: Do you have plans for dinner?

I could address that one later. It was only 2:40.

From Riley: How’d the performance go? I’m online shopping for a tuxedo to the Tony’s. Have dinner with me.

“Is everything ok?” I heard David ask. I realized that I was smiling. I responded with something that resembled a “yeah,” decided that this decision would have to wait and threw my phone off the mattress— at least if it went off again, I wouldn’t feel it.

The only vibration I felt in the next thirty minutes was David’s mouth around my cock. Within minutes of putting my phone down, he had us flipped over in a side-by-side 69. I felt like the yin to his yang as I slowly pumped my lips around his cock, matching his pace to a T in an attempt to swallow down his entire 8’’ pecker. As I was sucking him deep, I felt David’s fingers creep from my balls backwards towards my ass. I let out an involuntary moan as the pressure sent a thrill up my spine.

Encouraged by my response, David maneuvered his middle finger to my hole and slowly began rubbing it. I let go of his cock for a second, breathed in, and pushed my ass backwards towards his finger until it popped in slowly. I leaned upwards and smiled at him.

“Someone isn’t the scared virgin I met at the beginning of the term,” David said smiling at me. He sucked deeply on my cock and fingered me quickly while I tried my best to keep a firm oral grip around his dick.

A couple of minutes later, when I was sufficiently loosened up, David got up, retrieved a condom from his side table and dove down next to me. Still lying on my side, I felt him spoon in behind me and guide his dick into my ass with his hands. I lifted my leg up to give him better access and a minute later, I felt David buried deep inside of me and I felt as if I was about to explode.

“Breath babe,” I heard him whisper behind me. His hips had stopped moving but his lips were still dancing around the base of my neck, trying to distract me from the pain of his massive cock in my ass. I took in a deep breath, relaxing every muscle in my body. After a couple of breaths, I felt my body adjust to the invasion and simply leaned back into it.

As if he was reading my body like a script, David pulled out slowly and then pushed back in even more slowly. I let out a louder moan as he filled me back up with his rock hard, thick as fuck, dick. The pain was slowly being replaced with the kind of pleasure only someone as experienced with that tool as David was could provide. Before I knew it, he was pulling out and pushing in at a steady pace.

With a cock that big, it wasn’t necessary for him to fuck me hard and fast. Every movement he made was felt throughout my entire body. When his thrusts reached a steady pace, I started backing into them, meeting him as he thrust into me. This set David off something awful and the next thing I knew, he was kneeling between my raised legs and plowing into me missionary style.

The look on his face was breathtaking as he pulled all the way out and then plunged all the way back in, over and over. He let his hips do most of the work as his upper body held on firmly to my legs.

“Fuck, Cooper,” he panted over me. “Fuck yeah, man. Fuck yeah.”

If it’s even possible, I was enjoying myself too much to even form words. Instead, I just lay there with my head to the side, enjoying every motion David was making in and out of me.

His “Fuck yeahs” quickened as his thrusts got faster and deeper. With his dick putting constant pressure on my prostate, I knew for a fact I wasn’t going to last long and from the sound of it, neither was David. I tugged on my cock exactly four times before I rolled my head back, went limp from my head to my curled toes, and oozed what had to have been a pint of cum out of my rock hard dick.

The orgasm wasn’t the crazy forceful kind that shoots past your own head or onto your face. It didn’t form a pool of cum onto my chest or stomach. Instead, my cock just released semen in a steady stream onto my abdomen for what felt like five minutes. The orgasm was so toe-curling in fact, I was pretty sure I passed out for a second. My dick was so sensitive to the touch, I had to keep both mine and David’s hands off of it.

I could feel every sensation run across my body, including David’s last two extremely deep thrusts that sent wave after wave of his cum deep into the condom. I could feel his dick pulse with every ounce of cum as he collapsed on top of me, both of us too spent to say anything.

I stayed under David for a solid five minutes before I even ventured to pull him off me and sit up. The feeling of him inside of me was replaced by a feeling of emptiness. I asked him for a towel, wiped off in his combination bathroom/kitchen and put my clothes back on.

“Dong and ditching?” David asked, still lying on his mattress. A thin layer of sweat had formed over his body and he looked like he was glowing.

“What can I say?” I told him, pulling my shoes on and shrugging my shoulders. I tied my shoes, grateful for the quick fuck, and told David I’d see him later.

As soon as I was outside in the overcast cold, I remembered that I needed to respond to both of my invitations for dinner. I decided to wait to reply to either guy until I’d consulted with Spencer— assuming he hadn’t ambushed me with another lurking visitor today.

When I got to my room, Spence was sitting Indian-style on the floor of our room, surrounded by books and snacks. He was wearing shorts and a cardigan with no shirt underneath.

“I thought you would never get home and rescue me from this study binge,” he said as I stripped down to my first layers of clothing.

“It looks like a sugar binge to me,” I said.

“If I read one more thing about the origins of Democracy for this Government class, I’ll kill myself, I swear I will,” he responded, getting up and sitting down on my bed. “Please don’t tell me you have to study. Not for the next hour. I need a break.”

I realized Spencer was restless because he was used to being in practice in the afternoon. He had a ton of pent up afternoon energy and had no idea where to channel it.

“I’m glad you’re in the mood for a study break,” I said as I took a seat next to him and grabbed the bag of Hot Cheetos. “Because I have a dinner dilemma.”

“I love problems that feature alliteration,” he said. I told him about the two text messages, both asking me to dinner and then asked him what I should do. “Well, I don’t know this Riley character, so I say dump him now, nice and easy, and get back with Kyle.”

“It’s not that simple,” I said.

“It’s pretty simple,” Spencer replied. “You love Kyle. You said so yourself. He fucked up and he apologized. I’m not even going to pretend like you’re Ms. Innocent in any of this. It’s been four days; you’ve both suffered enough, now go to dinner and forgive him already.”

Maybe Spencer was right; maybe I had punished Kyle enough. On the other hand, maybe Spencer was biased— he would just want his old friend to be happy again, even at my expense.

I got up to get a Coke out of our fridge when Spencer asked me, “Who the hell attacked you?”

I stood up straight, turned around to see what he was talking about and then remembered the scratches.

“Oh,” I sighed. “Shit, I forgot about that.”

“You forgot about your fight with a mountain lion?” he joked.

“No,” I said. “Those are the product of Riley.” I sat down, cracked open my Coke and passed one to Spencer.

“Rough much?”

“It was so insanely hot, you have no idea,” I replied. And just thinking about how hot it had been caused a stir in my crotch that had just been taken care of, further letting me know that my dinner decision wasn’t as simple as I thought.

“Hot or not,” Spencer said sincerely, “You just have to listen to your heart. When it’s calling for you. Listen to your heart; there’s nothing else you can do.”

I smacked him softly on the shoulder, lay down on the bed next to him, and contemplated what I needed to do. I decided that it wouldn’t be fair to punish and reject Riley just because Kyle had come back with this grandeur gesture to prove how into this he was. I also felt like hopping right back in where I’d left off with Kyle wasn’t a possibility— it just didn’t work that way.

To get my mind of off the decision, Spencer told me about a party he’d been invited to. “You’re coming with me,” he said. “It’s called Screw Your GPA. It’s tomorrow night at ten in a house off of Greenville. There’s no excuse not to go, you’ll have all day Saturday and Sunday to study.”

“If I’m not too hungover to read a book,” I protested, knowing that I was obviously going. Spencer wasn’t the kind to take no for an answer when it came to partying.

After affirming our weekend plans, Spencer went back to studying and I took to my bed to ponder. I decided that Kyle still had penance to pay, and so I texted Riley and told him that I’d meet him at Jack’s Burger House across from Mango at eight. I took a nap for the rest of the afternoon, and when I woke up to shower, Spencer asked if I’d made a decision.

“If I tell you I didn’t pick your friend is he going to pop out from under my bed?” I asked him sassily.

“You don’t know what I’m capable of,” Spencer said.

An hour and two outfit changes later, I caught a cab to the north side of campus. Riley greeted me with a smile and those deep blue eyes. It was the first time I’d seen him since we’d hooked up and I made a lame joke about the scratches on my back.

“Yeah, that happens,” he said when we were waiting on our Cokes. “I’m sorry.”

“No, it was fine,” I said. “It was good.”

“I’m glad you had a good time,” he said. Even in the dimness of the restaurant, I noticed that Riley’s eyes really did sparkle. They looked directly at you when you spoke and I felt as though I could trust every word that he said. “So Sam emailed me all of the info that her and Kim compiled. It’s pretty good stuff, well organized. It shouldn’t take us but a couple of hours to put something together. I was thinking we do that in the morning.”

“What’s wrong with tonight?” I asked, giving him my best crookedly flirtatious smile.

“I was thinking that we could, you know, do other stuff tonight,” he said. He let that linger on the table for a while as we discussed other things over dinner.

After dinner, Riley and I walked out of the restaurant into the near freezing cold. As soon as we were outside in the darkness, walking the few blocks back to the north edge of campus where Riley lived, he did something I wasn’t expecting. Riley pulled me close to him by my shoulder and kept his arm wrapped around me. I looked at him at first and then settled into a steady stride with him, feeling both safe and comfortable.

This time around, when we got to his dorm room, there was no hesitation. For the second time that day, I took my clothes off with the only intention of getting naked with another guy. As soon as his door was closed behind us, Riley led me to his bed and kicked off his own shoes. I followed suit, not trying to be sensual or sexy. He was horny, I was horny; nothing else needed to be said.

I pulled Riley into me by the bottom of his shirt and lifted it over his head. The skin underneath was warm and smooth, with the lightest trail of hair on his stomach. He reacted to my touch by taking in a quick breath of air, biting his bottom lip and then kissing me aggressively.

For half a second, I tensed up when he pulled me into him by the small of my back thinking the clawing was already starting, but as soon as my crotch was pinned to his, I didn’t care. I let him suck my tongue sexily into his mouth as we ground our hard cocks together.

“You taste amazing,” he said. “Has anyone ever told you that” No one had ever told me that. I shook my head, lifted my hands over my head and let Riley pull my shirt up. He raked his nails down my chest and stomach, digging just into my skin and causing me to squirm. He wasn’t hurting me, it actually did feel good. But it was so different than the other guy’s I’d been with, it threw me off.

A minute later, both Riley and I were naked. I was lying on my back on top of his bed and he was straddling me. Without wasting any time, Riley had pulled a condom from his side drawer and was reaching behind him to drag it over my cock. I was glad that his roughness ended at my crotch— he was nothing but gentle with Benny and the Jets down there. What was really sexy about Riley was the eye contact he maintained even while he was blindly rolling the rubber over my hard on, getting it ready for his ass. I could get lost in those eyes, I thought.

Before I knew it, Riley had lowered himself backwards onto my cock, using only his hands for guidance. He kept eye contact with me the entire time and feeling my dick pop into his warm hole made me smile up at him. He let out a sigh, blinked his eyes slowly, bit his bottom lip and started riding my cock as if it was the only thing he’d ever wanted to do.

From the second I was inside of him, Riley was moaning and groaning louder than I had ever heard. Each bounce was accompanied by a different pitched “oh” from Riley and the faster the bounces got, the louder and higher the “oh’s” became.

After riding me for a solid five minutes without showing any sign of slowing, Riley leaned forward and grabbed onto my chest for leverage. He pushed himself up and down much faster than he had before, digging his nails into my side. I rolled my head back, feeling too amazed to consider what scars and bruises I’d have tomorrow. It was like Riley’s body had me pinned down and he was using me and my cock however he pleased.

Before long, Riley’s thrusts— coupled with my own upward bucks— became too much for either of us. I held on to his hips firmly and guided him up and down two more times and then exploded deep down inside of him. As soon as my cock was exploding inside of him, he tensed up in my grasp and exploded all over my chest. If I thought that his cum was warm and forceful the other day, I was blown away by his cum shower today. I just lay there, toes still curled, as Riley got off of me and collapsed next to me with his hand over my chest and his lips close to my ear.

As soon as he was off of me and the cum on my chest began to dry, I channeled Kyle and suddenly felt extremely sleepy. I let out a yawn, looked at the clock and realized it was just passed twelve. I was blown away that Riley and I could fuck for hours and it didn’t even feel that way.

“That was amazing,” Riley whispered to me as I felt myself dozing off. I was determined to at least try to stay awake, but I wasn’t sure what the point was. I could spend the night with Riley, shower here and go to class with him in the morning.

“I might have to invest in some Neosporin,” I replied quietly. I yawned again, a little tickled by Riley tracing his finger over my chest.

“So what is this?” he asked me just as I was making the decision to spend the night. I turned towards Riley and put my arm around him, getting his cum all over his chest.

“Ew,” he protested. I rubbed my chest into his, hugging him close, and smearing the cream all over the both of us. I smiled at him and asked what he meant.

“I mean, what are we doing here?” he answered.

“We’re lying,” I said yawning. He looked at me with his big blue eyes and continued to rub the tip of his finger over my chest.

“Are you asking if we’re a thing?” I asked more seriously, suddenly feeling cornered. Not this conversation again. A couple of months ago, this conversation had sent me into a tailspin that didn’t end well. Why was I about to embark on this déjà vu before the ink had even dried on mine and Kyle’s relationship?

“Yeah,” he said. “A thing. Are we turning into a thing?”

“I don’t think this is anything we need to define right now,” I said trying to send out as many warning signals to him as possible. Slow down, I wanted to say without actually saying it. “We’re having fun.”

“Okay,” he said. “Well, this is date number two of having fun. Are we headed anywhere?”

I was suddenly really annoyed, and not just at Riley. I was falling into this trap again, and I knew exactly what I needed to do before it was too late. I sat up and reached for my jeans.

“Where are you going?” Riley asked, sitting up and leaning on his hand.

“I just,” I started. “I don’t know how to do this right now. I like you, Riley, I do. But I can’t jump into anything with you right now. I thought you understood that.”

“I know. I know that when we started this,” he began. I took a second to note that “this” had started about 96 hours ago. “You were pretty messed up. But I like you, Coop.”

“I like you too,” I said. “But getting into a thing is the last thing I need right now. I have to go— I’m really sorry.”

And as quickly as I could wipe his specimen off of my chest, I had my clothes on and was back out in the cold. I hadn’t intended on being so rude to Riley, but I was scared to get sucked in so quickly the same way I had with Kyle. Riley was a great guy, and I didn’t want to jump into anything too soon. That had worked out so well for me last time.

I walked quickly and quietly through campus to the dorms further south. As I approached the courtyard that bordered my dorm, I found myself taking a slight detour. Instead of walking straight to my hall, I took a left at the quad and stayed on the northern side. A minute later, I was swiping my pass key into Kyle’s dorm and heading for the elevator and the fifth floor.

When I got to Kyle’s door, I still had no clue what I was going to say. I honestly couldn’t believe I was actually headed there in the first place. With a hint of hesitation, I knocked on the door.

As soon as I’d done it, I realized it was a terrible idea. It was midnight; surely he and his roommate, Mark, were either asleep or studying. This wasn’t the time to call on someone without calling first. But it was too late to run. Their hallway was too long and too well lit; whoever answered the door would definitely see me. So I planted my feet and waited. Almost a full minute later, when I actively considered resigning, I heard the upper bolt unclick.

I saw Mark, in just a pair of shorts, open the door, look at me and turn around. “Kyle, Cooper’s here.”

A second later, Kyle came to the door and closed it behind him. He was wearing a shirt that said CHS Tigers on it and I recognized it as mine.

“What are you doing here?” he asked me, squinting in the bright light of the hallway.

“I wanted to talk to you,” I replied. “I should have come in the morning.”

“Or texted me,” he said. “Is everything ok? Are you alright?”

“Yeah, everything is fine. I just wanted to apologize to you. I made mistakes while we were dating, some that you don’t even know about. And I think my biggest mistake was going too fast for the both of us. You were right when you said we should take things slow and I didn’t listen to you and for that I am sorry.”

The words came out of me as if they’d been written down in a script.

“Thank you for that,” Kyle said, standing straight up and folding his arms over my high school’s logo. I actually thought it was unbelievably sexy that he wore my old t-shirt to bed at night. “So where do we go from here?”

“We start over,” I said quietly. “But you can keep the shirt.” I smiled at him and was warmed by his smile before I turned, went down the elevator and walked back into the cold.

When I got home, Spencer was still up and reading. He had a final tomorrow and then he was done until his physics paper was due next week. I thought for a second that I should probably be more concerned with my final schedule, but I wasn’t. Instead, I was preoccupied. He reminded me of our celebration tomorrow, announced that he found us a pre-party to go to and ten minutes later, I went to bed.

I dreaded getting up and going to English class on Friday. I felt bad for ditching Riley like I had, but there was no way I was getting sucked into the same cycle I did when I’d started messing around with Kyle. Asking where something is going after the second date wasn’t going to fly with me, not this time.

So imagine how awkward it was when I walked into English five minutes late and the only two seats open were one next to Riley and one in the very back row. I scooted into the row and settled in next to him, trying to give him a smile, but he was taking notes furiously.

Thinking that I’d better clear the air before we were scheduled to meet up on Saturday morning to work on our end of the presentation, I passed him a note, a la the sixth grade.

To Riley: I’m sorry about last night.

He looked at it, opened it, looked at me and then scribbled quickly.

To Cooper: It was my fault. I moved too fast.

To Riley: I did the same thing with he-who-will-not-be-named and it bit me in the ass. Smiley face.

To Cooper: Lord Voldemort?

Next to the word was a picture of a stick figure with one eye, holding a sickle and standing on fire. I laughed when I saw it. I heard the teacher clear his throat and realized we’d been passing notes like little school girls. I put the paper away and started taking proper notes.

After class, I called David to see if he was up for another afternoon delight, but his phone went to voicemail. I thought about calling Ben, but realized that seeing him again would open up another can. I’d save it all for tonight— who knew who I’d run into?

I reread “Everything in this Country Must” so that I’d be ready to work on the presentation with Riley on Saturday. I took a nap and woke up around eight at night. I was about to hop in the shower when I got a text message from Kyle.

Kyle: Dinner?

I guess he was going to ask me every day until I agreed to go with him. I replied that I had plans with Spencer tonight and then quickly added “Not like that” to a second text. He replied with a smiley face and told me to have fun.

Wanting to get an early start, I hopped in the shower with a cold Keystone from our fridge. Halfway through my shower, I heard the door to the bathroom open.

“Coop, is that you?” I heard Spencer ask.

“Yeah,” I replied. “What’s up?”

Before I knew what was going on, I saw the shower curtain move to the side and a very naked Spencer hopped into the shower.

“What the fuck is this?” I asked. I saw Spencer naked all the time in our room, but something about being in such close quarters with him and both of us being single again made it awkward.

“Move over, will you?” he said trying to get under the stream. I waited for him to explain why he couldn’t wait for me to get out of the shower before he jumped in. “You won’t believe this. So the pre-party we’re going to is on a party bus. These girls from my physics class put it together and it’ll take us straight to Screw Your GPA.”

“Oh joy,” I said sarcastically. “A party bus with physics nerds. Color me thrilled.”

“Do I look like a nerd to you? A girl in my class is dating a Beta and they’re taking care of it,” he explained. “Anyway, it leaves in fifteen minutes, so we have to jet.”

He put a glob of shampoo on his hand and rubbed it into his hair. As I was beginning to feel cold and jonesing to be under the shower head again, I felt Spencer take the shampoo in his hands and rub it on my head. When I gave him a look he just shrugged.

“I put too much in my hands,” he said and he turned around.

I really didn’t understand what was going on. Did Spencer miss me? Did he think that because I wasn’t dating Kyle, or anyone anymore, we could go back to exploring what we’d started? It had been almost four months since we first hooked up and Spence was starting to feel like a brother to me rather than a sexual partner. The whole shower thing left me feeling awkward and wondering.

I pushed the thought out of my mind as Spence and I furiously showered, got dressed and still managed to take a couple of vodka shots.

“Let’s go, Killer,” Spencer said ushering me out of the room by pushing the small of my back. After the brief moment of awkwardness, he’d gone back to being the fun-loving and energetic Spencer I knew, indicating that I was making way too much out of the whole thing.

We walked out of our dorm and down to the center of the quad where a huge bus was parked and people were filing in. I counted about 20 people before Spencer and I got in, saying we were with Rachel and Zoe. Inside were two rows of girls and guys. The girls were drinking champagne and the guys were mostly drinking beer. When a guy asked what I wanted to have, I hesitated and asked for a Bud Light.

“Are you sure that’s what you want?” he asked. He had the unmistakable cockiness of an upper-classman. “You can have some champagne if you really want some. It might be easier for you to drink.”

Was he making fun of me? I was just drunk enough already to take offense to what he said and so I countered with, “I drink beer, buddy, probably in circles around you, but thanks.” It was dripping with attitude, but I smiled at the end to keep it lighthearted.

The guy’s buddy saw the exchange and let out a holler. I had been on the bus for thirty seconds and I’d already started a feud.

“There’s only one way to solve this,” the friend said. “Shotgun.” A second later, the two of them were changing Shotgun, Shotgun.

I’d never done a shotgun before, but I wondered how hard it could be if these two dimwits were apparently experts at it. I watched the guy take out his keys and strike a hole in his can of beer. He held out his keys for me to do the same. Luckily, Spencer saw my hesitation and took the keys for me. He poked the hole and handed me the can. He patted me on the back and said, “You can do this, killer. Don’t choke.”

With those encouraging words, we got the countdown, I brought the hole to my mouth and cracked the can open. A second later a rush of beer was flowing down my throat. I raised my head, loosened my throat like I’d practiced doing for the past few months and guzzled down the entire can in seconds.

The entire bus was cheering for me as I raised my hand, game face on, to taunt the other guy while he finished. There was no disputing that I had kicked his ass.

“Not half bad for a freshman,” the guy said, gulping. He offered me a hand. “I’m Dalton.”

Without thinking it through, I took his hand and said, “Do your friends ever call you Big D?” The guy just looked at me and took his hand back. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Spencer shake his headd and whisper something to Zoe.

Right after that shotgun, as I went from tipsy to drunk in as many seconds as it took to finish the beer, everything began to get hazy. As we circled around the city, I tried keeping up with Dalton and Tom, beer for beer, just to prove that I could. This turned out to be a terrible idea. By the time we were heading back to campus for the Screw Your GPA Party, I was blackout and crazy.

I don’t remember giving Rachel and Zoe a lap dance, but apparently that happened. I also don’t remember making out with a girl named Amber after a dare from Dalton and Tom. Spencer tried his best to do damage control, but the bus loved me. I was the shit show entertainment for the evening, and I played the part well.

I sobered up when the bus stopped outside of a house on the east side of campus. It was a huge house, sort of hidden by trees and away from any neighbors. As soon as we stepped off the bus, I had a moment of clarity to appreciate just how many students were risking their own GPA’s for one last night of debauchery before exams.

I stuck with the bus crew for a while: Spencer, Dalton, Tom, Zoe and Rachel. It turned out that Dalton and Rachel were dating and that Tom had a huge crush on Zoe. It didn’t take an Einstein to see that Zoe had a crush on Spencer, though. As for me, the drunker I got, the cuter everyone became to me.

Dalton, in particular, seemed cute to me and I didn’t know why. Even though he had a girlfriend, I still got a distinct vibe from him. He laughed at all of my jokes, looked directly at me when I talked to him and kept commenting on what a cool freshman I was. He was a little taller than me, about 6’0. He had a nice head of blonde hair that he’d kind of smoothed to the front in a very Jesse McCartney kind of way. What intrigued me, though, were the tiny little beauty marks he had on his face. He must have had three or four of them, one bigger than the rest, and for some reason I thought they were really cute.

A couple of hours and a few pulls from the gin bucket later, I came to the realization that I was borderline blackout yet again. I’d completely lost track of my coat, only to discover that I’d given it to Spencer five minutes ago to hold for me. I kept saying things to people only to have them say that I’d already told them that. At first I was embarrassed. After it happened a couple times, I just shrugged it off. I was blackout, but I was having a blast.

At about two o’clock, Dalton announced that he was ready to go. “We’re going back to my place to chill in the hot tub. You two are more than welcome to join,” he said.

I looked at Spencer, stoked to go hot-tubbing with upperclassmen and not even thinking that it was 30 degrees and practically snowing outside.

“I should probably get this one home,” Spencer said. I felt sort of bad that I’d gotten really drunk and he hadn’t, but we were both big boys. I hadn’t asked him to look out for me, so my feeling bad didn’t last too long.

“No man, we’re going hot-tubbing,” I said to Spencer.

“Coop,” he drew me aside. “You’re wasted. We need to get you home before you do something stupid.”

“What could be stupid about going into the hot tub? I think Dalton has totally been flirting with me,” I replied. “It’ll be fun.”

“First of all,” he said. “Dalton has a girlfriend. My friend, Rachel, remember. Secondly, how would you know he’s flirting with you when you can’t even remember where you put your coat?”

I looked around and noticed that Spencer was holding my coat. “My coat is right there, tricky.”

“We’re going home,” he said firmly.

At that point, Dalton chimed in, further letting me know that he wanted us to at least be a part of the hot tub after party.

“You guys are both coming to the house and getting in the hot tub. That’s final, let’s go, everyone in the cabs.”

Spencer, Dalton, Tom, Zoe, Rachel, and I all filed into a cab van and headed towards Fitzhugh Ave. were a lot of the sophomores and juniors chose to live because it was close to the shops and bars in uptown and campus at the same time. Fifteen minutes later, Dalton was handing the driver money and we were all filing out of the cab. Before we went inside the house, Spencer whispered to me, “If you do anything embarrassing, I’m dragging you home myself.”

I was kind of worried that he was worried. What could I possibly do that would embarrass us? To answer that, I would have had to remember all of the things I had already done that night. Unfortunately, shortly after we arrived, more bottles were popped and passed and I quickly went from being blackout to being obliterated. That glorious space of drunkenness before you throw up, where every memory is hazier than the last and all inhibitions are floating above your head like mist above a hot tub in winter.

As people were peeling down to their boxers and underwear, I told Dalton that I was going commando, as was my custom. I asked him if I could borrow some shorts and he told me to follow him up to his room.

“Pick your color,” he said holding up two pairs of Vineyard Vine swimming shorts, the kind with mesh inside. I opted for the blue ones with little pink sea creatures.

I didn’t think he’d stay to watch me change, but he did. In fact as I was pulling my shirt off, I noticed that he was getting undressed too. I noticed immediately that he had a rather large Beta tattoo on his chest. The tattoo was black and must have been their official Greek letters and crest. And the end of the crest, a tail kind of trailed down his side and disappeared somewhere before his back. As I was following it down with my eyes, I heard Dalton ask, “Say, do you think I have a nice body?”

That was my go ahead to really look at him. He could have meant that in a no-homo kind of way, I still wasn’t sure, but I was taking in his physique nonetheless. His stomach was flat, not incredibly toned, but slender. And so were his legs and arms. He wasn’t the kind of guy you’d expect to see at the gym every day, but he took care of himself. He might have done a lot of cardio or something.

“Yeah, you do have a nice body,” I said, trying to sound objective. I burped, probably my body’s way of telling me that objectivity was impossible.

“Rachel thinks my tattoo is stupid. She doesn’t get it,” he said, pointing to his chest. Why was he bringing up his dissatisfaction with his girlfriend to me?

As he lowered his pants and boxers to change into the Nantucket red shorts, I noticed that up until the small patch of hair just above his penis, Dalton was completely smooth. His pubic hair was trimmed into a neat little landing strip. Just below the patch was a dick that hung so long flaccid that I almost felt like my jaw was going to drop. This guy was a show-er if I’d ever seen one.

I couldn’t help but glance at it for longer than I should have and when I looked up to meet his eyes, Dalton just grinned at me and shrugged his shoulders. He pulled the shorts up.

“I get that reaction a lot,” he said. “Don’t worry, it doesn’t get much longer than that when I get hard. But still, I’m proud of my flaccid baby.” He gave his cock a tug and started walking slowly towards me and the door.

“Let’s go,” he said. “The hot tub isn’t going to stew itself, frosh.”

I followed him wordlessly, still sort of turned on by the sight of his sexily tattooed body and nicely hanging dick. The real surprise, however, came as we were walking down the stairs.

“Is it true that guys give better head than girls do?” he asked. I wanted to run to Spencer and say ‘I told you so!’ right then and there. I wanted to ask why he thought I’d know, but decided it was futile to try and hide it.

“They definitely do,” I said. “You’d be lucky to find out.”

He looked at me just as we were getting to the kitchen door that led to the patio.

“You’d be lucky to show me,” he said, gave me a wink, and opened the door. “Who wants to shotgun?” he asked the entire group.

I stupidly agreed to do it, needing my buzz back after that sobering come on just then. It nerved me out that this straight guy just basically offered me his cock with his girlfriend stewing ten feet away. The idea of being straight in public and still getting to mess around with guys intrigued me a little.

That shotgun, the fourth of the night, proved to be the hops flavored straw that broke my sobriety’s back. Within minutes of chugging the beer, everything went black again. I couldn’t remember a thing and was at the mercy of everyone’s storytelling.

What I do know is where I was when the sun hit my face the next morning and I was woken up by the light. I was lying naked on a bed that wasn’t mine in a room that I didn’t recognize. A thin white sheet covered me, not doing a good job of keeping my morning boner in check. Holding on to my boner, I noticed was Dalton, who was sleeping on his stomach, drool dripping from his face, hair disheveled, and snoring. On the other side of Dalton was Rachel, who had the blanket covering her, presumably because her clothes were at the foot of the bed. On the couch opposite the bed was Spencer, sprawled out, mouth agape and snoring. Next to him on the couch was Zoe, who had her head rested on Spencer’s lap as a pillow. She still had her clothes on but was hugging a husband pillow as if it was a life vest.

As I looked around the room, wondering what kind of crazy orgy I’d gotten into last night, I just blinked my eyes, decided I was too hung over to try and think about it, and collapsed back into the bed. I didn’t even once consider taking Dalton’s hand off of my cock. If he wanted to squeeze it in his sleep, it was his party; he could if he wanted to.