The Best Four Years of Adam Becker - 15. Freshman Year - Chapter 15

"I will be entirely honest," Erik said, as we walked down St. Charles Avenue to the parade route, "if I don’t see some tits tonight, I’m going to be pissed.”

Tripp looked at me, skeptically, then took a long sip of his Natty Light. Highly amusing fact about Tripp, which despite months of friendship I hadn’t realized until we began this particular trek: Tripp couldn’t walk and drink at the same time.

He caught back up to us. “I know they don’t have Mardi Gras up in Ar-Kansas, but this is a family event.” He paused to take a quick sip, so he didn’t fall too far behind. “You know, until you get trashed and go downtown.”

“Morton said under no circumstances should we go to Bourbon Street over Mardi Gras,” Erik replied. “Tourist central.”

“He’s down there right now,” Tripp told him. “Texted me earlier. Shoots that theory to shit. Becker, would you go downtown with me?”

“I would be honored,” I said, mock-ceremoniously. We both offered self-satisfied smiles, in roommate solidarity, to Erik.

Erik rolled his eyes, took a sip of his own beer, which he could do in motion. “Why don’t you two just fuck already.”

Tripp gave him the finger, but looked otherwise unconcerned. “Oh, speaking of fucking,” he said to me, “I ran into that Jackie Hughes at Bruff today.”

I did not like where this conversation was heading.

“Oh,” I said, trying to sound appropriately interested, but not too interested. “How’s she doing?”

“Good,” he said. “Asked about you.”

“Well, yeah,” I said, “I mean, I waited too long, and you know. Now it’s too late to just text her, right?” Was it too late to text her? I certainly had no intention of doing so. That excuse sounded plausible enough.

Tripp grinned. “You know what? I’m going to make it my personal mission to get you laid this Mardi Gras.”

“Even Tripp’s taking pity on your sex life,” Erik told me, shaking his head disapprovingly. “So do you want to drink Drano or eat a shit-ton of Advil?”

We were getting close; the crowds started to thicken quickly; the streets were closed, police barricades everywhere. By the time we reached Napoleon Avenue and St. Charles, the neutral ground was thick with people. We couldn’t see much except the tops of floats bobbing above the crowd, but we could certainly hear the raucous din of Mardi Gras, the shouts and the brass. It was just after six-thirty, the last lambent embers of sunlight dying behind the flooded-out restaurant on the corner--the first parade rolled at 5:45, but Baker told me that there was no rush. Three parades tonight, Babylon, Chaos, and Krewe of Muses, and plenty of time for the mythos.

“We have to find the tent,” Erik shouted, over the proliferating noise as we pushed our way through the neutral ground. “It’s down a few blocks.”

Suddenly, like a sniper’s bullet, a whole plastic bag of beads tore through the air and smacked Erik in the side of the face.

He went down like Jenga.

“Holy shit,” Erik said, clutching his face, kneeling on the wet grass. “What the hell was that?”

“It’s bad luck to pick beads up off the ground,” I reminded Tripp, who was already scavenging the unopened bag of beads with his eyes. I looked back to Erik. “You’ll be okay.”

“We can get ice at the tent,” Tripp replied. He was chewing on his cuticles, looking back and forth between our downed compatriot and the charging parade; I couldn’t tell if he was more concerned about Erik or about suffering his own bead-related injury in the line of duty. “Come on.”

Erik swatted away both of our hands. “I got it,” he said, as he stood back up. His right eye was winked shut; there wasn’t any swelling, but the whole right side of his face was already starting to turn red, like a mild sunburn.

“Fuck,” he said, clutching his face again.

“It’s just a bag of beads,” I told him.

“It’s a fucking plastic cannonball,” he replied, clearly irritated by both his injury and my nonchalance. “Thrown at full force by Justin Verlander, or whoever they have on the floats throwing this shit.”

Tripp gave me another sympathizing look, and neither of us said anything more, because it seemed to be a losing gambit at this point.

We kept forcing through the crowd, who seemed more concerned with grabbing the individual strands of beads that continued rocketing through the air--past General Pershing Street, Milan Street (pronounced myelin, or so Baker told me), and to the corner of Marengo and St. Charles, where we saw the big white tent with the Iota Chi flag hanging from the side.

The party was still picking up. Not a small crowd at this point, but just a few clumps of brothers and girls, all decked out in something purple, green, or gold--or, rather, some horrendous melding of the three. Eddie Darien and Ben Revis were sitting on the grass next to the keg, solo cups perched lazily in their hands.

“Ah, you’re all here!” Ben Revis screeched, as we arrived; he struggled to push himself up from the ground, eventually just falling back onto his elbow in a kind of awkward recline. “You made it.”

Tripp and I looked at each other disdainfully.

“I love babysitting the tent,” Eddie Darien agreed, his voice oddly high-pitched and childlike, which looked surreal coming from someone as big and imposing as he was--it was his drunk voice, which I usually noticed less because I was at least almost as drunk as he was when I heard it. “We’ve been here since noon.” He squinted up at Erik. “What the fuck happened to your face?”

“He’s Darth Maul,” Tripp replied, mouth creeping into a smile, even if he didn’t dare a full-on laugh at Erik’s expense. Erik didn’t hear anyway; he was knelt down, grabbed ice cubes out of the cooler and holding them onto his face.

“No, no,” Tripp said, kneeling down next to him. “You need a thin piece of cloth or something. Do you have a towel?”

“Yeah, I fucking carry a towel,” Erik replied.

“‘Don’t forget to bring a towel,’” chirped Ben Revis, as Towelie from South Park, and he and Darien both started cackling like it was the most hilarious thing they’d ever heard.

Matt Rowen, in his splendor, came walking over to the keg to fill up his solo cup. He glanced briefly down at Erik and Tripp, who were by this point attempting to wrap ice in the hood of Erik’s Tulane sweatshirt, but declined to inquire.

“You didn’t bring Michaela?” Matt asked, as he filled up his beer.

I shook my head. “Tri-Gamma’s at a keg kill with Zeta. Somewhere around here.”

“Oh, yeah,” Rowen said. “I forgot she’s a Tri-Gamma. I thought she’d go DDR for sure.”

Considering Delta Delta Rho’s less than wholesome reputation, I couldn’t tell whether or not that was a compliment or an insult, but I chose not to pursue it.

“No, Tri-Gamma,” I replied. I had grown a bit more accustomed to Rowen by this point, but he was still astonishingly handsome--especially in a clinging purple, green, and gold striped polo, the perfect amount of sunset in his face. “They’re cool girls.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” he said. “You didn’t bring that other one, either?”

I assumed he meant Jordan, and I shook my head. We actually hadn’t asked her to come with us, but that was a technicality--I couldn’t imagine her wanting to witness us get sloppy drunk at noon, especially if she wasn’t needed to babysit Michaela, like she normally did. I thought maybe we should have stopped by, but Erik rolled his eyes when Tripp suggested it--neither of us decided to follow through.

“Yeah,” he replied, deciding not to go any further on the topic of Jordan, so he circled back to Michaela. “Tri-Gammas are great.”

“I don’t know why they’re mixing with Zeta,” I said. “Sketchy as they are.”

“Hard to roofie kegs,” Rowen replied, with a smirk. “Better now than later?”

 

Four shots and a beer later, Erik was feeling better. He was looking worse--his face had gotten swollen and scarlet, and his right eye didn’t seem to be opening the entire way, but he had an incandescent smile on his face, a neck full of beads.

“You guys,” he purred, coming up to me and Tripp, slipping an arm around both of our shoulders. “You guys.”

Tripp and I exchanged.

“Hi Erik,” Tripp said, his voice slow and cautious; it wasn’t substantially later in the evening, wasn’t long enough for Tripp and I to get anything more than tipsy, but we hadn’t been hitting medicinal shots like Erik.

“Feeling cuddly?” I asked him.

Erik said nothing on the topic. “We should get Birdrock.”

“Feeling very cuddly,” Tripp said, wriggling out of Erik’s grasp; Erik paid no attention, letting that arm fall to the side, keeping the other around me. “How’d we managed to get from mean, sober Erik to ‘I love you guys’ to ‘I want to have sex with Michaela,’ in under an hour?”

Erik wasn’t paying any attention; he had a thin, frozen smile on his face as he stared hazily off in the direction of the parade.

“Look who’s drunk,” said Baker, as he, Morton, and Tommy Pereira came up, each holding a forty of Olde English and a plastic bag from Rite Aid.

“Just Erik,” Tripp replied.

I had been bracing for them to bring Kevin Malley, who I hadn’t seen or even chatted with in about a week. It was a long stretch for us--the longest since before anything had happened between us the day before Christmas break--and I missed him. Of course I missed him. I admittedly had zero experience in the relationship department--if that’s even what Kevin and I were tilting towards--but didn’t think I had fucked up badly enough to warrant him swearing me off altogether, especially considering our stable of mutual friends.

But, of course, any sort of detente would require seeing him--running the risk that he did plan on swearing me off altogether, and I just didn’t want to risk that. There was hope in the status quo.

“He’s working,” Baker explained, when I posited the question as to Kevin Malley’s whereabouts. “He works a shit ton during Mardi Gras because of the tips. Can’t borrow any more on loans.”

As much time as I spent around Kevin Malley, I didn’t know he was buried in loans. I did know his dad had died his freshman year in high school--esophageal cancer, age 44; Baker had told me that; Baker told me everything, Kevin told me nothing. So money issues would make sense, though I hadn’t really thought of it like that. Tulane kids seemed to be insulated from money issues, because everyone had plenty of it, arriving in weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly checks from Mommy and Daddy in Nassau County. Plenty to buy drinks, buy drugs, buy meals.

Morton surveyed Erik’s face. “What the hell happened to your face?”

“Becker beat him up,” Tripp told him, and based on expressions, no one seemed to believe that, which I didn’t appreciate. Not that I could take Erik, in a real life situation.

“No, but,” Morton said. “He looks like shit.” He paused for a minute. “Maybe we should rough up Rowen too, so we can have a chance with the really hot chicks. I know DDR’s been drinking all day.” He looked at us. “I’m just saying. Track down Meredith Greenblatt.” He turned back to Baker. “When’s Kevin done? I need to buy weed.”

“He’s literally sold out,” Baker said. “I talked to him this morning. I got his last eighth.”

“Fucker,” Morton said. “Tulane students love their shit. Share later?”

Baker nodded, then looked at me and Tripp. “What are you guys doing after this?”

“Smoking your weed, it looks like,” I told him.

Chris smiled at that, a bit of pride creeping into his face. “Becoming such a pothead, now that you’re hanging around with Kevin.”

“I don’t hang around with Kevin,” I said, quickly. Realizing this might have been too defensive, and thus, too suspicious: “I mean, I hang around with all of you.”

Chris shrugged. “Kevin’s a good guy,” he said slowly. “Straitlaced. Despite, you know, being my drug dealer.”

Kevin’s a good guy. Innocent? Accusatory? Baker wasn’t a difficult read much of the time, but I couldn’t tell from the lilt in his voice. Or maybe I was being crazy, and being paranoid.

“Yeah,” I said. “You know who I’d like to get to know better though? Veronica Tandy.”

I left that statement open-ended, but the knife had been inserted; Chris Baker could read between the lines. It was mean to say that, and I felt bad. But not that bad. Kevin’s a good guy? No, that shtick just set me off a little bit. What if Baker figured out Kevin was gay? I certainly wasn’t going to let him find out I was.

“Yeah, she’s hot,” Chris replied, nonchalantly, though I could read him a bit better this time: sorrow.

Now I felt bad.

“She’s like a sister, though,” he added, to convince himself. “I wouldn’t do anything.”

 

By the time Muses rolled around, we were in full focus on the parades. I was a bit drunk, squinting my eyes into the glitz of the all-female krewe as they rolled past us on a giant pink high heel. I was waving my arms, my voice added in chorus to the cacophony: “Beads!”

The floats were wedding cakes rolling down the street; festive high school marching bands interspersed--not playing somber standards like the Harrington School band, but swaying to jazz beats and syncopated rhythms. The entire street seemed to be dancing, seemed to be drunk.

And the floats kept coming--this was the third parade, although the names and themes had all seemed to blend together at this point. We kept waving as each one passed, and the masked throwers launched clumps of beads over the sides, raining down on us, on the ground, in the trees.

Patrick was over to the right of me, putting some of his excess beads on Annie Rue, both of them looking lovingly and disgusting.

The parades bore on. The night was getting progressively blacker, the keg progressively lighter, the load around everyone’s neck progressively heavier, the floats less seismic and entertaining as our ability to appreciate beauty drunkenly drained out of us.

“I thought I was going to have to flash,” Annie Rue told me, looking down at her chest, admiring her tremendous haul of beads. “You know, Mardi Gras.”

Patrick did not seem to approve of that statement, looking at her defensively. “It’s not Girls Gone Wild. It’s a myth that you have to show your tits to get anything.”

“Unfortunately,” what was left of Erik replied.

They didn’t hear that; they were both wasted. By this point of the evening, Patrick Sullivan had alternated between bead-giving and toxic flirtation with Annie Rue. They were about to spill into the later camp; he had his hand wrapped around her back, landing just north of her hip, pushing her t-shirt up a little bit, rubbing her bare skin.

I wondered how many other guys he had been with. I wondered if he had been with a guy recently and if Annie would’ve smelled it on him. I always think guys smell differently. I feel like, when I did stuff with Patrick or did stuff with Kevin, I could feel them on me. Their smell. Some sort of dirty sexual residue.

Kevin would be at work still--it was the height of the dinner rush. Bistro Napoleon--I was pretty sure that was where his day job was, his legal job. We weren’t enticingly close to the Warehouse District, but we also weren’t that far--suggested a nice meal, to celebrate the start of the holiday season? Sneak away by myself.

Even drunk as I was, I knew that was a pretty poor idea. What would be accomplished by barreling into a nice restaurant full of convention-goers, corner a member of their waitstaff, and, what, exactly?

This was the sort of moment that I would’ve appreciated having someone who knew I was gay. To spell out exactly what the situation was, exactly what I wanted from Kevin Malley, what I wanted to do.

I was reasonably self-aware. There was a not insignificant part of me that worried I was trying to push Kevin away, before we got in too deep--I wasn’t sure if it was insecurity or being in the closet or just things moving too quickly. Maybe a combination. And there was an equally not insignificant part of me that thought of Jackie Hughes, and how rewarding a flirtation with a cute sorority girl would be. And then another, maybe larger, maybe smaller, part, that though about how I needed to get the hell out of my own way.

“Let’s get another beer,” I told Tripp.

Tripp shrugged, looked down at his half-full solo cup. “I think the keg’s tapped.” He paused for a minute. “Boot?”

The spectators hadn’t begun to thin out, with the parades were still rolling, but both of us had seen about as much as we wanted to see without the continued promise of free alcohol. I scanned a bit for Baker, and the promise of free weed, but I didn’t see him: I just sent him a text message, “I think we’re heading Uptown,” and figured he would chime in when he got back to the Iota Chi house.

So Tripp and I clawed our way back through the remaining crowd; we left Erik in the care of Matt Rowen and the two blonde Loyola girls they were trying to bag, Erik’s disfigurement be damned.

And then we just kept walking--there were no cabs, and the buses weren’t running because of the parades, so we went on foot. About two miles, give or take, up the broken sidewalks of St. Charles Avenue.

“The streetcar,” Tripp said, drunkenly ushering a hand in the direction back to the neutral ground, once we’d sufficiently put the parade route behind us. “They’re doing a lot of work. It’s historic.”

His pocket architecture lessons were less informative when drunk.

“Yeah,” I replied. I pulled out my phone, flipped it open, and there were no messages. I’d been hoping for something--from Kevin, from Baker, just something, but there wasn’t.

Send New Text, Kevin Malley. I typed, “Hey, look,” and I didn’t know what he was going to have to look at, but I pressed send anyway because maybe he could read in between some of the blanks better than I could supply them.

I stared at my phone for another thirty seconds as Tripp prattled on about the architectural history of the Wedding Cake House.

“We should stop by the house,” I said. “Find Baker.”

My phone lit up. Erik. Tripp’s phone buzzed in his pocket--group text. “Where are you? In cab back to IX.”

Tripp squinted at the screen. “Just tell him we’ll meet him there.”

I texted him back. His eloquent response was, “K.”

Still nothing from Kevin Malley.

 

“He’s just a guy,” Michaela said, surgically attached to her phone, Saturday at the parade. We’d gotten a head start: brunch at Mat & Naddie’s on Leake, the waitress being none too careful about checking IDs. “It’s Mardi Gras,” Erik had said, gleefully, as he helped himself to the carafe of mimosa.

By the time we reached Napoleon and St. Charles, it was ten o’clock in the morning and the sun was already braising the parade route--unseasonably warm for mid-February; we had already stripped off our sweatshirts. I was a peculiar combination of still-hungover and already-drunk, the aftermath of a big Thursday, an even bigger Friday, and the mimosas on Saturday morning. The world had begun to fray, just a little bit, like we were old clothes fading in a spin cycle. We drank on, soldiers into battle.

“He’s just a guy,” Jordan mocked, in falsetto, as we settled in on Marengo and St. Charles, in front of the Iota Chi tent. “She hasn’t shut up about him for two days.”

Michaela didn’t respond to that, but she looked proud of yourself. “I’m sorry if Tate McClendon is real-world McDreamy.”

Baker and Morton were both matching in purple and gold striped polos with the Perlis crawfish embroidered on the breast pocket, shiny plastic St. Patrick’s Day hats on their heads. Drunk and dressed similar, they looked almost interchangeable, although they were anything but.

“I like the whole LSU leprechaun thing,” Erik told them, folding his arms. “Although I think you’re angling for the wrong holiday.”

“Argh,” Morton replied, drunkenly clinking a solo cup with Baker, who closer up didn’t seem nearly as drunk.

“Well, we needed green,” Baker told us, taking a sip of his beer. “Vee came by looking for you. She’s around here somewhere.”

It took him a second to realize he was talking about me, and talking about Veronica Tandy--I couldn’t imagine why she was asking about me, considering the only handful of times I had met her.

“Okay,” I said, because I wasn’t quite sure what to do with that information.

“Yeah,” Baker said; he wasn’t either. “She’s around.”

“What we need is another drink,” Erik said, clapping his hands together, even though we had been drinking all morning, and most of us had drinks at the moment. And then he skulked off, back towards the tent to forage for liquor.

“We went to brunch,” Michaela said. “Mat & Naddie’s.”

“I love Mat & Naddie’s,” Morton said. “We had brunch at Bruff.”

“I think that’s just breakfast,” Tripp told him.

“We smuggled in champagne,” Morton replied. “Those Sodexho workers really just don’t care anymore as long as you’re not breaking shit. We have to stay nice and drunk, especially because Kevin’s tapped out of weed.”

“Kevin still at work?” I interjected, as breezily as I could. “Or does he get reprieve?”

“Work,” Baker replied. “Going to try to meet us on Lundi Gras after he gets off work. We’re going to the Quarter.”

“I don’t know why anyone would brave the Quarter during Mardi Gras,” Morton added, stiffly. “I mean, I was there on Thursday, but that was an afternoon thing.

“Totally acceptable in the afternoon,” Tripp added, with a smirk that was lost on Morton.

“Becker!” came a drunk and aggressive Veronica Tandy, charging through the crowd to me. Jackie Hughes and some redhead were coming up behind her, a pace or two behind, which threw me off. I quickly sidestepped the remainder of my group, to cut them out of the conversation; I could see them out of the corner of my eye, line up as spectators in the gladiator show that was about to transpire on the St. Charles Avenue neutral ground during Krewe of Tucks.

“Hi,” I said, because what else could I say beyond that. “Hi, Jackie.”

Jackie gave me an uncomfortable little wave, and she and the redhead took her spot next to Veronica.

That seemed to satisfy Veronica, a smile erupting onto her face. “That’s right, mingle,” she said, and then she retreated back over between Morton and Baker.

This was exceptionally awkward, and I felt the heat of everyone’s eyes burning into the back of my skull. I could hear them all start to give us at least minimal privacy, turn back into their own conversations, but they were there, ready to watch me strike out or, worse, succeed.

“Sorry,” Jackie Hughes said, looking mortified by this whole situation; she also kept glancing over at this redhead, who looked exceptionally uncomfortable, now bruisingly aware she had caught her leg in this bear trap of a conversation. “I didn’t--nevermind.” She brushed a lock of dark hair from her eyes, gave me an awkward smile.

“No, it’s fine,” I said.

Jackie looked awfully pretty, in the stark sunlight--her hair seemed to glisten. She was wearing a t-shirt and jeans, her neck droopy with beads, but her hair was just so, her makeup just so--the type of intentional dressing down that some girls had completely perfected by age eighteen.

But I didn’t know what to say. “Hide your pins,” I said, slapping my hand over mine, and she stuck out her tongue, playfully, so that seemed to work.

“Good to see you,” she said. She motioned towards her friend. “Sorry, this is Lauren.”

Lauren gave me the least comfortable smile I’d ever seen, and then I felt a hand clap my shoulder--Erik swooping to my rescue.

“There you are,” he exclaimed, as if he’d been looking for me, as if he hadn’t been standing five feet behind me for the last few minutes.

“This is Erik,” I said, motioning towards Erik.

“We’ve met,” Jackie said. “I think? Bid day?” Erik nodded in agreement, even though he had not been at Tri-Gamma bid day with us. They both seemed to settle on that as canon.

Jackie was surprisingly not drunk--or, rather, had a sensational ability to downplay her intoxication, which made me a little nervous. I was either drunker than she was, or she was putting on some pretty impressive airs around me, neither of which boded well for the direction of this conversation. She decided to continue my awkward joke as her greeting to Erik: “You’re better at holding onto your pin than this one over here.”

Erik offered me a thin, knowing smile--he was less discreet than he thought when he was drunk, though I appreciated the effort. “Well, you know, Becker’s very trusting.”

I wished Kevin Malley had texted me back.

“It’s hot out,” I said, to no one in particular; Erik, Lauren, and Jackie all nodded affirmatively. “Nice throws,” I added.

“I know,” she said, holding up a stack full of plastic cups with parade logos stamped on the side. “We didn’t do so bad.”

“You have to fill them up,” Erik said. “Put them to use. So, Lauren, do you want to go over to the keg? We’ve got beer.”

It was a clunky segue; it suddenly dawned on me that Erik hadn’t necessarily swooped to save me from an awkward encounter, but to clear the runway for takeoff vis-a-vis Jackie Hughes by surgically removing the Lauren, which suddenly was much less chivalrous and much more pressured.

“Oh,” Jackie said, looking back towards our tent. “Do you mind getting me one?”

Lauren was just happy to get out of there, so she let Erik lead her over to the Iota Chi tent, which meant that Jackie and I were uncomfortably alone now, except not alone because everyone was still within earshot, still--I assumed--keeping tabs on the latest episode of “Will Becker Get Laid?”

“This doesn’t count as the drink we’re supposed to get,” Jackie said. “Veronica said you’d been asking about me.”

That was an abject lie on the part of Veronica Tandy, and I made a mental reminder to hunt her dead. I’d seen exactly what she had done, what she had maneuvered. I could imagine right there: help the two shy freshmen, dragging their feet in romantic endeavors, by giving them an extra, lie-fueled push.

But of course I wasn’t going to communicate any of that to Jackie Hughes--and there was something drunkenly easy about flirting with Jackie Hughes.

“Oh, yeah,” I told her, instead. “Well, you know, it’s been so crazy. Mardi Gras.”

In retrospect, it was a terrible idea to do anything but slam the door shut on a possible outing with Jackie Hughes, but I was full of terrible ideas when I was drunk at a parade before Mardi Gras.

Because Jackie Hughes and I did look pretty good together, not a bad couple, right? Not that we’d be a couple, of course, but we didn’t look all that incompatible.

I was drunk. I don’t know. I thought about Patrick and Annie--if they could do it. If Patrick was actually gay, instead of testing waters. And I thought about Kevin Malley. “Hey, look,” but no response, and he was working, but he was avoiding me--he was certainly avoiding me.

“How about next Friday?” she said. “After Mardi Gras is over and all.”

What on earth could I say to that, except, “Okay,” I said, and I launched a Hail Mary on what could be my only bulwark against a date-date with Jackie Hughes: “Yeah, maybe a few of us could get together--could be fun.”

Jackie didn’t seem to mind the prospect of a group setting, and she nodded. “Definitely. That’d be a blast. Boot happy hour?”

“Works for me,” I replied, and she clinked my solo cup.

 

“Woo-hoo-hoo,” Becker said, subtly, clapping me on the back as I rejoined the group and Jackie Hughes faded back into the ether of the crowd at Mardi Gras.

“You’re going to get laid before Becker,” Morton said, cloyingly. “What a Kodak moment.”

Jordan looked exceptionally uncomfortable at this towel-snapping; Michaela staring at her flipped-open phone as if it was a bomb that might go off in her hand at any minute.

“He hasn’t texted,” Michaela said, without looking. “It’s his turn.”

“He texted you this morning,” Jordan replied, crossing her arms, her patience already worn to the bone by this point of the Birdrock-McClendon pairing. “And I’m assuming you didn’t need the room for two hours in the middle of the night on Thursday to do homework.”

Michaela looked both embarrassed and proud at the same moment.

“Michaela can get anyone,” Morton said, dismissively, swatting her away; she looked even more proud. “Let’s talk about the real terminal case getting someone.”

“Thanks,” I told him, flatly.

“No, it’s cool,” Morton said. “Freshmen need to blossom.” He did theatrical jazz hands, with just one hand, and took a drink from his solo cup out of the other one. “You’ll get the hang of it. It’s not really terminal until you’re old and desperate like Baker.”

“Thanks,” Baker told him too.

 

Lundi Gras, that Monday, we went downtown. School was on break for Monday and Tuesday so we figured we’d live up the last full night of Mardi Gras.

Kevin Malley was, of course, theoretically going to be lingering somewhere downtown after his shift and I hoped--assumed, really, because he was going to be with Morton and Baker--that we’d run into each other. So I could stake out some semblance of cordial relations.

Things had not been cordial.

"I hear you have a date with some chick?" he had texted me, Sunday.

"It's complicated."

"No," he had replied. "It's really not."

And nothing else.

I felt incredibly guilty over Jackie Hughes, who had texted me a non sequitur about her hangover on Sunday morning as well--clearly an attempt to start a dialogue, but I wasn’t biting; I was giving her one word answers until, ultimately, she let me be in peace.

But we were still on for Friday--a date, if you could call it that. I had volunteered Tripp--I figured he’d be more amenable to the situation than Erik, who would demand too much as to why I didn’t want to be alone with Jackie Hughes. And her friend, Lauren, whom I had also volunteered, was a cute enough girl, but she was definitely not in Erik’s league--Tripp’s league, quite probably.

In the clear light of introspection, I thought a lot of Kevin Malley, and how he’d been right, and how he’d known exactly what I was thinking. And that was rare, wasn’t it, that someone could read you. It was terrifying, it was liberation. I didn’t know. I wanted to see him, to talk to him. I wanted to accidentally run into him, preferably when we were alcohol-lubricated enough to be fearless, like the time we first got shy, but not so drunk that we’d say things we’d regret.

I texted him: “Are you coming out tonight?” But there was no response, but he was at work and presumably without his phone. I imagined him, a few hours, taking out his phone, being happy to hear from me in some sort of coherent statement, rather than, “Hey, look.”

We were already down on Bourbon Street, but we weren’t meeting the Iota Chi guys until later. We’d planned to drink at the house with all of them, but Michaela was insistent that we go downtown with her a little early, so she could accidentally run into Tate McClendon on purpose.

“I just said we might swing by,” Michaela said.

“She said we might be at that bar too,” Jordan clarified, and Michaela sent her death rays.

So we wound up at this place called the Frat House on Bourbon Street--a place guaranteed to look the other way with our eighteen-year-old IDs, according to sources--so she could stalk Tate McClendon, without looking like she was stalking Tate McClendon.

At breakfast that morning, Jordan had filled us in on the dirt: they had met at the Tri-Gamma/Zeta keg kill, they had made out, they had gone back to her room together, kicked Jordan out in the middle of the night, which she seemed even slightly willing to forgive because he was gorgeous.

“No, like, better-looking than she is, even,” Jordan had told us, mouth full as she demolished while the rest of us were having waffles and eggs. “I almost died.”

“Come on,” Erik had said, his ego bruised, as he instinctively clutched his still-fucked-up face. “Who is this guy?”

“I’m just saying,” Jordan replied. “You’ll see him, and you’ll realize why Michaela wouldn’t ever give you the time of day.”

So I had high hopes for when we saw Tate, through the smoky, dingy air at the Frat House. And I recognized him immediately. He was in a psych lecture with me, nameless until this point, and he was one of those things of beauty that you admired from afar as a work of art, an Abercrombie bag of a man. One of those effortlessly hot guys; one that I would never have screwed up the courage to speak with, even socially, for a million years. He had a swagger, the attitude that came with just seeming to know he was in for an easy road ahead for the next sixty or so years. It must have been nice to feel like that. I’d never felt like that. I'd always panicked at the thought of the future.

And, of course, that was the kind of guy Michaela was always going to date. Being around Michaela all year, and all of her insecurities, had deadened me to how beautiful she was, but she really was. Movie star good looks, and an excellent rack. Even I could appreciate that, objectively speaking.

Tate was in a nest of Zetas over by the bar, doing a row of SoCo-lime shots, which seemed to be the house specialty, for three dollars. Part of his little entourage was Charlie Baker, who I was not expecting to see.

“Tate!” Michaela said, as if caught by surprise. “I thought I’d run into you here.”

Jordan gave a legendary eye roll, for my and Tripp’s benefit.

“Hey, there,” Tate said, sultry voice, though I couldn’t tell if that was his real voice or some facade he was putting on to woo our Michaela Birdrock. “What are you drinking?”

“Long Island,” Michaela said coolly.

“A woman after my own heart,” he replied, handing her an untouched one that happened to be sitting on the bar. “That’s my drink.”

Jordan met my eyes, rolled hers again. We, of course, had never once seen Michaela order a Long Island. She usually trended towards the girly drinks like vodka cranberry, so this was both hollow and uncharacteristic. Peopled acted weird in relationships, or weird when they were trying for a relationship. I couldn’t relate. The closest I had come to any sort of relationship was Kevin Malley and, for all of our back and forth, that wasn’t much, and seemed less so now that we weren’t talking. I was used to him texting me constantly. His little asides whenever something happened in his life.

I flipped open my phone; still no response from Kevin Malley, but he was at work, so he wouldn’t respond, and he’d respond later. Obviously.

We ordered drinks, and then quickly, discreetly segregated ourselves--Michaela and the Zetas in one circle, the rest of us and Charlie in the other.

Having not seen Charlie for almost the entire semester, and having seen his brother almost every day, was a jarring sort of realization. They looked similar, although Charlie was objectively more handsome and objectively seemed to know that. They had a similar smile though.

“So, how’s my brother?” Charlie asked, sipping his Long Island. I’d forgotten how deep his voice was, compared to Chris Baker’s. “Keeping tabs on him?”

“Doing great,” Erik said, quickly, stiffly, like he didn’t want to discuss Chris Baker in front of Charlie. And I got that--I had a pretty even handle on what their relationship was like.

Charlie was squinting at Erik’s face, but didn’t ask questions about what had transpired. “Yeah, I’ve been so busy since pledgeship started,” he said, breezily. “I haven’t really seen him at all. I haven’t had much time for anything--it’s a tough semester.”

Erik nodded, pointedly, for some reason not willing to budge an inch on what he clearly perceived to be Zeta vs. Iota Chi. “Yeah, it’s busy for us, too. They’re working us hard. How are you liking Zeta, though?”

“Oh, it’s awesome, bro,” he said. I noted Charlie’s conspicuously awkward use of the word bro, which hadn’t been a factor in his language the last time I saw him, before rush week. “Great place and all. Chill guys.”

One of the other brothers behind him made a theatrical slurping noise, and clapped Charlie on the shoulder. Charlie ignored him.

“Yeah,” Charlie said, quickly regaining his swagger. “Good so far.” That was kind of the end of the conversation; he excused himself to get another drink, and then joined the Michaela-Zeta circle instead of coming back to us.

There was something that made me uneasy about Zeta, when I hung around them. Maybe just their reputation. Their guy vat and their girl vat. I don’t know. I wouldn’t hang out with people with that kind of reputation, even if Charlie was there, even if Michaela was dating Tate, even if they all seemed nice on the surface, at least.

Michaela and Tate started kissing over by the bar.

Erik looked over in disgust, and then saw all of us staring at him.

“i just don’t like PDA,” he said defensively. Which was false.

“Don’t be jealous,” Tripp said, a smile creeping onto his face, “just because you’re not getting any from Michaela Birdrock.”

He said that almost gleefully, with a certain unexpected schadenfreude. But that was, somehow, excusable to feel towards Erik, because he went around with such a sexual hubris that it was nice to see him taken down a peg sometimes, even if he was one of our best friends.

“Please,” Erik replied, angrily, and his hand went to his swollen face as if he thought that might be the reason Michaela chose the supermodel over the merely very attractive Erik Fontenot. He was ready to lash back at Tripp, but he didn’t seem to have a roadmap for where to go after that so he went, instead, for the easy insult. “You want to see which one of us can bag a chick tonight?” He pointed back and forth between me and Tripp. “When your guys’ room is like a monastery?”

“Whoa, collateral damage,” I said, grabbing my heart with mock drama.

He looked back over at Tate and Michaela. “Whatever.”

“Come on,” Jordan told him. “I think you’re forgetting it’s Michaela. Who would drive you absolutely insane if she was your girlfriend.” She grinned. “Believe me, I’m happy to let someone else have a turn babysitting her, but let’s be real for a second. You guys would kill each other.”

That seemed to pacify Erik a bit. “And it’s not like I ever even wanted her enough to pursue her,” he added to the narrative. Jordan and Tripp, eager to diffuse, nodded profusely.

I looked at my barren phone, and I thought again, still, of Kevin, and he wasn’t someone I could so easily be talked out of--someone I could make up excuses for why I was okay that he didn’t want me in his life.

It pissed me off that he hadn’t responded. And then I realized I didn't exactly know what I was pissed about. Pissed that he didn't care about me. I did care about Kevin Malley. Had he been a girl, had it been something else, I would've paraded him all around. Smart, sweet, sexy, funny, a touch awkward. He would've been in my room, cuddling up next to me while Tripp shot Erik on the Playstation. Tripp would say shit, you're lucky, I need to find something like that.

But he wasn't a girl. So I had sex with him and didn’t tell anyone about it, and I didn't really know if I wanted to go for more than that. But I knew I wanted to keep him around.

That seemed shockingly selfish, but I didn't really care at this point. We were both tossed salad and scrambled eggs over this whole thing.

“Fine,” I texted him. “Don’t talk to me. I’m just going to have a conversation by myself.”

I paused, waited for a response. I didn’t receive one.

“Michaela’s making out with Tate McClendon at the Frat House on Bourbon Street,” I told him. New text: “Erik’s pissed, because it’s not him.” New text: “But if you saw Tate McClendon, you’d understand why.” New text: “Do you know Tate McClendon? He’s a sophomore.” New text: “So how’s work?”

There was finally a response, however curt and expository: “I will see you tonight. I’ve been working every night this week. Stop texting me.”

“No,” I replied, but he didn’t respond, and I stopped, I put my phone back in my pocket.

“Kevin’s coming out tonight,” I told them, because they were all staring at me, after my bout of marathon texting. “When we meet up with the Iota Chi guys.”

“Let’s go to another bar,” Erik said, still glancing over at Michaela and Tate, who had stopped making out but were now gazing lovingly into each other’s eyes, which was somehow even worse. “Screw these people.”

We pointed out that all of our drinks were about half full.

“Fine,” Erik said. “Five minutes. Drink up.”

“Where?” I asked, drinking quickly anyway.

“I don’t know,” Erik said. “Find your butt buddy, Baker.”

 

We found them at Tropical Isle, down the street, already sloshed.

“We’re going to sneak into Pat O’s after this,” Baker explained, too loudly.

“Shut up, you moron,” Matt Rowen muttered, looking nervously at the bartender. “We’ve been drinking legally all night,” he said, equally loud, unhelpfully, that sort of reactionary drunk problem-solving that never seemed to work.

“No, but we are,” Baker said. “Get ready.”

“They card,” Erik said. “There’s no way.”

Morton’s eyes lit up, so excited he couldn’t even get a word out. “No, no! There is a way. It’s totally foolproof. The only time it didn’t work was formal last year. Because they thought we were a prom.”

“They thought we were a prom,” Baker echoed.

“No,” Morton said, swatting him away. “I have a fake and Rowen has a fake. So you give us seven bucks for a hurricane, and we go in, and get drinks for everyone in geaux-cups. And then we scurry back on out--” He demonstrated with his index and ring finger on the palm of his hand. “--And give you your drinks.”

“But we’re outside,” Erik said, skeptically. “With drinks, granted, but outside.”

“Ye of little faith,” Morton said. “We break up into groups, go around the side entrance where they’re a little less strict? You just pretend you don’t notice the bouncer. Be deep in conversation and shit, and just brush on through. You’ll have drinks. They never stop you.”

Erik continued to look skeptical, but I thought it was zany enough to actually work. It was New Orleans, and tourism was on life-support; a bar wasn’t going to go out of its way to stop patrons from patronizing, even if we were eighteen and nineteen. That much I’d learned in my half-year in New Orleans.

“So let’s go,” Morton said. “Now that the pledges are here.”

“We’re still waiting on Malley,” Baker said. “I told him to meet us here.”

The thought of Kevin coming soon was positive news. We were both necessarily vague enough around the brothers where I knew he wouldn’t want them to notice anything. So he’d make the requisite friendly conversation, and that would at least open the channels up. Once I got talking to Kevin, I figured I could throw myself on his mercy. Hope that he couldn’t hold onto a grudge any longer than I could.

“If only we had a magical device,” Morton said, taking out his phone, holding it up for Morton to see, “that could communicate with people who aren’t here with us.”

“Baker got drunk,” Tommy Pereira said, slurring a bit, as he sauntered up to us. He had his arm playfully around our vice president Louis Montgomery’s shoulders, was dragging him back and forth limply as he moved across the bar. “Baker can’t hold his liquor.”

“Yeah, time to go,” Morton said, curtly. This might’ve been the first time where he was holding it more together than the rest of his group. He pointed a thumb at them, flashed us a goofy smile. “These fucking clowns.”

Morton and Rowen were inside Pat O’Brien’s for what seemed like a lethal amount of time--like they’d been detained or arrested. Not that I expected a New Orleans bar to arrest a couple of Tulane students--who, by all accounts had legal immunity for all but the most serious crimes committed in the city--but even so.

Finally, they came back out, arms full of drinks like an alcoholic Santa Claus, and dispersed them immediately.

I took a sip, because I’d never had a hurricane before. And it wasn’t awful--sweet, slushy. I took another sip, and then met Jordan’s eyes; she had a similar reaction to me, and we both went back for more.

“Okay,” Morton said, as we got to the corner of Bourbon and St. Peter. He pointed down St. Peter. “So here we go. That’s the back entrance. Jordan, you, Campbell, and Fontenot go first. They won’t stop a girl.”

There weren’t any instructions beyond that, so the three of us--me and Jordan probably the two people in the group who would be most uncomfortable in this kind of setting, doing this kind of thing--slowly made our way down the street towards the side entrance.

My heart was pounding, and I really didn’t know what to do, except keep walking Spanish down the cobblestone hallway that formed the entrance to Pat O’Brien’s.

“I mean, she’s hot but she’s not that hot,” Erik was saying, to make conversation, so we could pretend to be distracted. I wasn’t sure if he was talking about Michaela, or just vomiting some Lorem Ipsum, or some combination of both. “I mean, it just doesn’t make sense. I can’t make sense of it, you know? It’s crazy.”

We passed the bouncer, a thin, middle-aged guy wearing a green blazer and we all made a point not to look at him as we went.

“Yeah, yeah,” Jordan replied quickly, to Erik. “I don’t understand it either. It’s just weird.”

“So weird,” I added.

And then we were in. We exchanged silent, celebratory grins, and stood over near the patio bar. The bar was packed, and somehow serene--we were in their back patio, centered around a giant fountain with fire shooting out the top of it. Waiters in green jackets, like the bouncer, came around with trays of the scarlet liquid, in hurricane glasses.

Next trickled in Tripp, Baker, and Tommy, the latter two who were holding themselves together with commendable restraint, talking about a fictitious telecommunications convention at the Morial Convention Center, which seemed to me like overkill but seemed to work on the apparently very trusting bouncer.

Then Morton, Louis, Harry Capuano. Then Veronica and two other girls that I didn’t recognize, who were actually having a real conversation it seemed like. Then Rowen and Eddie Darien, holding up the back.

“I told you,” Morton said, quietly, trying to brag but not enough that we all got kicked out after our delicately-tiered entrance ritual. “I told you! It works every single time.” He pointed back down the hallway that we had just come in from. “Piano bar. Let’s go.”

The line for the piano bar was twenty people deep already, but we had drinks, so we just stood, mingled for about ten minutes until they seated us. The piano bar was exceptionally dark, the only light coming from the stage: two brass pianos, abutting each other, a diagonally-hanging mirror over them so you could see the pianists’ hands. There was a request jar on the top of the piano, but, “Don’t even think of making a request without giving them five bucks,” Morton warned.

We had ordered a fresh round of drinks when Morton’s phone vibrated.

He flipped it open.

“Malley’s here,” he said. “I’m going to sneak him in. Hold my spot.”

“I can get him,” I volunteered, standing up, before Morton had a chance to. “I want to see if I can pull it off.”

Morton did not look suspicious; he looked, if anything, proud.

I took my almost-empty Pat O’Brien’s geaux-cup with me, but I ordered two at the patio bar anyway. I finished what was left in my first cup, left it on the bar, and charged out the main entrance.

Game time.

I didn’t know exactly what to say to Kevin Malley, except that I was an idiot, that I did want to see where whatever we had was going. But I knew I wouldn’t say that sort of thing, that I wouldn’t leave myself open to such an uncomfortable suggestion of romance, which may or may not be reciprocated. So maybe I’d just say sorry, and maybe he’d do more of that reading between the lines.

Kevin was standing there, looking cripplingly attractive, hands in his pockets. He was wearing a white button-down and black slacks--obviously his work uniform, but at least he’d removed the name tag. He’d thrown a corduroy jacket over the top, and I seriously just wanted to rip off his clothes right in the middle of Bourbon Street. It had been a while, both since I saw Kevin and since I got laid and I wasn’t entirely sure which was the foremost thing on my mind.

“Long time,” I said. He reached for his drink; I snatched it away, because I didn’t want him to escape. As long as I had the drink, he was my captive. I tried to give him a goofy, pathetic smile. “Still mad at me? Am I forgiven yet?”

“There’s nothing to forgive,” Kevin said, folding his arms. “I’ve been busy. Lots of work. Lots of school. And whatever. I’m not mad at you.”

But he was speaking in a brusque, matter-of-fact way that made me think he was.

“Come on,” I said. “Look, I’m not going to pursue things with that girl. I don’t want to be with her. I want to be with you.”

Kevin was stone at that. “You want to mess around again? Okay. Fine.”

He was off--something was off.

“No, I’m just tired,” he replied. “I just served rich people cocktails for the last eight hours. Can I please have my drink?”

“No,” I said. “I need you to forgive me.”

He let out an irritated sigh. “You’re so high-maintenance--look, it was really just work. All week. My world does not revolve around you, Peter Adam Becker. It does not. And yes, before that, I was just legitimately pissed at you. Because we're having fun with this whole thing, and you're like, 'Oh, maybe I'll date some girl, even though I'm gay.'"

“Okay,” I said, instinctively looking around to see who was within earshot when he mentioned that word. “So let’s pick back up where we left off.” I had an idea, and I was terrified by the thought of it but I knew it would work. I lowered my voice and put forth my best gambit, my secret negotiating chip: “I’ll let you fuck me tonight.”

Kevin’s face couldn’t help but creep into an unwanted smile at that. “Your offer is on the table,” he replied, his mouth upturning even as he tried to suppress it. “Pending you give me my drink right now.”

We went back into Pat O’s, back into the Piano Bar. Kevin sat across from me, next to Baker. There was something romantic about it, the idea that I had possible, potentially, been forgiven, even though it came at such a gruesome price to my anatomy. I was already drunk--how drunk did someone have to be to not feel that sort of thing?

I ordered another hurricane.

Baker leaned across the table to me, as if he had something important to tell me.

"I think I had an epiphany," Baker whispered, his voice hoarse and slurring. "Like, happiness."

The pianists was playing “Get Happy” at the moment, but that was all I could really connect. And “happiness” didn’t technically qualify as an epiphany with the Webster’s definition anyway, but he seemed so genuinely intrigued by the word that I just let it be.

"Happiness," I repeated, noncommittally.

"Like, being happy," he rephrased, somehow even less helpfully. "You know?"

I nodded vigorously.

"You can just be happy," he said. He pointed to his smile, as reference. "It's an intriguing--" He hunted for the right word; burped--"concept."

"Aw, it's Baker and Becker having a secret conversation," Morton crooned, leaning in. "Which one of you gives and which one receives? I always forget."

"Oh, Becker, definitely," Kevin said, with the biggest smile on his face that I had ever seen.

 

Kevin slammed me against the door to his bedroom, held my shoulder with one hand, and tore down my jeans with the other.

"Well," he said, looking down. "Hello, there."

I was already straining the fabric on my boxer briefs; he yanked those down too so I popped out, pulled me in for another kiss, our exposed dicks rubbing against each other like two swords locked in battle.

He kept kissing me, as he led me over to his bed. He tore down his jeans the rest of the way, and then lowered me horizontal onto to the bed.

Kevin hopped up on the bed too, in front of me. He grabbed my knees, guided my legs up to his shoulders, and I could feel his hard, huge dick rubbing against my ass crack. He leaned down for a kiss; I wrapped my legs around his back, and I hadn't expected it to feel so right, so necessary. Telling him I wanted him to fuck me had been a gambit, a way to open back up conversation, to sweeten the deal. I hadn't entirely expected to go through with it.

But here we were, and it was going to happen. It was very clearly going to happen and I was suddenly a vessel of contrast, scared and enticed, nervous and wanting.

He was sliding his dick up and down the crevasse; he'd done this before. He moved his lips down to kiss my jawline, my neck, and I let out a groan.

"I'm going to fuck you so hard," he whispered. "Take that bottom virginity. Fuck you all night long."

God, he was gorgeous. Amazing. With that big dick, rapping on the back door. When I thought of sex with Kevin--sex sex, like when I was imagining porn and sticking our faces on top of the heaving, muscular bodies--I had tacitly resigned myself to the fact that I would probably be the one to bottom. He had that dick, he was Kevin, he was not put in a place.

"I want you to fuck me," I said, and I had no idea what to say but somehow these banal sentences sounded sexy; we were breathy, we were in the moment.

Kevin sat up, let me fall back to the bed. He reached over to the nightstand, pulled open the drawer, and grabbed a magnum and a bottle of lube.

"You really want this?" he said, but he had a smile even bigger than Baker's was tonight on his face, and there wasn't a chance he would let me opt of this thing, not after we had been frosty for a couple

weeks, after I promised. But, somehow, I didn't want to opt out--I was curious, I was intrigued.

So I nodded.

That didn't seem to be enough for him: "Tell me you want me inside you," he said.

"I want you inside me," I replied, and both of our smiles grew.

He unrolled the big balloon onto his dick, squirted a tremendous amount of lube into his hand.

"That much?" I said.

"You're going to thank me in about thirty seconds," he replied, slathering it on himself. He leaned down to me, kissed me softly, his lubed hand rubbing near my awaiting asshole.

It was bone-numbingly cold; I let out an audible gasp, and Kevin gave me a breathy giggle.

"Man up," he said, kissing me on the cheek. "It's not that cold."

It really was that cold, but I didn't say anything more; his index finger slowly reached inside, and it was deeply uncomfortable, like a giant concrete splinter.

"Mm," I said, squirming a bit. He stopped moving it.

"Give it a second," he said, and he paused, waiting for what I could only imagine was vivid discomfort streaked across my face to subside. Then he started prodding me again.

Ooh. He was hitting something that didn't feel altogether bad.

"Yeah," he panted, breathlessly excited. "I knew you'd like it when you got used to it." And then he slowly added a second finger, which felt like it had exceeded the room capacity.

"Too much," I said. "No, too much."

He stopped moving, didn't take it out. "You ever take a really big shit?"

I scrunched my face. "That's the last thing I want to think about right now."

"No," he grinned. "I just mean, your ass can handle something a lot bigger than this."

"But that's outbound," I said, squirming a little but I was getting used to the second finger at least a little bit. "This is running counter to the flow of traffic."

He prodded me with both fingers, I groaned as he hit that spot again. And then, twenty seconds later, he was pulling them out and I felt a little empty. It was like a bullet, left in a gunshot victim, which would get surrounded by skin and tissue and absorbed into the body, a new addition.

More lube was squirted onto his hand; he slathered more onto his dick, which was glazed like a donut. And, his dick against my ass, he leaned down and kissed me again.

"Just try me," he whispered. "You'll take it like a champ."

Which was encouraging. I was overthinking all of this, and I knew I was overthinking all of this, but he was so big and the entryway was so small.

He hoisted my legs back up to his shoulders, which made me spring back into action. He held one of my shins in one hand, guided his dick into me with the other one.

It was like a sabre, stabbing down there, searing through what I had rightfully expected to be a really small entrance. Did not like. Did not like. No. No.

"Do you want me to take it out?" he asked.

I nodded vigorously, and I felt him slowly slide out. It wasn't until he was on the way out that I realized how little of him had actually been inside me--barely more than his big head.

"Give it a sec," he said. "Wait for the pain to subside." And he leaned down again, kissed me again, his hand gripping my shoulder, his dick still rock hard and waiting patiently.

"Okay," I said finally, about ten seconds later, when it stopped actively searing. "Let's try it again."

My ankles went back up on his shoulders, he started guiding me in again. More pain, but not as jarring as the first time; I bit the loose skin around my wrist, and waited.

"Stop, stop," I said, finally.

"Take it out?"

"Just," I said, "leave it there for a second. I have to get used to it."

We waited, the most awkward handful of seconds, staring at each other, Kevin's mouth slightly agape and frozen, unwilling to move even in the slightest; me, fearful of moving.

And then it felt okay. Organic. Neither of us said anything; he slowly began slipping it in again, and then it passed the nerves, and I felt it enter a much larger, less painful reservoir. I could feel the tickle of his pubes against my ass, the slap of his balls--the way he smiled, I knew I'd taken all of it.

It didn't hurt--not like physical pain anyway; it was a dull discomfort, a stinging.

"Just hold it for a second," I told him again, and he did, leaned down to kiss me.

"You're so tight," he whispered, and then he started slowly pulsing in and out of me. "How's that feel?"

I groaned, involuntarily but affirmatively, like someone else was in control of all of my noises.

The second the stinging stopped, there was just a haze of pleasure--nothing else, like the rest of the world had evaporated except for this moment. It was so perfect, so necessary, like he belonged right there.

"Fuck me," I heard myself say, the only words I could manage, and shit, he took that to heart, picking up the pace, harder, harder. He was panting, throwing out reflexive catchphrases like, "You're so hot," or, "Yeah, take that cock," and, for my part, I had essentially lost all command of the English language other than grunts.

There was something about Kevin Malley--this wasn't his first time around the block, but he had a big, goofy smile on his face the whole time, like a teenager joy-riding, not that sly half-smile he usually wore. Something giddy about the way he was while he was getting some.

He leaned down, put his hand on the back of my head, pulled it up a little bit so he could kiss me again. He was burrowing into me even harder now, almost taking the whole thing out to ram it back in.

"I'm getting close," he notified, as if seeking permission to die. He stopped pumping into me, just let his hard dick sit there for a second, motionless.

“I don’t know if this qualifies as ‘I’m going to fuck you all night,’” I told him. “Big talk.”

He grinned. “I was really thinking more of your health. You know, I don’t want to crash that tight little asshole of yours on the test drive.”

“Fuck me,” I told him. “I can handle you.”