Hours later, Jeremy heard the knock on his door but did nothing. He was languishing in the afterglow of a pretty decent orgasm and he would be damned if anyone ruined his five minutes of boneless high. The boy at his side, a freshman who had fallen into Jeremy’s bed after nothing more than a few well-placed smiles and heated glances, groaned and nudged Jeremy with his elbow.
The knock came again, longer and more persistent.
Jeremy looked out his window with a frown. The sun had gone down hours ago and most people knew better than to disturb him when there was a subtle ‘do not disturb’ sign hanging from his door handle as well as the less than subtle moans and screams he’d managed to get out of his partner.
He swore and got up, grabbing his pair of boxers off the floor and putting them on. He walked to the door and threw it open.
“WHAT?”
He found himself facing a haggard-looking Kyle who looked at his state of undress and said nothing.
That was a first.
Knowing Kyle wouldn’t be patient enough to wait while he kicked out the guy in his bed, Jeremy simply put his arm around Kyle and ushered him to Kyle’s room which was right next door. He was about to close the door when Shay burst in behind them.
Jeremy gave her a look and Shay shrugged, lifting her phone to show that Kyle had sent her a text.
Whatever happened must have been really bad then. Kyle hated showing weakness and for him to have gone through the bother of texting Shay and seeking out Jeremy…
Jeremy sat Kyle on his perfectly made bed and let his eyes wander for a moment.
The room was clean and decorated in black, blue and white. The desk was neat and there were no dirty dishes in the sink. Jeremy spared a moment to admire how anal his friend was about being tidy and went into the tiny kitchen area to make him a cup of coffee. Shay went to help him, whispering to Jeremy that she would go get Kyle something to eat from Lays, the on-campus town and extravagant shopping mall.
Kyle’s eyes were red-rimmed behind his glasses and his face was pale. Jeremy and Shay shared a glance. The last time they’d seen the guy get this close to shedding a tear had been in fifth grade when he’d gotten a B+ on a report about reports.
Jeremy handed Kyle the cup of strong black coffee with enough sugar in it to kill a small child. Kyle drank deeply and sighed, his eyes open but somewhat blank.
“What happened?” Jeremy asked, squatting in front of Kyle, failing to keep the worry from his voice. Shay slipped out, giving Jeremy a thumbs up. Shay would let him work. With Kyle in that state, she doubted she would manage to get him to open up as fast as Jeremy would.
Kyle shook his head at nothing and took off his glasses, placing them on his bedside table. Jeremy scowled at him. “Tell me.”
When Kyle didn’t respond, the brunet grabbed his chin, forcing him to look him in the eye.
Kyle took in a deep breath. “Harold and I broke up.”
Jeremy’s eyes narrowed. Kyle did care about the man but he doubted that was all. He was sure there was more.
“Talk to me, Kyle,” he said, his thumb absently brushing the side of Kyle’s chin.
“He is seeing someone else.”
“He was cheating? On you?” Jeremy asked.
Kyle gave him a weak glare. “Yes.”
Jeremy gaped. He really hadn’t thought that could possibly be it. Harold, boring Harold, had the balls to cheat on Kyle?
“Has he gone blind?” Jeremy asked incredulously.
He was sure Kyle had said he and Harold loved each other for more than just looks, which was obviously true for Kyle because he had to, but Harold-
Come on.
Kyle was no doubt about to lecture him when Jeremy asked, “How did you find out?”
“I found them at his apartment,” Kyle said with a grimace, some of the colour starting to return to his face. “They were in his living room.”
“They?”
“Do you remember Miss Fudge?”
Jeremy gaped, then grimaced, then turned green.
Miss Fudge was the librarian at their old high school. She was old, wrinkled and hitting seventy if she hadn’t already crashed into it with her face. She had been quite large in her younger years and had gone vegan and lost most of the weight. The sagging skin however, she had kept like a trophy. A trophy that Harold had apparently won.
Jeremy shook his head to clear his thoughts. “Maybe they were just having a meeting? Maybe Harold was just helping her with…investments or something?”
Kyle gave him a scathing look to remind Jeremy that Kyle was not the type to jump to wild conclusions.
“They were naked and his phallus was hidden within her folds.”
Jeremy took a second to process that before he grabbed Kyle and pulled him down to the floor on top of him, hugging his friend close as he imagined just what kind of horror Kyle had endured seeing those two naked, worse seeing them naked together.
Kyle struggled on top of Jeremy, trying to get off of him but Jeremy didn’t loosen his grip, pushing Kyle’s face deeper into his chest as he tried to force comfort on him.
“I will get you the help you need,” Jeremy promised loudly. “I swear I will find a way for you to unsee that.”
Kyle let out a shocked chuckle and the next minute, the two of them were laughing together, unable to stop.
Shay walked in with a large bag of confectionary. She’d obviously driven to Lays.
She smiled when she saw Kyle spread out on top of Jeremy on the carpeted floor, both of them laughing so hard they were tearing up.
“Idiots,” she said fondly, placing a box of donuts by them and grabbing a chocolate-covered one for herself.
When they calmed down and started eating the wide array of food that Shay had brought from what Jeremy assumed was the broken-hearted girl section of the Lays supermarket. Icecream, cupcakes, cookies, chocolate cake…
“Did you even look at what you were buying?” Kyle asked Shay, grabbing an éclair.
“Not really,” Shay admitted. “There was a hot guy at the till and I had to hurry before his shift ended.”
Kyle snorted at that and nodded for Jeremy to tell Shay what happened.
When she reacted in much the same way as Jeremy, grabbing Kyle and burying his face in her chest as she offered condolences to his lost innocence, Kyle muttered insults at both of them.
“What did you do?” Shay asked when Kyle managed to get away. “Did you just walk away?”
Kyle shook his head, looking uncomfortable. “I confronted them.”
“Oh good lord, no.”
He nodded. “Harold pulled himself from her in surprise. There was a wet suction-like sound as he did.”
Shay and Jeremy glared at Kyle for giving them details but he went on. “He was there just standing in surprise and then he said ‘Oh, Kyle, I apologithe for having you find out thith way’.”
“Oh wow.”
“Miss Fudge nodded along with him and told me that she never meant to let it get that far. She said their passion caught them both off guard.”
“You’re kidding.”
Kyle shook his head at Shay who seemed to be the only one commenting. Jeremy seemed to be in some sort of horrified stupor.
“Harold said they were madly in love and that he hadn’t wanted to disturb my grades by breaking up with me before the midsemester tests,” Kyle said, rolling his eyes. Jeremy would have scoffed but that was not the time.
He suspected that even if Kyle was hit by a bus, his grades wouldn’t suffer. Sometimes they seemed to be sentient beings, anthropomorphic As that just walked onto all of Kyle’s assignments and papers.
“When I didn’t say anything,” Kyle continued, “Harold started explaining why he was cheating on me with an old woman. He said maybe being gay just wasn’t for him and all he’d needed was to find the right woman. He said she excited him in ways I just couldn’t. I left after that.”
Shay and Jeremy were both just staring at him and Kyle chuckled drily. “Would you believe neither of them even tried to cover up during the whole thing?”
This time both his friends grabbed him and tried to cuddle the pain away.
Kyle laughed at first, letting them be idiots and then he sobered up, sitting up and leaning against the side of his bed.
“I think I’m more offended than hurt,” he said, staring at the ceiling. “But I really did believe me and Harold would go the distance.”
Jeremy stood and sighed, grabbing the elastic of his boxers. “I can flash you if it will help get the image of Harold and Fudge out of your head. For no extra charge, I can even do a little dance.”
“Please don’t,” Kyle said with a snort even while Shay got out her camera. “I shouldn’t damage my eyes any more than I already have.”
Jeremy looked affronted. “Beneath this modest cloth lies an organ of vast and stupendous miracles!”
“Your brain is a vast and stupendous miracle,” Kyle muttered.
Jeremy smacked him with the empty donut box and Shay chuckled, nudging Kyle with her shoulder.
“He didn’t deserve you,” Shay said with a small smile. “It may seem cliché but he really didn’t. You’ll get over it and move on to better things. Handsome men with more interesting jobs even. Hell, you could even meet a florist tomorrow.”
“Harold’s job wasn’t that boring, you guys,” Kyle said.
They just gave him a look.
“Fine, maybe it was.”
Another look.
He offered no concessions as he lay back down. “What do I do now?”
Neither of his friends had any answers for him so they all spent the rest of the night getting fat on carbs.
Comments (0)
See all