My alarm woke me up just past noon the next day. Sunlight filtered in through my bedroom window from where I’d left the blinds cracked open the night before.

Rolling out of bed, I headed downstairs to find my mum in the kitchen, humming along to a Fleetwood Mac song that was playing from the small radio on top of the microwave. Bronze strands of hair fell in her face she moved to place a freshly baked loaf of pecan bread atop the wooden counter. She turned around at the sound of footsteps in the hallway.

“Oh, honey. You’re awake.” Mum said when she spotted me leaning in the doorway. She wiped her hands down her apron before untying it and tossing it onto the counter. “Do you want breakfast? There are bagels warming in the oven if you’re hungry.”

“Thanks, Mum.” I crossed the kitchen to the oven. The toasted smell of bagels wafted into the air as soon as I opened the door. I transferred them onto a plate sat down at the counter. Mum slid a small tub of organic cream cheese, fresh from the farmers market, across the benchtop toward me. Lathering the bagels eagerly with a butter knife, I tore into them hungrily.

“Where’s Dad?” I asked through mouthfuls.

“Playing golf with Mr Burnstein. Head of the English department at Holland University?” Mum replied. She laughed lightly. “He’s been challenging your father to a rematch for months.”

“Isn’t the man sixty?”

“Sixty-three,” Mum corrected, “but he still thinks he can beat your father.”

“Yeah, good luck with that. No one’s beat Dad since the eighties.”

I went back to eating. My throat was burning once I’d finished. The radio changed and the jaunty tune of a Billy Idol song came on. Mum hummed along with it as she removed a pitcher of homemade orange juice from the fridge and placed it in front of me. She reached into the overhead cupboard and took out a glass, placing it next to the jug.

I reached for the pitcher gratefully and poured the juice into the glass. It was gone in three gulps. I was halfway through pouring my second glass when I looked up and noticed Mum watching me in amusement.

“What?” I asked, mid pour.

Mum cocked a knowing brow. “Didn’t replenish ourselves enough last night at the party, did we?”

“I wasn’t drinking.”

“Boy, you better have not been. You were driving.”

“Which is exactly why I didn’t.”

I finished the glass and stood to place my dishes in the sink with the rest of the growing pile. Mum came to stand beside me as I cleaned, opening her hand expectantly as I passed each dish to her once I was done. She dried them one-by-one with a tea towel before stacking them in the rack next to the sink.

“How did the game go yesterday?” she asked as we worked. “I’m sorry your father and I couldn’t make it. We’d planned to go but both of us got held up at work.”

“Mum, it’s fine.” I rinsed soap suds off the plate before handing it to her with a soft smile. “”You guys have come to every one of my games since I was a little kid. You were there when I was awarded every one of those trophies in my room. You’re allowed to miss one here and there.”

“We want to be there no matter if you’re receiving a trophy or not.” Mum smiled. “So, how’d it go?”

My fist clenched around the fork I was holding. “We lost,” I growled. “If fuc-“

“Connor.”

“Freaking Anderson hadn’t stolen the ball at the last second we would’ve won.”

Mum chuckled. “Well, honey, that’s the point. You’re meant to steal the ball otherwise how would you win?”

“No.” I pointed a fork in her direction dramatically. “Don’t give me that. Don’t give me your logic. If I wanted to hear a reasonable explanation, I would ask for one.”

“Would you?”

“Yes.” I huffed. Then, “Okay, maybe not, and now I feel victimised by my own mother.”

Mum laughed and patted me on the arm. “A little tough love never hurt anybody, sweetheart. I’m building you up.”

“Just to knock me down?”

“Only when you adorably forget the world isn’t centred around you.” She splashed water at me playfully.

I scoffed as water droplets splashed down my front. “This is my senior year, Mum. Can’t you just let me have this?”

“Would I be your mother if I let you walk around thinking you own the place?”

“Well, my name is on the property ownership.”

“Your surname!”

“That’s not an important distinction!”

This time I laughed and dodged as Mum hurled another handful of soap bubbles in my direction. They landed on the countertop next to me and Mum huffed. “You are a menace.”

“No more than Dennis.”

Mum swiped the sponge across the counter to remove the suds and picked up another plate to dry. “So, how was the party?”

My mouth snapped shut and I stopped laughing. A flood of memories from the night before rushed through my head as I searched for the right response.

It wasn’t that my mum didn’t trust me. She’d made it clear over the years that my sense of responsibility was nothing for her to be concerned over, what with my excellent grades and pursuit of an athletic career. It was the fact that I couldn’t lie to her.

The party last night was nothing special but what – or rather who – I’d been doing felt incriminating. Everyone, including my parents, knew about my rivalry with Dakota. They’d witnessed it for years on end. What no one knew was what Dakota and I did behind closed doors and I planned for it to stay that way.

My mum was unlikely to care who I slept with. She’d given me the safe-sex talk when I was fourteen and again with Dad when I’d told them I was gay last year. The whole experience had been embarrassing and awkward for all three of us.

Mum had demonstrated putting a condom on a cucumber but she’d used too much lube and I’d watched in absolute horror as it slipped from her hands and rocketed through the kitchen window into the backyard.

“I’m not going to pick that up.” I’d said as we all stared out the window in the direction the cucumber had gone.

“You and me both, kid.” Dad had agreed, just as horrified as I was.

“Oh, for Heaven’s sake!” Mum slammed her palms against the dining table as she stood, chair scraping back against the floor. “I’ll get it then. How else are we going to finish the presentation, Carson?”

Dad shrunk down in his seat as Mum burst through the back door and scooped the cucumber off the patio. All Dad and I had heard from outside the window was a curse and, “Damn, that’s slippery. Are they like this in real life?”

“Mum!”

“Never mind. I got it.”

Dad’s method had been a little different, though not without the same level of heart as his wife.

“Now that we’ve successfully run out of cucumbers,” he’d said as he stepped inside my bedroom later that night, closing the door behind him. “I figured you and I would talk one-on-one.”

He’d sat on the edge of my bed and handed me a small collection of pamphlets. “I won’t pretend to know much about this stuff,” Dad had admitted. “The things I knew growing up, they weren’t something we had to think about like this. But there are parts of your journey to self-discovery that you’re going to go through without me so I want you to be prepared. I don’t know a lot about the things you’re going to be doing but I want to support you so we’re going to learn together.”

He tapped one finger against the stack of pamphlets in my hands.

“I got them from the clinic on the way home. I’ve glanced through them and now it’s your turn. So, read through them and come see me if you have any questions.”

“Dad,” I’d started. “I-“

“You’re my kid, Connor,” Dad’s eyes met mine, “and I won’t always have the answers but I’m going to learn because I want you to be able to ask me anything.”

There’d been nothing more to do then but hug him. The conversation was beyond awkward but it only proved how much both my parents loved me and were willing to learn for my sake.

Even if my parents knew I was gay and sexually active, they didn’t need to know who I coloured my flag with. What went on between Dakota and I was strictly our business. The more people asked questions, the deeper I had to dig for believable answers.

“It was alright.” I replied carefully, passing Mum a glass.

Mum didn’t notice my change in tone. She took the cup and began to dry the inside. “Did many people end up going? I know Angela’s parents. Mr and Mrs Culcheck were the benefactors of last year’s wine auction when the new gallery opened two towns over. They’re a lovely family.”

 I shrugged. “A few people, I guess.”

“Just your school?”

I scrubbed the last plate harder. “One or two more might’ve shown up. I don’t know, it was late.”

“The only school close enough in the district is Ridgemount Academy. Isn’t that who you played yesterday?”

My knuckles were turning white where my hand was clenched around the scrubbing brush. “Yep.”

“They’re doing pretty well this year, and it’s only the beginning of the season.”

I gazed at her in unimpressed silence and she laughed. “Alright, alright. What about Scott and Trent? Did they go last night?”

I laughed. “Yeah, and Scott was drunk off his ass!”

“Language.” Mum scolded. Then, “Did you get him home?”

“Safe and sound. Which reminds me, I need to drop off Trent’s car. Thanks for breakfast!”

I kissed Mum on the cheek and bounded up the stairs to throw on some clothes. Trent’s keys were lying on my dresser. I snatched them up and went downstairs, calling out a quick goodbye to Mum before heading outside to the car and starting the engine.

The drive to Trent’s house was short seeing as we lived on the same side of town. He was unlikely to be awake when I arrived so I’d leave his keys in the shoe box by the door. It had become our routine over the past year.

I took a shortcut through the backstreets to Trent’s house and parked his car in the driveway. Once I’d dropped off the keys I began the walk home. Patting my pockets for my earphones, I pulled them out, shoved them in my ears and blasted songs that were sure to deafen me by the time I was thirty.

I was approaching the corner when a grey Lexus pulled up beside me. The horn blared to get my attention and I glanced sideways, groaning when I saw Dakota’s signature smirk behind the windshield. Dark shades covered his eyes and one hand gripped the steering wheel as the window rolled down. I pulled my earphones out.

"Sheesh, I knew you were financially unstable but can't you at least afford a bike?" Dakota laughed, voice ringing out over the bass pounding through the car speakers.

I felt my face grow hot as I turned a glare on him. "For your information asshole, I was dropping off my friend’s car. It's called being a civilised person. You should try it sometime."

Dakota laughed. "My friends can actually handle their liquor in the first place."

“So they can commit a felony drunk driving?” 

He stopped laughing then and lowered his voice. His eyes darted each way before asking, "So, you got home alright?" 

I scoffed. "I'm here and alive aren't I?"

"Unfortunately."

I rolled my eyes at the retort and kept walking.

Dakota’s car rolled slowly along the road beside me. He continued with a smug, "I would offer to give you a lift except one, I don’t give my fuck buddies breakfast let alone a ride home and two, I don’t want to.”

"Is this your idea of chivalry?"

"Chivalry is dead. Do you want me to call you a cab milady?" he taunted.

I huffed, shoving my earphones back in since this conversation was clearly going nowhere. "Piss off, Anderson. It's too early in the morning to be drowning in the stench of your hubris. Shouldn't you be terrorising children somewhere that isn't here?"

My pace quickened but Dakota’s car kept up easily. He chuckled through the window. “Oh, wow. You’re such a grouch in the morning. Still sulking over losing yesterday? No wonder I don’t let you stay over. Pull it together, Taylor. I’d hoped even someone with standards as low as yours would be a better loser than that.”

My fist clenched at my side as I sent him a deep glare. “I didn’t hear any complaints yesterday.”

Dakota barked out a laugh. “Last night was fun. I like seeing you squirming and moaning under me. Almost makes up for your complete lack of tal-mmph!”

I was at the car’s side in seconds, torso halfway through the window to shove my hand over his mouth and stifle his stupidity.

“Are you crazy?” I hissed, head turning either direction frantically to make sure no one had heard him. The street was empty, save for a dog walker fifty feet away. We were in the clear.

Dakota bit down on my hand and I yelped, pulling it away before his teeth could graze the skin again.

“Are you five?” I scoffed, wiping saliva off on my jeans.

“You didn’t seem to mind my biting you last night.”

He laughed as he ducked to avoid my hand aiming for his face. My palm collided with the back of his leather headrest instead and I cursed.

“What the hell is your problem?” I demanded.

He shrugged. “It’s fun to mess with you. You’re so damn easy.”

“I am not easy. And I don’t squirm!”

Dakota snorted. “Oh, babe. Trust me, you squirm. But you’re rough so I’m not complaining.”

I wasn’t a prude when it came to sex – far from it actually – but to have someone such as Dakota Anderson weaponize my kinks and tendencies just to throw them in my face made me want to sink below the surface of a deep ocean. Fortunately, my anger kept me afloat because this was Dakota. His conceited personality made up for it. Maybe I was vocal in bed but there were far worse things to be.

I leaned forward in the car window, smirking at the Ridgemount Captain. “Yeah? Well at least I didn’t accidentally handcuff myself to the headboard and then bring the wrong key.”

Dakota growled, a deep and guttural sound. “You son of a bitch. Those handcuffs are designed to break under pressure and you know it.”

“Hm, I don’t know. All I remember is having to get a crowbar from the tool shed just because you’re too weak to break a thin piece of metal.”

“And do you remember smashing a hole through the headboard because your aim is shit and I had to get a whole damn new bed frame?”

I grinned. “Your new bed is really comfortable. You’re welcome.”

This time it was my turn to duck out the window as Dakota took a swipe at me. I stepped back on to the pavement, laughing as Dakota cursed at me from inside the car.

“If you would’ve sat still for a second instead of trying to get into my pants it never would’ve happened in the first place!” he snapped.

“And if you weren’t so damn bossy in everything you do I never would’ve had to flip us over just to catch my breath.”

“How about you come over here and I’ll show you exactly what I’d like to fl-“

"Well,” I took out my phone and cranked the volume up on my music, pretending not to hear him. “I would love to stay and chat but I have more important things to do, such as feeding the fish I don’t own. Catch ya later, loser.”

He could’ve easily followed me since I was only walking but it was clear our conversation was over. My music was paused long enough to hear his final cuss at me before his car pulled away from the curb and squealed down the road out of sight. I rolled my eyes and kept walking.