***

Except for Ray, Jonathan didn’t know anyone too well to do any actual hanging out, although many people stopped by their side to greet them and exchange a few words. He hadn’t realized he was unconsciously looking for a certain someone until he noticed his retreating back, as well as his right arm wrapped around a back on which lovely blond curls bounced. So, Maddox was present, and he was already having fun.

Jonathan stared into his cup for a moment. He could always leave the drink somewhere and pretend he had drunk it, but being part of college life meant that he needed to adapt, as horrendous as the taste of that beverage was. With newfound courage, he took another sip and decided that maybe he could just find a good moment to throw away the dubious liquid as discreetly as possible.

“Hey, Jonathan,” someone called for him. 

To be completely honest, he was surprised to see Connor making his way through the throng of people to get to him. Ray squeezed his shoulder quickly. “I’m off to make friends with some other nerds like me. Have fun, JJ.”

Jonathan wished Ray would have stuck around some more, but soon he was face to face with Connor, so he smiled politely. “Hey, Connor,” he replied.

“Having fun?” the guy asked him with a sly smile and pointed at his cup.

“Trying,” Jonathan offered.

“What?” Connor cupped his ear, a sign that he could barely hear him over the loud music. 

“I said --” He decided to forget about trying to have a conversation in all that noise. Not only was the music the problem, but all the cheering and hooting everyone was engaged in.

Connor smiled and wrapped an arm around his shoulders. “Let’s step outside,” he shouted in his ear and dragged him away.

***

After almost one hour of listening to Connor, Jonathan had had it up to his ears and beyond with the guy. At first, he had been polite and tried to follow his reasoning, but when he attempted to offer a different point of view, Connor just cut his words short and insisted on being right. 

That made Jonathan regret not drinking more when he had still had a chance. Maybe then enduring through Connor’s lecturing would have been a little more fun. However, his reserve of politeness was starting to wear thin. The worst thing was that Connor didn’t even say anything interesting. He was a walking encyclopedia of random facts and numbers, but he offered absolutely no new insight or what they meant. Even worse, he sounded like the mouthpiece for opinions everyone who watched the news already knew and quite repetitive after a while. 

“I would love to stay and chat some more,” he took advantage of a small break in Connor’s tirade, “but I’m a stickler for schedules, and I’m past my bedtime.”

That appeared to take Connor a bit by surprise. He made a disappointed face. “Are you sure you cannot make an exception? We barely scratched the surface. It’s Saturday, after all.”

“Yes, but I tend to turn into a witch if I don’t get my beauty sleep,” Jonathan joked.

“Hmm.” Connor didn’t appear in the least amused. “All right.”

Finally, it was over, Jonathan thought and closed his eyes for a second, which was, as it seemed, a mistake, as the next moment he felt the guy’s facial hair scratching his lips in a weird attempt to kiss him. Jonathan pulled back before Connor managed to launch his tongue action, which he seemed to have at the ready.

“Have fun,” he said and moved away steadily enough so that it didn’t look like he hated that completely.

“Sure. See you around, Jonathan,” Connor said. “I’d love to get to know you more.”

And turn me into a drone that activates at the sound of your voice, I bet.

Was he mean for no reason? But no, the guy was pretty obnoxious, and it didn’t matter whether he was gay or not, out and proud, and all that. Jonathan couldn’t stand a narcissistic ass, and he liked to believe that he could tell one was that after wasting an hour of his time listening to platitudes. 

“Yeah, sure. Bye,” he waved and hurried down the street.

He wiped his mouth as soon as he was far enough. Definitely, Connor was using something for his beard, and now Jonathan was pretty sure he needed to get to his room as fast as possible and wash his mouth for at least five minutes.

***

Maddox was fuming on the inside. Not only had Jonathan let his boyfriend abandon him and mingle with others, but now he was letting that monkey paw him like he was a banana tree in need of saving? What kind of guy did stuff like that? He had thought he noticed something that denounced absolute boredom in how Jonathan leaned against a tree, his arms crossed, while Connor must have been droning about his tree-hugging ad nauseam. For a moment there, while observing the duo from a distance, he had thought of walking over and rescue Jonathan, but when Connor had moved in for a kiss, Maddox had turned on his heels and walked back to the party.

So, Jonathan Hamilton was an easy lay. And Maddox surely had better things to do than sit there and watch him get fucked against a tree or something kinky like that. He grabbed the girl he had spent the last hour with by the hand, and she followed him happily upstairs.

***

“Don’t worry.” She patted his chest and forced a sympathetic smile. “I heard it can happen to everyone.”

No, that was absolutely terrifying. Maddox stared at the ceiling, searching for answers. So the girl had been all over him, and he had felt the familiar tingle in the lower part of his body, but as soon as he closed his eyes, all he saw behind his closed eyelids was Jonathan, his stupid smile, his weird broad chest, his deformed long legs, and big fucking ass!

And, being the good guy that he wanted to think he was, he had tried to push that away so that he could focus on the girl, her soft, smooth cheeks, her nice rack, and all her other assets.

And then, it had happened. His dick had died on him, not even caring to say a proper goodbye.

“Stress could be a problem,” she added, as clearly she was a nice person and trying to help. “Has anything happened to you lately? Something, I don’t know, to make you sad?”

“My dog died,” he mumbled.

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” she caressed his chest gently. “How old was he?”

“She,” Maddox said with a heartfelt sigh. “We’ve had her for twelve years.”

Good thing he had a good imagination. For the next ten minutes, the girl listened to him patiently while he dished out everything on a dog he’d never had.

***

The girl had assured him that her lips were sealed in regards to his little problem, so now he was back to the party but not in the mood to stick around too long. His eyes fell on Connor, who was with his usual cohort of disciples, talking animatedly and waving his hands. He had been away for how long? Twenty minutes at best? Was Connor done fucking Jonathan against the tree so quickly? He must have skipped foreplay.

He made his way toward the guy. “Hey, Connor,” he called out. “Where is Jonathan?”

Connor waved. “He left about twenty minutes ago. Something about needing his beauty sleep.”

Maddox could feel his cheeks hurting as his mouth stretched into an impossibly large grin. 

Jonathan Hamilton was not an easy lay.

That made him so happy he could get a boner. No, he wasn’t just saying. He could feel his best friend returning from his trip to the land of the dead. Woot-woot, he was back in business, baby!

“Would you like to join us in a little debate?” Connor asked.

Maddox slapped the guy so hard on the back that Connor almost lost his balance. “Another time, man. I need to go shake hands with a friend I haven’t seen in a while.”

He walked away without giving the other the option to interject anything else in their short yet meaningful conversation.

***

“Why is everyone offering you their condolences?” Kane questioned as they walked to their Monday classes after another student stopped by their group and gave Maddox a long and sympathetic hug. “Who died in your family? But, more importantly, why are we, your best friends, the lasts to find out?”

“His dog died,” Rusty said with a long sigh. “Look, it says right here.” He took out his phone and showed Kane the latest headline on that digital rag pretending to present life on campus as it was. Maddox seriously doubted there was one grain of truth in the bunch of bullocks presented as the so-called truth in there.

“Rusty, Maddox doesn’t have a dog,” Kane said slowly.

“Not anymore, he doesn’t, but he did,” Rusty protested. “It says right here,” he repeated.

So, the girl had only kept her mouth shut partially. Well, it could be worse, Maddox concluded. The title could have been ‘BMOC can’t get it up because his dog died’, so he needed to be thankful for at least having the girl’s sympathy regarding his little problem. And this time, a grain of truth would have been in it.

“It’s just a misunderstanding, guys,” Maddox said quickly.

“Misunderstanding, huh?” Dex observed him from the corner of one eye. “It’s incredible, however, how many details about your imaginary dog Xpress had managed to create. It sounds like something you’d say about a dog you’ve never had.”

“I have no idea why they say anything that’s in there.”

Kane wasn’t buying it, either, by how he stared at him like a disappointed grandma learning that her grandson was lying about his bad grades. “Why are you letting everyone believe it?”

“I can’t just tell people the truth. They would feel hurt,” Maddox replied.

All right, so it wasn’t like he often lied, so it had to be a curse that the one time he did, it had blown so out of proportion. 

“So, just to be clear, you don’t have a dog?” Rusty asked.

“No, I don’t,” Maddox replied. “But can you guys keep it between us?”

“Anything for my bro,” Rusty promptly said.

“We’ll cover your ass,” Dex added.

“Sure thing. But boy, I want to know what this is all about. This crush of yours is the worst I’ve ever seen,” Kane commented.

“There’s no crush,” Maddox protested. “You guys keep imagining things.”

“Not worse than imagining fake pets, though,” Kane retorted.

So… his buddies were on to him, and he was getting entangled in a bunch of lies. Things were looking pretty bad, and he wasn’t sure he could keep everything a secret from them. Not for long, at least.

But what could he tell them when he didn’t even know what was happening to him? He had the biggest boner ever for a dude. It didn’t matter that the guy looked like he had been sent to Sunny Hill to torture him specifically, given his good looks, sexy ass, and prickly personality. 

What mattered was that Maddox was in it deep and had no idea how to solve it, whatever this thing was.

***

Ray sniffled and wiped his tears with the back of his hand. Jonathan stared at him, baffled for a couple of seconds. They were barely back from classes, and he had returned home to find Ray like that.

“What’s going on?” he asked, trying hard to ignore the lump in his throat. 

Ray sniffled some more, and Jonathan barely had time to open his arms wide to welcome a very distraught roommate to his chest. “…mm, died.”

“What? Who died?” In the split of a second, his thoughts turned to his family back home. He hadn’t spoken to them in four long months.

“Maddox’s dog,” Ray barely managed and began crying again.

Jonathan breathed out. “All right, that’s quite sad,” he said cautiously as he patted Ray’s head. “But why are you crying so much?”

Ray pointed at his phone, abandoned on the table. “Xpress says that Maddox had her since they were both babies, and that when he was five, she saved him from drowning. And then, when he was seven, she saved him from a house on fire. And then, when he was ten, she stood up all night, every night, while he had the flu, and everyone he thought he was going to die!”

Jonathan bit his lips hard to stifle a laugh. There was no way all that could be true. It had to be a miracle that Maddox was still alive. The guy needed another dog pronto just to make sure he didn’t stumble over his own feet and fell to his death. He loved Ray, but the amazingly gullible nature of his roommate was something else.

“Um,” he cleared his throat, “but she lived a long and happy life. Twenty years is quite impressive for a dog.”

“She died at twelve,” Ray replied and started crying again as if he just now realized how tragic it was for a dog to die after twelve years of life when she was supposed to have lived twenty.

All right, so he was calling bullshit on that little piece in Xpress. That publication needed to be eradicated like the virus that it was. It was infecting totally sane persons, like Ray. Now, he would allow his roommate some space, but later, he would explain to him some basic math. It would be painful, but it was worth it.

TBC