He knew?
I yanked my hand away from where I’d been unconsciously clutching my collar again. I’d thought I’d managed to tuck it out of sight with this outfit, but maybe it was showing or something? But even if it was, and even though Arnie had been there at poker night when I’d first put it on, it shouldn’t… shouldn’t make him think that I was thinking aboutdicks, right?
Or about Gage’s dick in particular?
I mean, sure, I totally had been earlier when Arnie had first sat down, but he wasn’t psychic since that didn’t exist (except sometimes with Gage maybe, but that was different because Gage knew me so well that it was probably less of a supernatural ability and more just…us) and, um, where had I been going with that?
Oh, right.
There was no way Arnie could know I’d been thinking about Gage’s dick earlier. Or about any dick. It wasn’t a topic Arnie and I had ever discussed. I’d never talked about it withanyone, so... so maybe Arniewaspsychic?
Was that actually a thing?
Maybe a mutant X-Men-style side effect of too much… um, whatever-it-was that they’d replaced pencil lead with?
“Hey,” Arnie said, suddenly losing the smirk. “I’m just giving you shit, Noah. You and Gage are kinda relationship goals, you know?”
Um, no, I didn’t know. What?
“But seriously,” Arnie went on before I could ask what he’d meant by that, “we’ve got a test coming up in here next week, so…?”
He let his voice trail off and chin-nodded toward the front of the room where the professor had just finished the slides and was now writing something on the whiteboard that looked like Greek or math or something else totally foreign and incomprehensible.
“Right,” I said with a sigh, straightening my shoulders again and tapping my pencil on the textbook as I tried to pay attention.
I probablyshouldtake notes, but since I’d left my laptop in the dorms and didn’t have a notebook with me and didn’t actually know what the professor was talking about anyway, I just… just...ugh. I was horrible at this, and the idea of ever being able to change my parents’ minds would have felt totally, utterly hopeless if Gage already hadn’t promised me that he’d figure something out.
“Hey,” Arnie said quietly, elbowing my ribs. “I know you were kinda zoned out earlier—” he smirked again, “—but we can catch up. I can send youmynotes, if you want, even though I missed the first part of the lecture.”
“Okay, thanks,” I said, since that was really nice of him. And—my hand strayed up to rub the outline of my collar again (and possibly also scratch at my neck a little, since itwaspretty itchy... not that I was complaining, of course)—maybe there really was a way for me to fix things with my grades if I buckled down and stopped letting my brain go off on so many tangents during class.
Not that I could actually imagine how I’d make myself do that at the moment, of course, but—
Oh.
I smiled.
But that was okay, actually.
I was suddenly filled with a totally unfamiliar wave of confidence, despite having no clue at all what the upcoming test would even cover, because the comforting and already familiar feel of my collar had reminded me that I didn’thaveto make myself do any of it. Gage was in charge, andhe’dmake me do it.
I may not have ever enjoyed school much and was absolutely horrible about staying on task... or keeping my attention on boring things... or staying focused for long enough periods of time to make studying all that effective—and, fine, I also had absolutely nothing in my academic history to make an epic grade turnaround seem even remotely likely to happen—but what Iwasgood at?
Belonging to Gage.
Being good for my master.
Doing whatever he wanted, whenever he told me to, without question and (even better) without any other responsibilities but just that one thing. Obeying him and letting him decide and trusting him to… to take care of me.
So all this grade stuff, and the follow-up part about somehow miraculously changing my parents’ minds about letting me stay here at school with Gage? I grinned—maybe too wide, based on the weird look Arnie gave me—but Itotallydidn’t need to worry about any of that. Ihadthis.
By which I meant Gage did, which was almost the same thing, only better.
Wait, no. Not “better,” it wasperfect.Everything since I’d put this collar on for Gage had been perfect. And since he’d told me I didn’t have permission to take it off?
I was pretty sure that everything from now on alwayswouldbe perfect, too.
11
