Noah
“Ready, babe?”Gage asked after he’d pulled his Jeep into the driveway of my parents’ house and turned off the ignition.
I nodded, clutching my seatbelt strap with both hands and making no move at all to get out, because that nod was a total lie.
Gage reached over to squeeze my knee. It had been bouncing again, which he didn’t call me out on, but still, we both knew I was nervous now that it was finally time for Phase Two of our plan, a.k.a talking to my parents.
I wasn’t nervous for the reason Gage probably thought, though.
At least, not anymore.
I mean, Ihadbeen, because the idea of trying to change their minds when it mattered so much to me was nerve-wracking, but then—because he was basically the best boyfriend in the world and always looked out for me—Gage had noticed how jittery I was and pulled off at a rest stop to help me calm down (a.k.a. he’d taken me into one of the bathroom stalls, spanked me until I came harder than a firehose, and then pushed his cock down my throat to tether me back to the earth when all those floaty, wonderful, my-master-is-in-charge feelings took over and sent me flying).
I’d beensupercalm after that. The calmest.
“Babe,” he said now, unclicking my seatbelt for me with a little laugh. “It’ll be fine.”
“I know,” I said… and I even sort of believed it. The problem was that all that head-clearing and mood-stabilizing from the rest stop spanking had left me with nothing to do while we drove but face up to one big glaring fact that I’d been pointedly ignoring ever since Gage had first come up with this whole plan a bazillion years ago. Specifically, that since Gage wasn’t my parents’ favorite person and I was about to try to convince them that I wasn’t, in fact, co-dependent with him (lies) and didn’t need to move back home because I could handle college-level adulting on my own, the whole Phase Two presentation we had planned would probably go over better if I… if I did it on my own.
Without Gage by my side.
Without Gage running interference for me.
Without Gage there to jump in and defend me like he usually did.
Without Gage to…
Well, just that. Without Gage.
I glanced over at him. He totally expected to go in there with me. That was theplan, but I was pretty sure that it was only the plan because he figured it was never something I’d do on my own. At least, not dowell. I didn’t exactly have a great track record of standing up to my parents, after all, and Gage… gah. I loved him so hard. He always wanted to protect me from everything and I always wanted to let him, but the truth was that we had a way better chance of getting a yes from my parents if… if he wasn’t involved.
I swallowed hard, then—
“Um, Gage,” I made myself start, because even though I’d been putting off suggesting it for months, now it was go-time. I either had to a) chicken out completely, or b) man-up and do my part to make this actually work.
Or, of course, there was always the tried and true “keep stalling” tactic.
“You’re sure we shouldn’t have given them a heads up that we were coming?” I blurted, going with Option C.
I’d texted my parents to make sure they’d be home this weekend before we’d driven down from campus, but I hadn’t mentioned anything about Phase Two to them. Or even Phase One, for that matter. No point, since they didn’t really believe in me anyway... and sure enough, Gage came right back with the same argument he’d made when we’d talked about it the first time.
“Nah,” he said, twisting a little in his seat to face me and giving me a reassuring smile that totally made me want to throw myself at him and stick with the chickening-out option for what was coming. “You know they just would’ve blown up your phone and stressed you the fuck out, Noe.”
He was right, and I definitely hadn’t needed to hear them lecture me or go off about how they’d already changed out the stupid light bulbs in my old room to make it more study-friendly or whatever. I’d still get to hear all that, probably, but at least it would just be during this one conversation instead of for all the weeks leading up to it.
I nibbled my lip. Okay, no more stalling. I just needed to… tosayit. Man-up and tell Gage that I could handle it on my own.
“Hey,” he said before I could. (Because I was still totally stalling.) He grabbed my chin and eased my lip out from between my teeth, soothing the swelling with his finger. “Noah, you’vegotthis. You know how your parentals are, especially your dad. They’re gonna want to see facts and evidence and all that shit, and it’s all right here.”
He tapped the folder lying between us. It had my grade transcripts in it and a color-coded study plan and the articles he’d printed off the internet about all the focusing tactics I’d used to stay on track, and even letters from a few professors Gage had made me ask for, talking about how much I’d improved in their classes and stuff.
“You’ve got nothing to worry about, Noe,” he went on. “You already did the fucking work. Now it’s just about making them see that.”
“Right. Yes. Okay,” I said, trying not to hyperventilate as my knee started bouncing again.
And hewasright. I was ready for this. Prepared. I’d practiced what to say until my eyes crossed. Gage had even drilled me onbullet points, which was basically the adultiest adulting in all of adulthood, so my parents should definitely be impressed when I hit them with thatplusthe color-coded charts… even though I still kind of doubted that all the documentation in the world would stop them from talking right over me like they always did, interrupting me a bazillion times because they didn’t think I knew what I was talking about, and generally insisting they’d already figured out what was best for me so I should just shut up and do what they said.
Still I had to try, and I knew, deep down in my heart no matter how much I wanted to deny it, that I’d be way more likely to get through to them if they weren’t busy being all judgy about the fact that I’d brought Gage along for moral support.
