“I-I... don’t know.” Noah slumped deeper into the chair. “I don’t wanna ruin what we have.”
“I think you kinda already did that.”
“Ouch?” He winced.
“Sorry, didn’t mean to be so harsh but, honey, you need to face this. Hiding won’t solve anything, and guilt... she’s a bitch.”
“I don’t wanna tell him so I can free myself. Plus, he’ll leave me.”
“Whether he stays or leaves, that’s up to him. You can’t take away the option for him to decide what he wants. Honesty and respect. You owe him that much.”
“I know... and I hate it.”
“Being an adult sucks.”
“So much.”
On Monday, Noah finally returned to the dorms.
“What the fuck, dude?” was the first thing Theo said when he saw him, dropping the controller and stopping whatever video game he was playing. “Where the hell have you been? You almost gave me a heart attack when I came back to the bar and couldn’t find you. And what the hell happened to you?”
“Sorry.”
“You haven’t answered any of my texts these past two days. If it weren’t for your mom, I’d have thought you were dead in some ditch or something, and judging by your face, you were close enough.”
“It was just a stupid bar fight.” Noah walked toward his bed, dropping a bag of clean clothes.
“Are you okay?” Val asked. He’d already returned from visiting his family, too, and was sitting at a small desk they had, cleaning his camera.
“Honestly?” They both nodded. “No, I’m not okay.”
“What happened?” Theo insisted.
“I fucked up big time.” Noah let himself fall on his bed, the mattress bouncing him slightly as he did. “I cheated on Zach.”
“But... you’re not dating.”
“We agreed to be exclusive, and that if we ever felt like we wanted to sleep with someone else, we’d talk about it first. But I just went behind his back and did it.”
“It was a one-time thing, no?” Theo asked, tilting his head.
“Absolutely. Never happening again.”
“Then I say you bury that shit deep within and never think about it again. We’re all human and make mistakes. He doesn’t need to know.” He shrugged like it wasn’t a big deal.
“But hiding the truth from him feels as wrong as telling him.”
“If what you have isn’t that serious, he shouldn’t take it that badly, either. But I still hold on to what I said before—swallow the guilt and move on.”
“It would hurt me if he lied to me about something like this and I found out later through someone else...”
“Dude, it’s not like we’re gonna tell anyone shit.” Theo pretended to zip his mouth and toss the key.
“But...” Noah clenched his jaw. After Kaj had pulled out of him, as he disposed of the condom with a condescending triumphant smirk on his face, he had re-dressed without lookingat him, then walked out the same door he’d come in and left. “I can’t say if someone saw me walking out of that room at the club the other night or not. I was so baffled about what I’d done, I didn’t even check.”
“It happened there?”
“Yeah.” Noah ran trembling fingers through his hair. “Right after I got the shit beat out of me.”
