My ears burned.
“Darius?”
“Hm?”
“Can you...?” he asked, turning toward me, showing a few inches of pale stomach.
He had this line of fine hair that disappeared behind his belt buckle.
Landon Edwards was a beautiful guy. Way more attractive than me.
Sometimes I wondered what he saw in me anyway.
“Yeah,” I squeaked. I cleared my throat. “Hey. What’re you doing Friday?”
“Coming to your game?”
“I meant after.”
“I don’t know.” Landon wrapped his arms around my waist. I sucked in my stomach. “What am I doing after?”
I swallowed.
“You wanna come to a party? It’ll just be the team, I think. Playing FIFA and stuff.”
He let out this funny snort. “Really?”
“I guess.”
Landon squeezed my waist. I hated that it wasn’t hard and smooth like his.
“I’d love to.”
“Really?”
“Yeah.”
My cheeks warmed.
I couldn’t stop myself from smiling.
“Okay.”
MOLTEN NUGGETS
Like I said, I’d never been to a high school party before.
I had envisioned some sort of Level Seven Debauchery, with dried-out red Solo cups and used joints and people passed out on every flat surface.
Instead, there were twenty of us crammed into a half-finished basement, sitting on folding chairs or sprawled on the floor, using pillows from the living room couches to cushion us from the cold smooth concrete.
A few of the other guys had invited their girlfriends, and everyone was smiling and laughing and happy we’d won another game.
Christian’s parents were upstairs, swapping out batches of pizza rolls and popcorn chicken in the oven, and talking with some of the other team parents.
And there was no alcohol. We drank Gatorade, and took turns playing FIFA on Christian’s PlayStation, which was hooked into a tiny projector that James—who was a theater kid in the off-season—had managed to borrow for the weekend. It was pointed at the blank drywall, and we could barely hear the tinny built-in speakers over everyone’s talking.
Landon and I sat on the floor against the wall, cuddling and watching it all play out. We leaned our heads against each other and occasionally kissed, but not too often, because every time we did one of the guys would start whooping and clapping at us.
