Chapter Six
Harper
“I know what you mean, Banks.”
Harper offered an embarrassed little smile, absently rubbing the hand Banks had so thoughtfully covered in the wake of his stupid, embarrassing, awkward confession.He gazed around the café, empty now, the windows bathed in late afternoon light, the kind that flattered a pretty boy like Banks, highlighting his chiseled features and All-American bone structure.He gave a little snort, shaking his head even as he rolled his eyes.“I can’t even believe I told you all that, just ...shoot me now, please?”
“I asked you, Harper.I wanted to know, and now I do.I wish...I wish I would have known sooner.”
Harper gave him a searing “who are you kidding?”smirk.“Yeah, like that was gonna happen back then, Banks.”
Banks met his eyes, once again staring back unblinking, as if daring Harper to challenge his authenticity.“I guess I meant, I wish I’d knownyousooner, Harp.”
Harper wanted to believe him.So badly.He ached to believe Banks, and yet the scars of high school lingered in the places that haunted him the most.“What?Like I was gonna fit into your nifty little clique of jocks and rich kids and beauty queens and movers and shakers?”
Banks nodded resolutely, glancing toward the sales counter with a heavy, almost resigned sigh.“Probably not, Harp.But I’ll tell you a little secret.As many years as I spent with that crew, football games and parties and proms and homecomings and malt shops and beer bongs, I’ve never had a conversation with any of them that meant as much to me as the one we’re having right now.”
Harper took a moment to respond, the smartass smile fixed on his face as he struggled to reply.Then he leaned a little closer, then closer still, until he could smell the predictably masculine scent of Banks’s cologne and whispered, “Who are you and what have you done with therealBanks Principle?”
They chuckled then, soft and low and lazy and warm, the kind of laugh he hadn’t shared with anyone, possibly, ever?“I know, it’s...I’m not trying to get mushy, I just want you to know that I wasn’t who I seemed growing up, that’s all.”
Harper nodded.“I have to admit, I’m seeing hints of that today.But still?Beginner’s luck, maybe?”
Banks stretched, as if unused to sitting for extended periods of time.Harper struggled not to notice the way his forearms were sinewy just beneath the rolled-up sleeves of his stylish rugby shirt, his skin smooth, his eyebrows dark beneath the brim of his Piedmont Panthers cap.He wondered, idly, what his underarms might look like, wispy and dark, and was he the kind of dude to manscape until his pubic thatch was carefully tended and inviting just above the base of his smooth, savory cock.
“Harp?”
Harper snapped out of his sexy reverie, keenly aware Banks was waiting for an answer.“What now?”he sputtered bashfully.
Banks snorted, shaking his pretty little head.“Jesus, I was saying ...we could find out if it’s just beginner’s luck.”
“How?”
Banks waved his iced coffee cup, halfway empty now, at something on the wall beside him.Banks glanced over and saw a poster on a kind of community bulletin board, the borders covered in dancing skulls and bloody butcher knives, the words spelled out in predictably blood-dripping letters: “Spooky Scare-a-thon,” it read.“Part of Welcome Week Mayhem!”
“What ...what exactly are you suggesting?”
Banks rolled his eyes, waving his cup closer to the poster.“Read the date, Harp.”
“Can you just...”Harper glanced over and saw the date.“Tonight?”
“Do you like scary movies?”Banks made scary movie hands, waving his fingers ominously over the table and making what he must have assumed looked like a creepy face.
“Yes, of course, I mean ...wait, you do too?”
“Love ‘em, actually.All my friends were too lame to go with me back in the day, so I’d go by myself.”
Harper narrowed his eyes, picturing their small hometown theater, all those late nights standing at the concession stand alone, popcorn in hand, wondering what it might be like to share that particular experience with another living soul.“I call bullshit, Banks.”
