“Dubai chocolate,” I said. “It kind of reminded me of you because it’s, like… I don’t know. Some fancy rich thing. It’s, like, trendy right now or something.” Why did I suddenly feel so stupid?
His eyes widened, and he reached out to take it from me, lookingwaytoo delighted for something so small and silly.
“Dubai chocolate,” he repeated, and for some reason the corner of his mouth perked up and then re-straightened, like he was trying not to laugh. Did he think it was funny that I’d gotten something for him? I’d known I shouldn’t have done something so stupid and lame. I bit down on a growl, suppressing the urge to snap. “That’s pistachio, right?”
“Yes,” I responded flatly, now regretting the whole thing. “And it was like three dollars, so… I mean, it’s not a big deal or anything.”
He looked up from the treat, seeming to finally realize I was annoyed and embarrassed by his reaction, and shook his head quickly.
“No! This is great. Thank you. Seriously. That’s really sweet.”
I didn’t know if I’d hated it more when I’d thought he’d been making fun of me, or now that he was pathetically grateful and calling me sweet.
“I’ll eat this as soon as I get home,” he promised.
“Fine. Whatever,” I said, now just wanting the interaction to be over and for him to leave. He seemed to understand that I was embarrassed, because he cleared his throat.
“Take it easy tonight. You need a break sometimes too, okay?”
“Yeah.” Anything for this to be over.
He glanced up into the sky for a second, still looking like he was trying to contain a laugh, then lowered his gaze back tome. Then, before I could even process what he was doing, he raised the cake pop up to his lips, giving it a loud smooch, before reaching out and tapping it against my lips.
He’d indirectly kissed me through the fucking cake pop.
My stomach did a flip in my guts, heat rushing over my whole form as I stared at him in complete shock. I knew my face was red.
He threw back his head and laughed before giving me a cocky wink.
“See ya, Cupcake.”
And then he was gone. My hand flew up to my mouth, my fingers trailing over my still-tingling lips as I watched his retreating back. Asshole.
LATER THAT EVENING, I sat in my dorm room with Ren and Che, all of us with our laptops out and logged into our favorite game, Federation of Fables. Maddox played with us sometimes now too, but it was usually just us three. As we waited in queue for the next match to start, Ren eyed me from his bed. I was sitting on mine, and we’d given Che the desk.
“You know,” he started, “Maddy’s been theorizing about you.”
“Me?” I questioned. If Maddox wanted to know something from me, he could just text me. And if he didn’t want to do that, we’d see each other at the campus gym on Saturday, like always.
“He was with me when you texted me yesterday asking if I was in the room. He thinks you wanted to know because you’re hooking up with someone,” Ren admitted, and I cleared my throat, fixing my eyes to the screen.
I wasn’t really offended that they were gossiping about me, that was a normal part of our odd little friend group. And anyway, Ren was like the least malicious person on the planet. Well, he and Che were probably tied for that.
“Well… So what?” I said, shrugging a shoulder.
“You were?” He asked, sounding slightly surprised. God, had it beenthatlong since I’d brought a guy back to the room, that people were speculating about me?
“Yeah,” I said, determined to sound casual and not embarrassed.
There was nothing embarrassing about fucking. I’d done it plenty of times, and everyone knew that. They didn’t know that this last time had been different and that I’d felt like I was melting into the bed with my eyes rolling back in my head. They didn’t know that I’d gotten my dick sucked for the first time ever, and that my orgasm had been so intense I’d barely been able to hold back a scream. And they also didn’t know that it had barely been a day, but I’d already caught myself fantasizing about the frantic, desperate way Caelyx had been rutting his hips on me, and the way his slick cock had felt grinding on me.
No one needed to know any of that.
“Oh,” he said. I knew he’d tell Maddox as soon as they talked, but that was fine. I didn’t care who knew. I didn’t need to take out an ad in the school paper, but I’d never kept my sex life a secret either.
“Is it, um, the same guy you hooked up with at the rave?” Che asked, piping up from his spot at the desk. Slowly turning toward him, I kept my face carefully composed in a neutral expression. He stared back at me through his long, dark lashes, an equally neutral expression on his pretty face. He was wearing a baby blue collar with tiny spikes all around it, a bunch of bracelets comprised of chunky blue beads, and a bright blue bandage stuck over the bridge of his nose, a pastel goth femboy fantasy.
“You hooked up with a guy at the rave?” Ren asked in surprise.
