Page 83 of Arctic Titans of Northwood U: Volume 2

I wasn’t sure if I feared that it would hurt as much as I feared disliking it. Pain I could live with, but not liking it was too terrible to imagine. Would we have to give this up, then?

The thought made me ball my fists, nearly breaking the box of chocolate I was carrying. I wouldn’t give him up. Not for all the money and power in the world. But would I have to let him go? Would keeping him do more harm than good? Would I be trapping him?

I returned to the house and stuffed the box of chocolate inside my jacket to avoid curious looks. Luckily, nobody was downstairs to see me enter, anyway. I quietly climbed the stairs and paused in front of our room. I was about to touch the door knob when a frustrated growl reached my ears. A sharp clack of something falling to the floor followed it and then a thump that resembled a foot hitting the side of a desk. Sebastian cursed.

I was instantly aware of having two options. I could either walk away and act like nothing happened or I could come in and deal with whatever troubled him. I just couldn’t keep standing here and eavesdropping.

My hand made the decision for me. The knob turned and I pushed the door open to the last thing I expected to see. Wearing a plain white T-shirt and an old pair of black sweatpants, Sebastian stood on one foot, the other one shaking the pain of the thump out of itself. The floor was covered with an old, white bed sheet, scattered with paint that matched the paint on Sebastian’s fingers and T-shirt.

“Fuck,” he said, his tone equal parts worried and guilty. “You weren’t supposed to come back so soon.”

I’d snuck out to buy the chocolate under the excuse I had to skim through some books at the library. Truth be told, I had stayed out longer than I’d expected after running into Phoenix. “What’s going on?” I asked, amusement in my tone unmistakable.

Frustration replaced guilt on his face. “It’s pointless,” he despaired and curled his legs under his butt as he sat on the big, white sheet on the floor. Turned face-down was a square canvas and I began connecting the dots.

“Show me,” I said as I shut and locked the door, curiosity exploring inside of me. “I wanna see.”

“Hell no,” he said and pulled the canvas away. Where it had lain, a thick smear of several warm colors remained on the sheet. “I’m useless, Ty. I’m totally useless.”

“I can find a few good uses for you,” I said playfully.

He shot me a serious and almost desperate look. No jokes, it said. It served to remind me that we weren’t, in fact, putting each other to all the good uses that we expected. “You know what today is,” he said gently as I sat on the clean bit of the sheet.

“Our one-month suckaversary,” I said as I pulled out the box of chocolate. “Don’t touch it with those fingers.” He almost laughed as I yanked the chocolate slightly out of his reach.

He scanned the box and smiled softly, sadly. “I gave you the same one the night I found Jennifer and Pizza Boy showering together.”

“The snowball that started the avalanche,” I said. I shrugged like it was nothing. “I figured you’d like the symbolism.”

“I do,” he said, but a frustrated sigh followed. “That’s sweet, Ty. And what I got you is…” He looked around. “A whole lot of shit to help me clean up.” He looked at his fingers. “I should have used a brush,” he whispered in horror.

I could barely contain the welling laughter. “Can I see, though?”

“It’s all wrong, Ty,” he said sternly, but sadness and regret surfaced in the next moment. “It looked so much easier in the tutorial. I thought…fuck, I don’t know what I was thinking. I wanted to do something nice for you. So far, it’s always you making the big moves, being the considerate one, saving my sanity, cheering me up, kissing me, calling us boyfriends. I feel so useless.”

“Sebastian, it’s just a painting. It can’t be that bad,” I teased him.

He almost smiled. Rolling his eyes, he lifted the canvas and turned it around.

Against a deep orange background, a smeared and smudged figure stood with his back turned to the viewer. It was blurry after the fall, but it was unmistakably a male figure, naked and with a mop of brown hair. “That’s me,” I said, the delight in my tone was genuine.

“Fuck, seems like dropping it helped.” Sebastian cocked his head to the side. “It still needs…” He waved his orange finger around the bottom of the canvas. It was only eight by eight inches, but it depicted the figure fully, and the guy in the picture was packing some nice ass, too.

“This is incredible,” I said in awe.

Sebastian shot me an angry glare. “It’s not incredible. It’s barely anything. At this rate, I’ll have to drop it ten more times before it’s close to alright.”

I barked out a laugh, then forced a serious expression back to my face. As I tossed the box of chocolate away from the stained sheet and the coloring palette, I focused on Sebastian. “Is this what upset you so much?”

He almost said yes, but stopped himself. He inhaled a deep breath and looked into my eyes.

“It’s more than just the painting, huh?” I asked. I wasn’t sure what I felt just then. Some sort of hopelessness that had filled him must have overflowed and spilled on me. I’d hoped we would have more time to figure it out. I’d hoped we’d talk about this later.

Sebastian shook his head. “I love being your boyfriend,” he said, his gaze dropping. “Everything we have done has been amazing, Ty. Everything. Kissing, blowing, touching, dating…” He licked his lips as my heart clenched. I feared his next words more than I feared anything. Some things I simply couldn’t fix with words. “So why can’t I take us further?”

I frowned a little. “It doesn’t work that way.” I wanted to take his hand in mine, but he was holding them both tightly together. “There aren’t any IOUs between us, Sebastian. We do what we want to do, right? What we both want. There’s no scoreboard saying who did what. Just feel it.”

“But what if we never…?” He shrugged and let the words trail away.