Chapter Nine
Damon was acting weird.
Elliot had been right to keep his sexuality a secret all these years. Sure, Damon wasn’t homophobic or anything, but he was tiptoeing around Elliot, uncomfortable and tense.
When he caught Damon staring at him (on more than one occasion), Damon would panic and look away, embarrassed. Elliot pretended not to notice, mostly because he didn’t know what else to do.
He might have assumed Damon was just coming to terms with Elliot having powers.
Except Damon never acted strange when Elliot used his magic. In fact, he’d started coming to Elliot for all his minor bumps and bruises.
My shoulder hurts from practice.
I stubbed my toe.
I got a splinter from helping my mom in the yard.
Elliot would wave a hand over his ailment, and just like that, it was gone. He hadn’t needed to try or focus at all.
His magic was always eager to touch him.
Afterward Damon would jump around the room, singing and dancing as if Elliot’s magic somehow gave him a boost of energy, made him even more Damon-like.
Damon wasn’t weirded out by his powers at all.
He was weirded out by Elliot.
He made it a point to never touch him anymore, and he’d flinch if they accidentally brushed against one another. He dropped a plate that he was passing at the dining room table when their fingers bumped.
They stopped playing video games side-by-side, too. Instead, Damon sat on the bed, while Elliot was on the floor. He hadn’t tickled him, ruffled his hair, or tackled him since the awkward wrestling match last week.
It was probably for the best, but Elliot missed it. He missed having an excuse to touch Damon. He missed his best friend acting normal.
Damon probably just needed an adjustment period. He’d eventually see that Elliot wasn’t going to come on to him or try to fuck him or something.
He hoped so, at least.
In some ways, things had gotten better. Elliot had finally figured out the trick to get his magic to cooperate.
Unfortunately, the trick was having Damon in the same room with him.
He’d started bringing his best friend to his training lessons at the clinic under the guise that he wanted to show Damon his magic.
It was easy to slip into the healing flow state when Damon was next to him.
Something about his presence got the spark of Elliot’s magic to catch.
Fired him up and steadied his mind all at once.
“It’s fine,” Grandmama whispered when they were out of earshot. “Some people use crystals to align their energy, some use wands, or religious totems. You use a person. It’s no big deal. Once you get used to conjuring magic, you won’t need him anymore.”
“Right,” he said.
Somehow, he didn’t think that was possible.
“Okay, you boys go try these on, and we’ll see which size looks best,” Ms. Montré said, shooing them into the back of the suit rental store.
“How long do you think this is going to take?” Elliot asked Damon as they went into their dressing rooms. “I hate malls.”
The fluorescent lights. The pushy salespeople. The stupid smiling people in the giant marketing photos hanging on the walls.
“I don’t know,” Damon said. “Like twenty minutes?”
Elliot took off his shirt and slipped on the collared button-up. Twenty minutes. It was just twenty minutes. Then they would go back to Damon’s house and play games together, and that uncomfortable itch of wrongness he felt when he was overstimulated would dissipate.
“Wait. You’re gay,” Damon said. “You’re supposed to like shopping and trying on clothes.”
Elliot snorted. “Ha. Ha. Very funny,” he deadpanned as he pulled on the dress pants.
“Sorry.” Damon’s voice lost its humor. “I shouldn’t joke like that.”
Elliot rolled his eyes. He left his dressing room and knocked on Damon’s door. “Let me in.”
“What?”
“Let me in your dressing room.”
The handle unlatched, and Elliot slid inside. “Knock it off.”
“I’m sorry,” Damon said. “That joke was so inappropriate, and I don’t want you to think I have a problem with you or that I’m stereotyping. I was just ragging on you like we usually do, but I need to be more careful and less—”
“Damon!” Elliot grabbed his shoulders, shaking him.
“Stop. Stop freaking out all the time. You can make gay jokes with me. You can be a dick like you usually are. Stop fucking apologizing for it. I don’t want your apologies or for you to keep tiptoeing around like you’re afraid if you touch me, I’m going to take that as an invitation to jump you. ”
“I don’t think that!”
“No?”
“No!”
“Okay, then why did you quit cheating in our games?”
Damon licked his lips. Elliot forced himself not to lower his gaze to watch.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I never cheat,” Damon said.
Elliot raised an eyebrow. “You’d shove me or mess up my hair when I was winning, and I’d kick you back, and if all else failed, your sadism would come out, and you’d tickle me and wrestle me to the ground.”
Damon winced.
“We’ve done that once since I told you I was gay.
And you freaked out.” Elliot ran a hand through his hair to push it out of his eyes.
“And I get it. You’re uncomfortable, but I’m not going to try anything, and I know you’re straight, okay?
If you don’t ever tickle me again, I will praise the lord, but I just want you to act normal. Alright?”
Damon rubbed the back of his neck. “Yeah. Sorry, man. I’ve been a shitty friend.”
“Stop apologizing.” Elliot flicked his ear.
Damon huffed a laugh and smacked his hand down. “Yeah, okay.”
His smile didn’t meet his eyes. His gaze was cast down, watching as Elliot tucked the tails of his collared shirt into his dress pants. Elliot buttoned them up and stared in the mirror, knocking his shoulder into Damon’s.
Damon swallowed and met his gaze in the mirror. His eyes traveled down Elliot’s body and up again. “You look nice.”
Elliot smiled and fixed the collar. “You do too,” he said with as neutral a tone as he could muster.
The button-up shirt fit Damon so well. The fabric pulled taut over his muscled chest and arms, making a sexy silhouette of his tapered waist. Elliot didn’t see Damon dressed up often.
The last dance they went to together was probably in the ninth grade.
They’d both been gangly and awkward. Now, Elliot was still gangly and awkward, but Damon was the quintessential embodiment of the perfect prom date.
The perfect prom date for Chelsea, Elliot reminded himself.
He scurried out of Damon’s dressing room and back into his own, grabbing the jacket and slipping it on.
“You know, you basically admitted you miss me tickling you,” Damon said. “Which, if anything, makes you more a masochist than I am a sadist.”
“No!” Elliot said. “I fucking hate it. Never ever do it again.”
“I’m going to. Now that I know how much you love it.”
“No! If you tickle me again, I’ll…”
“What?” The door clicked as he opened it. “What will you do?”
Elliot stepped into the open space outside the dressing rooms. He couldn’t think of an adequate punishment because Damon’s eyes widened, and he breathed out, “Wow.”
Elliot’s spine tingled as Damon drank him in. He wanted to preen, wanted Damon’s eyes to stay on him like that forever.
Ms. Montré came around the corner and clapped, snapping Elliot out of his fantasy.
“Oh, look at you, Elliot!” She came over and brushed the tops of his shoulders and yanked on the jacket to check the fit. “You look perfect. He looks so good, doesn’t he, Damon?”
“Yeah,” Damon said, his voice a little hoarse.
“Did yours not fit?” Ms. Montré asked.
Damon shook his head and handed over the jacket. “Too small.”
She’d already grabbed alternate sizes and handed Damon a different jacket.
He slipped it on and stepped in front of the mirror. He spun around, checking the back before buttoning the jacket like a suave secret agent or something. He’d gotten a fresh haircut yesterday. It was buzzed in the back and the sides. His short, tight curls expertly shaped on the top.
Elliot was a slob compared to the perfection of his best friend. Why Damon was even friends with Elliot, a shy and pimply gamer nerd, he didn’t know.
Elliot’s tiny inconvenient crush was not only stupid but downright delusional.
“So handsome. Such beautiful boys.” Ms. Montré said. “I can’t believe you both are all grown up.”
“Mom,” Damon whined.
She waved him off. “I’ll find ties to match your dates’ dresses.”
When Ms. Montré was out of earshot, Damon asked, “So if you were taking a guy as your prom date, what tie would you get?”
“Huh?” Elliot realized he’d still been staring at Damon and yanked his eyes away.
“If you were taking a guy, like, what color tie would you get since neither of you would have a dress to match?” Damon clarified.
Elliot shrugged. “I don’t know. Something basic, I guess. Blue or red, maybe.”
Ms. Montré reappeared and waved around a hot pink tie and a bright orange tie. “Found them!” She held them up to their necks, and they made disgusted faces at each other in the mirror.
“Kinda wish I was taking a guy,” Damon mumbled.
Elliot huffed a laugh, trying to ignore the ache in his chest.
Me too, he thought. Me too.