Chapter 15
Bash
Bash was very patient, but he wasn’t superhuman. He had been waiting to fuck Adonis since that night in Minneapolis. It had been weeks, now, and the weather at Bellford was turning. Autumn would be here soon.
As much as Bash liked seeing Adonis lose control, and knew that lightening up a bit was good for Adonis, he knew that he needed to be in complete control. Not of others, but of himself. That meant that he was making himself wait for what he really wanted.
Fucking Adonis would be good, he knew it would be. They had great chemistry, and Adonis was clearly ready. He wasn’t as ready as Bash, though. Bash wanted it badly. It was primal, his desire for sex with Adonis. Because of this, he knew he had to wait.
The longer he waited, the more he wanted it, yes. But also, the longer he waited, the better he knew it would be, and the more he trusted that his appetites weren’t controlling him.
He was in control of his sex drive. It was not in control of him.
Soon, he knew, it would be time. Soon, he would let himself go, and they would fuck, and it would be glorious.
He hadn’t seen Adonis since edging him last week, a session that had been so hot, Bash had almost cum on Adonis, even though he had barely touched his own cock.
The week since then had been full of hockey practice and classes, and they hadn’t managed to line up their schedules.
They had resorted, again, to a scheduled “appointment” on their calendars.
It wasn’t for another three weeks, after fall break.
In the meantime, Adonis was out of state for another figure skating competition, and as soon as he was back, Bash was leaving for a scrimmage with Ashwell, their rival Ivy League school, in Rhode Island.
Then it would be fall break, and Adonis had told Bash he would be traveling with his mother to visit the U.S.
Figure Skating headquarters in Colorado.
The official hockey season would be starting in just a few weeks, and Bash’s strength and skill were almost fully back. His shoulder still got sore, and there was a lump on his collarbone from the injury. It would never go away, the doctors told him. A permanent sign of what had happened to him.
He didn’t mind. Instead, he thought it was a good reminder that, no matter how strong he was, he wasn’t invincible.
He was only human.
At least once a day, he and Adonis texted.
Most of the texts were sexual—one of them would message the other, something short, something to get the other person’s attention.
They would go back and forth for a bit, and then it would be pictures.
The pictures were usually of ass (Adonis’s) and cock (Bash’s), though Adonis also loved to show off his cock (which was beautiful), and Bash was quite proud of his muscular ass (which Adonis called “majestic” on one occasion).
The videos they exchanged would’ve made even Bash’s most sexually liberated Dutch friends blush.
Bash loved it.
“You’re getting some ass, aren’t you?” Robbie asked him when they were getting ready in the locker room at Ashwell.
“What?” Bash said. He had been so focused on getting ready, adjusting his jockstrap, his moisture-wicking shirt, and compression pants, and his socks, that he hadn’t been paying attention to Robbie.
“Ass. You’re getting ass,” Robbie repeated, flicking a wet towel at Bash. Bash dodged the towel.
“What makes you say that?”
“You’re glowing,” Robbie teased.
“It’s the sweat.”
“No, it’s the ass.”
“I haven’t had sex,” Bash insisted. That was mostly true. He hadn’t fucked Adonis. Though he was pretty sure that the other things they had done could comfortably fall under the definition of sex.
“Are you sure?” Robbie said. “You’ve been texting someone. A lot. I’ve noticed.”
“I’m surprised you notice anything, now that you’re dating Clarisse.”
Robbie blushed. “We’re not dating.”
“Sure.”
“We’re not.”
“Sure. She’s here to cheer you on, isn’t she?”
“She’s supportive. A supportive…” He floundered, trying to find a word.
“Girlfriend?” Bash offered.
“No.”
“Friend that you’re fucking?”
“Um.”
“Girlfriend,” Bash said decisively. He began putting on his gear.
Robbie smiled wickedly. “You know who came with her?”
Bash froze. “Who?”
“Adonis Costa.”
“Really?”
Robbie waved his phone. “Yep. She texted me that he decided to join at the last minute.” He cocked his head. “You know, that might’ve been meant to be a surprise.” His smile widened. “Why would it be a surprise, Bash?”
Bash mumbled something in Dutch.
“Hm,” Robbie said. “Not getting any ass?”
“I swear,” Bash said. “No ass.”
“So, you and Adonis haven’t fucked?” Robbie said. Weston shot a look their way, smirking. Bash flipped him off.
“Lower your voice,” Bash said, “unless you want everyone, including Coach and the fans, to hear you. No, we haven’t fucked. Meaning, my penis has not been in his asshole. We have done other things.”
“I knew it!” Robbie crowed. “Hell yeah, bro. You like him, don’t you.”
“No,” Bash said. “It’s just physical.”
“Uh-huh. That’s what they all say.”
“We have a lovely arrangement with calendar invites and everything,” Bash said.
Robbie cackled. “I’m glad it works for you. And I hope you enjoy seeing him cheer you on at the game today. Like you said, very normal for a friend you’re just having sex with to show up and cheer someone on at a scrimmage game.”
Bash groaned.
The Ashwell University Krakens were known for their fast, aggressive style of play. The Bellford Ravens regularly faced off against them in the conference. The games during the season were often the highlight of each college’s winter sports, and the pre-season scrimmages were well-attended, too.
When Bash got out onto the ice, he didn’t know where to look for Adonis in the stands. He didn’t know if he should look for Adonis in the stands.
It was nice of Adonis to surprise him. Did it mean anything?
Was Adonis showing up because he cared about Bash in a way that was more than sex?
Bash doubted it. He liked Adonis in the sense that he liked the figure skater as a person.
But he didn’t think he liked Adonis. Feelings and sexual attraction had always been easy for Bash to understand.
Why did it seem to be getting harder?
He wasn’t on the starting line during the scrimmage. Cort played, and played well, and Bash went in later. He got a few shots in, didn’t score any goals, and managed to cuss out only two of the Ashwell players. A brawl broke out between the teams’ enforcers, and the fans were roaring.
Bash, sitting on the player’s bench, squirted water into his mouth.
Robbie came off the ice and sat next to Bash. He was breathing heavily. “I saw him in the stands,” he said, panting. “He’s with Clarisse.”
“Where?”
Robbie pointed.
Bash looked, but couldn’t make out any faces. His heart pounded.
When he was back on the ice, a flow state came over him.
Before his injury, he had always felt most himself when he was playing hockey.
It was the closest he thought he could ever get to a sort of transcendent inner peace.
Time slowed down, and his mind cleared. The only thing he had to worry about was the game.
And he was good at the game.
Now, months after the injury, he found that state again. Knowing Adonis was there, watching, didn’t make him nervous.
It made him better.
He got the puck, and he was unstoppable. His skates cut along the ice. He dodged Ashwell players, passed the puck to a teammate, and then was open again.
He shouted, and his teammate saw him. An Ashwell defenseman did, too, but he was too late. Bash’s teammate passed him the puck, and Bash shot.
The Bellford fans erupted at the goal, and Bash cheered.
“BASHER! BASHER! BASHER!”
He laughed, hearing his nickname echoing from the crowds.
When he looked up into the stands, that’s when he saw them: Adonis and Clarisse, waving their arms and screaming. He was too far to see Adonis’s eyes, but he felt that they were making eye contact.
Breathing heavily, he bowed and then skated off the ice.
——
The text from his sister was simple and aggressive:
Lotte: bel me, klootzak!
Call me, asshole!
The Bellford Ravens had won the scrimmage against Ashwell, and the team had taken over a local pizza joint in celebration.
Some of their fans were clustered at neighboring tables and booths.
Bash had noticed Adonis and Clarisse huddled over plates of pasta in a corner, shooting looks in his and Robbie’s direction.
They weren’t watching now while he looked at the text from his sister. They talked relatively regularly, but it was rare for her to send him a message like this.
He excused himself from the guys and walked out of the restaurant. It was a cool September night in the small Rhode Island college town. He stood outside the restaurant, beneath the lights and the awning, and called his sister.
“You didn’t need to be so aggressive with your text,” he said in Dutch when she answered.
“You weren’t answering my calls, asshole,” she replied. “I called you three times.”
“I had a game. And then we went to get pizza.”
“What if I had been trapped underneath a burning car?”
“Then, I hope you would’ve thought to call someone else after I didn’t pick up twice.”
“You know, that’s a pretty good point.”
Lotte was three years younger than Bash, and they were good friends.
She was, simply, the definition of the word “cool.” She was brilliant, top of her cohort at the University of Groningen.
A year ago, she had interned with the United Nations.
She had won international equestrian competitions, played in a rock band, and spoke six languages (two more than Bash, who spoke Dutch, English, German, and French).
He was convinced his sister could, if she wanted to, take over the world.
But she was also his little sister, and that meant he was allowed to be annoyed with her.
“I miss you,” Bash said, softening a bit.