2. Chapter 2
Wednesday evening, Jake was prompt for his tutoring session.
He breezed into the library straight from lacrosse practice in his sweaty clothes, but he’d sprayed himself with Calvin Klein so he didn’t stink too bad, and wet his head under the sink. His golden hair was still damp as he sat in a seat across from Ezra at one of the tables nearest the elevator.
Ezra had been busy with what looked like some complicated math shit, formulas drawn all over graph paper and a textbook full of highlights. He glanced up at Jake as Jake got out his Stats book. Ezra wrinkled his nose. “Are you wearing cologne?”
“A little bit. Why?” Jake noticed Ezra’s T-shirt today had Tree Mugger printed on it with a cartoon robber holding a pistol to a tree, saying stick ’em up! It made Jake laugh.
“What?” Ezra said.
Jake nodded to the shirt. “Where do you get those? They’re funny.”
“I made them,” Ezra replied, shutting his textbook and capping his pen.
“Really?” Jake was kind of impressed. “How?”
Ezra looked at Jake like he should know. “I make the design on my computer, print it on transfer paper, and iron it onto a plain shirt.”
“That’s pretty cool.”
Ezra didn’t seem to think so. He grabbed Jake’s Stats book, flipped it open, turned it to face Jake, and pointed to a paragraph. “Tell me what you know about base rate fallacy.”
Jake blinked. “Uh… what?”
But by the end of the hour, Jake was able to tell what he knew and then some.
And even understand joint probability distribution better.
Ezra was a good teacher. A hell of a lot better at explaining things than Jake’s Stats professor.
At seven o’clock on the dot, Ezra closed the Stats text and began putting away his books.
Jake felt like the hour flew by. “Thanks, man. I think I’m starting to get it already.”
“You will.” Ezra zipped up his bookbag and adjusted his Sally Jessy glasses. “So, I was thinking after I tutor you, you could teach me something?”
“Okay.” Jake gathered up his books. “Like what?”
“Like… I don’t know. How to talk to people, maybe?”
“We’re talking and we’re people.”
“I meant people as in Sean.”
Jake lifted his bookbag onto his shoulders. “Just go up to him at rehearsal tomorrow and say hey. Ask him how he’s doing. Make small talk. Stuff like that.”
“Yeah, see… I kinda have a problem with the whole small talk thing.”
“What do you mean?”
Ezra looked down at his Converse shoes. “It’s like my brain goes all haywire, and I don’t know what to say.”
Jake shrugged off his bookbag and set it next to his chair. “Okay, then pretend I’m Sean and talk to me.”
Ezra took a quick look around. The main floor of the university library was usually pretty busy, but where they were sitting didn’t have many students around. Ezra looked at Jake. “What do I say?”
“Just say hi and ask him how he’s doing.”
Ezra sat up straighter. “Hey, Sean. How are you doing?”
“Pretty good, Ezra. How about you?”
“Good.”
Ezra sat there. Jake waited. Ezra kept sitting there. Jake turned up his hands. “Well?”
“Well what?” Ezra frowned.
“Is that it?”
“I don’t know what else to say.” Ezra tugged at a strand of his frizzy hair. “See? I get nervous.”
“Okay, well, say something interesting. Something that will get his attention.”
Ezra was still for a second, like he was absorbing the information, then he nodded. “Got it.” Then he started the whole thing again. “Hi, Sean. How are you?”
“Good, Ezra. How about you?”
“I’m good.” He cleared his throat. “Did you know after praying mantises mate, the female rips the male’s head off?”
Jake gaped at Ezra.
“What?” Ezra looked genuinely perplexed.
“What the hell was that?”
“You said to say something interesting.”
“Yeah, interesting good . Not interesting like that .”
“Well, how am I supposed to know?”
Jake stared at Ezra. “Seriously? You think Sean’s going to be impressed by weird bug sex? Jesus, Ezra.”
Ezra’s shoulders slumped. “Okay, fine. I’ll try again.”
So, he tried again, but this time his interesting thing was about how flamingos orgasm for thirty minutes.
Jake put his head in his hands. “Oh, dear god.” He looked up. “Are you fucking with me right now?”
“No,” Ezra said. “You said to say something interesting and that’s what I’m doing.”
Jake scrubbed a hand over his face. “Okay. Forget interesting. Say something flirty to him. Like how good he looks in his shirt or whatever.”
Ezra bit his lip. “Can you give me an example?”
Jake turned to the empty chair beside him. “Hey, Sean. How’s it going? That shirt looks great on you. It really brings out the deep blue in your eyes.” Jake flashed a grin at Imaginary Sean and gave him a little wink too. He turned to Ezra. “See? Like that.”
Ezra chewed his bottom lip for a second. “All right.” He sat up straighter and turned to the empty chair. “Hey, Sean. How’s it going? I like your pants. They really bring out the shape of your ears.” Then Ezra offered Imaginary Sean a tight smile and a wink that looked more like a spasm.
Jake bent forward until his head hit the table with a thud. “Oh, God,” he groaned.
“Not so good, huh?” Ezra slumped against the chair.
Jake turned his head to look at him. “Are you shitting me right now?”
Ezra crossed his arms.
“Why didn’t you just repeat what I said?”
Ezra lifted a shoulder. “I didn’t want to be a copycat?”
“Don’t talk about his ears, man.”
“But I like his ears.”
“I don’t get it.” Jake shook his head. “We were talking all normal before and now… now, you’re all—”
“I know!” Ezra pointed to his bookbag. “I’m good at this.” Then he gestured between them. “And you’re good at this. That’s why I need your help.”
“Oh, you need help, all right.” Jake rubbed the bridge of his nose. He sighed. “But practice makes perfect, I guess.” He turned to Ezra. “Okay, here’s your crash course in flirting. All the dos and all the don’ts.”
Ezra leaned forward to listen and absorb every word.
Jake went to the choir room early.
He played Hacky Sack with Pete Petrow, one of the baritones, to kill some time before practice started.
Last night, before leaving the library with Ezra, Ezra had asked Jake if Jake might talk to Sean today and find out if he was seeing anyone.
Jake promised he would, then he took a long, hot shower and some Tylenol.
Ezra was a socially awkward mess, but he’d given Jake some hope last night near the end when he finally understood that talking to your crush about murderous insects and bird orgasms was a big no-no.
So, Jake got up early today so he could be in the choir room earlier than usual, because Sean usually was.
Ezra typically slipped in through the back entrance unnoticed and went straight to his seat without speaking to anyone.
He never left his music on the shelves—which were labeled with all their names—in order to avoid socializing, at least that was Jake’s guess.
Jake was balancing the Hacky Sack on his foot when Sean walked in.
Jake watched him go over to the shelves to get his music.
Did Ezra really think Sean was so cute? Sure, he had that curly hair and all, but his nose was kind of crooked.
And his forehead was a little lopsided. And Ezra might be onto something about his ears.
But really, it all added to Sean’s handsomeness, and Jake hated to admit it.
But Jake still thought he’d win Best Looking—if there ever were such a thing for the men’s choir, which there wasn’t, and Jake didn’t really think there needed to be, since he hadn’t thought about it all that much or anything.
Sean said hey to a couple of other guys and went to take his seat. Jake absently launched the Hacky Sack off his foot and right into Pete’s face.
“Hey, watch it,” Pete exclaimed as Jake snatched up his music folder and went to sit next to Sean.
Sean glanced at him. “Sup, Fallon?”
“Hey, Sean.” Jake watched Sean flip through his music. He did have weird ears, now that Jake was up close and could see. They were almost pointy at the top, like Sean could be a sexy elf. But that didn’t help Jake understand why Ezra liked them any better.
“What?” Sean said, noticing Jake was staring.
Jake cleared his throat. “Nothing.” He looked down at his music for a second, then over at Sean again.
Jake’s interactions with Sean had been minimal all semester, even though the guy sat right next to him.
There’d been some comments about the music they were singing, or some shared eye rolls at something Dr. Martin said, but that was about it.
Jake barely knew the guy that Ezra was crushing on, and it weirdly made Jake curious about him.
And kind of like Jake was now the one not knowing what to say.
“So, um,” Jake said, “Have you always sang bass?”
Sean looked at Jake all confused for a second, then he shrugged. “Yeah, I guess. I mean, I can sing tenor if I need to. Just that bass is more in my vocal range.” He raised a brow. “Why?”
It was Jake’s turn to shrug, only it was a nervous kind of shrug, because for some reason Jake’s hands were getting sweaty. “Just wondering.”
“Okay.” Sean gave Jake a strange look, then shifted his eyes back to his music folder.
Jake noticed Sean was wearing baggy jeans today.
Jake had never really thought about it, but he bet Sean had a big dick.
A big dick a whole lot of guys were begging him for every ten minutes.
So, it was probably unlikely Sean was single.
He probably had lots of boyfriends. Jake guessed there had to be a few gay guys on campus, but he didn’t really know.
Sean noticed Jake was staring again. His brows knitted together, then he smiled smugly. “Are you checking me out, Fallon?”
Jake felt his face heat a thousand degrees and his laugh was unnecessarily loud. He cleared his throat. “You wish.” He flipped through his music for no reason. He cleared his throat again. “So, uh, this is sort of out of left field, but… um…”
Sean turned to him with an eyebrow raised.
“Are you like… seeing anybody?”
Sean grinned all smug again. “Why? You interested?”
“No, no, no.” Jake shook his head vigorously. “Just, um, just wondering.”
“Okay?” Sean chuckled, shaking his head.
“So…?”
“So what?”
“Are you seeing anyone?”
Sean snapped his folder closed and stretched. “Nope.” He stood up. “I gotta take a wiz.” He walked out of the choir room, and Jake watched him go because he wanted to see if Sean even had a nice ass and the fucker did.
“Pssst!”
Jake startled and dropped his folder. He turned to see Ezra a few seats away.
“When did you get in here?” Jake asked.
“A couple minutes ago,” Ezra whispered. “What did he say?”
“You’re in luck.” Jake smiled.
“Awesome.” Ezra smiled back. Then his smile faded. “You didn’t tell him about me, did you?”
“Oh, no.” Jake shook his head. “No, I won’t. Unless you want me to.”
“Cool. Thanks.” Ezra grinned again, and Jake noticed for the first time that Ezra had dimples when he smiled.
“You’re welcome,” Jake said as Ezra went back to his seat, the choir filled up, and Dr. Martin rolled in to start rehearsal.