Chapter 16
TIM
Iwait in the stairwell, listening to see if Mark needs me.
He and Greg headed upstairs a little while ago.
As much as I’m worried about Mark’s feelings, I’m also scared as fuck.
Since Greg and Morgan called things off recently, I’m wondering if he’s trying to win Mark back.
What if Mark makes up with him? What if he figures Greg just made a mistake and that it’s something they can work through?
I keep telling myself I’ll miss the sex, but that’s not all I’ll miss.
I’ll miss Mark’s pretty face and those beautiful blue eyes.
I’ll miss our talks and joking about Roxxxy Andrews with him.
Fuck. What am I thinking?
I try to chase those thoughts away.
Mark rounds the corner and starts down the stairs.
Shit.
He stops and looks at me.
A tear runs down his cheek. He quickly wipes it away with his arm before saying, “Hey.”
“I was just coming up to check on you.”
“Sorry.” He takes a breath. “It’s been a rough night.”
This would be the perfect opportunity to say something like, “It could be an even rougher night.” Something sexual.
Something that could give me a chance to take him off somewhere and fuck his brains out right now.
But I don’t want that. He clearly needs to talk to someone, and I wish I could be that person.
But I figure he needs to get back to his friends to get the sort of consoling I’m sure he needs right now.
“I know,” he says quickly. “Rules and all.”
He starts past me. I snatch his arm, and he looks at me with surprise.
“Fuck the rules.”
“He’s gonna be coming down in a minute. Can we get out of here so I don’t have to see him again tonight? I’ll go ahead. Just meet me out front.”
He continues down the stairs.
“You okay?” I ask.
“Been better.”
We walk through the woods behind campus. It’s a reclusive spot. I come here sometimes to think. We’re not supposed to be here this late, but I’m never supposed to be here. It’s a secluded park behind campus reserved for students and teachers, not leeching drug dealers.
Shining our way with my iPhone flashlight app, I duck under a branch, and he follows until we step out beside a creek.
“You come here often?” he asks.
“It’s where I bring all my little glory holes.”
He chuckles, and I’m pleased. He hasn’t been very talkative, let alone relaxed since his chat with Greg. I don’t press. Let him come around in his own time. If he has something he wants to share with me, he will.
I lead him to a log beside the creek and sit on it.
“Sorry, it’s not the grandest of places, but it’s a nice hideout when you’re trying to get away from the city. Not many quiet places like this.”
He sits down beside me.
“It’s cool. Greg took me on a walk around here when we first started seeing each other.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—”
“It’s fine.”
He’s quiet. We sit in silence until he says, “I think I kinda deserved it. The cheating.”
“No one deserves to be cheated on,” I say.
“I was so fucking na?ve when we started going out. After like a week of seeing each other, he gave me his class ring. So cute, right? He’s always very romantic with his gestures.
I never liked stuff like that, but he did, and silly me, I thought that meant something.
Turns out it was all just a production that he puts on.
I guess by working so hard to impress me he blinded me to everything else.
I thought he was so in love with me. I wasn’t in love with him, though.
I thought I was, but I think I just loved how much he loved me.
How much I thought he loved me. And when I found out the truth, I felt duped. ”
“That makes sense.”
“Why are people so terrible?”
“Look who you’re asking.”
“You ever cheated on someone?” he asks.
“I’m pretty honest about what I’m looking for, so no.”
“Maybe that’s the best way to be.”
“I don’t think so.”
“I’m surprised to hear that coming from you.”
“It’s lonely like this. Never really getting close to anyone. Never opening up. Never trusting.”
“You trust, you get hurt,” Mark says.
“You never get hurt, you never really live.”
His eyes shimmer in the moonlight.
“Sorry,” I say. “I was trying to cheer you up. Not bring you down.”
“I don’t think that’s going to happen tonight. I don’t know what makes me feel stupider—that it happened or that Greg thought I’d be dumb enough to fall for his excuse.”
“Neither seems all that great,” I joke.
He smirks, and like when we fuck, I enjoy knowing I’m the reason he’s feeling better. That I can please him.
“If you’d asked me when we started this if I thought you’d be counseling me about a breakup, I would’ve said, ‘Hell no.’ ”
“If you’d asked me, I would’ve said the same thing. But since we’re on the subject of counseling, want to talk about last weekend?”
I can tell by the way he frowns that he doesn’t, but I wanted to give him the chance.
“Come on, man,” I say. “I know that had to be a lot for you. I saw the look on your face while your mom was giving that speech.”
He reaches into his pocket and retrieves his phone. He fidgets around on it for a moment before handing it to me.
“That’s her,” he says.
It’s a picture of a girl. She’s gotta be in elementary school.
Maybe eight or nine at most. With blonde hair and blue eyes, she has the biggest smile in the world.
And I can see the similarity in Mark’s smile.
Their mom and dad stand on either side of them as they huddle together for a group picture.
They must be on a mountain because the ground drops off behind them, and in the background, a river runs through a deep valley.
“We used to take trips to Tennessee as a family. Camp up in Signal Mountain for a few nights. That’s where my dad grew up, and Mom liked that it gave us a chance to get away from it all.
This was back when she wasn’t totally obsessed with her career.
Back then, she did her best to be a mom and a congresswoman.
When I was in middle school, she used to take me and Becky out for milkshakes on Thursdays when we got home from school.
Dad was working every day, and that was the only free time Mom had with us.
Most of the time, we were being watched by our nanny.
But Mom did her best to make sure when she got home from work to spend time with us.
I remember how excited Becky would be when we’d go on those little trips together.
She liked strawberry milkshakes the best. And if you could have seen the way her eyes lit up as soon as Mom gave it to her.
She would just beam with excitement. And she was the most beautiful kid in the fucking world. ”
His face trembles as he continues. “It’s hard watching her turn all the memories I have with my little sister into a marketing tool.”
“I can imagine.”
“Mom and Dad were always so busy with work, and they went out of their way to spend time with us, but Becky was the only one I had to play with. She was my best fucking friend in the world. I remember one day when she came home from elementary school, she was crying, and I finally got out of her that she’d asked to play kickball with some other kids, but they told her no.
Oh my God, you would’ve thought they’d fucking hit her with how it tore me up.
I just wanted to find those kids and beat the shit out of them.
Then, not three years later, we found out about the diagnosis, and it was like watching kids being mean to her every single day.
Watching her get picked on. My poor, helpless sister who I couldn’t do a fucking thing for. ”
I wish there was something I could do or say to help him right now, but I know it’s just my job to listen to him.
I set my hand on his. I want him to know I’m here for him.
“I’m sorry,” I say.
“The situation was horrible, but there was one physician assistant in their chemo center. She would spend time talking to Becky during her treatment. Didn’t just talk to her, but she’d buy her little presents and bring her coloring sheets every day.
Her name was Sierra, and she was the best fucking woman on the planet.
She’d read stories to Becky. Spend extra time with her.
Make her laugh. Make her forget about what she was in the middle of.
Even made me forget sometimes. She wasn’t just doing her job.
She gave a shit. And that helped so fucking much.
“That’s what I’m studying for. To be a physician assistant. Because if I can give someone else that—if I can be there for someone when they need that support most, my life will actually matter.”
“Your life does matter,” I say.
His expression shifts as he looks at me like he suddenly has a question for me.
Wiping his face with the back of his free hand, he glances around. “Did you ever bring Keith here?”
“What?” I’m surprised by the change in the conversation, and how cold his words suddenly sound compared to how they were when he was talking about Becky.
“Did you guys…do this? Things that made him maybe imagine things were moving in a direction that…”
“I can tell you with total confidence that I didn’t talk about shit like this with him. He would’ve totally got the wrong idea.”
“You’re not worried about me getting the wrong idea?” he asks.
I’m not, and that scares me, because unlike with Keith, I wouldn’t mind if he got the wrong idea.
I haven’t admitted it to myself until this moment, but seeing Mark looking as beautiful as ever in this moonlight, wanting to soothe the pain from his past, it’s hard for me to deny my growing attraction to him.
It’s not just his body or that he’s some rich kid looking to live on the wild side.
I’m intrigued by him. I don’t know him very well, but I want to know him. I want to understand him. I want him to share those secrets he carries around with him. Secrets about his life. Secrets he would want to share with someone who meant more to him than I do.
I don’t like that I feel this way, but fortunately, I can tell Mark isn’t interested like that.
And even if he was vulnerable enough to let me in right now, as soon as some brat like Greg came along, he would move along in no time and just remember me as this strange period in his life where he had a crazy fling with the school drug dealer.
He’s still looking into my eyes, awaiting my response.
“Nope,” I reply.
His gaze shifts from mine.
An impulse rises within me. One I won’t deny. I lean forward, grab the back of his head, and pull him into me.
He doesn’t push away. Doesn’t fight as I offer him a kiss. Not like the sort of frenzied kisses we exchange when we’re fucking. Softer. Gentler. More meaningful.
A warmth tickles at my cheeks as goosebumps race through my body from a familiar excitement.
I wrap my arms around him and pull myself closer to him. He wraps his arms around me.
I just want to hold him and be held by him tonight. I know that’s what he wants, too. That he’s all alone. And I’m taking advantage, but I’ll take Mark however I can get him.