Page 29

ERIK

J ust so you know, I’ve never moved the goalposts.

I just wanted to hold Kayden to some kind of standard.

Think about it now. If I didn’t, he could use me for my body, and we would never move to the next step.

Deep down, I knew there was more between us.

I felt it. Sure, it sounded scary, but one of us had to be brave enough to acknowledge it and take the leap.

Let’s face it, guys like Kayden need a little push.

When Kayden visited my place on Bush Street, that became more apparent than ever.

“Holy shit, dude,” he said. “There’s barely any room to breathe in this place.”

“Come on, it’s not that bad. Besides, I’m the only one that lives here. It’s perfect.”

“Even still, anyone could get claustrophobic in a hurry.”

I lived in the top-floor apartment of a duplex in what was probably once an attic repurposed into two units. Kayden was right. It could get claustrophobic. It also got hotter than hell when I moved in at the end of summer. Aside from that, it was the perfect situation for a college student.

“It must be a really tough place to have sex,” Kayden said.

“You must have sex on the brain, dude.”

“Got a problem with that? Anyway, the walls in this place must be paper thin. You probably hear the neighbors going at it all the time.”

I snorted at him. It was just like Kayden to think of something that stupid, but I wouldn’t tell him that.

Why? Well, if I’m being honest, I could hear the neighbors going at it sometimes .

One time, I even heard a woman say, “ Jesus Christ, is that it?” after about thirty seconds of grunting and groaning.

My teammate was probably alluding to how people would hear us having sex.

Maybe he was uncomfortable with that. On the other hand, we wouldn’t be performing any more mattress gymnastics until we at least tried becoming a couple.

Yeah, I might’ve slipped during a moment of extreme weakness before, but I now knew how to spot a problem before it started.

And hey, neither of us had turned sex into a marathon, but we could easily outlast the downstairs neighbor.

I sat in the chair across from the T.V., and Kayden flopped down onto the bed. He didn’t automatically start removing his clothes, which was a good thing. It meant, amazingly, that he had some sense of boundaries. Not much, but I would take what I could get.

“I know I don’t have a lot here,” I said, “but I’ve got Netflix.”

“Ahhhh, I see what you’re doing.”

“What do you mean?”

“Netflix. I understand the codeword, bro.”

“What codeword?”

“You know. You want to Netflix and chill, right?”

I lifted an eyebrow, mostly because that was the dumbest thing I’d ever heard. The only thing I found stupider was that he honestly seemed to think he could fool me so easily.

Now Kayden lifted his shirt over his head and tossed it aside, revealing that perfectly sculpted physique. I knew his restraint wouldn’t last forever…or more than five minutes. I would have to exercise willpower for both of us.

“Put your shirt back on, Kayden.”

He froze, looking a little stunned. Then he picked up his shirt but didn’t put it back on.

“Erik,” he said. “Bro. You weren’t really serious when you said you wouldn’t have any more sex with me until?—”

“I was serious, dude. I’ve got to protect myself.”

“But you can’t resist forever. Look at you, you’re getting a raging hard-on.”

He pointed towards my crotch. I looked down. No hard-on.

“You can argue with me all you want. I’m sticking to my guns.”

I waited for a look of frustration to appear on Kayden’s face. I pictured him pulling his hair out by the fistful and screaming maniacally because I was driving him crazy. None of those things happened, which felt like a small blessing.

Kayden glanced around the room, looking hesitant, but I knew he had plenty to say.

“Don’t you know there will be consequences to starting a relationship?” he asked. “I mean, people are going to find out.”

“Not if we keep it secret.”

“I’m serious, Erik. The whole team will find out. Maybe the whole school.”

“So?”

His eyes widened only a little.

“I think it’s a bigger deal than you do,” he said. “And I’m worried about how the guys will react to it.”

“Why do you care about what they think?”

“Hold on a second, timeout. Why wouldn’t I care what they think?”

“If we’re in a relationship, that’s our business and no one else’s.”

“Right,” Kayden said. “So, they don’t need to know.”

“But the whole point is we shouldn’t have to hide. We shouldn’t feel ashamed.”

Kayden didn’t respond.

I didn’t mean to be such a pain. That really was how I felt.

On the other hand, I couldn’t deny that he had a point.

Of course I’d considered that stuff. The world was in a better place now, even for athletes, but there would always be haters.

We could even lose friends for being our authentic selves.

I wanted to think that would be worth it, though.

“Who knows?” I asked. “Maybe they’ve known about us all along.”

“Fat chance.”

“You know we’re going to have to take a step like this eventually, don’t you?”

He shrugged like he knew but probably hated to admit it.

“Is it that you don’t want a relationship?” I asked. “Or you only care about me for the sex?”

Deep down, I knew the answer to that. I wouldn’t have pushed for a relationship if I really thought he would never go for it. I wanted my teammate to at least think about it. If I didn’t push him, we would keep drifting along, going exactly nowhere.

Kayden got up and paced the room, finally putting his shirt back on. That he didn’t storm out felt like a small victory.

“I don’t know what I want,” he said.

I paused, worried this conversation wouldn’t go in the direction I wanted it to.

“So, you’re not even open to it?”

“I never said I wasn’t open to it. It probably is the next step for us, right? I’m just not sure how to do it.”

“Why think about anything? It’s not romantic. Just go with the flow.”

“I can’t just go with the flow, Erik. You know that.”

“What’s your biggest problem? What the guys on the team will think?”

“The guys…and everyone, really. They’ll think I’ve been lying to them. I won’t know what to say to anyone about it.”

“You don’t have to say anything.”

“Yes, I do. Don’t you get it? Even if the reaction isn’t so bad, they’ll want answers to way too many questions. If we don’t say anything, they’re going to keep pushing me to dish about everything.”

“Like what?”

“Girls, dude. You know how much time the guys spend on that topic. If they see us together all the time and neither of us ever go after any girls, then they’ll know something’s up.”

I didn’t want to give him that much credit, but I also understood what he meant.

Guys in our shoes never have trouble finding available girls.

I’m not saying they throw themselves at us, but you get the point.

Passing over a few of them is one thing.

Ignoring them altogether and sticking so closely together could be taken as a red flag.

Maybe.

But so what? We didn’t have to care about what other people thought. But could I tell Kayden that? I think we both knew the answer. If I wanted to convince my would-be-boyfriend to go for this, I had to tiptoe around the tricky parts.

“It’s just that you can’t put the toothpaste back in the tube,” he said.

“What do you mean?”

“Like, once it’s out, it’s out. There’s no going back. They’ll know who we are, and we can’t change that.”

“But why would we want to change who we are?”

He paused. We both knew the answer but neither wanted to say it.

“Look, I’m not asking you to make a huge announcement,” I said. “I just want us to at least try. We’ve got the potential for something amazing here. You can’t deny that.”

Only then did I realize my finger was pointing straight at him.

That meant I was in control of the conversation, right?

His head hung a little. Normally Kayden acted cocky and confident, but now he looked sheepish.

He didn’t say that he agreed with me. I already knew.

But why did he have to be so goddamn stubborn?

“I don’t want to lose you,” he said.

He sounded flat, like he couldn’t allow emotion to spill over into his voice. Too late for that because he couldn’t say it without fear and sadness appearing all over his face.

“You’re not going to lose me,” I said.

“How do I know?”

“You’re a tough cookie, Kayden, but I’ve seen your soft side. I know what’s in your heart.”

“But…”

“I’m not trying to play hardball with you. I want to make sure you want more from me than just my body.”

“I do want more from you. Haven’t we established that?”

“And I want us to have the future I know we can have.”

“So do I. It’s just…”

“You’re scared.”

His eyes snapped open. He probably would’ve slugged me—you know, if I’d said that in the days before he hadn’t wanted to lose me.

“I’m not scared,” he said.

“You’re scared shitless then.”

He rolled his eyes. This was no time for jokes.

Obviously, he wanted to impress that on me.

I had to do something to lighten the mood but had only been half-joking anyway.

I would be lying if I told you the idea didn’t make me tense too.

But we couldn’t be scared to be ourselves. We had to face fear head-on.

“All I’m asking is for you to give us a shot,” I said. “Just try.”

“And if I do, you won’t…?”

Won’t what? Won’t turn my back on him? Won’t out him to the whole team? Won’t withhold sex for the next decade?

I wouldn’t push for an answer, at least not right now. If you could’ve seen how vulnerable Kayden looked in that moment, you’d totally understand. The only promise I could make was that I truly believed we had a bright future together. Don’t ask me why. I just knew.

Kayden kept his head bowed over two balled fists, eyes closed. This must’ve driven him crazy, but he knew he couldn’t run from it.

“Okay,” he said. “I’ll do it.”

“You’ll give a relationship a try?”

He nodded, threw his arms around me, and kissed my lips. Then I rested my head on his chest.

“I love you,” I said.

I didn’t plan that. The words slipped out of my mouth before I could call them back.

Kayden stayed silent.