Total pages in book: 87
Estimated words: 83394 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 417(@200wpm)___ 334(@250wpm)___ 278(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 83394 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 417(@200wpm)___ 334(@250wpm)___ 278(@300wpm)
When Dad called Mouse’s mom to come over, I packed a bag and headed out. They went at it loudly, and the last thing I wanted was to hear them fucking all night. As usual, Dad didn’t even ask where I was going.
The walk through the woods to get to Joey’s took about half an hour, and I had a flashlight to help me see along the way. When I got to his place, it was nearly midnight. Guilt prickled at the back of my neck for waking him up on a school night, but…I needed to see him.
I tapped on his window. I never had to do it loudly. Somehow, he always heard.
I looked through the glass and saw him stumble out of bed. He came over, opened it, then went to the closet to pull out the blanket and pillow he kept in there for me. Sure, I was allowed to sleep over sometimes, but his father liked to be in control of everything. He would be pissed if he knew I sneaked in. He never checked on Joey, though, and Joey got himself up for school every day, so we’d be okay.
I locked the door to be safe, then turned around to see him laying out the blankets for me. He was wearing only boxers, which rode low on his slender hips. I watched him, trying to see if I felt…well, anything, like if I was gay or bi or whatever, but then he turned and looked at me, and my eyes shot away.
“What?” he asked, wrinkling his nose.
“Nothin’.”
Joey shrugged and climbed into bed. I kept my clothes on and lay down on the floor.
“Did something happen?”
I could have told him that Dad was going to spend the night having sex with Mouse’s mom, which was true, but so was what I said instead. “No. Just wanted to be with you.”
He gasped but didn’t reply. The thing was, I knew Joey thought he depended on me, that he was needy with me, that I could find better or cooler friends, or that I did too much for him, but I didn’t. He was the one who asked me to be his friend, who trusted me, who made me feel important. Like I was worthy or meant something. Yeah, girls wanted me, and I was good at baseball, and I had respect from people at school, but none of that felt real. It was surface shit. Joey knew me and liked me for who I was. That mattered.
The sound of sheets moving came from above me, and then Joey’s hand was there, hanging over the side of the bed. I reached up and laced our fingers together, held on, squeezed. We stayed like that for a while, but no way could I keep my arm positioned like that, so I tightened my grip one more time and let go.
I didn’t want to think about what it meant when my hand felt empty without his.
CHAPTER FOUR
Joey
Thanksgiving break came around, and Gage was still seeing Katie. It was the longest relationship he ever had. I asked him one day if he loved her, and he said he didn’t, but I couldn’t help wondering if maybe he did and was afraid to tell me. Because maybe he knew I loved him and didn’t feel the same.
He had to know. Sometimes I told myself he didn’t, that I did a good job hiding it, but I wasn’t that stupid and Gage wasn’t either. We could read each other better than that. We knew each other as well as we knew ourselves. So yeah, Gage had to know, and if he never said anything, it meant he didn’t love me back.
But yeah, Thanksgiving break. We had the whole week off from school. We were in Creekside Park—me, Gage, Mouse, Romeo, and Katie. It wasn’t fair, but even her name bugged me. It made me kind of a dick, disliking her because I loved him, but I didn’t have too many bad habits, so I was okay with this one.
“Do you got a smoke?” Gage asked Katie.
“Yeah, I stole some from my mom.”
He didn’t smoke often. I didn’t know why he even did it, but sometimes with Katie, or some of his other friends, or if we were at a party, he liked to have a cigarette.
“I hate it when you smoke,” I found myself saying.
“It’s not a big deal, Jojo.”
“He’s a big boy,” Katie said.
“And Joey is entitled to his opinion,” Mouse countered.
“Simmer down, everyone,” Romeo added.
I crossed my arms, didn’t say anything as Katie and Gage smoked a cigarette.
Then Katie said, “We should go grab dinner and see a movie tonight.”
“Can’t, I have a family thing,” Romeo replied.
“Can’t, I don’t want to,” Mouse added, and I bit back a smile. God, I loved her.