Total pages in book: 87
Estimated words: 83085 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 415(@200wpm)___ 332(@250wpm)___ 277(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 83085 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 415(@200wpm)___ 332(@250wpm)___ 277(@300wpm)
After the second time, we hadn’t parted, a tangle of limbs while we made out until my jaw ached to the point I couldn’t keep going.
Kissing had become one of my favorite things. Any way he touched me was incredible, but something about tasting someone that way, about the slide of tongues and swallowing little moans, got to me.
I stayed the night, and the next day we went for a jog in the morning, then hung out around his place all day, finding ourselves in the same position more than once, bucking our hips together or Josh sucking me off. God, his fucking mouth was to die for. But we also talked, and watched movies, and cooked, and it was…nice. I didn’t realize how alone I’d truly felt lately until I was with him and felt the contrast in both the quiet moments and the ones where we were calling out each other’s names.
I didn’t go home until Monday night. My house felt…fuck, it felt even more empty, which should have been my warning that things were already getting too deep for me too quickly. It was amazing how easy it was to lie to myself when doing so meant I got to keep having moments like we’d had the past couple of days—moments that some people took for granted and others savored every day. Moments I’d never known.
Tuesday morning I found myself driving to Kell and Chase’s. I knew my brother wasn’t home, and I also knew we’d have to talk eventually. Any other situation, I would have gotten ahold of him ASAP to make sure everything was okay. Guilt still ate at my conscience, for fucking around with Kellan’s best friend in the first place, for not being the one to tell him, for not rushing to smooth things over once he knew, but damn, I’d just wanted to spend time with Josh. Was it so damn wrong to think of myself first for once? Maybe I really was becoming a little selfish. Hopefully that wasn’t a bad thing.
Chase was outside with Bowie when I pulled up. I’d called ahead to make sure he would be around. He raised his hand in a wave as I parked. It was a chilly morning, a hint of moisture in the air.
Bowie jumped all over me when I got out. “Hi, boy. How are you?” I scratched his head and behind his ears.
“Hey, man. What’s up?” Chase said when I made my way over to him.
“Not much, brother. You?”
“Dealing with your brother, who is freaking out about something between the two of you that he won’t tell me about.” Chase cocked a brow.
Well, that surprised me. Yeah, no one other than Josh and Kellan knew I’d been questioning my sexuality or my feelings regarding sex, but I thought Kellan would have told him about me and Josh.
“Coffee?”
“Yikes. Now I’m nervous,” Chase teased as we went inside. He poured us each a mug, and we doctored it before heading to the back deck. We sat down, the fog in the distance around the trees seeming to match the mood.
“I, um, I’m gonna need you to be my best friend first for this conversation and not Kellan’s fiancé.” It was a delicate balance, I got that, but Chase had been my best friend since I was a kid. I needed to be able to talk to him about this.
“Yeah, Griff. Of course. You’re stressing me out a little, though.”
“No.” I shook my head. “It’s nothing bad, it’s just…” I was drawing a blank on where to start, so instead I took a drink of the coffee before setting it down. “Things have, well, they’ve been pretty confusing for me most of my life.”
“How so?”
“Women. Sex. I don’t know. I spent most of my life doing something because it’s what I thought I was supposed to be doing. I felt like there was something wrong with me, so I’d pretend to be like everyone else I knew when it came to sex, when the truth was, I didn’t get what all the hype was about. I didn’t feel the same way about it as I think most people do, and I never understood it.”
“Shit, man. I’m sorry. I’m feeling like an asshole for some of the things I’ve said over the years and the times I tried to drag you out with me.”
“No, don’t. How could you know if I didn’t tell you? I spent my life denying my reality because I didn’t think it was something other people felt. When, um…when everything went down with you and Kellan, we talked. I told him, and he gave me all these terms that blew my world wide open. It was the first time I realized that maybe I wasn’t alone.”
How many times and in how many ways had I felt alone in my life? It was strange how you could come to terms with truths about yourself, how they could begin to undig themselves, making themselves be known, when you hadn’t even been aware they’d been hiding there all along.