Fever Pitch (19 page)

“Mmrf,” Aaron gurgled. He turned his head lazily to Giles, as if the gesture took superhuman effort.

A clumsy hand trailed over Giles's face as Aaron's eyes opened over a sleepy smile.

“Love you too,” Aaron slurred. Giles's heart soared.

Thirty seconds later Aaron was asleep.

Giles wanted to join him, but he was acutely aware of the discarded choir and orchestra clothes littered around them, clothes they would be expected to wear again Sunday afternoon. Fighting off lethargy, he rose and gathered them, hanging them up and dabbing at the jizz stain on the leg of his pants with a washcloth. By the time he started brushing his teeth, Aaron was stirring on the floor. Smiling around his mouthful of foam, Giles handed over the spare toothbrush, new in its pack, and the tube of toothpaste. And a washcloth.

Aaron stumbled to his feet, half fuck-drunk. “Sorry I passed out.” He touched his spunk-smeared chest and made a face—and laughed.

Giles brushed a kiss on his cheek. “You're fine. You clean up here, and I'll get the futon turned into a bed.”

Once the bed was made, their clothes righted and their mouths minty fresh, they spooned together naked on the futon, Giles with his back to the wall, his lanky body wrapped around Aaron.

“That was amazing,” Aaron said at last.

Giles kissed his hair. “Yes. It was.”

Silence.

Aaron's hand skimmed over Giles's, which rested on his own midsection. “Are we…dating now?”

“I would love to date you.” Giles slid his hand down to tease Aaron's limp cock. “Wish we hadn't started this right before a break.”

Some of the tension returned to Aaron's body. “I don't want to go home. I don't want to have to explain everything I've changed. I want to stay here, where I'm happy.”

Giles hated knowing he was part of
everything
. Rather, it was about Aaron coming out, but it affected Giles too.

Good Christ, if Colton found out.

Hell.
When.

He wrapped himself tighter around Aaron. “I'll help you however I can. Just let me know what you need.”

“To stay here on this futon with you. Forever.” He threaded their fingers together. “Can we…get together over break? I'll be at my mom's. I'll…tell her. She'll be surprised, but she'll be okay.” He paused. “I think.”

“You don't have to tell anyone until you're ready. But yes. I'll be with you wherever and whenever you want.”

Aaron turned in Giles's embrace, nuzzling his neck, massaging his ass. “Will you fuck me again tomorrow? Before we go?”

“No. Your ass will be too sore.” He slid his hand to the hole in question, touching it lightly, making Aaron jerk with overstimulation.

“Damn.”

Giles bent to his lips, smiling wickedly. “I'll be happy to kiss it better, though.”

Aaron laughed, then moaned as Giles took his cock in hand, teasing them both into full erection. They came again, languidly, little loads easily mopped up with tissues.

This time when Aaron went to sleep, Giles let himself drift along after, holding him close, unsure of what exactly lay ahead. All he knew was now that he had his dream boy, he was going to do his damnedest to keep him.

C
hapter Eighteen

A
aron did wake up sore the next morning. When he rolled over, he hissed at the initial contact of his ass on the mattress.

“Sorry.” Giles nuzzled him sleepily, planting a kiss on Aaron's collarbone. “I guess I'm an asshole after all.”

Since Aaron distinctly remembered begging like a whore for Giles to fuck him harder, faster, he wasn't calling anybody names. Not even himself stupid. Because a little literal butthurt was worth great sex. And it didn't remotely eclipse how awesome it was to wake up beside Giles in the morning.

Giles. His boyfriend.

Since the dorm floor was still completely deserted, they showered together, laughing and touching and kissing the whole time. Giles ordered pizza as soon as the stores opened, and they ate it for lunch, foregoing the cafeteria so they could make out. Giles offered Aaron a ride home, which Aaron had to decline because his mom was coming to the concert.

This reminded him he'd have to figure out a way to come out to her…which was a serious buzzkill.

Giles sat behind Aaron, their naked bodies entwined as they munched on pepperoni and cheese. “Seriously, don't worry about coming out to your mom. Do it whenever you're ready.”

Aaron leaned against his chest. “How did you tell your parents?”

“You're joking, right? Oh—wait. Sometimes I forget you were the new kid at A-Hell. Hon, I've been a flaming flamer since I was old enough to ask for a tiara. I got teased for it before I understood the term. In fact it was sixth grade before I worked out that gay was the same thing as me wanting to marry Devin Mack.”

Aaron remembered the beefy linebacker from Alvis-Henning. “Are you serious?”

“Hey, I was eleven. How was I to know meatheads were only good for fucking?”

Something in his tone made Aaron pause. “Are you telling me…?”

“That I fucked him? Yes. Honey, I'd probably curl your toes if I told you how many of A-Hell's finest I've boned. I told some of it to Mina earlier this year, and I think she's still reeling. Though most of the guys I had aren't gay. Definitely Devin wasn't. Lonely and horny and trapped in the northern burbs is not the same as gay.”

Aaron had a hard time reconciling Giles with the kind of guy who would fuck straight guys he knew hated him. It sounded so…seedy. Crude.

Giles's arm slipped, his touch on Aaron's thigh a little sad. “Sorry.”

Aaron caught his hand. “No, don't be. I like knowing about you. Even when it isn't sunshine and puppies.”

“How about some tit for tat?” Giles nudged him with his knee. “Let's hear some of your backstory.”

“I'm not sure I'm very interesting.” He tried to think of something not lame. “I was in a band in Eden Prairie. We kind of sucked, but it was fun. I wrote the music most of the time. My…friend Tanner wrote the lyrics.”

Giles pressed a kiss on his hair. “Tell me more about this Tanner. I sense a story.”

Aaron didn't want to, but he suspected that was all the more reason he should. “He…was my first. Ish.” He shifted in Giles's arms, uncomfortable with the confession. “All we did was kiss and touch each other one night when we'd been drinking.”

“And it didn't go well?”

“He hasn't spoken to me since.”

Giles hugged him. “Oh, baby. I'm sorry. That's awful.”

It was. It still hurt, after all this time. “We were friends since we were young. I always loved him, but it was little-kid love. Sometimes I pretended in my head we were married, but I knew I shouldn't ever say it out loud.”

“So you knew early on you were gay.”

“I knew how I felt and what I wanted wasn't like what most people thought I should want and feel, but that went for most of my life anyway. My mom always picked out my clothes. My dad enrolled me in clubs and sports. When we had a mock election in seventh grade, he told me how to vote. Half the time he orders for me in restaurants. So the fact that I wanted to marry the wrong gender fit in with everything else—what I wanted had to be wrong. I assumed I didn't have a choice and let girls tell me we were boyfriend and girlfriend, which was easy because I just had to smile at them, hold their hands and go to dances. When I got older, it got messy, because they wanted to do more than get a peck on the mouth. I had sex with one girl once. Or rather, I tried. I couldn't get either of us off. It was awful.”

Giles kissed his hair.

Aaron ran his fingers down Giles's arm. “Tanner…God. I thought he'd always be there. I couldn't marry him, couldn't hold his hand, but we would always be friends. I figured that would be enough, and it
was
, until that night. Because
he
kissed
me
. He put
his
hand on
my
dick, told me to do the same thing. And it was so good. Like I'd been drinking dirty dishwater and somebody passed me a bottle of wine.”

“What happened? If he started it and it was so good, why did it go to hell?”

“I don't know. I've never been able to figure it out. One minute we're kissing, the next he's telling me to get out. He wouldn't tell me what was wrong, just told me to go home. I had to call my mom, and she asked why I was crying, and I couldn't say anything. Couldn't tell her the truth.”

Giles held him close. “He was a shame-and-blame. I'm so sorry.”

Aaron frowned. “What's a shame-and-blame?”

“A guy who is gay only when he wants to get off. All you are to him is a piece of meat, and when he's done with you, he wants to burn you so nobody knows what you did with him.”

That was pretty much what Tanner had done. “I can't believe he gave up all those years together, all our history, just to get off.”

“In his case, I doubt it was so simple. This wasn't Devin Mack deciding it was better to hump the gay kid than risk getting a girl pregnant. Tanner probably didn't count on his fear being bigger than your friendship. It's still a dick move, but not as callous as it feels, at least not as far as intent. That would be my guess.”

While Giles's observation might be true, it didn't make Aaron feel any better. Then the full impact of what Giles had said hit him. “Wait, are you telling me you let Devin fuck you?”

“Ah. Well, no. I'm sloppy about calling all sex fucking, no matter who's putting what into whom. To be honest, the number of times I've been in someone's ass is less than five counting you, and I've only let two people in me. Mostly it's blow jobs, frots and this move I think of in my head as the near-fuck.”

Aaron laughed. “This I need to hear.”

Giles's voice turned silky. “Oh, sweetheart, I'll
show
you.”

He put Aaron on his knees over the futon, which made Aaron's cock perk up but his sore ass clench. Instead of spreading Aaron's legs, though, Giles pushed them together.
Tight.
He pressed his cock along Aaron's crack. “Sometimes it was this—me jacking them and fucking their crack. But if I could talk them into it, I did this.”

He parted Aaron's legs wide enough to slip his cock through, then thrust back and forth. It ran the length along Aaron's balls and taint, and Aaron couldn't stop a soft moan.

Giles slipped his tongue briefly in Aaron's ear. “I'd tell them if they let me go first, they could do it to me after. Except I jacked them too, so most of the time they came too early to reciprocate. Even if they could get it up again, usually their sense of straightness returned and they bugged out.”

No wonder they hated him—Giles was a freaking manipulator. Aaron didn't have the word power to say that now, though, because Giles was still thrusting and, as he had his former conquests, jacking Aaron.

They made a hell of a mess on the futon, but Giles didn't care, only pulled a bottle of Resolve from underneath and dabbed it up with some paper towels. “I'll take the cover home and wash it over break. It's time anyway.”

While they finished up their lunch, Giles packed, and once he was done, they went over to Aaron's room to do the same.

Giles recoiled when he saw Elijah's religious paraphernalia. “Holy shit, did you land a Jesus freak or something?”

Or something.
“He's really weird. We never talk. At all.”

“That sucks. Brian is awesome. You'll have to meet him when we come back in January.”

Aaron loved the idea of January, of being back in school, of being able to hang out with Giles, having sex whenever they could get a room to themselves. “I hate how this is almost over.”

Giles kissed his cheek. “It'll be okay. We're in the same town. If you need me, I'll be over in two minutes.”

Aaron kissed his mouth, opened it as Giles's tongue nudged the seam.

The preconcert dinners were more of a pain in the ass than anything else the fourth time, and Aaron performed on autopilot, trying to think of how he was going to come out to his mom. Maybe he'd have them go out to dinner. She couldn't make a big scene then.

Maybe he should talk to Walter first, he thought as he passed on the partially thawed frozen burrito someone handed him during the concert. Walter would have good ideas about how to come out.

His mom came up to him right away after the final number, hugging him and going on about how amazing he was, how happy he seemed. She got a little teary, but for once it looked like it was because she was happy. For him.

That was nice.

He wouldn't tell her right away, he decided as she kept carrying on about the school and how quaint it was and how well he seemed to fit in at Saint Timothy. Maybe he'd wait until after Christmas. He wondered if he should do it
right
before he went back. Give her time to process, but not too much.

He excused himself from her to say goodbye to the Ambassadors and Salvo, and he and Giles went off for a private goodbye around the corner of the lobby.

This kiss was bittersweet—passionate, but everything about it said they were about to be parted and they didn't like it. Giles grabbed Aaron's ass, kneading it and pulling him close to almost grind against him. Normally Aaron would have balked at that in public—they were in an empty hallway, but anyone could come around the corner. The idea of leaving, though, of having this be the last touch until who knew when or how, meant Aaron couldn't tell Giles no.

Which was why Giles's hand was halfway down the back of his pants when he heard his mother call out in a strange voice, “Aaron?”

It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out the dark-haired woman gaping at them was Aaron's mom. Giles didn't jump back from Aaron, thinking if he pulled his hand out of Aaron's waistband slowly, they could preserve the highly minuscule possibility of Mrs. Seavers not seeing Giles's fingers in her son's ass crack. Not much he could do about having his tongue halfway down Aaron's throat, though.

Aaron had gone rigid in Giles's arms. At first he gripped Giles's waist, a seeking-comfort gesture, but he looked at his mother and let go as if scalded. Cheeks coloring, he stammered an apology to Giles.

Giles put a hand on his shoulder, rubbing gently, taking him into a subtle, comforting embrace. “It's okay. It'll be okay.”

“Giles, there you are—
oh
.”

Giles swallowed a groan.
Fantastic.
Now
his
mom was here too.

Vanessa Mulder appeared beside Mrs. Seavers, but after her initial eyebrow raise, she had a decidedly different look about her, scary for a more matchmaking kind of reason.

“Aaron, I'm so sorry,” Giles murmured.

After glancing down at their joined hands and over to his mother, Aaron drew a shaky breath and squeezed Giles's palm. “It's okay.”

The two mothers were a crazy contrast—Aaron's clearly trying to process her son making out with another guy, Giles's utterly naked in her glee at seeing her boy all partnered up. Giles didn't know which fire to put out first. What would freak Aaron out more, his own mother being repelled by his gayness, or Giles's for whipping out wedding samplers?

Keeping Aaron firmly at his side, Giles nodded politely to Mrs. Seavers. “Hi. I'm Giles Mulder. This is my mom, Vanessa, and that's my dad Tim over there. I'm…dating your son.” He turned to his own mother. “Mom, this is Aaron Seavers. My boyfriend. Who you didn't know about because this is relatively new. Though I actually know Aaron from Alvis-Henning.”

“Oh, really?” Vanessa held out her hand to Mrs. Seavers. “Hi there. So pleased to meet you. How darling is this, our sons going all the way to college to hook up? Where do you live, Oak Grove or Anoka?”

Mrs. Seavers accepted the offered hand in a kind of daze. “Oak Grove. We…haven't lived there long. Only two years.”

“We'll have to go out for coffee. I'm so sorry—I missed your name.”

“Beth.” She glanced at her son, still shell-shocked.

Aaron stared back at her, deer in headlights.

Giles didn't know what to do now. This was supposed to have been a kiss goodbye, but he couldn't very well leave Aaron now. Of course he could imagine his mother ramping up to a joint family dinner before they all pulled out of town, which would be good except Vanessa would be all about playing house while poor Beth tried to catch up. Which maybe would be what she had to do. All Giles cared about was Aaron. His mom could sink or swim.

He couldn't figure out, though, what Aaron needed.

“Is everything okay?” Vanessa glanced between the three of them, finally realizing the awkward was getting thick. “Giles? Honey? What's going on?”

Neither Seavers said anything, just kept staring at one another. Giles began to sweat. Seriously,
what
? How could he fix this for Aaron? Should he even try?

This was about Beth being surprised. This was about Aaron being scared his mother was about to reject him.