Kieran & Drew (3 page)

She deflated, and he immediately felt guilty and ridiculous at the same time. He didn’t enjoy playing the role of parent; it felt completely unnatural.

“Alright, I’m sorry I asked. I know how you feel aboutthat.”

He sighed. “Mom, you know Mr. Gullbeck is moving away soon, you can’t rely on him to always be there to help calm your nerves. And I’m not willing to find a… a
dealer
for you either.” He’d bet good money that none of his friends had ever had this conversation with their mothers.

“I just thought that maybe I could… stock up?” She shrugged, looking helpless.

 

“Or you could not smoke at all,” he tried.

His neighbor, a middle-aged bachelor perhaps as strange as his own mother, was a good enough guy who, on the odd occasion, sold his mother weed for her nerves. He was, however, in the process of trying to sell his house. “We’ll find a healthier way for you to get over your nerves, mom. I promise.” He knew he shouldn’t make such promises, but he was becoming desperate to just drop the subject.

“You’re right. Of course, sweetie.”

He took his plate over to the sink, ran it under the hot tap, and then left it on the draining board to dry. “I’m kind of tired, Mom. I think I’ll turn in.”

“Good night, honey. I’ll see you in the morning.”
“Night.”

He made his way upstairs, leaving her to sit at the kitchen table alone. He took a quick shower and then pulled on a pair of boxers before plugging his headphones into his laptop and turning it on. He sat at his desk, checking his e-mail, and then, after a quick glance at his closed bedroom door, he typed the address of a porn site he favored into the browser.

He slumped in his chair, then flattened his hand against his stomach and slid it under his boxers to just gently roll his balls in his hand. He grimaced and turned down the volume when the woman onscreen screeched as the guy behind her took it up a notch. Drew felt a slight stirring but otherwise wasn’t into it. He clicked the Home icon to return to his homepage, bit his lip, and then typed in something else.

Images appeared on screen that immediately made his mouth go dry. He clicked on a video, and ten seconds later his dick was as hard as stone. He quickly stood to find the moisturizer he kept in his sock drawer, and pulled his underwear down just beneath his ass when sitting back down.

His breath caught on the first stroke. He wanted to draw it out, but he was already sliding his hand up and down his cock in a firm stroke, picking up tempo and squeezing over his head. He focused on the man in the video who was bent over at the waist, and imagined what it’d be like to fuck him. He wanted to do that. He wanted it so bad.

He felt his groin tighten when the muscular man topping anchored the breathless, flushed guy beneath him by the shoulder and started to ram into him. He gasped as he reached climax and reached blindly for the box of tissues he kept by his desk.

His breath slowly returned to normal, and he cleaned up, deleted his browser history, and shut down his laptop. He climbed into bed and replayed the video in his mind. He wished there was someone he knew like that, someone who was like him who he could fuck. He placed his forearm over his mouth to stifle an unhappy groan. He was getting hard again.

He didn’t want to feel this way. He just wanted an easy life, but his body was not confused and knew exactly what he wanted. He rolled over onto his stomach and closed his eyes. With no sounds in the house other than what he could hear of his mom tinkering about downstairs, he tried to unwind enough to sleep. He just wanted to sleep. He wanted an easier life than this, and he wanted to sleep.

ChAptEr TwO.

K
IERAN wondered if it was normal for teachers to hate him as well as the students. To be fair, it was just the one teacher who always looked at him witheringly, and he knew he was probably being dramatic, but Mr. Trinder had never liked him, not ever. Perhaps it had something to do with Kieran thinking art was kind of dumb and never really making an effort to hide it.

If it weren’t for the fact that he got to sit next to Drew Anderson for the next hour, he’d probably skip the class altogether. However, he noticed Drew was late. The idea was both a relief and a disappointment.

“Hey, Kieran.”

Kieran looked up to see… what was his name? Oh, Toby Bennett. Toby was of the alternative persuasion and one of the few people who for some reason occasionally said hi to him.

“Hi, Toby, how’s things?” he asked quietly.

“Not bad, not bad at all.” Toby made his way over to his own desk, shooting Kieran a smile that seemed a touch smug, or perhaps knowing. Either way it was confusing, and Kieran shrugged it off.

While the last few students filed in, he opened his notepad and doodled. He rested his chin in his free hand. He was pretty sure they’d probably be deconstructing Picasso’s cubism again today. Like he even gave a fuck. He’d rather be doing this if he had to be doing something artistic. He drew a heart around the initials K.A. + D.A., smiling faintly, and doodled “always” in stupid bubble writing underneath.

His crush was stupid, he knew, but he couldn’t help finding Drew Anderson gorgeous any more than he could help breathing. It was the forearms that’d done it for him. While Drew was not stocky as, say, the almighty douche Adam Jefferson, Drew had a kind of sinewy muscled frame to him. His arms were thick, peppered with faint hair, and flexed in a way that made Kieran’s mouth go dry. They brushed arms once, in fact, quite accidentally, and he’d had to excuse himself to the bathroom.

Drew was tall without being too tall, nice without being smug, and had an almost beach boy type of vibe without being too laid-back. He absolutely ticked all Kieran’s secret boxes, but had to be (Kieran hoped) completely oblivious to his crush. He wondered what Drew, if he were likewise inclined, would see when looking at him?

One of the things he supposed made people think he was weird was probably the way he dressed. One day he might wear flip-flops, beach shorts, and a T-shirt. And on any other he might be rocking baggy, low riding jeans and a Hawaiian shirt and beanie hat. He supposed a nice way to put it was that he could be a little offbeat. A horrible way to put it was that he looked fucking weird at times. He didn’t give it too much thought, really, and just wore whatever wasn’t too creased and didn’t smell bad.

Other than that, he was of average height and quite slim, had brown hair and blue eyes, and was super quiet. He shaded in the heart he was doodling and thought,
nah
; he wouldn’t be into him either, in Drew’s shoes.

He glanced up to check where the teacher was and noted that he was leaning over his own desk with a frown, reading something. He took the opportunity to lean down and snag up his backpack. Having missed breakfast that morning, he desperately needed to nibble on something. He took a bite of his Snickers.

“Hi.”
And choked.

“Whoa, you okay?” Drew laughed, patting him on the back and setting his own backpack down under the table at the same time.

Oh my God, he’s touching my back
, was the thought running through his mind as he coughed. Eventually he managed to clear his throat, and with eyes watering and cheeks bright red, he looked at Drew and nodded.
Great, that’s
gotta
look sexy. Well done, Kieran.

“I’m fine, thanks.”
“Appleby, are you quite done?”

With dawning horror Kieran looked to the front of the class where Mr. Trinder stood, one eyebrow raised in question. The rest of the students were turned in their seats, looking at him with various expressions that ranged from “what is wrong with that guy?” to “fucking freak.” He wanted to curl up and disappear.

“S-sorry,” he managed.

Mr. Trinder offered a final tired look before going back to handing out the large A3 pieces of paper draped over his arm. Looked like they were drawing again today. When the snickering eventually died down around him, he dared a look at Drew. Drew was frowning slightly, looking at something on Kieran’s side of the desk. Kieran followed his eye’s line and was mortified to realize Drew was looking at the notebook that lay open with its stupid but nonetheless damning doodles there for all to see.

With a quiet gasp, he slammed the notebook closed and folded his arms over it. At the same time, he sensed someone standing next to him and looked up to see Mr. Trinder staring back at him. He could tell by the tick in his cheek that the teacher was not having a good day and had quite obviously run out of patience.

“Passing notes,
really
?” Mr. Trinder asked, clearly resigned and beyond annoyed. He made a “give it to me” gesture with his hand. “Hand it over, now.”

Kieran’s eyes widened in horror, and he looked at Drew, who was staring back at him with a blank, unreadable expression. He looked back at his teacher. “I-I wasn’t passing notes, honest,” he choked out quietly. A glance forward confirmed that the class was once again watching him.
Oh God
.

“I said give it here,” Mr. Trinder said firmly. “Now, Kieran.” “He wasn’t passing notes, sir,” Drew offered.

Mr. Trinder glanced between the two of them, and with a sigh, reached to take the notebook from Kieran. Kieran acted instinctually, and when the notebook was nearly out of his grasp, he scrambled and tore out the front page. Gasps and startled laughter erupted around him when, without thinking, he quickly crumpled the paper and shoved it into his mouth.

He could feel his face turning scarlet as Mr. Trinder stared at him, as shocked as the rest of the class. To his mortification, he could feel his eyes begin to actually sting as the laughter with intermittent whispered comments of “oh my God, he’s so fucking weird” ricocheted around him. He cut a glance at Drew to see if he was laughing at him too, but was only further appalled to see a distinct look of pity instead. He looked back at his teacher when sensing Mr. Trinder leaning close.

The teacher spoke firmly and in a low voice. “I want you to collect your things, go to the bathroom, spit that out, and then go and wait for me in my office. Understand?”

Kieran nodded unhappily, gathered his bag, and left as swiftly as he could without running.

D
REW had never in his entire life felt as bad for another person as he did for Kieran in art class that morning. He was still trying to make sense of what he’d seen in Kieran’s notebook and which ultimately had ended up in his mouth. He knew he’d seen both their initials and a doodling of hearts. It was pretty hard to misunderstand what that meant. But he reasoned that he couldn’t be the only person with those initials, surely? But then why would Kieran shove the paper in his
mouth
?

It’d been easy to see the clear-cut humiliation on the poor guy’s face. Kieran had a hard enough time as it was, without drawing attention to himself like he had today. Though he’d never thought of the super-quiet guy he sat next to in art class as a weirdo like others seemed to, he had to acknowledge that Kieran was most definitely marching to a beat all of his own.
Thing was, he kind of liked that.

Yeah, sometimes he dressed a little… differently. And yes, Drew never saw Kieran hanging out with anyone else or even talking to anyone else, but that didn’t necessarily mean he wasn’t an okay guy. In fact, Drew sort of admired someone who was brave enough to break away from the herd. He thought about Jefferson, and how he put up with the guy’s attitude and bullshit for the sake of keeping the peace. If he were braver, like Kieran, then maybe he too would have told Adam to go fuck himself a long time ago.

The idea of approaching Kieran now was an uncomfortable one. He couldn’t do it without acknowledging what he’d seen in that notebook. But the idea of leaving him to stew and fret over the next time they bumped into each other seemed worse, somehow. He had to at least let him know it was okay. If the initials hadn’t been his? Well then the decent thing seemed to be to tell him to pay no mind to what anyone else said or thought, and that he was okay in Drew’s books. And if they had been his initials….

That required some thinking. It was a subject that he’d as yet been unable to acknowledge to himself. How did he feel about the prospect of another guy maybe being into him? He thought about it and had to admit, it was a little… stirring. Not exciting in a looking-forward-toyour-birthday kind of way. Exciting in an… off-balance, nervous kind of way.

All of his friends had had girlfriends; they’d had that exhilarated feeling of doing something sexual and new for the first time. His few (very few) fumbles with the opposite sex so far had been nothing but stressful and obligatory. So far, he’d felt nothing but resigned and almost cheated out of something he bet his friends didn’t think twice about. The idea of there being someone else like him in school? It was nerve-wracking but kind of cool.

Kieran himself? He’d never given it thought. He never had a reason to. Put a gun to his head and… yeah, he’d have to admit the guy was kind of cute. Not hot as in porno-guy hot, but cute in a preppy and offbeat-with-big-blue-eyes kind of way. He felt himself grow warm; he’d never actually allowed himself to think that way… in a
gay
way.

He didn’t want to get ahead of himself, though. For all he knew, he could be making shit up out of wishful thinking. But at the very least, he felt he should go check if Kieran was okay and all. A few more minutes and the bell would ring for school to let out. He discreetly pulled his cell out of his pocket and texted Matt that he’d be fifteen minutes late meeting him at the front gate.

He had a feeling he knew exactly where Kieran would be. Last year Drew and some other guys had been screwing around with a football outside the art department and the predictable happened: they broke a window, and as a result, he received detention by Mr. Trinder.

T
HISwas quite possibly the shittiest day of Kieran’s life. He was used to feeling awkward and uncomfortable around other students, but today had to be one of the most embarrassing days on record so far for him. He couldn’t decide what was worse; that he had shoved that piece of paper in his mouth, looking like a freak in front of everyone, or that Drew had seen what was doodled on the paper.