Page 116 of Their Wicked Ways

“Not really. But I can go?—”

“He was asking if you needed to leave. He wasn’t kicking you out,” Wes said gently.

“Sorry.” I scrubbed my hand over my face. “I’m being weird.”

“You’re fine,” Ez assured me. “I’m guessing you haven’t had many morning afters.”

I huffed out a laugh. “Nope. The first time I spent the night with someone was my wedding night. Although, the morning after was pretty awkward.”

“How so?” Wes asked.

“I’m not sure how to explain it without sounding like some naive kid.” I toyed with my fork. “But it didn’t really hit that we weretogethertogether until we got married.”

They exchanged a curious look but didn’t say anything.

“We grew up together. I was so used to Naomi being around that even when we were courting, things didn’t really change except we held hands a lot and people referred to us as a couple. Then we got married and spent our first night in our new house, and it all hit in the morning that it was real, and that was going to be every morning for the rest of my life.”

“That sounds like a huge change.” Wes’s tone was understanding. “A lot to deal with all at once.”

“You haven’t had any weird morning afters, have you?” I looked between them. “Not if you’ve only ever been with each other.”

Ez chuckled and glanced at Wes. “We did. Remember after homecoming?”

Wes laughed. “Like I could ever forget.”

“Wait, what happened?” I asked, perking up. “I’m sensing a story.”

“We started dating when we were in tenth grade, but because we were still in the closet, we couldn’t go to school events together or go on dates because people might see us,” Ez said. “When homecoming rolled around, we went with a couple of girlfriends.”

“Like, girlfriends, or friends who are girls?”

“Friends who are girls. They didn’t know about us, and sixteen-year-old us were too stupid to realize that asking a friend to a dance was the same as asking them out on a date.” Wes smiled ruefully. “Thankfully there wasn’t any drama because a whole group of us did it. Just kind of paired off to have an official ‘date’ for the tickets, but we spent the whole time hanging out as a group.”

“After the dance, Wes and I went back to my place because my parents were away for the weekend. Or at least they were supposed to be.”

I winced. “Please tell me they didn’t come home and catch you doing stuff.”

“Not exactly.” Wes smiled ruefully. “They came home early the next morning and found us in bed together after doing stuff.”

“Were they pissed?”

“No.” Ez laughed. “They were surprised because we never made it to my bedroom and they found us butt naked on the couch. Thank fuck we had a blanket over us, but they knew what we’d been up to.”

“And they weren’t mad?”

He shook his head. “Not about Wes and me, but I broke a house rule by having him over without asking permission first.”

“His parents made us get dressed, then his dad made a big breakfast, and we had to sit with them for over an hour making small talk and pretending like we hadn't just been outed.” Wes glanced at Ez. “Then his dad sent us out to do a shit ton of yard work as punishment for breaking the no sleepover without permission rule.”

“That’s how they found out about you?” I looked at Ez.

He nodded. “They already suspected I was gay, and they also figured that Wes and I were more than just friends, but that was when they found out for sure. At least we have one good outing story.”

“Wait. One good outing story? You’ve been outed more than once?”

Wes leaned back in his chair. “That’s the thing about being queer that sucks. You don’t just come out once. So you can be outed more than once.”

I looked between them. Was it okay to ask more questions?

---