“Me neither,” I confessed. “Like you just heard, I’m allergic to peppers. The spicier they are, the worse my reaction.”

“What happens when you have peppers?” she wondered. “When I have bananas, I break out in hives.”

“Things start to swell. Really, it’s only the truly hot ones,” I admitted.

“He started to die right there in front of me in eighth grade,” Bryson offered up. “I had to kiss him to keep him alive.”

“He had to give me CPR,” I corrected. “There was definitely no kissing involved.”

“It didn’t work, though,” Eliska offered. “His throat was swollen up so bad that they had to cut his throat open.” Eliska pointed at my throat. “They did it right there in the middle of the cafeteria. They being the paramedics.”

That was true.

It’d been the scariest moment of my life.

Bryson and Eliska’s, too.

We’d been best friends since childhood, and we’d done everything together. It only made sense that we’d all been with each other on our first near-death experiences.

“Wow,” Merriam said as she leaned forward and stared at my throat. “That’s a big ass scar.”

“It looks worse than it was,” I explained. “It grew as I grew. And I didn’t hit a growth spurt until I was in eleventh grade.”

“He was B team, the runt of the litter,” Eliska said. “Then one day, it felt like he grew an entire foot, put on fifty pounds of muscle, and beat Donny Duvic out of his starting spot on varsity. That was the best day of our lives.”

“Why is that?” Merriam asked, turning back to face Eliska.

The movement caused her backside to roll deliciously against my cock.

I tried to tell it to calm down, but the way she was squirming on top of me let me know she’d already felt it.

She didn’t get up, though, surprising the shit out of me.

“I’m hungry. You ready?” she chirped. “All this talking of wings has me wanting them now.”

“Sixth Street Wings or BWW?” I asked.

“Buffalo Wild Wings has atrocious service. SSW is the way to go,” she pointed out. “I have to go get these skates off.”

I reached down for her foot, causing her to lean forward as I did, and came back with her foot in my hands. I untied her skates and tossed them down onto the bleachers and said, “Where are your shoes?”

“They’re with my bag in that locker room beside the one y’all disappeared into,” she said.

“That’s the visitor’s locker room,” Bryson said.

I pushed up to my feet and allowed her to slide slowly down the length of my body.

When she was on her feet, she leaned back into me for a few long seconds before she pulled away and said, “It’s nice to be on dry land again.”

“You’ve been on dry land this entire time,” Gisela pointed out as she skated toward the door.

“Hey, where are y’all going?” Calliope called out as we all started to leave as a group.

“We’re going to the wings place,” Gisela called.

“What?” she asked. “There is still an hour of practice.”

“We’ve decided that we like our faces just the way they are,” Eliska called. “Call me when you’re done here, friend!”