Page 76 of Unrecognizable Player

I just wanted to let you know I have something going on I have to focus on right now. I just need to take a break from being online to work on something in real life. If you need anything, of course I still want you to reach out.

And in the meantime, I want you to try and reach out to people in real life too. I know it’s scary, but I believe in you. I know you can do it. You’re so much better than you think you are. And you deserve all the best things in life, because no matter what you say, you’re a good person.

Bye for now.

Horror boy

I stare at the message, reading it through a few times before putting the phone down.

He sounds exactly like Stef. Telling me I deserve to be happy. That I’m a good person.

I know he’s stopping our conversations after we shared those new pictures and it sounds like he got a new boyfriend. He doesn’t want to be unfaithful to this guy he likes in real life and his loyalty is one of the things I like most about him, so how can I be mad about that?

But it’s like he knows me. Like he has this insight into my soul. And there’s a part of me that’s scared to lose that. But him telling me he believes in me, I don’t know, that means something.

I think about Stef sleeping in the next room because he stayed up all night to make sure I was okay, and I kind of believe him for once.

When it starts gettingdark out, I knock on Stef’s door and wait for an answer. When I don’t get one, I think about walking away, but I know he’d do the same for me. He’d want me to make sure he doesn’t mess up his sleep schedule.

I open the door slowly, making sure he’s not naked or anything.

He’s in bed with his back to me. His bare arms over the comforter. His back glowing in the moonlight flooding around the drapes. His hair fanned out over the pillow. My gut clenches at how fucking beautiful he is. How perfect he looks lying there like that.

I come around the bed and crouch down beside him, allowing myself a couple of seconds of his face in sleep before I wake him up.

Imagine getting to wake up next to him every morning. Imagine getting to look at him whenever I want. Being able to call him my boyfriend. Knowing he’s mine. Getting to take care of each other, every day. Have each other’s backs. Be a team. Forever.

He opens his eyes before I have a chance to wake him up. When he sees me creeping on him, he flinches.

“Sorry.” I back away, standing up and holding my hands out. “I thought I’d better wake you up.”

“Why?” he asks, rubbing his eyes and yawning. When he lifts his arms I catch the fair hair in his pits and it causes heat to pool in the pit of my stomach.

He turns and catches me looking, and I can’t even hide it anymore.

“Stef.”

I take the few steps to the bed and put my knee on the mattress so I can reach him. That split second before my face comes close enough to kiss him, I see something in his eyes and it tells me he wants this too.

He sighs into my mouth the second our lips make contact and it feels like…finally.

I press my chest against his, feeling the heat radiating off him through the sheets. I hold his face in my hands, letting go, feeling like ten tons of weight has just been shucked off my shoulders.

I kiss his face. Brushing my lips across his cheeks, his chin, his jawline, ears, hair, nose, eyelids, until he’s laughing and pushing me away.

“Alexei, what are you doing?”

“I’m kissing you.”

“I know but…” he bites his lip. His cute little teeth making my chest ache.

“Don’t you want me to?”

“Yes, I want you to.”

I dive back in. He opens his legs under the comforter to invite me closer and I press my whole body against his, groaning into his open mouth.

His hands find my face, run through my hair. He stops when he comes into contact with the fresh cut on my head.

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