Page 30 of College Town

He trailed off when Tommy narrowed his eyes at him, half-suspicious, half-accusatory.

“What?”

“Dude,” Tommy said. “I took my shirt off.”

“And I’m super appreciative of that.”

“We’re literally making out right now.”

“Right. Yeah. Again:superappreciative.”

“Jesus, you idiot.” Tommy was straddling his waist, and the scrape of denim over the sensitive skin of Lawson’s stomach had been driving him insane the past five minutes. Now, Tommy reached around behind himself to where Lawson was tenting the front of his own jeans, andgrabbedhim.

Lawson squeaked. His whole body spasmed as if electrocuted.

“Who cares what they’re doing,” Tommy said, hand tracing the shape of Lawson’s cock through his jeans and boxers, gaze going half-lidded. “I’m worried about what we’re doing.”

“Uh-huh…yeah.”

“If I put my mouth on your dick, will you stop being so stupid?”

“Definitely not. You should do it, though. You know. If you want.”

Tommy smirked…but it melted into a true smile as he lowered himself down to lie between Lawson’s thighs.

~*~

Two days later, Noah had football practice, and Tommy had to stay late for an extra credit Spanish assignment; it was the one subject he truly sucked at, and their teacher was adamant no one fail.

Lawson was going to meet him outside Señora Kitteridge’s trailer classroom at four-thirty, and until then, he and Dana sat on a bench overlooking the practice fields, passing a cigarette back and forth beneath the shade of two interlaced crepe myrtles. If Coach Stevens had seen the wisps of smoke curling up from their fingers, he didn’t stop barking at his players long enough to reprimand them.

It was two days in which Lawson had thought of little else beside what had played out in his bed, in a drowsy patch of afternoon sunlight, and before he could think better of it, he blurted, “Do you and Noah fuck?”

She skated him a cool look, brows lifted, and exhaled a slow stream of smoke. “What?”

Lawson pushed a hand through his hair, and found that sweat had beaded along his forehead; his palms prickled. “Sex. Do you guys, like…” He shrugged, and glanced away from her. They were best friends, yeah, but they’d never talked about that before. It left him squirmy inside, though he was desperately curious.

“Do we have sex?” she asked, expectant.

“Yeah.”

She was silent a beat, and then he felt her fingers against his: she was trying to pass him the cigarette. “Take a breath before you pass out.”

“I’m not about to pass out.” But he took a drag and it helped a little. When he turned to regard Dana, she was smiling at him, small and amused.

“Why do you want to know?”

He shrugged.

“You’ve never–” She cut herself off with a gasp, eyes widening. “Wait. Did you and Tommy–”

“Dana–”

“You did!” She snatched the cigarette back. “Tell meeverything.”

Lawson glanced away from her, and out across the field, seeing nothing but a blur of white and blue practice jerseys, fingers peeling at the flaking paint on the edge of the bench. The funny thing was, he’d always thought he would tell her everything, when he finally cashed in his V card. That he’d want to tell her. The two of them thick as thieves, splitting off to have separate experiences, but coming together again after to gossip and laugh over their own stupidity. Nursing each other’s half-broken hearts, toasting two cigarettes together and shaking their heads over their foolish teenage exploits.

But Tommy didn’t feel like a teenage exploit, foolish or otherwise.

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