Frat Boy and Toppy (15 page)

Collin walked fast, hands stuffed in his pockets, nervous energy all hanging out. Brad decided it was Collin’s show. He’d just wait and see.

After they passed the first bar, Collin finally spoke up. “I’m sorry.” He was walking along next to Brad, doing some weird fidgety thing: tucking his chin into his zipped-up coat collar, then pulling it out, over and over. Brad had never noticed Collin was so much shorter than him. Couldn’t be more than five eight. Couple inches shorter than Sebastian.

“You said that already. Don’t be sorry. You’re good at it.”
Not as good as Sebastian
.

Collin’s chin popped out of his collar and he stopped walking to turn to Brad. He looked kind of like a startled turtle. “Uh, thanks.” He sighed and ran a hand through his hair, looking off to the side for a second. “Listen, it’s not exactly like I made it sound, man. I mean, I sounded all into you, and I was, I guess, but I’ve had all day to think about it . . .”

Brad nudged Collin’s arm with his elbow, and they slowly started toward the bar again. Brad tried to figure out exactly what he needed to ask. “Okay, so what’d you work out?”

“I figured out I’m secretary of this fucking frat but I feel like I’m pretending to be something I’m not.”

It took Brad a minute.
Oh, duh
. “’Cause you’re gay and no one knows.”

“Yeah. Just, I ended up here and I knew I was gay, but I wanted to be part of a group of brothers or something. I thought I’d just feel it out, maybe figure out a way to tell everyone. But as soon as I became active, I was voted Pledge Chair, and since then it’s seemed like it’s not such a great idea to tell everyone I don’t want to hear them calling anyone a fucking faggot anymore.” Collin’s voice, sad at the start, had turned bitter and caustic.

“Dude, you knew you were gay and you chose this frat? I wouldn’t have done that.”

“You didn’t think you were gay when you rushed?”

“Not really. I mean, I felt different, I guess. I don’t know.” Brad shrugged and kicked at a rock in the sidewalk.

Collin nodded. “I getcha.”

He probably did.

They reached the door of the falling-down, dismal, gray-peeling-paint dive they’d been heading toward. Brad stopped and looked around. It was kind of a nice day, really. You didn’t get a lot of nice days around here in the spring. One of those days where the clouds looked like rain, but you knew they wouldn’t dare, with the sun always peeking through and making everything buttery yellow. “You really wanna go in there?”

“Nah. We’ll get plenty to drink later. Tonight’s our second rush party.”

“Shit,” Brad groaned. He was always forgetting about frat obligations unless it was something he had to help with. He made it a point to help as little as possible. He never remembered rush parties because food was almost an afterthought, so he didn’t have to be involved in the planning. As long as there was enough beer, things were good.

They turned around and walked slowly back. Brad watched his feet scuff the ground while Collin went on. “My uncle was in Theta Alpha Gamma, and he wanted me to be in it, too. We’ve always been close and he doesn’t have any kids, so I figured if I was going to join one anyway, make him happy. But fuck, man, I’ve been living in the house for a year, been active for almost two, I’ve held, like, ten different offices, and I feel completely isolated. You know?”

Well, Brad could lie, but, “Not really.” Collin scowled at him, so he tried to explain. “Dude, I joined because I needed cheap housing and they offered me a scholarship if I’d pledge. I never really cared about brotherhood stuff before I pledged, and after, it was sort of a bonus. I guess maybe I felt it at first, but not so much lately.” Weird, he hadn’t even noticed that.

“That’s the first thing that made me think you might be gay.”

“What?”

“You started isolating yourself. My first year you were more involved and you hung out a lot, but now if it’s not in the kitchen or part of the morning workouts, you avoid it. You even started being kind of a dick to Kyle.”

“Yeah,” Brad said softly, “guess I have.”

“One day about a month ago, Eddie was giving you shit in the TV room about some girl he hooked up with and you said, ‘You can have her, man.’“

“
That’s
what made you sure I was gay? Pretty thin.”

“You looked at my ass every single time I bent over in the shower, dude.”

“I
knew
you were doing that on purpose! Fuck! Of course I looked.”

Collin was smiling, but trying to hide it in his collar. Sort of trying to hide it. He slowed down, the smile melting off. He started kicking the ground. “Nah. It was when I placed that stupid bet, you know? I didn’t even mean to; Ricky was going on about it. Asking me what I thought. It just sort of slipped out.”

“Then a twenty slipped out of your wallet?”

Collin flushed and glanced at Brad. “Yeah. After that, you started being weird around me. Sorry.”

“S’okay, man.” Surprisingly, he actually meant it.

Even though they’d been walking slowly, they were less than a block from the house now. “Listen, I thought: you were gay, I was gay, we’re in the same frat; let’s be gay together,” Collin said quickly. Brad looked at him skeptically. “And yeah, I like you,” Collin admitted. “But I’m not, like, broken-hearted. I’m lonely.”

So he was looking for love in other places? “You hooking up with Toby?”

“Just that one night: the party. You went after Sebastian that night, didn’t you?”

“Yeah.” They stopped next to a telephone pole for a minute, within sight of the house. He didn’t think Collin had said everything he wanted to say, and Brad had something he wanted to know. He started to ask, but Collin beat him to it.

“You work things out with him?”

Oh, man. There was Brad’s goofy smile again. He looked at the ground, embarrassed. Collin snorted softly and looked away. “Yeah,” Brad told him finally.

“Good. Really, I mean it. You seem kinda into him,” he added dryly.

Brad bit his lips together to keep from smiling more. He needed a change of subject, and maybe someone else’s opinion. “You ever think about coming out to the frat now?”

Collin looked startled. “Not anymore. Maybe if I wasn’t so involved.”

Brad nodded and looked up at the frat house. It was nearly the same color as that dive bar. Another thing he’d never noticed before. At least it was in better shape. Kind of.

“Are you thinking about it?” Collin asked.

“I don’t know.”

“Fuck,” Collin muttered to the telephone pole. “Every time I think about how the guys might react . . . I think I’m giving myself an ulcer.”

“Yeah, see, that’s the thing. I guess I’m not really sure I care how they react.”

“Hey!” They both turned to the frat at Julian’s yell. He was standing on the porch in yellow rubber gloves and an apron. “Get your asses in here and help us get ready for this party tonight!” Then he turned and stomped back inside.

“You ever think Jules’s gay?” Brad asked as they started toward the house again.

Collin snorted. “No.”

Sebastian spent a lazy Sunday morning watching Brad work in his kitchen, making blueberry pancakes with maple syrup and bacon for breakfast. The pancakes were nearly freaking orgasmic. They would have been
truly
orgasmic if he’d eaten them off Brad’s naked body.

Unfortunately, his roommates were there.

Brad made enough blueberry pancakes for them, too. He set a stacked serving plate on the table, then sat down to eat with Sebastian and Toby. Paul wandered in, scowled in Brad’s general direction, and said, “Morning, Sebastian. Hey, Toby.”

Sebastian looked up at Paul pointedly, looked at Brad, then looked back at Paul. Paul ignored him and sat down at the table, muttering to himself.

Toby kept his head down, shoveling in pancakes. Like he wanted to get while the getting was good and then get gone.

Sebastian watched Brad. Instead of seeming pissed or any of the other things Sebastian found himself worried about—confused or stunned or, worst of all, hurt—Brad looked amused. He stayed amused all through the mutterings and scowling. Then Paul said, “Where’d these pancakes come from?”

Sebastian found it hard to be as amused by Paul’s sucky attitude as Brad was. He smiled now, though. Broadly. “Brad made them. He’s a really good cook, yeah?”

“They’re awful,” Paul said nastily, then took another two from the serving plate and picked up the syrup pitcher.

Just as the syrup started oozing out, Brad grabbed the plate out from under the pitcher and took it to the garbage.

Paul stared, surprised, as the syrup poured out on the table. “Hey!” He hastily set the pitcher down and stood up, shoving his chair back and turning to Brad. Toby finally stopped pretending to be deaf and dumb and looked up in interest.

Brad very deliberately stared at Paul as he dumped the pancakes in the garbage. The expression on his face was pretty scary, and Paul wisely stayed quiet. He still looked pissed, though, hands fisted, teeth clenched.

It appeared Brad didn’t take insults to his cooking skills well.

Once the pancakes had splatted their way into the garbage, Brad took the plate to the sink, rinsed it, and then got a washcloth wet. He carried it, dripping, to Paul and dropped it on the table in front of him. “When you’re done cleaning up your mess, you’re excused.”

Paul turned red. He sputtered at Brad a few seconds before he rounded on Sebastian. “If you’re going to have jocks over, you could at least make them behave!”

Then he stomped out of the room.

Toby snorted. “Paul’s whack.”

Brad sat back down, but he wasn’t eating, he was just looking at his plate.

“Sorry about that,” Sebastian said.

Brad finally looked at him. He appeared annoyed and disgusted, but not hurt. Sebastian’s breath came a little easier. He wasn’t sure how to fix a hurt Brad. Well, except for taking him back to bed. “I’m not cleaning it up,” he told Sebastian.

Sebastian shrugged. “I say we leave it for Paul.”

“Fine with me,” Toby said between bites. He swallowed his last mouthful of food and wiped his face, then leaned back in his chair and smiled as only the well-fed grad student could. “Frat Boy, those were some amazing pancakes. Feel free to stay overnight anytime.”

Sebastian lifted an eyebrow at Brad as Toby wandered out of the room. Brad shrugged. “It’s a better nickname than my fraternity brothers gave me.”

“Which was?”

“At first they called me ‘Fellator.’ ’Cause of my last name, you know? Feller; Fellator.”

Sebastian grinned at him. “Yeah, but what do they call you now?”

Brad turned pink and cleared his throat. “Um, they call me Alpha Dawg.”

Sebastian stood up and rounded the table, draped his arms over Brad’s shoulders and leaned down to speak in his ear. Brad tilted his head to make room for him. “Oh, but honey, they have that wrong. You’re not the alpha dog. I am.” He caught Brad’s earlobe between his teeth and watched goosebumps prickle Brad’s skin.

“Yeah,” Brad agreed. “I think you are.”

Sebastian took Brad back to bed.

Brad didn’t go back to the frat until Sunday evening. He’d finished his homework at Sebastian’s. Then Sebastian had rewarded him for being a good student.

He’d been wearing his glasses while rewarding Brad.

Brad wanted to be a good student again at the earliest opportunity.

Back at TAG house, as Brad was walking up the stairs, Ashley was skipping down them, smiling and humming to herself. She looked up and saw Brad, smiling bigger.

Then she recognized him. “Shit,” she muttered.

Brad cleared his throat and rubbed his ear. “Uh, hey, Ashley.”

“Brad.” She nodded. Then flicked a look over his shoulder. The smile came back, but it was fake now. Julian was probably down there.

“Hanging out with Kyle?”

“Yeah.” Some of her real smile fought its way back. “Collin was gone all afternoon, too. We just hung out and, um, studied.”

Julian had a coughing fit behind them. Ashley snorted at him.

“Brad, you know how we were talking about getting together for coffee sometime and talking?”