Love 'N' Stuff [boyxboy]

Love 'n' Stuff [Original Slash] {07}

Matt

Eventually I managed to soothe my burning cheeks and, while my heart rate was still not exactly what one might call normal, it had slowed significantly since I’d been overcome with the impulse to kiss my best friend on the forehead while my left foot actuallytouched the boxers on the floor.

Forcing myself not to think about it, I grabbed a clean pair of boxers from Freddie’s wardrobe – a heart-rate-quickening feat in itself – and returned to Jack’s room, hesitantly knocking on the door before I entered. I wasn’t sure I could handle the sight of Freddie if he had arisen from the bed, still naked from the waist down.

‘Are you decent?’ I asked, trying to inject a joking quality into my voice so I’d sound normal.

‘Hilarious,’ I heard him mutter from inside, which I took as my cue to enter.

‘Here,’ I said, tossing the boxers at him and turning around to leave again.

‘Hang on a sec,’ Freddie said, and I stopped, frozen on the spot, as I heard him rustling around, pulling on the underwear. Then the sound of him padding across the small room and suddenly he was behind me, beside me, weirdly close, then pushing past me out into the hall. ‘Breakfast?’ he asked, grinning, tilting his head towards the kitchen.

Still slightly shaken by his brief proximity, I shook my head slightly and followed him out of the room. Why did part of me feel like he’d done that on purpose? I scowled at myself. Because you want to believe he did, I answered myself scornfully, dropping onto the couch beside Benny again as Freddie lounged into the kitchen and poured himself a bowl of cereal. I could see Benny peering at me concernedly from the corner of my eye, but I glared determinedly at the screen, ignoring them both.

Benny 

Not for the first time, I found myself wishing time would speed up and I could get out of this awkward situation. That I could blink and suddenly it would be three weeks, months, years from now when all of this was sorted out and we would all have degrees and boyfriends and an iota of normality in our lives.

But no, instead I got to sit there as Freddie lazily munched on his Cheerios and smouldered an intense, inappropriate gaze at Matt from across the room, while beside me Matt stared resolutely at Jeremy Kyle telling off an alcoholic mother for leaving her child in the care of drug dealers while she went on a bender and emitted waves of confusion and uncertainty in my direction.

I swallowed nervously. ‘So, good night?’ I bleated, then cringed. In an effort to bring conversation into the room and possibly alleviate some of the tension – mostly sexual – I instead managed to bring up something which, I could immediately tell, was somehow off-limits.

‘Fine,’ Freddie curtly, and I knew that was the end of that line of questioning.

‘Going to college today?’ I enquired breezily; selfish as it was, I wanted him to leave. Matt and I were the Arts students, we were the only ones allowed to skip lectures like this. He was Med-head for fuck’s sake, what if he missed a lecture on using those paddle thingies? I wouldn’t want him to be my doctor if that was the sort of casual attitude he took to his lessons.

‘Think I’ll stay here today,’ he said lazily, never taking his gaze off his best friend. Freddie was hot – really hot, even I could admit that – but even though he was confidently aiming his dark-lashed gaze at Matt, I could sense a sort of nervous hesitancy which, though I was starting to sort of hate him, I found him endearing. At least he wasn’t the arrogant prick he’d had every opportunity to become, seeing as every guy except me who clapped eyes on him seemed to want him. ‘What about you?’