Praise Me [BL]

Chapter 22

I stared at him for a long minute. "You-? You know I'm dating Caesar too, right? I thought it was kind of implied..?" He stared at me just as long before letting out a heavy sigh. My eyes widened when he opened his car door and went to get out. "What're you doing?"

"I was waiting for you to tell me you were joking." He opened the backseat and grabbed a baseball bat.

"What're you doing?! Why do you have that in the car?!"

"Safety." He answered like it was obvious. "C'mon."

"What- Declan!" I grabbed his arm. "Where are you going?"

"I thought we were going to have dinner?"

"We?"

"Yeah." He shook my arm off and started walking inside. "What's he making?"

I stared at him in disbelief while the baseball bat loosely hung from his fist. He looked nothing but casual the whole elevator ride up, he even nodded at the receptionist.

I couldn't form any words when he knocked on the door and waited patiently, like he wasn't carrying a baseball bat and coming over uninvited. When Caesar opened the door, he looked just as surprised. "Hey?"

"'Sup." Declan greeted. "I heard you're making dinner."

"Yeah." Caesar spoke slowly and let his eyes trail over to me in question.

"Cool, I'm hungry."

Caesar shut the door after we were both inside. I awkwardly took my shoes off and set my bag down while Declan walked into the kitchen. "Um-" I scratched my cheek nervously, "I don't know why he came."

He stared at the baseball bat cautiously. "Why does he..?"

"Sorry.." I cringed.

"It's alright." Caesar ruffled my hair but still looked confused as to why he had a baseball bat. "We bought enough food so it's fine." He joined Declan in the kitchen and started sifting through the many grocery bags on the counter.

"Morgan's sleeping so just don't, like, scream or anything."

"Morgan, huh?" Declan hummed thoughtfully.

Caesar glanced up. "You still looking for him?"

Declan shrugged. "Are you not worried?"

"About..?"

"You tell me."

"Declan." I kicked his foot under the bar table. "Go home."

Caesar raised an eyebrow. "If it's about Morgan, no. If you were serious, you would've talked to him by now." He took out a few vegetables. "You keep glaring at me and you brought a baseball bat, so I'm assuming it's something else though."

Declan's eyes narrowed on him. "How long have we been friends?"

"Ninth grade, I think? Maybe longer."

"Yes, ninth grade. That's like-" He stopped and counted on his fingers, "-I don't know, it's a long fuckin' time though. I know when you got your first girlfriend, lost your virginity, I backed you up when that senior beat the ever living shit out of you-"

"Dude-"

"Remember when your dad beat your ass because we took his alcohol and you told him you forced me to even though it was me?" Declan dropped a hand on my head. "We've been best friends for a while but you can't even fucking tell me you're hooking up with my little brother?"

"Like- what did you think I was gonna do? Tell you to fuck off and leave him alone? I'd rather it be you instead of some fucking creep because I know you'll treat him right, but you seriously couldn't just tell me? I thought we had enough respect for each other for at least that. It's not like I wanted you to get down and beg for my permission."