Love, Hypothetically[Theta Alpha Gamma 02 ] (8 page)

Sebastian’s customary slightly mocking smile appeared. “Don’t ask me. And let’s hope it’s not a hypothetical kind of love.”
They sat there in silence for a few minutes before Paul realized he was exhausted and Brad had fallen asleep, head in Sebastian’s lap.
“He gets up ridiculously early every morning to work in the college’s organic garden. This is the latest he’s stayed up in a month.” Sebastian looked down at Brad as he spoke, brushing fingers through his hair. Before Paul could do more than nod, Sebastian changed the subject. “We’re having a party on Saturday. You should come.”
Paul shrugged glumly. “I don’t really think I’ll be in a partying mood, but thank you.” He’d remembered to thank him. He was getting better at this social aptitude thing.
“Brad’s whole frat will be here,” Sebastian said, as if that was some kind of enticement. “The eye candy should be good. We can hold up the wall and ogle the straight boys together.”
Okay, that was tempting, but Paul felt somehow dirty just thinking about eye candy when things with Trevor were unresolved. If he could look at eye candy with Trevor, well, that would be different. He shrugged again.
Sebastian carefully traced the whorl of his boyfriend’s ear.
He had to leave. Just watching Sebastian and Brad together made his chest ache, and Brad wasn’t even awake. This couldn’t be good for him. “I should let you guys go to bed.”
“Guess you should,” Sebastian agreed, barely glancing up at him.
Neither of them moved, except for Sebastian’s fingers in Brad’s hair. “How long have I known you?” he asked Paul quietly.
Paul let his head loll on the back of his chair. “I don’t know. A few years.”
“You’ve never had a boyfriend that I’ve known of.”
“Neither did you.”
“No, but I didn’t care.”
Paul decided pretending he hadn’t cared either was futile.

When he got back to his dorm room, he was so tired he could barely drag his feet up the stairs, but he couldn’t fall asleep once he’d brushed his teeth and dropped into bed. Something kept playing through his head: right before he’d left, Sebastian had roused Brad enough to get him off the couch. Shuffling off to bed, Brad had mumbled, “Sounds like you can be right or you can be happy,” over his shoulder to Paul.

He didn’t know where that had come from. Some dream Brad was having or delusion or . . . But it seemed apropos, didn’t it? He hadn’t thought any of this was about him being right. It was about him not being taken advantage of and having been wronged. How could being right have anything to do with being wronged?

Ah. A logic puzzle.
Lying there, watching the wind make leafy shadow patterns on the ceiling, Paul started to suspect he’d invested too much of his life in being right and very little in being happy.

For a guy with so many muscles, Brad understood a lot about things Paul seemed to not have much of a clue about. He hoped Sebastian appreciated what he had.

The muscles were a definite bonus.
Trevor had thick, bulging arm muscles, but it wasn’t about the way they looked so much as the way they felt around Paul’s body. Sometimes it had felt like a cradle and sometimes a cage, and both sensations had their charms. He could recognize now that the feelings hadn’t been just physical, but emotional.
When Trevor held him, Paul felt wanted. But had Trevor felt wanted in return? He couldn’t say, and it was suddenly incredibly, earth-shatteringly important to be certain that Trevor knew how much Paul had wanted him, nine years ago and during the past two days.
The thought that Trevor had believed it when Paul said he didn’t want to love him was enough to stop his heart. It was enough to drag him out of bed at 1:18 a.m., when he couldn’t take the pain anymore that had started out dull and become sharp. It was enough to send him digging through his paperwork from the tutoring center to find Trevor’s email address.
But unfortunately, it wasn’t enough to help him figure out what to write. He knew—as presumably every other idiot on the planet did—that it was in very poor taste to break up by email, but could one make up by email?
Did he have a choice?
Not at—he checked the clock again—1:43.
Besides, they wouldn’t actually be making up. Paul would be making the first overture toward making up. Surely that was acceptable.
I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it.
Oh, that was just pitiful. Certainly someone with his education could do better than that.
I’m very sorry. It’s possible I’m terminally stupid. Please forgive what I said.
That didn’t cast him in the best light, did it? And when it came down to it, he wanted to appear worth the time to try having a relationship with, if that was a possibility.
I’m sorry. I forgive you.
Horribly condescending. Did he have any business dispensing forgiveness after what he’d done? No.
I’m sorry. That part seemed impossible to avoid. Can we talk about it, please? I’m afraid to lose you again.
Well, that just laid his heart on the line. Which was what Trevor deserved, wasn’t it? Short of actually using the words, “I want you,” the message was clear enough, wasn’t it?
Dammitall. Paul hit send.

e spent Thursday in the tutoring center, where he was visited by the usual parade of morons and miscreants— including three softball players, who he attempted to think of more positively than his other clients—while he tried not to check his email every thirty seconds.

Every three minutes had to be enough.
Trevor never responded to him.
On Friday morning, Paul decided he had to take

stronger action, and he went to the Athletic Department. The receptionist ignored him when he cleared his throat unobtrusively to get her attention. He cleared his throat obtrusively with pretty much the same result.

She glanced up from the pile of mail she was attacking with a wicked looking letter-opening stiletto and grunted inquiringly.

Paul pressed on. “Yes, I’m looking for Coach Gardiner? He doesn’t appear to be in his office, and I need to talk to him. About the team. Tutoring them. The players that need it.”

“He’s out of town on personal business for the rest of the week,” she said, turning back to her pile.
That stopped Paul cold. Trevor hadn’t said anything to him about going out of town. But when would he have done that?
Paul cleared the blockage out of his throat. “Will he be picking up messages while he’s gone?”
She shrugged. “He didn’t say. Could be.”
“Could I leave him one? Please?”
She finally looked up at him. Paul didn’t know what it was that did the trick, but she smiled slightly, her face softening just in one cheek area. “Sure. You want to leave him a voicemail?”
Paul stood there stupidly and realized he didn’t even have Trevor’s office number. It was probably somewhere in his paperwork, but he’d never bothered to write it down, had he? “Um . . .”
She sighed and rattled off the number while Paul yanked out his cell and tried to keep up. When it rang, he stepped out into the deserted hallway for privacy.
“Hello, you’ve reached the voicemail of Coach Gardiner. Please leave a message and I’ll get back to you as soon as possible.” Beeep.
He swallowed. “Trevor, hi. It’s me, Paul. I just, um, I’m sorry. Would you please call me so we can talk about it?” That seemed cold and too brief, didn’t it? He had to say something more. “I’d like to try working this out,” he added in a rush.
Voicemail—that stone-cold bitch—cut him off.

Babies were strangely soothing. Sitting in a restaurant halfway between Josie’s house and his dorm with the warm weight of baby Callie on his lap, trying—and largely failing— to defend his scrambled eggs from her grabby hands was somehow reparative to the soul.

How odd.
“Paul, talk to me. I didn’t drive forty-five minutes for breakfast on a Saturday morning to watch you play with my daughter. Especially when you woke me up and begged me to meet you. Do you know how early you had to call to wake me up before my nine-month-old?”
“I thought, since you have a parasite and all, you’d be up at six. And I’m not playing, I’m trying to keep her from stealing my food.”
Josie smiled at her daughter. “If you’d put her in her high chair, you wouldn’t have to share with her.”
“She’s fine where she is,” he said quickly, tightening his arm around Callie’s chubby tummy.
Josie assessed him, then pointed her fork at him. “When you said you saw Trevor Gardiner the other day, you meant you saw him, didn’t you?”
Paul inhaled a bit of egg. Somehow, in the ensuing coughing fit, Callie was whisked into her high chair by her mother, and the rest of his eggs were dumped on the tray in front of her. Callie squawked happily and slammed both her palms down into her pile of booty, causing bits of yolkshrapnel to shower the table and Paul and Josie.
Josie yanked something that looked like a diaper out of the gigantic bag she never went anywhere without and started wiping globs of gelatinous goo from Paul’s cheek.
“I suppose”—hack—“I should be grateful you aren’t trying to clean me up with a spit-slicked thumb, shouldn’t I?” He hacked some more while Josie finished up.
She sat back down across from him and looked at him until he broke. “Yes. I saw him.”
Callie gurgled and stuffed her mouth with an eggbedecked fist.
Josie sighed. “What did you do?”
“What did I do? What about him? He’s the one who betrayed me.”
“Did he grovel?” she asked calmly over a piece of toast she was buttering.
“Duh duh duh?” asked Callie, looking at him with pursed lips and wide eyes.
Paul reached over and stroked down the hair on Callie’s head. She ducked, then went back to her eggs. “Yes, there was groveling.”
“Hand me the strawberry jam, please,” Josie said. Paul handed it over grudgingly. Strawberry was his favorite—which she knew—and there was only one little container left. He’d have to steal some from another table now. As she ripped the foil off the jam, she asked, “Was the groveling sufficient?”
Paul thought about it, staring absently at the ceiling for a few seconds. “How much groveling is sufficient?”
“Do you feel he was truly sorry? Did it involve him getting on his knees?” she asked, spreading copious amounts of jam on the bread.
“Oh, he certainly spent some time on his knees. Let’s just say I feel adequate lip service was paid.”
“Pbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbt,” Callie said, motor boating her lips.
Josie smirked. “I’m not exactly too stupid to understand that, you realize. Now answer the real question.” Josie reached across the table and handed him the toast.
Paul stared at the buttered, jammed toast. It was for him? He blinked back some bit of emotion and answered. “Yes, I think it was enough. I believe he’s truly sorry, at least. He said he wanted a chance to make it all up to me, and to earn my trust again.”
“So why are you here with me on a Saturday morning instead of in bed with him?”
Paul winced. “I had one of my little fits.”
“Oh no. Did you apologize for whatever you said?”
Did that sort of comforting voice come with motherhood? Paul blinked back further emotional detritus at her tone. “I’m trying,” he rasped.
“Keep trying,” Josie said.
“Bah!” Callie agreed.
“Now eat your toast, and you can hold the baby again.”
He looked at the eggy, drooling baby and made a face.
“I’ll clean her up first,” Josie said, pulling out her trusty diaper.
Paul ate his toast.

Toby dragged him to Sebastian and Brad’s party on Saturday night completely against his will. He’d gone so far as to force Paul to take a shower first.

Was this what having concerned friends was like? Paul wasn’t convinced he needed it. It disconcerted him to have friends who burst into one’s room, dragged one out of a perfectly good sulk and into the bathroom, and then started undressing one.

He’d slapped Toby’s hands away at that point. “I can do it myself, dammitall! If you’re going to insist on ruining my depressive episode, at least leave me the dignity of letting me groom myself.”

Toby smirked, the lousy douche. He saved his strangest behavior for the party itself, though. Paul couldn’t be positive, but Toby looked as if he were being assisted by Sebastian as well. He managed to say hello to Sebastian’s sister Sophie, who appeared to be the only female present and was surrounded by guys. That seemed strange—Paul had been under the impression that even gay frat parties generally had more than one woman in attendance. Otherwise why would the straight boys even show up for the gay boys to ogle?

Sebastian sighed theatrically, looking pointedly at Brad. “Because she’s very, very good at manipulating my boyfriend.” Brad averted his eyes and chugged his beer.

Paul screwed up his face. “I’m not familiar with the concept of a princess party.”
“It’s where one single, lovely princess is courted by all the suitors in Fratlandia.”
Paul stared at Toby. “That makes no sense at all.”
“You looked tired,” Toby said suddenly.
“What?”
“The depression is clearly evident in your expression,” Sebastian said.
“Nice of you to notice,” Paul snapped.
“You could go lie down on the weight bench in your old room,” Brad offered.
“Weight bench . . . ?”
Brad shrugged. “I moved my weights in there, since we had the space.”
“Why would I need to lie down on a weight bench? I was perfectly happy lying down in my own bed gorging on toffeeroasted peanuts when you dragged me here, and now you want me to rest on a piece of exercise equipment and find my bliss?”
“Pretty much, yeah,” Toby agreed.
“You really look peaked,” Sebastian said, beginning to herd him down the hall. Paul resisted his efforts, until Brad started helping him.
“What is wrong with you people? You promised me ogling!”
“You can ogle later, if you’re up to it,” Toby said, opening the door to Paul’s former bedroom.
“Yeah, I’ll find you a blanket,” Brad offered, grabbing his arm and shoving him through the entryway.
They slammed the door in his face. He had the strangest feeling that Brad was holding it closed by the handle.
“What’s going on?”
“I think we’ve been set up.”
He whirled when he heard the voice, and there— predictably, if he’d imagined his friends were prone to this sort of meddling, which in point of fact he hadn’t—stood Tre vor.
Paul noted with relief that he no longer looked as devastated as he had in the parking lot. Unfortunately, he seemed uncertain instead.
Paul swallowed. “What are you doing in here?”
Trevor hesitated, as if he might not answer. “Some guy named Brad said he wanted to show me his weights.”
“Good lord, that sounds like the modern athlete’s equivalent of showing someone your etchings.”
Trevor lifted his brows a second but said nothing.
Paul caught his breath as a horrible thought occurred to him. “Did you want to see his weights?”
Trevor shook his head. “No, but I guess he’s the host so I thought it would be rude to refuse.”
“And you just stayed here, waiting for him to arrive and show you his weights?” His chest felt in imminent danger of seizing up.
Trevor hesitated again, scratching his nose. “Once I got here, he told me you were coming and if I wanted to talk to you I should stay and he’d bring you to me.”
Paul stared, his breath quick and shallow. “So, you want to talk to me?”
Trevor nodded, not quite looking at him.
Paul forced himself to take a deep breath. “Did you get my email?”
“Yes.” Trevor shoved his hands in his pockets, the corners of his mouth turning down.
“Oh. Did you get my phone message?”
He nodded once. “Got that this afternoon when I went into the office.”
Paul took another calming breath. “Did you believe that I’m sorry? Because I’m sorry.”
Trevor smiled shakily. “I’m sorry, too.”
Paul didn’t know why those were the words he had been waiting to hear, but when Trevor said them, the dam broke in his lungs, and he could breathe again. He rushed to Trevor and grabbed his arms. “You have nothing to be sorry for.”
Trevor stared at him, brow wrinkling like Paul had lost his mind.
“Except the obvious,” he amended.
Trevor pulled his hands out of his pockets and reached for Paul, gripping his waist gently. “I pushed you too fast. I’m sorry for that, too. It’s why I didn’t answer your email right away. I wanted to give you enough time to be, you know, sure.”
“It’s okay, Trev. I’m sorry I told you I just had sex with you out of some twisted sense of being owed it. It wasn’t that, or revenge, I swear. I was just confused, I hadn’t had time to think about everything, I overreacted. You know how I am—”
Trevor nodded. “You had one of your little fits.” He pulled Paul closer, until his arms were wrapped around Paul’s waist, and Paul slid his hands up to Trevor’s shoulders. “It’s my fault. It’s like, you know how I was so, um, eager on the boat, and I sort of jumped the gun?”
“It’s all forgotten,” Paul said, trying to shush Trevor with a hand over his mouth.
Trevor pulled his hand away and held it. “I was so happy when you seemed to be willing to at least listen to me, and then, when we were on the boat and you kissed me, I should have backed off. I jumped the gun there, too. You’re going to need time to forgive me, but I got excited and I pushed the limits.”
“I forgive you,” Paul said immediately. “For everything.”
Trevor took a shaky breath. “You do?”
Paul nodded. “Of course. Maybe even before we went sailing. Certainly before I let you make love to me.”
Trevor swallowed. “Don’t just tell me that, Paul. Be certain.”
Paul gripped his face and looked into his eyes. “I am one hundred percent certain I’ve forgiven you.” He had complete confidence in that.
“Thank God,” Trevor breathed, his shoulders relaxing under Paul’s hands.
Paul’s friends were right—he was terrified of taking a chance on Trevor, but not taking this chance was a far scarier prospect. “I want to try again,” he whispered. He moved closer, until they were chest to chest, gripping the back of Trevor’s head, trying to keep his trembling hands under control. “I think we could work this out. I care about you. I could do it—fall in love with you again. All those years without you, I never had anything happen worth remembering. You came back and that all changed in a few days.” He had to hang on tightly to Trevor’s neck to keep from going down.
Trevor lifted his head and blinked down at him. “That makes a weird kind of sense.”
“It does.” Paul nodded giddily.
Trevor held him tightly with an arm around Paul’s back, bringing the other hand up to stroke his cheek. “I still love you.”
Paul’s shaking was taking control of him. “Trevor?”
“Yeah?”
“This is a lot of emotional vulnerability all at once for me, and I’m feeling sort of, um, exposed, I guess, so I’m hopeful we can just get on with th—”
Trevor kissed him. Slowly, settling Paul’s nerves and righting his world, yet somehow tenderizing his heart at the same time.
“Thank you,” Paul sighed. “My emotional tachometer was going into the red zone.”
Trevor kissed him again. This one was for Trevor’s emotional tachometer, Paul felt it immediately, so he tried to put as much of what he couldn’t say into it so Trevor would know.
It wasn’t quite enough. Paul pulled away to whisper, “I still love you too.”
“If you’re just saying that—”
Their third kiss was to shut Trevor up, sandbag his heart. “I love you,” Paul said firmly against his lips.
Trevor rested his forehead against Paul’s and closed his eyes a second. We can still do it. They could still communicate without words. Paul hadn’t quite had a clue how much he’d missed that until he got it back.
He gave in to temptation and hid his head in Trevor’s neck while Trevor’s arms were wrapped around him so tightly he could barely breathe. “Can I tell you something else?” he whispered. He scrunched his eyes shut, as if that offered further privacy.
“Of course,” Trevor said, then kissed his cheek.
Why did he feel compelled to admit these things? But even though he could feel his face heating like a teakettle, he couldn’t stop himself from saying it. “I love your arms. I love how strong they are and how big your muscles are and when you squeeze me like this, it makes me want you.”
“Is that why you love me?”
Paul yanked his head out of its comfy, private nest and stared at Trevor. “No!” But Trevor was grinning at him. “Stop mocking me,” Paul grumbled, burrowing back in. “If you ever tell anyone I said that, I’ll kill you.”
“I won’t tell,” Trevor said, tonguing his ear until Paul shivered. Trevor flexed his biceps next to Paul’s ribcage, and Paul’s ass clenched in reaction. “If you say more about this wanting me.”
“Mmm.” Paul slid his hands down Trevor’s back to rest on his perfect butt cheeks. “I used to have this fantasy . . .” He slid his hands lower, until his fingers could curl around the underside of Trevor’s buttocks. Trevor’s dick was starting to press insistently against Paul’s lower abdomen. He squeezed and Trevor jerked forward, pushing it into him. “Possibly I still have it.”
“Tell me, please?”
Paul smiled and kissed his neck. “I used to imagine stretching you out on a bed, naked, and holding you down by your wrists while I fucked you.”
“Yeah,” Trevor whispered.
“Your arms would be straining, biceps popping, but you wouldn’t break my hold, you’d just beg me to fuck you harder, until you were sheened in sweat and trying to wrap your ankles around my neck. And then—”
Trevor fisted Paul’s hair and yanked him up for a kiss, grinding his hard-on into Paul’s belly, forcing his thigh between Paul’s legs and shoving him back until he hit the wall. Paul sucked on his tongue until Trevor was moaning softly, then he broke the kiss. “Let’s go to your—”
“Back to my room,” Trevor panted.
“Your room? Wait, where are you staying?”
Trevor nipped his earlobe, so Paul tilted his head. “I’m staying at the Theta Alpha Gamma frat. It’s okay, I’ve got my own room in the attic and—”
Paul shoved his shoulders until Trevor pulled back and looked at him, blinking in confusion. “You’re staying at the TAG house?”
“Is there something wrong with that? We could get a hotel room, baby, I don’t care. But all the guys from the frat are here, so it’s empty . . .”
As Trevor spoke, Paul realized maybe it was all right. He didn’t seem to have the same revulsion to frats—or, as evidenced by the blood in his dick, jocks. And when it came right down to it, fucking Trevor into the mattress inside that frat house? That sounded downright, deliciously naughty.
“I don’t have a problem with it in the least. Let’s go.” Trevor started to pull away, and Paul stopped him with a hand on his cheek. “But you’re just staying there temporarily, right?”
“Of course. I needed somewhere to stay while I looked for a place to live, and they have some kind of relationship with my frat from college.”
Trevor was a jock and a frat boy. It was so perfectly predictable. And Paul didn’t care. He would love Trevor if he were a micro-penis-sporting longshoreman. He ran fingers along Trevor’s cheekbone, knowing full well he was becoming the kind of sap he usually derided, but not caring. “It’s fine. I just want to be with you.”
Trevor looked at him a long second. “I promise you can trust me again. I don’t care how long it takes, but I’ll prove it to you.”
Have a little faith. “Okay,” Paul said.
Trevor took his hand and didn’t let go of it as they walked out through Brad and Sebastian’s place, pausing only to tell them good night.
Brad, Sebastian, and Toby stood near the front door, looking unbearably smug. Paul managed to check his first instinct to glower—they had helped his situation a little, after all. Not that he couldn’t have worked it out on his own, given time. Ah, well, their hearts were in the right place.
“I guess we’ll be seeing you later,” Toby said, slapping Paul’s shoulder. Had he winked? “Maybe in a few days?”
Paul narrowed his eyes and tilted his chin up. “If you’re lucky.”
Sebastian smirked. “Oh, we aren’t the lucky ones here.”
Brad jerked around to look at his boyfriend. “We aren’t?”
“You’ll get lucky, honey, no worries.”
Trevor regained Paul’s attention by squeezing his hand. “These are your friends?” He lifted a skeptical eyebrow.
“We are indeed his friends.” Toby stepped toward him, smile huge and hand extended. “I’m Toby, and you must be Coach Gardiner.”
“Yes,” Paul told Trevor. “As difficult as that may be to believe. I’m working on acquiring a better class of friend.”
“So, I don’t have to threaten to kick your ass if you’re a dick to Paul, right, dude? Because up until yesterday, I didn’t even really like him, but, you know, I’d do what needs to be done.” Brad kept his hands non-threateningly in his pockets, but stood square in front of Trevor, somehow looking larger than normal.
Paul worked very, very hard not to roll his eyes.
“I promise not to be a dick to him.” Trevor vowed. “Unless he provokes me.”
“I think that’s the best we can hope for, hon. Stand down,” Sebastian said, hand landing on Brad’s back.
Paul’s patience sputtered out. “Well, we’re leaving this freak show now. Thank you for dragging me out of bed and making me attend.”
Toby gave him a look. “Ingrate.”
“Yes, well, it’s nothing I haven’t been before, so good night.”
Sebastian laughed. “Good night.”
Paul determinedly didn’t look to find out if any of the other frat boys were staring. Instead, he focused on the way Trevor’s palm felt rubbing against his as they walked out of the apartment, and the firmness of his grip. He knew the TAG frat wasn’t hostile to gays, but that didn’t mean they wouldn’t have a reaction to finding out Trevor swung that way.
As Trevor pulled the front door shut behind him, he said into Paul’s ear, “They already know I’m gay. I told them before I moved in.”
Paul turned and looked at him, the gold in Trevor’s eyes bright in the porch light. His jaw was ticcing, as if he expected some kind of comment from Paul.
Paul didn’t have one on hand.
Trevor looked at him intently, their faces inches apart, gripping his shoulders. “I’m never lying about that again.”
“I believe you.” Paul lifted his hand to Trevor’s face, stroking the tense muscles with his fingers. Trevor’s expression eased and he smiled—such a kissable look on him. He slid his hand to the back of Trevor’s neck, pulling him down for one.
Trevor leaned forward and rested his forehead against Paul’s. “If you believe that, I guess there’s hope for us.”
“Of course there’s hope. I wouldn’t be going to that frat house with you otherwise, and I wouldn’t have let you touch me, not even that first time in your office. And no, I didn’t realize that at the time,” Paul added when Trevor’s eyes widened. “I want this, Trev. I want you.”
“I want you too,” Trevor said right before he kissed Paul, wrapping the arms Paul loved around his waist, palms moving on his back, pressing close to him until their clothes felt like a horrible, chafing barrier between them. Paul could almost hear Trevor’s skin crying out for him. “I just don’t want you right here,” Trevor panted, pulling away from him and grabbing his hand, drawing him down the stairs.
Stumbling after Trevor, feeling somewhat giddy—yes, titillated by the idea of sex in that den of macho iniquity— Paul opened his mouth and uttered the one phrase he’d never imagined he’d say: “Take me to your frat house and do me, baby.”
Trevor threw a look over his shoulder at Paul as they hurried down the stairs. “I thought you were going to be doing me. Is fucking a frat boy some kind of fantasy for you?”