Social Skills (8 page)

“I
don’t know that I’m always so patient…but you’re worth it.” Jared pushed in to
kiss Connor’s nose. He yawned when he was through, arching his back against the
bed and giving Connor a glimpse of tan skin peeking out from under his shirt. “Hey,
would it be really weird if we took a little nap? I’m feeling kinda beat today.”
He didn’t wait for a response before pulling Connor against him in a
near-smothering embrace. “Wake me in like fifteen.”

Jared
drifted off easily, his breaths slipping into an even rhythm, his dark lashes
fluttering every so often beneath twitching lids. Not wanting to miss a minute
of his sleeping form, Connor fought to keep his eyes open. He wasn’t
exactly comfortable, but he remained still so as not to disturb Jared. Besides,
comfort was overrated if the alternative was being in Jared’s arms.

At
some point he must have dozed off, though, because the next thing he knew Jared
was sitting up and stretching.

“Hey,
I’d better get going. But I’ll be back for our next tutoring session.” He
chuckled. “This is a lot more enjoyable than hanging out at the athletic hall—not
that I minded that all that much.”

Connor
sat up as well, already missing the proximity to Jared’s body. “If…if you want,
I can still help you…with your anthro stuff.”

“I’ll
probably take you up on that.” Jared leaned over to plant what was quickly
becoming his customary goodbye kiss on Connor’s waiting lips. “See ya later,
bro.”

***

For
the first time since they’d met, Rebecca’s familiar form was missing from the
lunch table the next day. Connor approached hesitantly, his feet slowing as the
distance narrowed. He considered hanging back for a while to see if Rebecca came
late, but Chrissy looked up and caught sight of him.

She
patted the empty chair by her side. “Becca’s working on some project for her
film editing class, but she told us not to gang up on you for joining that hive
mind of music called orchestra.” She paused, putting a thoughtful finger to her
lips. “Or maybe she just told me that.”

Connor
blinked.

Tate
shook his head. “Seriously, you know you just ignore her when she says stuff
like that, right?”

There
was no way to escape now, so Connor shrugged and took his seat.

“You
know, Connor, you’ve never really told us that much about yourself,” Tate
continued, stroking the coarse hair of the goatee he’d recently begun growing.

A.J.
snorted. “Yeah, ’cause he can barely get a word in edgewise between you and
Chrissy.”

Tate
whirled to glare at him. “What is that supposed to mean?”

“It
means the two of you are conversation manipulators,” A.J. answered, unfazed.

Chrissy
stabbed a piece of tofu with her fork. “Don’t include me in your unsupported
theory!”

Tate
ignored Chrissy and dismissed A.J. with a flick of his middle finger. “Dude,
whatever. I’m not manipulating anything right now. All right, Connor, center
stage. Tell us about yourself.”

After
watching the conversation with darting eyes and praying that, as usual, the
three friends would talk themselves in circles and forget all about him, Connor
suddenly found himself the focus of their undivided attention.

“Not
much to tell,” he muttered.

“Everyone
has a story,” Chrissy countered. “Everyone and everything. From the largest
mountain to the smallest stone.”

“Really,
Chrissy. Like that’s helpful. I’m trying to give the guy a chance to talk here.”

“So
am I! I’m just explaining that while he may not think his story is remarkable,
it is.”

Connor’s
gaze drifted past Chrissy to zero in on Jared and Veronica, who were laughing
as Jared’s lanky roommate related what looked to be some hilarious story.
Taking
a break
evidently didn’t involve changing seats at lunch, but there was no
evidence to suggest they were acting as anything other than friends.

Out
of habit, Connor began to tune Chrissy and Tate out, imagining how much happier
he would be if he were sitting next to Jared instead. Or rather, next to Jared,
but without anyone else around. And in his dorm room. On the bed. And maybe
Jared would have on very little clothing.

Tate
rolled his eyes. “No one is saying anything about remarkability. I’m just
asking him the basic getting-to-know-you questions.”

“And
I’m saying that even though it may seem basic to you, it
is
remarkable.
We’re all interconnected, all important…you know the old butterfly flaps its
wing adage.”

“There
are too many butterflies flapping around in your head if you ask me.”

A.J.
cut in with a broad smile. “See, what did I tell you? Conversation
manipulators.”

That
sent both Tate and Chrissy off on another round of protests, leaving Connor in
the clear. He stared at Jared for several more minutes before it suddenly
occurred to him he should have been putting the time to better use.

Tate,
A.J., and Chrissy were experts at conversation. If he were smart, he would take
note, and hopefully pick up a few things to use with Jared. Sure, Jared liked
him, but how long would he put up with a mute?

There
was little hope of jumping back into the conversation now, though. Chrissy was
prattling on about the butterfly effect, which launched Tate into a discussion
of a movie by the same title. Annoyed at the hijacking of the topic, Chrissy
resorted to tossing a few peas at him, while A.J. leaned back in his chair with
his usual smug look.

They
were each so different…how could he know which would be best to emulate?

Chrissy
and Tate eventually met somewhere in the middle of their disparate subjects,
landing in friendly banter. And whenever A.J. opened his mouth, it was with
complete confidence, as though he’d been listening carefully and waiting for
just the right moment to make the fullest impact with his few words.

All
Connor felt as he prepared to speak was a crawling uncertainty along his skin,
and a deep conviction that whatever he was about to say was going to be
insufficient. He seriously doubted any amount of studying his lunch mates could
alter that fact.

“Well,
we gotta go. See ya later, Connor,” Chrissy announced cheerfully amid the
clatter of scraping chairs and clanking trays.

Connor
eked out a smile as they left him to his thoughts.

Chapter Eight

The
pacing started a good fifteen minutes before Jared was due to arrive. Connor
ran through a hundred possible conversation starters, ranging from the mundane
to the absurd, and rejected each thought that crossed his mind. He worked his
fingers through his hair as he strode, straightening it out and ruffling it
back up again, unsure of which look was best.

He
finally stopped to peer into the mirror and test both styles. The clean-cut
look made him appear a little too juvenile, so he thrust his hand back into the
blond strands and flung them around until they were thoroughly mussed.

One
challenge down, one to go.
His
reflection gave him a doleful smirk. After a moment he tried to get his mind
back on his plans to keep from sounding like a complete imbecile in Jared’s
presence, but something in the mirror held his attention.

Narrowing
his eyes, he studied his features for longer than he had in some time. The same
face he always saw stared back at him. He hadn’t changed, so why was it he
thought he caught a glimpse of something a little less meager than what usually
seemed to be there?

Of
course, he was still frustratingly short, but maybe his eyes weren’t all that
bad—they did have the rarity in color going for them. His lips were a
decent shape, as lips went, and hadn’t Jared said something about his
cheekbones?

A
group of students trampled down the hallway outside his room, their laughter
shattering Connor’s reverie. Realizing the precious minutes he had wasted, he
resumed his pacing route and focused on the more important conversation front. Nothing
he could come up with sounded natural, though, and he felt just as clueless as
always when Jared’s knock sounded at the door.

“Hey,”
Connor said first. That, at least, was a small step forward.

“Hey,
bro. I brought my anthro stuff this time, but I gotta tell you, not so sure I
wanna do any work right now.”

Connor
nodded, and because Jared was still standing in the doorway, gestured
hesitantly. “C-come in.”

“Thanks
for the invite.” Jared smirked as he kicked off his shoes and dropped his bag
by the bed.

Only
a small amount of air from a weak, shallow breath made its way to Connor’s
lungs. For all his attempts at preparation, he found his mind nearly blank.
Open
up!
he screamed at himself.
Talk! Act normal!

“Um…h-how
were your classes today?”

Jared’s
eyes bounced with suppressed laughter. “They were all right, I guess. Yours?”

“G-good,
good.” Connor licked his lips and bit down fiercely on his tongue when he was
through
. How were your classes today?
He sounded like his mother, and
that was a horrible image to put in his mind, now or anytime.

“What’s
that face for?” Jared asked, mouth twitching into a grin. “You look like you’re
in pain.”

If
he’d looked like that before, Connor could only imagine the expression had just
gotten worse.

He
closed his eyes. “I’m trying,” he mumbled, his sense of failure a palpable
tightening in his chest. “I just…I can’t think of the right things to say.”

“You
know there’s no handbook on how to hold a conversation. There’s no right and
wrong thing to say. You just talk.”

“No.”
Connor crossed his arms. “I do it wrong. I
know
I do it wrong. And it’s
not because I don’t like you, because I really do. I’m bad at talking to
everyone, and—”

Jared
came closer and wrapped him in a hug. “Don’t be so hard on yourself. You’re not
doing that badly.”

“Right.
Because asking how your day went doesn’t make me sound like some kind of fifties
housewife.”

He
felt the rumble of Jared’s laughter in his chest. “I think you put too much
pressure on yourself. The stakes aren’t that high in every casual thing you say
to people. No one has a scorecard and no one is judging. If you’d just be
yourself, you’d be fine. You’re a very likeable person.”

Yeah, right.
“You’re the only person who’s ever liked me.”

“Maybe
like this.” Jared pulled him onto the bed. “But you have friends. I see you
with them at Newcomb all the time.”

Connor’s
head naturally rested on Jared’s muscled shoulder, and he curled into the space
under his arm. “They’re kind of hard to miss, huh. Tate’s nearly seven feet,
and Rebecca’s really tall for a girl. And Chrissy dresses like a flower-child
from the sixties…I guess A.J.’s the most normal one.”

“Mm,”
Jared agreed, running his fingers up and down Connor’s side. “Have you noticed
you tend to talk a lot more when we’re close like this?”

“Yeah…I’ve
noticed.” Connor sighed, too pleased by the feeling of Jared’s hands on his
skin to be embarrassed.

“Well,
then maybe you should just come hug me as soon as I get here.”

“Really?
That wouldn’t be…weird?”

“You
are a little weird.” Jared laughed. “But I think I can handle it.”

That
comment probably should have been upsetting, but for whatever reason, it wasn’t.
Connor just found himself curling a little tighter into Jared’s embrace.

“Don’t
stop talking yet,” Jared prompted after a moment.

“Wh-what
do you want me to talk about?”

“Hmm.
Well, what’s it like hanging out with the artsy Brownie crowd? Do they drag you
to lots of arts exhibits and film festivals and stuff?”

“Oh…I
don’t really hang out with them all that much. Just Rebecca, and that’s mostly
when we’re practicing for orchestra.”

“Connor.”
Jared shook his head with a gentle
tsk
.
“Come on. This is your college experience here. You really need to get out of
this room more.”

“I
know.” Moisture sprang to Connor’s eyes, and he scratched restlessly at a
freckle on his arm. “I…I should try harder.”

“As
quirky as they seem, it should be easy to be yourself around them,” Jared added
thoughtfully. “Not that I’m saying you’re quirky. Just that I doubt they’d be
the judgmental types.”

Quirky.
That
really was a good word to describe them, and Jared did have a point. A smile
crept onto Connor’s face. Maybe there was hope for him yet. “So…I guess you’ve
always had a big group of friends. It must come naturally to you.”

“I
guess.”

“That…that
must be…nice.”

Jared
stared off at the bookshelf across the room. “Yeah. I guess.” After a moment he
turned back to Connor and gave his arm a squeeze. “This is nice, too.”

His
voice had gone soft and deep, his lids were half-lowered, and suddenly there was
no more pressure to talk. They observed each other silently as a minute ticked
by, Jared’s eyes locking Connor’s in a steady gaze.

The
staring went on far longer than Connor expected. Was he supposed to be doing
something? Did
he
need to take the initiative to bring things to a
more physically intimate level? It wasn’t something he’d ever imagined
doing—wasn’t even something he was sure he
could
do—but the atmosphere seemed right, and he was dying
for there to be less clothing between their bodies.

Thankfully,
Jared was a mind reader. Either that, or he had a perfectly good set of eyes
and could see his casual touch already had Connor hard. He stretched and peeled
off his shirt. “Okay, enough talking for now. Clothes off. All of them.”

“All
of them?”

“Yup.
Here, I’ll turn off the lights, so you feel more comfortable.” He made his way
over to the light switch, shedding his pants and boxers as well. All that was
left by the time he got there were his socks.

Even
in the dark, Connor could make out the long muscles of Jared’s thighs and the
high, firm curve of his butt. After that sight, it’d probably take only the
lightest touch for him to wind up coming in his pants, yet again. He
closed his eyes and tried to shut out Jared’s impressive body, using the notes
of a tedious etude to distract himself.

“Need
some help there?” Jared murmured playfully, then began to strip off Connor’s
clothes.

Connor
repeated the etude in his mind until he was completely naked and Jared was
lying close at his side.

“Open
your eyes,” Jared said. “I like your eyes.”

His lids
fluttered open and he swallowed hard. “Would…would you like me to…um…for you…first?”

“Nuh
uh.” Jared shook his head. “I want you right there.”

Jared’s
fingertips coasted along his skin, and somehow, the contact made the normally
incessant voices of his self-doubt grow quieter. They faded to the dullest of
roars as Jared wrapped a powerful thigh around both his legs, then drew their
bodies together with a grunt.

Connor
latched on to Jared’s shoulders, trying to pull him even closer—to be
wholly enveloped by the warmth of his skin. It was almost possible, too, given
how much larger Jared was than him. Their lips met in an extended kiss, until
the necessary gasp for breath forced them apart. Jared used his leverage to
grind them together, his thrusts coming faster and faster until Connor’s breath
quickened and he released, all over Jared’s stomach.

The
thrusts kept coming, with Jared’s thigh clamped firmly around him so he couldn’t
back away. Jared gripped himself and started pumping. A gasp became a
moan, and the warm spurt hit Connor right above his groin.

“Mm.”
Jared planted a soft kiss on Connor’s jaw. “Yeah, I can definitely handle this.”

He
shifted away after a moment, grabbing a handful of tissues from the desk to
wipe first Connor’s stomach and then his own. When he’d cleaned them off to his
satisfaction, he threw the wadded ball of paper into the trash and flicked on
the lights.

Connor
scrambled to redress, managing to get on his boxers before Jared donned his own
and returned to the bed.

“Hey,
that’s enough clothes.” Jared yanked the faded high school orchestra t-shirt
out of his hands.

“Um…”
Connor tried to recapture the clothing, but Jared easily held it out of reach. “I
was going to go over your paper for anthro. You brought it, didn’t you?”

Jared
threw his shirt into the corner of the room. It only lay there for a second
before he snatched it back up and placed it in the hamper instead. “Yeah, but
you don’t need a shirt to do that.”

Connor
folded his arms across his chest. “Um, I guess not.”

“Good.”
Jared grinned victoriously. He grabbed his backpack and handed off a stack of
papers. “Hope it meets with your approval.”

“I’m
sure it’s fine.” Connor gave him a nervous chuckle. “If you incorporated the
stuff we covered in tutoring, it should be all right.”

He
launched into his review, but kept his arms crossed, all too aware the lights
were on and Jared was staring at him. In an effort to remain covered, he pulled
his knees up to his chest.

Jared
snuck a hand under his arm and attacked his ribs with a few tickling jabs.

“Hey!”
Connor squirmed away. “I can’t concentrate.”

“Do
you usually curl up into a little ball and hide your body when you concentrate?”
Jared asked with another jab. “I’m bored here. The least you can do is let me
look at you.”

Connor
sighed. How was it Jared’s teasing could both unnerve him and set him more at
ease?

“Fine.”
He uncoiled, and to his relief, Jared pulled him close. The feel of Jared’s
body against his made the tension slip away once again.

“Much
better. But hurry up.”

Despite
the order, Connor was thorough in his notes. He couldn’t let Jared’s grades slip
just because they’d co-opted the tutoring time for a much less academic
purpose. By the time he was finished, their hour together was almost up, and he
silently cursed the clock as Jared shifted out of his embrace.

Two
loud beeps sounded before they could stand. Jared reached down to pull his cell
phone from his pants pocket, then laughed as he read the screen. His thumbs
danced across the buttons with practiced speed.

“Man,
Ben is such a riot. He’s always texting random-ass shit. You should hear him
sometimes, when he gets going—” He cut himself off abruptly and shoved
the phone back into his jeans. “Anyways, speaking of going, I guess it’s time
for me to do that.”

A
hollow space opened up in Connor’s chest as soon as the word “going” left Jared’s
lips. In a sudden bout of desperation, caution flew to the wind.

“Really?”
He pressed in closer. “I thought…I thought maybe you could spend the night.”

Was
he actually being
forward
? Apparently
he’d discovered the secret to getting his voice to work—just dangle the
carrot of having Jared close to him for a few more minutes.

Jared
nuzzled his shoulder. “Not tonight, bro.”

“Oh.”
Connor found a stray piece of lint on his comforter and devoted a good three
seconds to picking it off. “I just thought, since winter break is coming and we
won’t be able to see each other…”