Devil May Care (Boys of Preston Prep 1)

I watch her, her cheeks flushed from anger, chest heaving, and it takes me an infuriatingly long moment to remember. Why had I brought her in here?

“I thought so,” she replies to my silence. “You’re just fucking with me again.” She moves to leave, which snaps me back to reality.

“I needed to talk to you,” I blurt, stopping just short of grabbing her arm. “To make something clear.”

Her arms cross over her chest. “What?”

“What happened between us last night?” I don’t grab her arm to stop her from leaving, but I do lean closer, eyes narrowed in threat. “If you tell anyone, even that new kid—”

“You’ll what? Make my life miserable? Give me the silent treatment? Oh, wait, I know, you’ll convince the entire school not to speak to me and treat me like a pariah.” She rolls her eyes. “Trust me, Bates, you don’t have to worry about me telling anyone what we did. I know it must be hard for you to imagine, but it’s actually more embarrassing for me than you.”

My responding laughter is jagged with hysteria. “Yeah, right.”

“What, you think I’m joking?” When our gazes meet, the corners of her eyes are pinched. “Last night was the most humiliating moment of my life. Not just because you kissed me, but because—” She pauses here, looking away. “Fine, okay? I kissed you back. You gave me the chance to leave and I didn’t go.” She looks as untethered and confused as I’ve felt all day. “And I don’t even understand why. I don’t even know myself right now, do you have any idea how that feels? I didn’t just demean myself, I betrayed everything I believe in, including my family.” She swallows, finally looking at me again. “Trust me, I don’t want anyone to know what happened between us. That secret is going with me to the grave.”

It’s quite the rant, self-pitying and delusional. Oh well. Whatever she needs to tell herself. “Fine. Just make sure it stays that way.”

With that I exit the closet, refusing to let her be the one that walks out first this time. It’s petty and juvenile—this whole thing is, really—but Gwendolyn Adams has always had an irrational effect on me, whether I want to admit it or not. Those days are long past and things have changed. That girl is kryptonite—the ultimate derailment of an already derailed senior year. One thing is for certain, I will not let her be the catalyst of my undoing. I’ll make sure she runs from Preston Prep long before that.

7

Gwen

The next few days pass without incident, falling into a typical pattern of meeting the twins for carpool, and being ignored in the halls and classroom. I tutor a few elementary kids in the afternoons and sneak in extra swim practice in the evenings. Every now and then, Tyson will accompany me to the pool to practice his dives in the deep end, but other than that, everything is comfortingly, horrifyingly, normal. There are no more run-ins with Hamilton, who has just as easily fallen back to pretending I don’t exist.

Balance is restored.

That said, I can’t help but notice the subtle winds of change. Daylight savings rolls in and it gets dark earlier, the air a bit crisper, cooler. Madam Okausa gives us extra French homework. And, not that I notice overmuch or anything, but Reagan and Hamilton seem closer than usual. Like right now, as I walk across the quad from the dorm to the library for a tutoring session. I see them wrapped up in one another, leaning against a locker. She’s got her back pressed to the red metal and he’s leaning over—into—her, moving a lock of her shiny blonde hair away from her ample cleavage.

Not that I care.

Because I don’t. It’s just curious. He’d always seemed pretty aloof about her, blowing her off and snapping at her all the time, but now he’s giving her all this obvious attention. Maybe, I think, his brush with being a cheater made him realize he liked her more? Whatever. Not my business.

Except…

Except now I can’t un-know what I know. Like how Hamilton kisses with his tongue in these really elegant looping sweeps, or how his fingertips feel when they’re pressing into the flesh of my hip, and how the little crescent impressions from his fingernails take approximately an hour to completely disappear. And I know other things, too. Like how when he’s turned on, there’s this little divot between his eyebrows, like he’s confused but also really impatient. Or how he apparently likes to guide a girl’s head with the fist he winds into the hair at the base of her skull, but he also doesn’t pull it.

But the biggest thing I can’t un-know is definitely the shape of him pressing into my belly, hard and eager. He felt big, which is just stupidly predictable. Of course, he has a big cock. And it’s probably gorgeous, too. It probably performs magic tricks and solves complex algebraic equations and holds the answer to the universe or whatever. A perfect cock to go with the perfect body and perfect face and perfect trust fund. There is truly no justice in this world.

But not being able to un-know these things—and the unfortunate consequence of knowing them frequently, and with a frankly concerning amount of fascination—makes me ponder the rumors of the blow job test and whether or not it’s true. Does he really make potential girlfriends take a test? The sordid locker room gossip about it varies, the veracity of which verges perpetually on the edge of urban legend.

Most believable is the gossip that one girl took the test and gagged, therefore failing. And another, who used too much teeth. And a third, who refused to swallow.

Far less believable is the gossip about one girl getting it stuck in her throat. And another, who ended up spraying his spunk out of her nose.

If the test does exist, then Campbell Clarke obviously passed. They were the couple sophomore year. Even a break-up didn’t hurt either of their reputations. If anything, it just made them more popular, like when those huge crime families split up into different but symbiotic factions.

Even hours later, I’m still lost in some bizarre train of thought about the blow job Costra Nosta as I enter the fine arts building. The library is on the other side of campus, but it’s cold and much warmer to cut through the music hall. Preston Prep has an incredible fine arts program—theater, orchestra and band, visual arts, even dance. Micha is in the dance program, and he’s incredibly talented. It’s also his happy place. It’s like every worry, every thought, every distraction melts when he steps on the stage.

I don’t have a creative bone in my body, but I feel the same way when I get in the pool. There’s something about the silence, the cool embrace of isolation, that

just sets my mind into a singular, comforting focus. All I have to do is swim. I don’t have to think about who is looking at me, or what they’re saying about me or my family. No one knows my pedigree. The judgement is purely merit-based. There’s just a time at the end, and it’s not subjective, not based on who your parents are, how you look, what you say. You win or lose, it’s that simple. And typically, I win.

I turn the corner into a long hallway of private music rooms. These rooms, booked by students in advance for practice or individual tutoring sessions, are state of the art, and mostly soundproofed. Although, as I pass, I can hear the faint strains of different students as they work. Their faces are visible through the windows. One girl is playing a flute, her posture perfectly straight. Another boy is playing a trumpet, and from what I can hear of it, really badly.

Toward the end of the hall, I feel a vibration before I hear any actual music. I peek in the window just enough to discern the warm, curved wood of a cello. I pause, leaning against the wall there, watching, mesmerized by the deep reverberations and the quick slim fingers of the musician. There’s an innate confidence in the movements, quick and nimble, something I long to possess, but never will. I’m satisfied to just appreciate it, watching as the bow moves gracefully, with competent intent, coaxing a dark, haunting melody from the instrument. The fingers glide over the strings, pressing down hard when needed, then switching to a gentler touch to get the desired result. There’s never a break in the music, never a skip. It’s deep and powerful, and yet, there’s also a vulnerability to it—a longing, wistful sound to the dips and keens.

Reluctant to give up my personal show but knowing that I can’t afford to be late for my tutoring session, I push away from the wall and finally pass the window. Unable to help myself, I dare to shoot a glance at the person cradling the instrument.