“Eleventh grade. Kang Yoo Taek, that foreign exchange student. He didn’t understand English, so you tried to learn Korean. When he said hi to you, you told him, in Korean, that his grandfather’s spirit had been sacrificed to a monkey god.”
“Hey! Korean is a hard language to learn!”
“You were trying to ask him to sit with us at lunch!”
“There may have been something lost in the translation,” I said. “Also, did he really need to react like I’d just shit on his entire familial legacy? Talk about a drama queen.”
“The point is, Sandy, you can’t Meryl Streep your way out of this,” Paul said, sounding amused. “You’re going to become the most uncomfortable-looking person in the history of the world until you spill your guts. Trust me on that.”
“I’ll show you a slow-bone, you scandalous bitch,” I snarled into the phone.
“Will you look into my eyes, then come on my chest with love?” he asked.
I screamed into the phone and disconnected the call quite savagely. It felt good. I felt good. I could do this.
I would do this.
Chapter 14: Raising Holy Homo Hell
OF COURSE, as soon as I approached the table, I heard a topic of conversation I hadn’t expected and didn’t know whether to throttle Darren or kiss him.
And then I thought even more about kissing him and I swear my ass crack was instantly sweating.
“—know Vince likes to go there,” Darren was saying. “And he takes his boyfriend. They have other friends there too.”
Taylor looked annoyed. “Be that as it may, I’m not in any position to discuss that with you. Whether or not some club of disrepute stays open or not has no bearing on you and me or this conversation. Honestly, Darren. You know that I get enough of this from your brother. I don’t know that I need to hear it from you.”
“Funny,” Darren said, “I didn’t know you got anything from Vince, seeing as how he won’t speak to you.”
“Sorry about that,” I said, pretending I hadn’t heard a single word they’d said.
“I ordered you the sea bass,” Darren said. “Hope that’s okay.”
I coughed and tried not to blush when I looked at him. “Thank you,” I said, cursing inwardly how breathless I sounded, like someone ordering me fish was the greatest thing that had ever happened to me. I cleared my throat and tried again. Much to my horror, my mouth didn’t get the message my brain was sending. “You make me want to speak Korean and tell stories about monkey gods.”
It was pretty silent after that for a while.
Then Darren squinted at me. “Um. What?”
“Ha-ha!” I said, trying not to sound hysterical. “A quote. From a movie. Just this… thing. I was thinking about. In the bathroom. A lot of people do that. It’s not weird, to think in the bathroom. Or whatever. Anyway. Sea bass! That’s… that’s just swell.”
I sat down in the chair next to him and tried not to think about how awesome it would be to give Darren Mayne a blow job within the next twenty minutes. Because that was just ridiculous. And also, we were out in public with his father, so now was not the time to realize that my feelings toward Darren had become less about anger and more about wanting to suck his balls. It was quite the quandary to be in. But then, that was the story of my life.
I was never going to get out of this lunch alive, much less this fake relationship. Chances were I’d probably have a guilty jerk-off session tonight (and possibly for weeks to follow) and would never be able to look Darren in the eyes again. His pretty, pretty eyes that were like stars in the sky—
Oh dear god.
No. I was stronger than this. I was more than this. I was the protégé of the legendary Vaguyna Muffman. I was the Queen known as Helena Handbasket. I ate men like him for breakfast and then threw them up because I had to watch my figure. I was the Meryl Streep of drag queens in the performance of my career in front of a powerful douchebag and his son whose cock I wanted to gargle at the back of my throat and—
Whoa.
That was me getting distracted.
Which was not a good thing right now.
And they were both still staring at me, waiting for more.
So I said the stupidest possible thing I could have said, just to get the attention off me and my impure thoughts about my fake boyfriend.