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Mario was a member of the Avispas, the Spanish word for wasps. That’s exactly what those tossers were. They went around, stinging left and right and fucking up everyone’s day.
If this man was a member of the Avispas, then he would have no qualms about stabbing an innocent boy just for fighting back. Could Greg have gotten together with Mario and planned this attack? They were connected online for a reason; they had to have known each other in some capacity. Greg lived next to Oliver; he could have devoted time to studying Oliver’s schedule, to figuring out when and where he would be the most vulnerable. The police may have thought the assailants didn’t know Oliver and Derrick, but I believed Oliver when he said the opposite.
Those questions kept me up close to midnight.
And then other thoughts began keeping me up.
Images of Oliver, fresh in my mind, pictures of him back on my lap, smiling and kissing and groping and moaning. It was a shock, seeing him again. It felt like a bloody miracle, even if we were linked through Jonah. I had no idea, and neither did Oliver, which made it all the more bizarre. Jonah had mentioned his brother before, but his name had slipped my mind, especially after the day I had been through when I met Oliver. My brain was a sieve, and all the contents had left the moment he and I locked eyes for the first time.
My phone buzzed, the screen lighting up my room. I rolled over and grabbed it, expecting some kind of spam text.
It wasn’t a text about free car insurance. It was Oliver, his number already saved in my phone.
OLIVER: Ok this probably looks like a ‘you up?’ text but I swear it isn’t.
Barely a minute later.
OLIVER: You up?
My smile came out of nowhere.
BECKHAM: Yup. Can’t sleep tonight.
OLIVER: Same.
OLIVER: I even tried playing jungle sounds but I got scared when it sounded like two tigers were fighting it out next to my head.
My laughter filled the empty room.
BECKHAM: Well you are the tiger whisperer, Mr. Jamison. I woulda thought those sounds relaxed you.
OLIVER: Hahaa. Let’s not bring that up again, kk?
OLIVER: OK?
His text bubble ended up slamming onto my screen, making the ones before it in the chain shake. I’d never seen that happen before.
BECKHAM: Whoa. What kind of voodoo is that.
OLIVER: You mean this?
His text bubble started off small and grew on my screen. Another effect I hadn’t seen before.
OLIVER: Or this?
The blue bubble was highlighted by a spotlight. I cracked a smile.
OLIVER: And for the grand finale. How bout this:
And the next text message was an emoji of a big eggplant, except it wasn’t just one eggplant. Somehow there were hundreds of the eggplant text bubbles floating around my screen, all settling down into just one.
I snorted. We chatted for the rest of the night, texting about all kinds of bullshit, until at some point, and I’m not exactly sure when, I fell asleep with the phone still in my hand, a smile on my face.
10 Oliver Brightly
Seeing Beckham walking down the street toward me, smiling wide and—holy mother of sweet gay pearl—a bouquet of bright flowers in his hand, well, my heart pretty much melted on the spot. My knees were shaky, and my stomach was doing an impressive set of gymnastic-level flips.
Sticking all the landings, of course.
“You look great,” he said, his voice and accent washing over me.
“So do you.” We hugged. His big arms wrapped around me. My hug landed lower, closer to his hips. We held each other for a split second longer than what a normal hug would entail.
“These are for you.” He held the flowers out. They were an arrangement of light pink roses and peonies.
“Thank you so much, Beckham. You really didn’t have to.”
I took them and brought them up to my nose, taking in the fresh flower scent that I loved.
“No one’s ever given me flowers before.”
“I wasn’t sure if it was a dated thing to do or not.”
“It’s not,” I assured him. “It’s a special thing is what it is.”
I looked into those blue eyes and found myself falling headfirst. I had to look away, back down at the gorgeous and fragrant flowers in my hand.
“Let’s go put them in your car so you don’t have to hold them. You parked in the same car park as me, right?” Beckham asked, pointing a finger toward the garage building. I nodded and led him to where I’d parked, chatting about our day the entire way. It was hot out, but my car was parked underneath cover, so I wasn’t worried that the flowers would start a bonfire by the time we got back.
I delicately set the flowers on the front seat. Beckham was standing close behind me. When I turned, there were only a few inches separating us. I took a breath, frozen, feeling his body so close to mine. I could almost feel our legs becoming tangled, our hard bodies pressing together.
