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And despite all my demands and best intentions, both our love-drunk eyes rock back as we empty ourselves.
I collapse on my man when I’m through, utterly spent.
The pair of us breathe heavily, our sweaty heads side-by-side. My chin rests over his shoulder, and his face is tucked into the nape of my neck like it was made to fit there. Our tired bodies are embraced in each other’s arms, the mess of sticky desire between us forgotten, quickly cooling, while sweat drips from our brows.
We don’t move for the longest while.
We just listen to each other breathe in the wholesome, safe, beautiful silence of my bedroom.
“I’m all yours,” I tell him, my voice muffled by the sheets.
“Jimmy …”
“Every part of me.” Has this always been true, and I’m only now putting it to words? “Every single part of me. It belongs to you.”
His hand finds my back where he starts to gently rub. “Jimmy. We’re more—”
“What?”
“We’re more, now.” His head shifts slightly, his lips touching my ear now. “More than buddies. We crossed a line.”
Lying on him, I feel like we’re one being, one body, one breath and mouth and set of ears. “Yeah?”
“I want you to …” He takes a breath. “… to be my boyfriend.”
The word isn’t strange when used to describe me. I’ve been many people’s boyfriends.
But I’ve never had one myself.
“I want you to be—” I start.
“Yeah?”
I lift myself off of him to get a look at his face.
Bobby’s starry, sparkly brown eyes meet mine, curious and excited for the rest of my sentence.
I run a few fingers over his forehead, drawing some of his unruly strands of hair aside. Then, to that precious face, I say: “I want you to be my dance partner for the Spruce Ball.”
To that, Bobby Parker’s face freezes.
He sure as hell wasn’t expecting that.
20
JIMMY
I’m not sure how it happened.
Or when.
Or why.
Or for what greater, unknowable purpose.
But Bobby Parker and I are now in love, and he’s officially my boyfriend in every sense of the word.
Except for the whole telling-people-about-it thing, because it ain’t no one’s damned business, quite frankly. What we have is so precious and special, I think even Bobby agrees that letting it out into the world is asking for Spruce to come and take it away from us and turn it into something else.
We don’t want to be the next Billy and Tanner.
We don’t want to be the big, scandalous Cody and Trey.
Bobby and I transcend every box Spruce and all its gossip-hungry hens would try to shove us into. We don’t fit into a single one of them, anyway.
Plus, there’s something special and powerful about what we have. It’s beautiful, even in its secrecy. It’s fun. It’s exciting.
And it’s all ours.
No one else’s.
“I’m here to rehearse,” Bobby announces, stepping into the garage with cute bravado.
Weeks have passed since that night when Bobby helped me lose my man-on-man virginity.
If that’s what it’s called.
I extend a hand toward him. “Let’s see if you remember all the steps, then. Come here, boy.”
“Boy?” Bobby snorts, then struts right up to me and grips my hand with surprising strength. “You better recognize who your man is when you see him, Jimmy Strong. I ain’t no boy.”
He snaps into position in front of me, arms locked where they belong, hands clasped to mine.
I smirk knowingly into his eyes. “Alright. Then prove it.”
The music kicks on.
Five, six, seven, eight …
And our dance begins.
Of course, we’ve been doing more than just rehearsing these past few weeks. Bobby and I have engaged in several productive and important tasks.
Such as secret rendezvous in my bedroom for “studying”.
And in the barn for “discussing foot technique”.
And out in the woods for … well, I forgot our excuse for then.
Whatever the reason is, I’m shameless enough to admit that they’re all flat-out lies. The simple truth is: Bobby and I can’t keep our fucking hands off each other.
The last stroke of music plays, and Bobby and I stop in place, posed, our fierce gazes locked on one another’s.
Bobby cracks a smile.
I do, too.
Ten minutes later, we’re in my bedroom with the door shut and locked.
Another ten minutes later, we’re naked.
Give another ten, the dirty pair of us have made another mess on the bed and our bodies are drenched in sweat.
This is our lives now.
“Are you sure I’m enough for you?” he asks me.
It’s around eleven at night, several nights later, and we have climbed out of my window to sit on the small awning of roof that stretches out from beneath it. My mama despises when I climb out onto the roof, but she isn’t home now, and I’m feeling especially high on cloud nine tonight with Bobby at my side to care.
I turn my face to his. My arm is around his back, holding him against my side in a lazy cuddle. “Enough?”
