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“Oh fuck you,” I mutter, even as a smile breaks out across the flush on my cheeks.
Me: Someone doesn’t want to say that he imagined losing his virginity by taking it up the ass.
Dammit. I don’t want to see what he says to that.
I shut off the phone entirely, stuffing it under my pillow just as my dorm room door bangs into the wall and Shiloh comes barging in all red-faced and sweaty.
This morning was a rough one for him, though morning is a stretch because I couldn’t get him up and moving until nearly two in the afternoon.
“Motherfucking drill sergeant,” he mumbles just loud enough for me to hear and kicks the door closed.
He immediately tosses his shirt into the corner and kicks his workout pants off to the side.
“Self defense class a little rough today?”
He glares and towels off the sweat from his chest.
“Corvin is an asshole.”
Did I forget to mention that his co-instructor is our RA? Corvin was Shiloh’s teacher before the incident freshman year, and even though he hates the guy’s guts he still took up the offer to run the classes together.
“C’mon, lay down.” I stand up and pat Shiloh’s bed, where there’s no hesitation as he flops down face first.
Shiloh has a lean, swimmer’s build from his moderate exercise routine that I oversee, while I’ve packed on a bit more muscle since I’m at the gym at least once a day. Exercise isn’t fun as most muscle-heads will lead you to believe, but when you’ve got someone to protect the pain is worth it.
I throw my legs over his hips and settle my weight over him. He barely acknowledges me as I press my thumbs into the back of his neck aside from the little grunts that tell me I’m doing something right.
We’ve had this pattern for years going back to high school when he’d sneak in my bedroom window covered in cuts and bruises from whatever fight he’d gotten into that day. I’d bring out the first aid kit (which was really just a bottle of peroxide and some old washcloths), clean him up, and then work out the stress in his shoulders until he fell asleep.
“What happened?” I ask.
“Corvin couldn’t take the class this morning—which you know—“ he glares back at me again, ”—so he moved it to this evening, and when I tried to show up and teach my class, he said I wasn’t needed. He’s not taking this shit from me, so I taught the damn thing with him.”
When I brush my fingers over his lower back he hisses and flinches away from me. I throw my hands up so I don’t accidentally touch him again and spot a bruise just under his ribs on the right side.
“This from today?”
Shiloh grips the pillow at the head of the bed and buries his face in it.
“Loh. I need to know if this is from class or if you got in a fight.”
He huffs, shoulders slumping, and I already have my answer.
“Loh.”
“Oh, don’t give me that!” He half pushes himself up, and I shift my weight to my knees to keep my balance. “Corvin and I played out a scenario for the kids, and I got my ass handed to me. I didn’t go out asking for it.”
“Did you egg him on?”
“Of fucking course I did. He pisses me off.”
I sigh and press down on his shoulders until he relents and falls back flat on the mattress.
“Why do this with him if he pisses you off so badly?”
He’s quiet for a moment, and I wonder if he’s dozed off, But then he sighs loudly into his arms and turns his head to stare at the wall.
“Because whether I like it or not, Corvin gave me something no one else has. A way to protect myself. I know I have you and Blair, but I can’t expect the two of you to fight my battles forever. The ugly truth is that there’s always going to be people who hate me for being trans, and I always run the risk of stumbling into the worst of the bunch. Does it suck that I have to be prepared for that? Yes. But I refuse to let them win. I want to give other queer kids that power, too.”
