[foow]

Chapter 3: Birmingham

I dreamt of Josh that night. We were in the church, with some weird worship song playing, but the band didn't seem to notice that we were the only ones there. Or, for that matter, what we were doing. Josh ripped his shirt off, revealing a perfect hairless eight-pack and well-toned pecs, and then removed mine, showing off a nearly-identical physique. Then he wrapped his arms around my shoulders and neck and pressed his soft, tender lips against my cheeks. My own hands came around his back, grabbing onto his warm flesh, and I nuzzled my head against his. Then we were making out, as the band got louder and slower: “I love you always, I worship you forever, I just want to get on my knees, get on my knees...”

And that's what Josh did, falling down and ripping my jeans open. A huge bulge had formed in my boxers, and as he reached to pull them down, his beautiful face pressed right against my groin--

BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!

I rolled over and slammed my alarm off, then sat up in my sticky sheets. “Damn it.” I was still exhausted and every muscle in my body was swearing at me. How come morning had to come so early?

The clock read 8:35, which strangely woke me up even more. I'd set it for 10—I didn't have class until noon. I hit the alarm button and checked: yep, it was still set for an hour and a half into the future. So if it hadn't woken me... My phone. I sighed and rubbed my forehead. What idiot was texting me so early?

I climbed out of bed and walked over to the dresser, eager to give a sarcastic reply to whatever the jackass was messaging me about. As soon as I grabbed the phone, however, all the anger inside me dissipated. It was from Josh. Hey wanna grab some food this week?

“Do I?!” I shouted aloud, raising a fist triumphantly. Getting woken by Real-Josh was far better than anything I would have done with Dream-Josh. I quickly typed a response: U bet! Then I stopped. Was that too enthusiastic? I erased it and typed Sure. But that wasn't exciting enough. I stared at my phone, trying to think what to write. Then I realized I was overthinking. Gah, why did this have to be so freaking complicated?

That'd be awesome! When's a good time for you? I pounded it out and hit “Send” before I could second-guess myself. Then I threw the phone on the bed and took a nice warm shower. The hot water felt great on my aching muscles, which in-turn felt great along my hands as I washed them down with soap. Once I'd stepped out of the steamy bathroom, there were several unread messages on my phone:

How about tonight?

We can meet at Wendy's? The food there is good.

And talk about being acountability buddies?

Hell. Yes.

I texted him back to confirm the address and told him I'd be there at six. Then I raced to the kitchen and cracked several eggs into the pan. I needed to eat fast and get to the gym before my class started. At least I'd had an early alarm.

***

Turns out it's really, really easy to overdress for Wendy's. I thought I'd look good, but not fancy, in straight black khakis and a tight dark-blue dress shirt (to emphasize all the time I'd spent in the gym recently), but when everyone else in the restaurant was wearing ragged t-shirts and torn jeans, I definitely stuck out like a sore thumb. I shrugged it off and looked around for Josh. He hadn't arrived yet—I was ten minutes early anyway—so I ordered a fries and sat down to wait.

It reached six o'clock, and he still hadn't shown up.

Nor at six-fifteen.

Or six-thirty.

As I finished my third order of fries, I looked at the clock and realized something had gone wrong. Maybe his mom hadn't been able to bring him out or maybe he got tied up with school. Whatever it was, he obviously wasn't showing up. I pounded the table in anger and threw the empty fries carton at the garbage bin. Then I left the restaurant, my head down and my fists clenched. I knew there was a good reason—there's no way he'd stand me up, right?--but I was still frustrated as hell. Sighing, I made my way to the bus stop and waited on the bench. What a waste of an evening. It just wasn't fair.

The bus was just approaching as I sat down. I smiled faintly. At least my luck was turning around a bit. It stopped in front of me and I started to climb in.

“Jord!”

I stopped and looked over. Josh jumped out of the back entrance and ran towards me. I think my heart jumped up in my chest. I waved to the bus driver and stepped back onto the sidewalk, as Josh reached me, his arms open wide. Before I knew what I was doing, I'd grabbed him in a tight hug and nearly lifted his lean body off the ground. He, in turn, wrapped his arms around me and was definitely feeling up my back.

“About time you got here,” I said. I squeezed him once more and then let him go.

“Yeah, sorry, the bus was late...” He stepped back awkwardly and chuckled. “You give good hugs.”

“You too.” I pulled my jacket down, making sure it was covering my jeans. “You hungry?”

He shook his head. “My mom made me eat before I left. Do you want to get some food?”

“I'm fine.” I motioned down the nearby residential street. “Why don't we take a walk?”

He nodded happily. Keeping very close to each other, we walked down the street, past nice, two-story houses that were developing Halloween decorations and front lawns covered with fallen leaves. After a bit of small talk, I asked Josh what his plans were for this week.

“We have the big rally this Friday.” He nearly jumped up and looked at me. “You should come!”

I cocked an eyebrow. “Rally? What rally is this?”

“A big one against homosexual marriage. There's going to be thousands of Christians at the legislature, protesting it and upholding traditional marriage. If you want to come, we can give you a ride.”

“Oh, wow. Umm...” My mind seemed to freeze up as I tried to figure out what to say. I'm not a political person at all, but I support equal rights for all (including myself), so this was one rally I did not want to be seen at. But this had also given me some insight into who Josh was... and it didn't look pretty. I needed to delve into it more. “I can't make it on Friday. I have work. And I don't think my gay friends would want me to be there.”

He gasped audibly. “You have gay friends?”

I shot him a look as we turned down another side street. “Yeah... is that a problem?”

“It is!” he shouted emphatically. “The Bible is clear that homosexuality is a terrible sin. Your friends can't be allowed to live that sort of sinful lifestyle. They need to be brought to Jesus.”

“Right...” Were we having this conversation? Two closeted gay guys, talking about whether it was a sin? Dear God, how much my life had taken a turn in the past few weeks. “Do you think people choose to be gay?”

“No. I think it's a mental disorder, caused by abuse or abandonment or something like that.” This was the most animated I'd ever seen him. It was scary. Is this what he was actually learning at his church? “But I also know that people can be healed from it when they turn to Jesus and ask Him to take away their same-sex attractions.”

“Is that what they are?” I asked. “Same-sex attractions? Not actual feelings?”

Now he looked at me strangely. “Of course they're not real. Jord, we're all straight. Just some people have weird feelings at times, but those can be fixed with prayer and counselling.”

“Right...” Well, I knew one thing: this boy was in denial. But there was no use arguing any further. I had to remind myself that I was pretending to be an evangelical Christian for him.

We reached a park and walked down to a small pond. He found a nice round stone and tossed it at the clear, glass-like water. It hit the water and sunk immediately. I laughed. “No, that's not how you do it.” I showed him the right way by grabbing another stone and flicking it across the pond. It skipped along the water before settling in halfway across.

“Nice.” He tried again, only to have the same results.

“Here,” I stepped behind him and gave him another stone, “let me help.” I gently grabbed his wrist and held it in the correct position. He stepped back, pressing right against my body, and every one of my hairs stood on end. “N-now you just flick it--” I kept him in position as he tossed the stone. “--and there you go.” The rock bounced over the water several times before sinking. “Good!”

He turned around, putting his pale, fresh face right in front of mine. “I did it!”

“Y-yeah, you did!” Our lips were just inches apart. How easy it would have been to just lean forward and kiss him. I knew there were feelings between us, but I didn't know how he would react. I clamped my jaw firm and forced myself to take a step back.

He reached down, picked up another stone, and threw it at the pond. As he did, the silver watch that hung off his wrist flew off as well, landing with a loud splash about twenty feet from the shore. Josh gasped. “My watch!”

We ran to the edge of the pond, where the ground dropped off and was replaced by a few feet of water. “Please tell me it's waterproof,” I said, keeping my sight on where the splash had been made. The only light came from the streetlamps beyond the park.

He shook his head. “It was my dad's.” His voice sounded choked, as though he were about to cry. “I need to get it.”

I started looking around for a large branch, but Josh took a more direct approach. He tore his shirt, shoes and pants off and dove into the pond wearing just his black boxers. “Oh no,” I muttered. It was hardly a warm night out, and the water had to be near freezing. He surfaced and swam towards the target, his firm, muscular arms tearing through the water with ease.

“There's no way this ends well.” I quickly removed my wallet and phone from my pockets, ready to jump in as soon as the cold got to him and he started to struggle. He reached the area where the watch had landed and slipped under, emerging a few seconds later in a fit of coughs. “Josh, are you okay?”

He held a thumb above his head and slipped back under again, this time for a good twenty seconds before shooting back up. “I saw it!” he screamed. He took a deep breath and was right back under again. I held my own breath as I waited for him to break the surface again. Ten seconds passed. Then twenty. Then thirty. Something was not right.

“You idiot,” I muttered, unbuttoning my shirt and throwing it off. I ran at the pond and dove in. The water hit my body like a million tiny needles, stinging every inch of my skin. I gritted my teeth and swam through it, my thick, soaked jeans now holding me back. I reached the point where Josh had gone under and took a deep breath, ready to go down and find his body. Just as I started to descend, he sprang back up, silver watch in hand.

“Ahh!” He jumped back in surprise as he saw me. “What are you doing?”

“S-s-s-saving y-y-y-you,” I said through chattering teeth. “What took you so long?”

“I wanted to see how long I could hold my breath,” he said innocently. “Sorry, I didn't think you'd jump in.”

“I thought you'd drowned.” I started to backcrawl towards the land.

He grinned and followed me. “So you dove in to save me? Thanks buddy.”

I shook my head. “Don't do it again, okay? Seriously, this water is freezing.”

He splashed at me. “I don't mind it.”

“Oh really?” I asked. I stopped in place and then jumped at him, pushing his head underwater. He struggled to fight back, but was no match for me. I wrapped my arms around him and held him in place. “There, how's it now?”

“Not so bad.” His tone was soft... almost seductive. I felt shivers go down my spine, and they had nothing to do with the freezing water. “Especially with you near.”

“What do you mean?” The words were out of my mouth before I could even think.

He seemed to pause for a second, before ducking under the water and appearing a few feet away from me. “Nothing. You're just a good friend, you know?”

“Sure.” Like that's what he really meant. I sighed quietly, swam towards the land and climbed out, my whole body shaking from the cold. I helped Josh out and then ran for my shirt, holding it over my body as though it could act like a towel.

“You okay?” Josh stood in front of me, wearing is soaked boxers, as though it was a sunny summer day. I finally got a good look at what he looked like under his clothes, and I wasn't disappointed. He was ripped, from a defined six-pack and pecs to his muscular legs and arms. There was a definitive bulge in his boxers, one that was quite large at that. He shook his head, flinging his wet black hair back and sending small droplets everywhere.

“Yeah. I'm fine.” It was true. I really was.


(Next chapter: things really heat up. I promise)