Hard Glass

by Lina Langley

  I wouldn’t have to tell him anymore, and I supposed that had to count for something. I sighed. Brandon had decided to leave me alone after I told him I needed space, but I had forgotten my phone in Jules’ car, and I would need him to open it if I wanted to call Clive and Denise to come get me.

  And I really wanted them to. I needed to get out of there, as soon as possible. But I also didn’t want to run into Jules and I didn’t want to run into his mother, either. I had no idea what I could possibly say to her.

  She had made her feelings toward me very clear. As far as Hashim went, I didn’t think he would want to see me, and maybe that was better. I didn’t know what I could say to him and I didn’t know how much Jules had disclosed.

  I began to walk back toward the house, my hands in my pocket, when I heard rustling in front of me. I didn’t stop. I wanted to avoid whoever was in my way, keep my head down and get my phone. It should have, in theory, been easy.

  “Mason,” I heard Jules say.

  I stopped, my mouth dry. I hadn’t expected to run into him so soon. I had been thinking about what I could possibly say to him, what I could possibly tell him to make everything good between us. I had come up blank, and when he was standing in front of me, waiting for me to say something, I couldn’t think of one thing to say.

  I told myself not to cry. I didn’t want to make my emotional state his problem too. I cleared my throat before I spoke. “Hey,” I said.

  “Hey.”

  I waited for him to say something. It was clear after a while that he was waiting for the same thing, except he expected me to say something smart or interesting or that would make it all makes sense, but I didn’t have anything. “I’m sorry.”

  “Why?”

  I looked up at him. He was shrouded by darkness, the only light on him the moonlight breaking through the tall trees around us. “What do you mean why?”

  “I mean, why are you sorry?”

  I swallowed. “Because I should’ve told you the first place. Because you had a right to know.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me in the first place?”

  I bit the inside of my cheek so hard I could taste copper with the tip of my tongue. “Because I was scared,” I said. “I don’t know, I was so ready to tell you, and then—then I met you and holy shit, you were so nice, and all I wanted to do was make you happy.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Yeah,” I replied. “Seriously. And I kept telling myself that I had to tell you, because I knew it was wrong and I knew that you deserved to know, but I couldn’t bring myself to. Because at that point, it felt like I had too much to lose.”

  He looked at me for a little while. “I don’t understand,” he said. “What did you have to lose?”

  “You, Jules,” I replied. “I didn’t want to lose you.”

  He blinked, then got closer to me. “You can’t say stuff like that, Mason.”

  I shrugged. “Whatever,” I said. “I don’t have anything else to lose.”

  “No,” he said. “Tell me what you mean.”

  He sounded serious. Maybe more serious than he ever had before, and there was a part of me that felt a little shaky at his words. I sniffled before I set my gaze on him.

  “Because,” I said quietly.

  “No,” he said. I watched him cross his arms over his chest. “You know that I deserve better than that.”

  I licked my lower lip. “You do, Jules,” I said. “You deserve better than me.”

  “Don’t,” he said. “Don’t throw yourself a pity party just because you think it’s going to get you out of this.”

  “That isn’t what I’m trying to do,” I said. “And I know there’s no way for me to get out of this. There’s… I mean, I could tell you I love you, but I don’t think it would make a difference.”

  “You love me,” he echoed.

  “Yeah,” I said, trying to ignore my fast-beating heart. “Yeah, I love you. And I know, I know I shouldn’t be telling you this. I know it’s too much. You should probably ignore me.”

  “I can’t ignore you,” he said quietly. “I’ve been thinking about trying. But even when I think about it, I can’t really begin to parse it. I want you in my life, even if it’s… Complicated.”

  “It’s more than complicated. It’s beyond fucked.”

  “Yeah,” he replied. “I know.”

  “I was just going to call my parents,” I said after a little while. “They can come pick me up. I won’t be in your way anymore.”

  He scoffed. “You think that’s what this is about, you being in my “way?”

  “No, I don’t know what this is about,” I said. “I can’t even begin to put myself in your position.”

  He took a step closer to me. I could see his face then. There was a line between his eyebrows, which were furrowed. “Let me clarify my position,” he said.

  He was so close to me I could feel his breath tickling my skin. He wrapped his hands around my wrists and gently yanked my body closer to his own.

  “What are you doing?” I asked under my breath.

  “What I want,” he said. “Because you’re always doing what you fucking want, and so should I, right?”

  “That’s not fair—”

  He stopped me by kissing me on the mouth, his mouth hungry, his face pushing against my own. He was pushing me so forcefully that he cornered me, putting me up against a tree. He had enough foresight to put his hand between the back of my head and the rough tree trunk, even as he pressed hard against me, his crotch pressing against mine.

  He pulled away from me for a second. “Jules…”

  “You want this, right?”

  I licked my lips. “Yeah,” I said. “But we can’t.”

  “Why not?” he asked. “Nobody knows, right?”

  “I—”

  I stopped again when he moved his hands away from me and dropped to his knees, leaves rustling under him. He put his hands on the zipper of my jeans and looked up at me. It felt like his green eyes were cutting through how dark the night was. “I can stop,” he said. “You just tell me to stop and I will.”

  I looked down at him. I opened my mouth to tell him that it was time to stop, that we both knew he couldn’t do it. But I found myself putting my hand on the back of his head, threading my fingers through his thick blond hair. “Fuck,” I said quietly as he began to unzip me.

  I was so hard I was sure I was going to burst. He took a deep shaky breath, then pressed his cheek against the bulge in my boxers. I threw my head back when I felt his breath, then licked my lips as he curled his fingertips around the waistband of my boxers and slid them down my legs, slowly, all while he kept his gaze on my hardened cock.

  “Oh my God,” he said, more to himself than to me. There was a part of me that still expected him to back off, but my cock was so hard it hurt and I felt like I was going to explode.

  I needed him, and it was clear that he needed me too. He didn’t take a lot of time to think it over. He wrapped his mouth around the head of my cock, swirling his tongue around my piss slit, then moving down toward my shaft. He hesitated, but only for a second, then began to move his head back and forth quickly, his mouth perfectly warm and tight as his tongue ran across the underside of my cock.

  He was sucking me off with such hunger and my cock was throbbing with every stroke, with every time he moved his head up and down my hardened cock. He put his fingers around the base of my cock and I could hear him begin to gag, but he never slowed down, and I began to feel pleasure spreading through my extremities, little explosions going off everywhere in my body as I held on to the back of his head even harder, trying my best not to put too much pressure on him, barely hearing myself when I spoke, when I told him that I was going to come in his mouth. I expected him to pull away, but he didn’t, he never did, and I could feel my toes curling as I began to come, certain I was hurting him with how tight my grip was, certain I was hurting him because I was coming inside him in the first place.


  He never pulled away from me. Even as he drank all my come, even as I closed my eyes and all I could see were stars under my eyelids, even as my knees became weak under me and I almost collapsed, he never pulled away from me. Even as I dropped my hand from the back of his head and began to gasp from how tired I was, from how amazing that had been, from how empty my head felt.

  I could barely keep myself up, but it seemed like he knew that, because he stood up and put his arm around my waist, steadying me instantly. “You have no idea what I want,” he said.

  Then he kissed me on the mouth, a sloppy open-mouthed kiss with a tongue that was still covered with come, and when he was finally done and pulled away from me, he smiled, his eyes shining. “Now,” he said. “All you have to do is swallow.”

  I looked at him, just for a second, and his eyes were so intense and so beautiful.

  So I did it. I swallowed, and then I smiled at him.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  MASON

  We walked back toward the house together. Every now and then, our homes would touch, and I was almost sure that he was going to intertwine his fingers with mine. He never did. He never even looked back at me. He was walking much faster than I was and I was lagging behind, waiting for him to turn back and acknowledge me.

  When we finally got to the door, he stopped. “Don’t go,” he said. “Please?”

  He wasn’t looking at me. He didn’t look at me when he spoke at all. I could see his reflection on the glass door. “Why not?”

  “Isn’t it obvious? I want you here.”

  I swallowed. “Not everyone does, Jules.”

  He turned to look at me then. “Are you talking about my mother?”

  I blinked, looking away from him. “Maybe.”

  “You have to tell me.”

  I pinched the bridge of my nose, then swallowed. “Okay. She doesn’t want me to be here,” I said. “And honestly, I can’t really blame her.”

  “Why? She’s the one who did this. She needs to learn to live with the consequences, because that’s what she’s always talking about. She could’ve told me about you, but instead, you had to find me all by yourself. She doesn’t get to decide whether my brother gets to stay here or not.”

  I shook my head. When I spoke, my voice was shaking. “Jules,” I said. “The last thing I want to do is make things difficult for you.”

  “Yeah,” he said. “But you know me. I don’t like easy.”

  ***

  I stayed. Part of me was scared of it, but then, everything had changed since the night before. Hashim and Brandon teased us. They can tell that something had happened, but neither one of us could tell them what.

  I did notice that even though I had stayed at his request, he began to sit further and further away from me. I knew that it was simply because the situation, but I wished there was something I could do about it, except sit there helplessly and wonder if Catherine was going to talk to me.

  She gave us all a wide berth and I didn’t dare ask if that was how she normally behaved, but the answer came anyway when Hashim joked about how amazing a hostess she was. Jules laughed along with him, but unless I was mistaken, I was sure I could see some pain behind his expression. I couldn’t tell, not for sure, and I definitely couldn’t ask.

  We were sitting by the pool while Brandon grilled some burgers. I hadn’t seen Catherine’s car—the black Audi SUV. I had been looking out for it, mostly because I was scared that she would find me and kick me out of her house, but I knew she couldn’t do that without giving herself away.

  The day was a little cold for the pool, but we had it all to ourselves and it seemed perfect. Hashim was trying to decide on the music when Jules looked at me and smiled. “Will you help me get the drinks?”

  I nodded. “Yeah,” I said. “Of course.”

  I stood up and watched as he did the same thing. He cocked his head as he looked at me. “You’re getting a tan again,” he said.

  “Maybe,” I replied, covering my eyes and looking up at the sky. “It’s not that sunny.”

  He nodded. “It isn’t, is it,” he said.

  He began to walk, so I walked alongside him.

  “I can give you some sunblock, if you want,” he said.

  I shrugged. “Sure,” I replied. “I’ve never used any before.”

  He opened the sliding door for me and let me in before him, the air conditioner hitting my face as we walked inside. I closed the door behind me, Hashim and Brandon giggling in the distance.

  “We should probably talk,” he said as I followed him into the kitchen. He began to open cupboards, making a considerable amount of noise as he did so. “First of all, I want to apologize to you.”

  “Apologize? Why?”

  “Because, you didn’t deserve this. You deserved so much better than this,” he said, grabbing some cups and slamming them down on the kitchen counter. “You deserved better than my mom.”

  “That’s not your fault.”

  “Yeah,” he replied. “But if I had been paying attention, I would have believed you from the get-go. Fuck, I might have even been able to help you.”

  “How would you have been able to help me?”

  He shook his head. “Get the soda out of the fridge?”

  I did as I was told, turning around and leaning forward mostly just so he could stare at my ass. I didn’t know if he was going to, but he was quiet for a second and I liked the idea that he was transfixed with me.

  I grabbed the soda and put it on the kitchen counter. “I don’t know,” Jules said. “Just… I think I would have been able to help you somehow.”

  “You’re wrong,” I said. “No one can help me.”

  He shook his head. “I wish you didn’t think that way,” he said.

  I shrugged my shoulders. “How else am I supposed to think?”

  “I don’t know,” he said. “But you’re not alone anymore, and that has to count for something.”

  I swallowed, leaning back against the fridge. The blow job had been one thing, and I wasn’t sure but he was acting like he didn’t hate me. He was acting sweet and compassionate again and I didn’t know what to make of it.

  I had been going over everything that had happened between us, playing it like a video on repeat in my head. I could still feel his hands around my wrists. I could still feel his mouth around my cock.

  I could still, and I wanted to, feel him all over me.

  It felt more than just physical, it felt like he had broken through my skin, like he was inside of me. It felt very much like he had torn me apart and he had crawled into me, taking over my heart, taking over my body.

  I knew I could never feel complete without him again. Like my life had only started after I had met him and that sort of scared and exhilarated me in equal amounts.

  And I understood how he might not want it to be a long-term thing. I got how it looked and I would have understood if he never wanted to forgive me. But maybe he was going to be able to and maybe my life wouldn’t have to change as much as I thought it would have.

  “I’ve been thinking about it a lot,” he said. “I’m going to have to ask Hashim out.”

  I blinked and swallowed. That was not what I had been expecting to hear. “You’re going to have to ask him out?”

  “Yeah, think about it. If I ask him out, it’ll seem like you and me are done for good,” he said. “And that’s what we need right now.”

  “Okay…” I replied, looking him up and down. He was wearing a flimsy white tank and his swimming shorts, and he looked gorgeous. I wanted to take him in my arms and kiss him right then and there, push him up against the fridge and return the favor. I could feel the electricity crackling between us, I could almost hear it in the air. I had to stop myself from closing the space between us, from claiming him as my own. I knew that Jules didn’t belong to me. Not in any way, not at any time, but fuck, I wanted him to tell me that he did. “And what if he says yes?”

  Jules smirked at me. “Are y
ou jealous?”

  I looked away from him. “So what if I am?”

  He laughed, throwing his head back, then set his gaze on my face. “The thing is, Mason, you can’t be.”

  “I can’t be what?”

  “Jealous,” he said. “We can’t have that type of relationship.”

  I shrugged. “I know—I know,” I said. “I just…”

  “I don’t want him to say yes, Mason,” he said. “But if he does, I’ll tell him it’s one date and then I can disengage. I just need…”

  “You need what?”

  “I need to get over it,” he said. “I need to get over you, and at this rate, I’m never going to be able to.”

  “So you’re just going to ask your friend out?”

  He looked at me for a second, his eyes narrow. He might have thought that I thought it was a terrible idea. I did, but I wasn’t sure why. I didn’t know if it was because I loved him, or because I didn’t want him to use Hashim like that. Maybe it was a bit of both.

  Maybe it was just that I was madly jealous and I didn’t want him to attempt to get over me.

  “You know,” he said. “Hashim is straight. He’s definitely going to say no.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Oh, yeah,” Jules said. “I had a crush on him for a longtime, and he knew. But he’s in love with Trixie Medina.”

  I laughed. “Who?”

  “Trixie,” he said. “She grew up in the house next door. He writes poems about her.”

  I snickered. “No, he doesn’t. Does he?”

  “He does,” he replied. “They’ve gotten lots better. When he started, a couple of years ago…”

  I shook my head, still smiling. “He’s never mentioned her.”

  “Well, he knows I have a crush on him,” Jules said, then rolled his eyes. “Had. Had a crush on him. The last thing he wants to do is hurt my feelings.”

  “Did you tell him?”

  “Nah,” he replied, shaking his head. “No, nothing like that. He read my blog.”

  “Wow,” I replied, still laughing. “That sounds super fun.”