Poster Boy

by Anne Tenino

  Lovely. “Do you want to go inside or sit out here?” And can we make this fast?

  Noah looked at him beseechingly. “Can we go down to the bar in the village? I need to get away from this place.”

  Toby sighed. “Just let me tell someone where we’re going?”

  Noah nodded, and Toby jogged up to the house to find Danny sitting in the living room by himself, watching some part of Carlos yet again. He paused it and greeted Toby with, “He’s in the shower.”

  Toby played dumb. “Who is?” Jock was showering too? That sounds promising.

  “Your boyfriend.”

  “Don’t use that word!” He waved it away, warding off potential jinx. “You’ll scare him.”

  Danny lifted his brows, but was otherwise circumspect. “’Kay.” Obviously, love had changed him.

  “Can you just tell him that Noah has some kind of problem and I have to talk the guy off his ledge, but I’ll be back later? Noah and I are going down to the bar.”

  “Oooh.” Danny nodded exaggeratedly. “Yeah, that convo might take a while, dude, ’cause—”

  “Don’t tell me.” Toby held up a quelling palm. “Give him the dignity of confessing whatever it is to me without my prior knowledge.”

  He escaped while Danny was still trying to decipher what he’d said.

  Any hopes Toby had of getting through his “advising session” with Noah quickly died when he saw the dude waiting for him. He was standing at Toby’s hut with his head bowed and his arms hugging his chest. When he looked up at Toby’s approach, his face was pale and vacant. Not blank, just not there.

  This was going to be worse than his talk with Danny yesterday. What was it Collin had said last term when he’d come out to at TAG? “God save me from straight, sensitive frat boys.” Toby hadn’t fully understood that until this week, but he totally comprehended it now.

  Except Noah wasn’t straight, so maybe it was just frat boys in general. Well, not all of them. Hopefully. Toby gave Noah his most reassuring smile and laid a hand on his shoulder, squeezing. “Okay, let’s go. We’ll get this worked out.” Whatever it was.

  Noah nodded, chin crumpling for a split second before he straightened his spine and started walking toward the trail the boys had discovered, worn by previous guests of Madame Bouvinet’s, presumably with similar needs to theirs.

  Beer, wine, and advice.

  “You kissed him?” Toby asked again, gripping his beer tighter, hoping that this time Noah would say “no.” It had taken the dude utterly forever to admit the real problem, which had driven Toby insane and allowed him to drink enough that he was catching a buzz, but now he couldn’t help wishing Noah hadn’t told him at all.

  “Uh-huh,” Noah said, nodding slowly, staring down at his own glass in front of him. “I don’t know what happened, but it was like my hormones took over. Or maybe it’s Turbo’s pheromones.”

  “Oh Jesus.” He wanted to lay his head down, but the bar was nearly full at this time of the evening—not surprisingly, since by Toby’s estimation it could only hold about twenty people—and they’d had to stand at one of the countertops built along the walls. Totally not the correct height for hiding one’s face in defeat. One of the little round tables would have been perfect, but they were all taken.

  He took a deep drink of his beer, then a deep breath, before continuing their conversation. “And what did he do when you kissed him?”

  Noah swallowed, staring at the wall in front of him with blank eyes. “He pushed me away.” He touched his shoulder with his fingertips, as if remembering the other guy’s hand there.

  Well, yeah. But now was not the time to point out the obvious, or to give Noah a lecture on the fruitlessness of pinning his hopes on “turning” a straight boy. Well, what time is it?

  It’s damage control time.

  “Did he say anything to you after that?”

  Noah ignored the question, burying his face in his hands, then slipping even lower, until he gripped his own hair, his nose inches from the countertop. “I couldn’t stop myself,” he moaned. “He wasn’t wearing anything but that towel, and his hair was all wet from the shower and he smelled sooo good and the hallway was deserted—”

  “What? You assaulted him when he was almost naked?”

  Noah straightened up, but couldn’t look at Toby. “I . . . I’m not sure I’d call it assault, exactly.”

  “Noah.” Toby leaned forward, enunciating, wanting this to be very clear. “If Turbo was a girl, and you’d done that, what would be happening right this second?”

  His eyes went wide. “All the sororities would be marching on TAG House and throwing things through our windows and ripping up our lawn and spraying penis slurs on our walls? And they’d hunt me down mercilessly on campus and scream abuse until I had a nervous breakdown and left college? Oh God, I don’t want to go like BLO, dude.”

  Toby had his doubts if kissing a girl—even a half-naked girl—against her will would bring down the kind of wrath that had been heaped on the Beta Lambda Omicron brother after he’d drugged and raped that girl fall term, but it helped Toby’s case to play along with it for now. “If we were at Calapooya? Maybe. You’d also be facing assault charges. Or at the minimum, a complaint to the college and the Greek council.”

  “But he’s a guy.”

  Toby leveled his sternest expression at Noah. “A straight guy, who didn’t in any way invite you to come on to him. He’s been avoiding you like—like you’re a gay guy he knows has a crush on him.”

  “Um, I’m actually bi,” Noah said.

  “It doesn’t. Matter.” Toby used his index finger to make his point, tapping the counter with it. Maybe a bit hard, if the beer sloshing in his glass was any indication. “You may as well be an alien offering him a bioprobe. He wants it about as much.”

  Noah’s face fell. “Isn’t that a little harsh? I mean, the internet told me most straight guys will actually—”

  “Porn is not reality!”

  Noah scrunched up his forehead. “But I read it on Facebook.”

  Toby grabbed Noah’s biceps, making the dude pay close attention. “Facebook is not reality, either. Anything that glows, chimes, chirps, pings, or rings to get your attention? Not a reliable source of information.”

  Noah’s brow wrinkled up again. Toby began to interpret it as a sign of mental exertion. “Okay, even if you’re right . . . this is different. It’s not—it’s not just lust. I didn’t assault him so much as express my overpowering emotions.”

  “Okay, first thing is, that’s what stalkers say in court and the judge finds it as worthy an excuse as I do. In other words, your feelings don’t matter. I mean, they matter, but not to Turbo. Not in this situation. You cannot do anything you want and then excuse it by saying you were overpowered by some primitive, limbic response.” He shook Noah slightly, hoping that would somehow help what he was saying to penetrate his skull. “That’s why they call them ‘crimes of passion.’ It’s still a crime.”

  “What’s going on?” Someone asked, looming far too close to them. Close to Toby, in particular. Jock. Did he come looking for me?

  Focus on the problem at hand.

  Noah turned to speak to Jock. “I committed a crime of passion.”

  “Oh my God.” Toby dropped his hands from the guy’s arms. This might be hopeless.

  “Yeah?” Jock drawled, staring at his roommate, eyes downright icy. “Which one would that be?”

  Noah’s thinking wrinkles appeared yet again. “As far as I know, the only straight guy I assaulted today was Turbo.”

  Jock squinted at him a moment longer, then turned to Toby. “You guys missed dinner.” Either the lighting in this place was bad, or Jock was pouting.

  “We’ve been here that long?” Toby craned his head but couldn’t find a clock anywhere. He stretched to see around that post over his shoulder and bumped into Jock, who’d moved even closer to him. Standing with his arm braced on the bar—Toby could feel the heat on his back. Clos
er than one guy generally stood to another in public, which Toby couldn’t help but see as a positive sign.

  “You’ve been here a couple hours.” Jock answered Toby, but Toby was fairly sure his focus was on Noah. “Uh, I think.”

  Toby tipped his head ever so slightly to the annoyed hulk behind him, then widened his eyes.

  “Um, can I just talk to Toby another minute?” Noah asked Jock, looking over Toby’s shoulder. “Alone?”

  Toby felt Jock’s huff more than heard it. “I’ll be sitting out front with the other guys,” he said after a few seconds. The heat of his arm dissipated, and then he stood next to them again, giving Noah one more hard look before turning to go.

  Oh he’s totally into me.

  “Wow, uh.” Noah gave one of those laugh-snorts of disbelief, staring after Jock. “He possessive much?”

  “I don’t know.” Toby stared after Jock himself, watching the muscles in his back. “It just started today.”

  “Well, congrats, dude.” Noah sounded utterly wrecked.

  Shit. Toby diverted his energy, putting it back into this kid. If he fixed the problem well enough, he could forget it for a while. “I’m sorry things aren’t working out for you, but seriously, you have to believe me when I tell you that—”

  “No, I get it.” Noah nodded, twirling his beer glass. “Sorry about before, I was just . . . I guess I wanted to believe.”

  “You’ll recover,” Toby said, knowing that was an easy platitude in his position, even if true. “I’ve been there, I—”

  “You were in love with a straight dude?” Noah jerked his head up.

  “Not exactly.” Not at all. Although he’d definitely done the unrequited lust thing in his high school PE class. And many, many other times. “I mean, I’ve had crushes on unattainable guys.” Okay, it was disturbing that Noah’s eyes drifted over his shoulder, in the direction Jock had just gone, but Toby forced himself to ignore it, reaching to grasp his advisee’s arm. “I know it might feel like, you know, ‘love,’ but it’s not. Real love isn’t one-sided.”

  “But I’m not sure it’s one-sided.” Noah leaned forward, earnest in his belief. “I mean, there were times when he—”

  “It is one-sided.” Toby firmed his jaw and nodded after a second of Noah staring at him. If the poor kid had looked wrecked before, he was destroyed now.

  “You think I really scared him?” Noah swallowed.

  “Um, well, it depends on how you define ‘scared.’” Total evasion. “Let’s just say I think he was very concerned for his safety.” Not exactly pulling his punches, but he had to be cruel to be kind and all that.

  “I probably owe him an apology, huh?”

  “Um, I would say so, yes.”

  Noah nodded quickly, shuffling his feet. Toby hated making him so unhappy, but it had to be done. He clapped Noah on the shoulder with false cheer. A totally fake “Well, glad we resolved that” gesture. “Okay, then. Let’s go get another beer and find the guys.”

  Noah made a face, but followed along when Toby led the way to the bartender.

  Waiting for Toby in front of his place, Jock had some time to think. A lot of time. More than he wanted, for sure. But he was the coward who’d run this afternoon when they’d gotten home and the guys had caught them kissing. He was also the dumbass who’d gotten all territorial when he’d seen Toby with Noah, even knowing nothing was going on. Danny’d filled him in about Turbo, and he could see why Toby was the obvious guy to go to.

  Still, he’d decided against waiting with the guys at the bar for Noah’s crisis to end, because he was sick of their never-ending beer terrorist crap. And because he didn’t want anyone else to waylay Toby. Now that he was certain he wanted more, he wasn’t interested in letting anyone get in the way.

  Everyone wanted a piece of him, didn’t they? It didn’t matter that Jock didn’t feel like sharing. He’d never been good at sharing. He was the kid who’d whacked others for taking his toys in preschool, and the kid who’d always wanted to make up the rules of the game. It was part of the reason his parents had started him in hockey early, to “channel his aggressions” and “help him learn discipline.”

  Hockey’d done that, but it hadn’t rid him of those personality traits, had it?

  Whatever. Jock sighed and slouched further in Toby’s patio chair, stretching his legs out in front of him and hanging his arms off the sides. The thing was only comfortable for so long, at least when he was sitting here by himself waiting for its owner. It was too straight-backed, and it didn’t support lounging.

  The sun had just set when he’d gotten here, but it was full night now. The wind had died some—it did that at the end of the day—but there was still enough of it to chill him. Toby said the mistral was the reason Provence had a unique climate, but still, it could be warmer and it wouldn’t hurt, would it?

  Probably, what did he know? That wind, the mistral, definitely felt unusual. Nights like this with a full moon, looking out over the landscape, Jock almost thought he could see the way the air currents swirled. Like watching cold and warm water mix, little disturbances that were barely detectable.

  “Was that necessary?”

  Jock nearly fell off the chair onto his ass when Toby’s voice came out of the darkness. How had he snuck up on him? He shoved himself up onto the seat, then stood, watching Toby pass through the glow of the yard light mounted by the pool, that same confident walk, but slower, approaching warily.

  “What?” Jock asked.

  “The way you acted toward Noah, was that necessary?”

  “Um, what way?” He didn’t have a lot of hope that Toby’d buy his act, but he didn’t have any other answer, either.

  Toby smiled; Jock caught his mouth curving up just before he passed from light into darkness again. “Like you were a dog protecting your bone.”

  He shrugged. “If you’re my bone, I guess.” He forced himself to stay still as Toby came closer, not shifting his weight. “Sorry,” he mumbled when Toby stood just in front of him.

  “For calling me your bone or treating me like one?”

  Jock shook his head because he wasn’t sure if he was sorry at all. Toby stepped forward until he stood so close not even the wind could fit between them to blow away the smell of him—a hint of salt and something else that Jock’s brain labeled caramel, even though it wasn’t anything like that. Before he knew it, he had a hand on Toby’s waist, pulling him closer. “You don’t wanna be my bone?”

  “Do you wanna be my dog?” Toby pressed his body against Jock’s, wrapping his arms over Jock’s shoulders so they were as close as they could be with clothes on.

  “I wanna feel you naked, all over me.”

  Toby’s heartbeat reacted immediately, picking up speed, thumping against Jock’s ribs. “You gonna fuck me?” he asked, barely louder than the sound of Jock’s lungs working to bring in air.

  Jock swallowed. “Yes.”

  “Thank God,” Toby said, right before Jock kissed him.

  Toby let them into the cabin, Jock standing right behind him, prickling Toby’s skin from the brush of breath on the back of his neck while his key slid into the lock like a lover. He took that as a good sign. A shiver worked down his spine, feeding the building ball of tension at the base of his dick.

  Once he got the door open, Jock followed him in, stepping out of the entry so Toby could shut it, moving silently, then clamping Toby’s wrist in his hand and pulling Toby toward him. He didn’t say anything, but that eye-lock connection they shared told Toby a lot. Jock wanted this, and he wanted it because it was Toby.

  Toby pulled Jock’s head down, getting things underway, making the first move but knowing it was probably the last moment of real control he’d have. This kiss was his, and Jock would take what he wanted after that. Toby’d never had a clue nervous tension balling in his gut could be so exciting.

  Jock was pushing Toby’s coat off and then pulling his shirt over his head within seconds, looking at Toby, running his hands
down Toby’s sides, then bending to kiss his neck. Using teeth to scrape along the side of Toby’s throat, bringing up goose bumps everywhere.

  The way Jock undressed him made Toby forget all about his physical insecurities and shortcomings. He didn’t think once about how his body compared to GI Joe’s, not with the way Jock touched him, using his whole hand to feel every molecule of Toby’s skin. Molding and kneading and finding obscure parts of Toby’s body. The spaces under his scapula, and where his ribs curved around his torso. Jock’s touch gave him a buzz, disorienting him enough to tell Jock, “You aren’t leaving until we’re both sweating, panting, wrung out, and drunk on sex.”

  Good lord, he’d even made himself swoony with that line. He had to rest his forehead on Jock’s collarbone, and then he had to trace the line of it with his tongue.

  “I fucking hope so,” Jock said, voice so deep it resounded in Toby’s ear, small vibrations infiltrating his body and adding to the great big pile of arousal building inside him.

  Fingers slid down Toby’s abdomen, searching out the top button of his jeans, then flicking it open before skimming around to his back and working under his waistband. Jock pulled his head up then, eyes catching Toby’s again before he cradled the back of Toby’s skull in his other hand and kissed him. Tongue lunging into his mouth at the same time Jock shoved into his briefs, fingers gripping his ass, forcing Toby’s jeans down until they hung up on his hipbones. Jock barely had room to maneuver inside Toby’s clothing, but he managed to wedge his thumb between Toby’s cheeks, hooking it on Toby’s tailbone for leverage and working down further.

  Toby pulled out of the kiss. “You can’t feel me naked all over you if you’re still dressed,” he panted, bunching Jock’s shirt up his back, under the coat he still wore. Jock let go of him long enough to shrug his jacket onto the floor and yank off his tee, then he pulled Toby close again, gasping when Toby slid his chest along Jock’s, stretching up on tiptoes and letting Jock’s abdominal ridges caress his own belly, until they were almost the same height and Jock’s pecs skimmed his nipples. Jock cupped and kneaded Toby’s ass, kissing him while walking them toward the bed. Pushing Toby down until he lay on his back, stripping off his shoes and jeans, then standing to get rid of his own.