by Lydia Thorn
Snap out of it!
I’m playing a dangerous game; Raven could very well have a meltdown and expose me and ruin Damien’s life. I’m gambling with his entire career and future and all I can think of what I can get out of it if it works out in my favor…I’m actually anticipating Raven choosing to let me have him. I think on the spontaneous nickname I gave him three years ago, Raven; I like it. Ravens are smart but associated with ill omens in most cultures, but also insight and prophecy. And I can’t help but think his sudden popping up when I least expects means something, good or bad, I can’t say.
He seems like a lonely person just looking for someone to care about him. He and I have that in common, each of us wanting what we feel we can’t have.
Why not take comfort in each other’s arms? He’ll have a taste of what he desires and through him, I’ll sort out how I feel about Damien.
I don’t want to think about how I felt nothing when I kissed him. But with Raven, I felt the heat so keenly I needed to taste him. This is not how it’s supposed to be.
Something is wrong.
“Is something wrong, sir?” Tai’s voice knocks me out of my thoughts and I’m sucked into the small office at home. Spring is in the air, more people are out despite the cool winds and I’m stuck inside this office looking over amateur drone designs for a contest I’m holding for my brother’s automation tech company called Portunes, named after the ancient Roman god of doors and keys, livestock and ports.
This contest was my debut as his partner, something simple to ease me in and get some tongues wagging. The plan is for me to do a few more of these types of engagements before I’m officially hired. My brother plans to one day pass it on to me, and I promised him that I was ready for the responsibility of preparing for what that means.
I wasn’t prepared. At least not for the ass load of tutors he scheduled to begin homeschooling me or the long nights I had to stay at the company to learn about each division and the extensive work they had to do every day. But I would be lying if I said I hated it. I don’t. I love it. Just last week I rode in a car with no steering wheel and no front seats. You entered the sleek as hell light slate blue car like a limo with seats facing each other and on the screen, you can customize the car’s AI avatar. For the first time, I understood why my brother nearly worked himself to death reviving the company after our father almost pissed it away with his alcoholism.
Being at that company felt like I was personally shaping the future and just as my brother desired to be better than our father, I now desire to be better than him. But now I’m nothing more than a minnow in the sea. I needed to learn. And that’s why this Raven/Damien situation is so damn annoying. Granted I caused this, I deserve it and more.
“I’m sorry, I have a lot on my mind.” I finally reply to the assistant I hired. Already, I don’t like her, not that she’s a terrible employee, but it just feels like she’s someone my brother would have hired. Clean cut and sophisticated like fine wine. I wish I had chosen Gina, the fiery redhead with the grungy jeans, colorful tattoos, and thick Brooklyn accent.
“You know. My mother used to work for your father.” She smiles all sweet and innocent, but it doesn’t feel real. Her eyes aren’t as dark as his. “She told me that your father would leave the judgment for these contests to a committee who will be responsible for writing a summary of the chosen ten. He’ll look it over and decide which one he liked, it saved him a lot of trouble.”
“My father almost bankrupted this company.”
“I’m sorry—” She looks shocked, like she knows she spoke out of turn.
“Don’t be. I’m not angry.” I wave it away. I suck as a boss already. “I just want to do it right and it’s a learning experience for me.”
“Right.” Her worrisome expression turns to a smile, and she hands me a stack of folders. One of them is marked with a red X.
The contest is for amateur drone creators, the reward is fifteen thousand dollars and to have their invention made and marketed by our company. My only job was to choose the winner and create a presentation to the investors as to why I made my choice, nothing more, nothing less, an easy job.
“It’s so peculiar.” The woman leans over the desk, her cleavage right in my face, I try not to look but what the hell are you supposed to do in this situation? “A drone powered by the sun and runs on water vapor or oxygen gas?”
“Next time mark nothing with an X without running it by me,” I say writing the words KEEP on the front page of the cover sheet. This wasn’t a typical drone.
“I apologize. I feel so bad.” She rises, her creamy dress shirt tightens around her large tits. “But I don’t know how that drone can work.”
“It’s not meant to work on Earth.”
CHAPTER SIX
LOUIS
That bastard now haunts my dreams, the feeling of his mouth on me, the taste of his kisses, the feeling of his hard body pressed against me. I keep picturing him naked on the bus and he didn’t even take off his clothes. I want to run my fingers through his short blond hair and bury my face in his vanilla oak scent.
Just what the hell did I even expect to happen? Just what the hell was I thinking? Mentally kicking myself is all I have at the moment. I never took him for a dumb jock or a moron, even if those around him looked and acted like doofuses or roid-raging violent jackasses, he remained a calming center, a light that they all gravitated toward.
If I were to be honest with myself, he never really made fun of me or my friends, his crime was just sitting back and doing nothing about it. He could have called his people off, told them to relax or something. They would all listen to him and yet he just sat back watching it all happen, those silver eyes of his full of staunch indifference. What the hell was going through his mind? Does he think he’s better than everyone else? He had a look that he could give you that would make you feel like shit at the bottom of his shoes. So far away and untouchable.
And yet for a brief moment in time, I touched him….at least physically. I kissed him, I felt his lips on my cock, I watched him lick my cum. Which was hot as hell by the way.
I don’t want to go to school and face him even if my penis does.
My sheets are wet. I lift them and look at my partner who peeks out from the piss slit in my shorts….are these things called piss slits? I doubt it but I’ve always called them that so I’m going with it.
“He called you tiny.” I pouted at my penis as I assessed the organ’s length and girth. “…or little.” Bastard.
“Guys really do that?” The familiar female voice startles the hell out of me and I almost jump out of my skin like a frightened cat.
“What the hell are you doing looking into my room?” I bunch the sheets around my partner to see Kiki, a brown-skinned woman with her medium length hair in very thin dreads staring right at me from my bedroom window.
“Can’t a neighbor check up on another neighbor when they hear strange noises coming from their room?”
“I wasn’t making any strange noises.” I protest.
“I beg to differ.” She grins wickedly. “Oh, Ivan.” She moans deeply, her eyes closed to mimic pleasure. “Yeah, that’s the spot, suck my cock.” She loses herself in the act, moaning louder and louder and grunting.
The shame washes over me. “I didn’t sound like that…I don’t talk in my sleep!”
“Haha, yeah you do playboy.”
“Get away from my window.” I pull the shades in and get up.
“If you need someone to judge how big it is just let me take a look.”
“Go away, Kiki!”
“We’re not gonna let anyone else be mean to you today.” I soothe my partner and head for the toilet.
After showering and changing into the white shirt and red pants that is my uniform I grab my jacket and plaid tie and put them on and snatch up my backpack. I take a look at my phone and still see the pictures of Ivan sucking off Mr. Bowie in the teacher’s lounge, last night I put them under passwor
d protection. I then checked Facebook and twitter to see if any embarrassing dick pics were floating about. It doesn’t seem as though Ivan uses social media a lot, his last posts were two weeks ago and it was something mundane. Like a pic on twitter of a giant gyro sub he got from some diner. Most of his posts are sporadic and incohesive, almost like he just remembers to post something. Most of his activities are likes on his friend’s posts and short replies like ‘Yes.’ ‘Coming soon.’ ‘Will do.’ Or something.
Yes, I spent most of the night going through his social media activity. Don’t judge.
I head out the door to find my mother asleep by the computer, her fried blonde hair tied up into a bun and a cup of cold coffee by her side. After dumping the creamy liquid in the sink along with the crust of sugar at the bottom, I place a small airplane pillow under her head. I won’t dare shut the machine down, even with the row of h’s on the screen.
I scroll up to see what she was working on. Chapter twenty of her latest novel, looks like it’s all coming along well. When I lock up Kiki is waiting for me outside. We live in a small apartment complex and Kiki and her mom, a Caribbean woman with a beautiful accent, were our next-door neighbors. My bedroom window is next to hers. It isn’t uncommon to either talk to her with our backs against the wall or just hang out the window for a quick gab session. Kiki is two years older than me so her high school days are behind her.
“Don’t you have anything else to do for the day besides harassing folk?” Mrs. Jean’s rich accent shines through when she’s pissed. She stands in the doorway with her hands on her wide hips, her dark eyes glaring daggers at her spitting image.
“Nope,” Kiki replies nonchalantly.
“You should look for a job.”
“Why get a job when I have you?”
Her mom rolls her eyes and slams the door.
“Don’t go to class today, stay in and gab with me.” Kiki leans against the iron railing. I’m surprised she’s even awake this early.
“Not when I have a couple of months left I can’t.”
“Pish posh.” She waves her hands glibly. “I doubt that fancy French school is counting how many days you go to class.”
“Yeah.” I chuckle. “But I don’t wanna get as lazy as you.”
“Kiss my ass.”
“You wish.” I run off and cover my ears, I get the last word here, even if I have to cheat by running away.
The rumble of that sports car will now haunt my weird sex dreams I just know it. I’m about halfway to school when Ivan pulls up and rolls his window down. My heart is in my throat and I don’t know if I should run away or see what he will say or do. I can’t see his gray eyes behind the dark red shades he’s wearing.
“You didn’t delete the pictures.” That’s not even a question. He just says it and he doesn’t give me time to reply. He just rolls up the window and drives away.
What the hell does that mean?!
Oh shit, he’s going to reveal my dick pic to everyone in school. I need to talk to him, to find out what his game plan is, to maybe talk him out of it. Or I can delete the picture and take his deal, which I have no guarantee he will make do on. Just what the hell was I thinking keeping the pictures anyway? He was right about everything he said to me, and even if his so-called deal is fake, it would still benefit me more to get rid of it, just do it and pretend this whole thing never happened?
Or, maybe not? Did I mention I can be a stubborn idiot?
If he can release my dick pics without it tracing back to him then what if I can release his pictures without it tracing back to me? I’m hardly a PC genius to pull off something like that, but maybe Toby could? I take my finger off the delete button and try one more possible avenue. The fear of Ivan humiliating me and laughing to all his friends about it will seal my ultimate defeat at his hands, and the fact that I still want to fuck him is just the cherry on top of that shit sundae.
I spot Toby in the halls and barely give him time to greet me. “I need you for something.” Or maybe greeting me is the last thing on his brain. I follow his eyes to Mr. Bowie who is speaking to Mr. Mortensen in the halls. “I think you should give it up.”
“It’s not as impossible as you think.” He tears his eyes away. “You know the rumors about Mr. Bowie.”
“That one about him giving boosted grades to students who sleep with him?”
Toby nods.
“That’s just a rumor.”
“All rumors have a shred of truth.”
“I thought you only cared about doing the bare minimum until you leave here?”
“If I do better with my grades my dad might let me stay in the city and go to community college.” He flings his backpack over his shoulder. “I won’t be stuck on a farm in the middle of cow shit ville.”
He clicks his teeth and turns his head to look over there again and this time Ivan and Mr. Bowie are talking about something. My heart races a million miles a minute. He knows Mr. Bowie by his first name. Maybe they do have a consensual relationship with each other and Ivan is lying about his innocence to protect him. I think of Ivan holding Mr. Bowie in his powerful arms and whispering in his ear, and giving him a smile only reserved for him alone…jealousy is not a pretty emotion.
“Look at that bastard. You think he’s fucking Mr. Bowie for good grades? I heard he’s been holding down a 4.0 and might even become valedictorian.” Toby clicks his teeth at the pair.
“Then it would mean he banged all the teachers.”
“What’s wrong with you? Petty gossip is enough to get you turned on?”
“No!” I sigh, I wonder what the hell I look like right now. “I just…I need your help.”
“With?”
I have an even better idea. If I want this mess to go away for good, then wouldn’t the solution be to delete my dick pics then delete the pics I took? Neither of us has any pictures and we can both move on. “I need to steal Ivan’s phone.”
“Why?”
“I’ll tell you later.”
“Oh, this has to be good.” Toby’s transition to a wicked grin is enough to scare even the Joker. “Is this some sort of revenge?”
“You can call it that.”
“How are you gonna pull that off?”
“You act as a distraction team while I snatch the phone out his pocket and run away.”
Toby laughs. “Shit, I’m in. But you better damn well tell me what this is all about later.”
“I will, we’ll talk after school.”
Xander, Ivan’s right hand who just couldn’t leave us alone marches over to us, a smirk on his lips. “What does the fag brigade have on the menu today?”
“Fuck…” Toby sighs hard.
“I don’t know how you’ve managed to pull it off, but the order we have is to not bother you at all. What kind of dirt do you have on Ivan?” Xander says to me. “Come on, you can tell me all about it.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I reply ready to get away from him, he just creeps me out.
“Too bad, because info like that would be worth a pretty penny to a loser like you.”
“Still don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.” I shrug hoping I’m giving an Oscar-winning performance here. If I was still on my earlier plan then maybe I would have found a way to get him the pictures if my dick pics surfaced but…I don’t know, I’m liking the idea of putting this behind me more and more and as I said, Xander kinda creeps me out.
Rei stands off to the side watching Xander hesitantly. He flicks my cheek and walks over to Rei and pulls up his chin so brazen in front of everyone. “Make sure you’re in detention again today, and wear that uniform.”
I wait until he leaves. “Just what the hell does he mean by that?”
“It’s nothing.” Rei looks downcast.
CHAPTER SEVEN
LOUIS
We follow Rei, who runs right for the men’s bathroom. I have no clue what the hell is going on or what the little exchange was all about, bu
t Rei isn’t his normal bright sunny way and that concerns me. Usually, he became this way right after dealing with his drunk mother.
“Let me guess, he said something mean to you.” Toby leans against the wall while Rei grabs some towel paper to wipe his eyes.
“Wow, talk about being callous,” I say not at all liking the sarcastic way he spoke to Rei. This wasn’t the first time he’s been either dismissive or just a dick to him, and it began happening more and more since Rei began dressing in the girl’s uniforms.
“What do you want me to do? Rub his head and tell him everything is going to be alright?” He folds his arms, the sunbeams into the windows causing his light brown curls to have a halo effect.
“No, but you don’t have to be so dismissive.”
“Whatever.” He shrugs. “What’s up?”
“I just want to be left alone.” Rei wipes his eyes. “It’s nothing. I just really hate that guy.”
“And that’s enough to make you run in here and cry?” I say, not wanting to let it go.
“You know how it is.” Rei tosses the paper away. “He’s a jerk, they all are. And we have to put up with it so these dumb ass teachers can have some peace and quiet. They do nothing to help and only step in when you ruin their day by fighting back and standing up for yourself. I don’t know why I bother.”
“How long are we to put up with this garbage?” I mutter, getting more and more pissed off. Down the hall, Xander sits at the center of the group, and it is darker for it. One of the popular buttholes trips some poor student, causing him to stumble to the floor, his books scattering about.
“What can you do about it?” Toby follows behind, concern in his voice. “Wait. What are you going to do?”
“Not taking this shit anymore.”
Toby stands in front of me to stop me, his facial expression already speaking before he opens his mouth. “Alright Louis, with Rei there’s no helping it, he set himself up for public ridicule the moment he started wearing dresses, you on the other hand are…”
