Brother's Keeper✔️

19. One Time

Manny POV

Homecoming was in two weeks. His parents wanted to come down that weekend and hang with him and he did not know why. The week after Homecoming was Parents' weekend, they could just come down then, but they didn't want to. Said Homecoming was more exciting.

He told them he was pledging so that should not be a big shock to them. They were the ones to give him the money needed to pledge.

What they did not know was that he was going to be in the talent show that weekend. They did not like him singing anything that was not church music. They would flip if they saw him on stage talking about the things he wanted to do to a girl...in front of hundreds of people.

Not that he wanted to do that with girls. Well, unless it was Laila.

"I've dated boys, but none like you."

Was that a compliment or not?

"What do you mean?"

"In a good way!" She laughed. "Boys were so immature back in high school. They did not want a relationship, like what we have. Maybe a few dates, but it was all about trying t get into my pants. And I'm no prude, but I'm not sleeping with a guy just because. I wanted to get to know them a lot more personally before I do all that."

He nodded. He still did not know how he felt about going all the way with a girl. His parents gave him the sex-ed conversation pretty early in life. They did it gradually from when he could first remember at aged six and then progressed from there. All they preached was used protection, protection, protection. They sent him off last year with a case of condoms.

A case, as in, a box with several boxes in it. He never used not one. That's how much his parents knew him...they did not at all.

But those condoms were still good if he decided he was ready to use them.

"So what are you trying to say, Laila? You want us to-" He couldn't even say it.

She nodded. "When we're ready."

"Oh, okay." He wasn't. He liked how things were with them now. He heard sex made things complicated. She was his first girlfriend, he felt like he was just getting to know himself.

"Sometimes I can't believe I'm a virgin and I'm nineteen."

"I'm nineteen too and still a virgin, there's nothing wrong with that."

"I didn't say there was, just...some kids start young."

"Good that you didn't give into peer pressure then. There were girls in my high school pregnant before graduation...and of course, the guys that put them in that situation were losers. At least be responsible if you're going to have sex."

She leaned over and kissed him. "See, that's why I like you. Such a breath of fresh air."

"Besides," he said, with a smile at her. "I like our make out sessions, we don't need to go any further."

He held her close to him and kissed her, rubbing his hands through her short curls. He was a lucky, lucky guy. His first girlfriend was someone like her. They matched so well together. They liked the same things and thought alike about many things. Not everything, most.

She didn't like him pledging, but she still was there for him every night when he needed to unwind. She did not like the attention he was getting from girls that heard him singing on her floor.

It was nothing. He was not interested in any of the.

After he left Laila's room, heading back to his wing of the dorm, he was stopped by those girls from Laila's floor.