I'm Your Wreck

25- Please

Despite finals being one week away, Ollie insisted on having a stress relief party on Saturday night. What it really was, was an excuse to see Morgan again because after an entire semester pining over the girl, he had yet to ask her out.

So we gathered in the living room with the girls from next door, Beth and Sam, and Chris from the soccer team. Even though our season was over, he was a pretty cool guy and I'd started inviting him and a couple of the other guys around whenever we have gatherings like this at the house.

I kept myself practically glued to Banks's side in the most inconspicuous ways, because Ollie was the only one that knew about the kissing, in an attempt to stay off of Sam's radar. By the cold glare she shot me across the room, I was doing a terrible job of it.

"What's on your hand, Liam?" Walker noticed the flower on my hand that Banks had drawn the day before.

I panicked because if I said the truth, it would make it very obvious that Banks and I weren't exactly just friends. I wasn't ready for people to know yet. "Just something I doodled," I said quickly, covering my hand with the sleeve of my shirt. "Let's start a game of Kings."

Ollie, always enthusiastic for a drinking game, leaped from the couch to retrieve a deck of cards. Maybe I was being paranoid, but I swore I could feel Banks shifting an inch away from me.

When he was near silent during the game though, I knew that he was upset. Because I lied about the flower on my hand? Was he upset that nobody knew about what we were doing behind closed doors? We hadn't discussed telling Kenji and Walker or anybody else, so I didn't know that it was a big deal to him.

I just wasn't ready to tell people though. Not because I was ashamed or embarrassed about what was going on, but because I hadn't given myself any time to process it on my own.

Kissing him felt good, and so I continued to kiss him. Thinking about anything passed that, the big picture of it all was too much. If we told other people, they would ask questions that I hadn't even asked myself yet. It would force me to face truths that I wasn't ready for. I just wanted to keep kissing him, and maybe other things too, without thinking about the rest of it.

Would that be a good enough explanation for him, or was I being a total asshole by keeping us a secret? Especially from Walker and Kenji, when we usually shared everything with each other. I knew the last time they both took a shit because they put it on the group chat, and I still couldn't get myself to tell them that I liked kissing a boy.

Only halfway through the deck of cards, Banks got up from the couch and without a word, started up the stairs. There was a bathroom on the first floor, so I knew that wasn't where he was going. I debated with myself for only a couple of seconds if I should follow him or not.

Maybe it was better to give him time to cool off, but I couldn't stand the thought of him being upset with me even for a second, so I stood too and followed up upstairs.

"Hey," I caught him halfway down the hallway, between Kenji and Walker's closed bedroom doors. "Where are you going?"

He gave me a plain look. "To my bedroom, Liam."

Banks tried to step away toward his door, but I tugged his hand toward me to stop him from leaving. "I'm sorry that I lied down there. Can we please talk about it?"

He shrugged. "Apparently, there's nothing to talk about."

I ran my fingers through my hair, wanting to say the exact right words, but having no idea what they were. "You've never had to do this, Banks."

"Do what?"

"You said you've always known that you were attracted to men. So you've never had to go through the confusing part of not knowing," I tried to explain myself, but I wasn't sure if I was doing a good job at it. "Two weeks ago, I was straight as an arrow. Or at least, I thought I was. Looking back, I think maybe I started to curve around the time you showed up. But the point is, I'm so confused."