The Tuxedo Man (boyxboy)[Wattys 2016]

Chapter 16 - Aftertaste

[Picture: Dylan James Callaghan. Video: Aftertaste - Ellie Goulding]

A good, tight hug was all we needed to wrap up a magical night. 

"Where are you headed?" Eric asks, straightening out the edges of my suit for me, then running his hand down my necktie to smoothen out any creases. 

I shrug, glancing at the girls who were now on their phones. "I don't know, probably home." 

"I wish I could take you to this afterparty." He says. "The thing is, it's exclusive to the school's varsity, which means the boys couldn't bring their girlfriends or- you know," He winks. "Boyfriends. I think it's gonna be fun, but I'd like it if you were there with me." 

I shake my head, smiling the gesture. "It's okay, I wouldn't want to ruin anything for you, anyway." 

He shrugs. "Well, I'm sure I'll see you some other time, and you still owe me a date." He brings his hand up to caress my cheek with his thumb, something that makes my whole body shake, bringing euphoria all through.

He taps me on the nose twice before pulling me in for a hug before we part ways, him to his afterparty and me to my sweet glorious comfortable bed, because I really need to recharge right now, all my social powers are fucking drained out. To his advantage of being taller, he gets to sneak in a kiss on the cheek, not making it obvious enough since he's already leaning down from hugging me. He smiles, knowing damn well how he just made me feel like the adorable asshole he is, throwing me one last wave before he turns around and joins the massive flock of boys on the other side of the room. 

As I turn around too, I find that my group was already walking towards me, so I wait while I watch them exhaustingly drag their feet, trying their best to keep it all together for the last few minutes of the Junior Ball. 

"I can't do this anymore." Astrid sighs. "My feet like they're being stabbed and I want go home." 

I shrug. "Well, I wasn't really looking forward to going out, so I guess that's a good thing." 

Having agreed on something, we head over to the exit while Ella links my arm with hers, telling me how happy she is that Eric and I became a thing. 

"And you told me that it was impossible." She mocks, revelling in the fact that she has predicted one of the major things that has happened in my life, not just what I was going to eat for lunch or what color my shoes are going to be, but who I was going to end up with. She told me that she was picking up signals that Eric wanted to be with me, and while I doubted her before, it's apparently true. 

Once we get outside, where students wait by the school grounds still dressed as whoever's fetching them is on the way, couples being slightly less-obnoxious as they try to find places a little bit darker, a little bit isolated, I notice that familiar fucking car parked in one of the spaces in the parking lot. I've never seen anyone drive it in our school before, so I was pretty damn sure whose car this was. 

"I'm gonna hang around for a little bit." I tell my friends, knowing that if I tell them I was going to see Dylan, things wouldn't go so well. I don't know, now that Eric and I are trying to be something all of a sudden I feel like I should close Dylan off. He's someone Eric doesn't know and that's reason enough for Eric to get jealous; but on the other hand, Dylan and I still have something to talk about and we still have things to settle, I'm not the type of person to leave someone hanging so I feel obliged to see him tonight, since he's made an effort to go all the way here. "I have some things to say to Eric." 

They nod and greet me a good night, they even give me life advice as they do. "Use protection!" 

Now that they've mentioned it, It never occurred to me until now that I haven't done anything in preparation for what could have happened between Eric and I. What if he surprised me by booking a hotel as he thinks that he's getting some tonight? I don't have a condom on me, and I sure didn't prepare everything else beforehand, so I guess it's lucky that Eric had innocent intentions tonight, and I think he wants to take it slow as well, being his first boyfriend and all.