Insatiable (UNDERGOING REWRITES)

Chapter 5 : Caleb Ryan

[ Tyler Cole pictured to the side ]

~~~

Nolan was going to throw Mr. Cortez over a cliff.

All through lunch, my best friend was practically fuming, angrily eating his sandwich and chips. I could almost see the steam trailing out of his ears.

"Stop glaring at the chips, Nole. They didn't do anything to you."

Nolan turned his glare to me, but I didn't flinch. "How do you know? They might've tried to strangle me in my sleep."

I tried to give him a dead pan look, but his face was so serious that I couldn't help but laugh. I could feel the force of Key rolling her eyes from beside me.

We both knew why Nolan was in a mood. Because our creative writing professor was trying not to blatantly check out the other English professor, Mr. Cortez. All the years I've known Nolan, he was never one to get jealous. Sure, he could be protective at times, even to the point of over bearing, but it was always in good intentions. But Nolan Daniels never got jealous. He had nothing to be jealous about. Everyone else was jealous of him and what he had or could get. But this was certainly jealousy eating at him quickly from the inside out. He was jealous of the looks Julian gave Mr. Cortez. I had no idea why though.

Nolan only met the man yesterday, and I knew he wanted to sleep with him, just like he did any other person ever. But compared to every other person Nolan has seduced and weaseled into bed with him, things seemed different already. I don't know what had gone down between the two since Nolan laid eyes on our professor yesterday, but whatever it was had Nolan in a tizzy the past twenty-four hours.

Maybe Nolan had finally met his match. I smiled to myself at that, really hoping there would be someone out there that would challenge Nolan for whatever it was he was seeking in his life.

My best friend was a player, some would say he was a man whore, and to those people, I never hesitated in trying to punch them—I might be small, but I can be mighty, and nobody disrespects my friends. Everyone knew Nolan got around, probably because most everyone had sexual relations with Nolan. I didn't voice my opinions on the matter, for many reasons. The first being that, while he is my best friend, Nolan's sex life was none of my business and I wouldn't insert myself into it. Second, Nolan was his own person and could do whatever he wanted. The rest of the reasons were too minor to even think about. It was the first two that were the most important and the ones that I would stand behind no matter what.

I might not particularly like his...endeavors. But I wasn't not going to be there for him.

Letting out a sigh, knowing that whatever I would say to Nolan to get him to calm down would be useless. I still didn't quite understand, probably never would until he told me, and who knew when that was going to be.

I looked up at the slap of a bag on our lunch table. Tyler scowled down at the bag before sitting down next to Nolan. They looked at each other, giving a nod at their mutual scowls—for different reasons I hoped—and went back to sulking in silence.

"Oh, for Gods sake!" I sighed, throwing my hands up in frustration. I had to deal with Nolan being in a mood, and now Tyler? And it was only the second day of classes? Was the world trying to test me? No doubt, I thought, remembering the first meeting for the art club was after classes today. While I loved the club as much as the rest of the members, getting to just be in my element was the best feeling in the world, I just didn't have the energy to be around others.

"There's too much pouty testosterone here. I need to leave," Key said, pushing herself out of her seat beside me. She grabbed her tray of half eaten food, slinging her back over her shoulder. She gave me a pitying look and I glared at her. "See you later, Caleb!"